Abstract
In the next fifteen years the characteristics of organizations and the way they manage
human capital will be conditioned by the development of eight processes with global
presence: pre-eminence of knowledge, globalization, population ageing, importance of the
role of women, psychological contract, erosion of traditional authority, and the emergence of
new organizational values. These eight factors are analyzed here, and their evolving
tendencies are addressed.
These processes are combining to transform the organizations of the second and third
decades of the XXI century into more complex and pluralistic structures, with more diffuse
frontiers, open and disperse structures, and with work forces organized into different levels
of involvement which communicate among themselves and with the outside world through
global networks.
These organizations present new challenges to people management, including the
consequences of rising retirement age, occupation and productivity of older workers,
coexistence of three generations in the work force, intercultural intelligence, motivational
development, merit significance, talent management in open organizations, and new
leadership styles required in a more fluid, more spread out, and more egalitarian
environment.
We approach the Portuguese situation in the light of similarities and differences with regard
to the evolution of the conditioning factors analyzed here and in the light of measures
recommended for this issue in general. We identify its specific characteristics and discuss
the effect they may have on people management policies and practices to be adopted in the
period under consideration.