Strategic Human Resource Management (SHRM) has been, and remains, one
of the most powerful and influential ideas to have emerged in the field of
business and management during the past twenty-five years. Policy makers
at government level have drawn upon the idea in order to promote ‘high
performance workplaces’ and ‘human capital management’. Within business
corporations, the idea that the way in which people are managed could be
one of, if not the most crucial factor in the whole array of competitivenessinducing
variables, has become a widely accepted proposition during this period.
Many management consultancy firms – both large and small – have built substantial
businesses by translating the concept into frameworks, methodologies
and prescriptions. And, not least, academics have analysed, at considerable
length, the meaning, significance and the evidence base for the ideas associated
with SHRM.