Resource Perspective
Since human resources represent the knowledge, skills, abilities and competencies of the overall workforce, this mosaic of talent becomes what Barney (1991) describes as a resource that is relatively rare and difficult to imitate. A firm’s human resources can be used as predictors of firm performance (Hitt & Ireland 1986 and Barney 1991). Organizations that possess a resource that other are not able to easily duplicate are known as benefiting from a sustained competitive advantage. Thus we argue that one of the underpinnings of Employer-of-Choice strategy lies in resource-based strategy. One can look at Southwest Airlines, a leader on Fortune magazine’s list of the best companies to work for and realize that their business model is simple –Tom Peters characterized it “as one that any 3 year old can understand” (Myerson 1997, P. 38) – and yet others have failed to imitate it (O’Reilly & Pfeffer 2000) due to the competitive advantage it has in its human resources.