NAME: CHRISTINE UMEANA

STUDENT ID: 20520094

COURSE TITLE: ADVANCED HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

COURSE CODE: MGMT 577

TOPIC: ANALYZING THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN HIGH POWER WORKING SYSTEMS AND EMPLOYEE
TURNOVER

PROFESSOR: DR. CEM TANOVA

INTRODUCTION

This read is purposed to summarize “DO HIGH PERFORMANCE WORK SYSTEMS ALWAYS HELP TO
RETAIN EMPLOYEES OR IS THERE A DARK SIDE? (Behravesh, Tanova, Abubakar, 2020)”. To analyze
whether or not HPWS has a relation to employee turnover will mean to look into the in-depth HR
practices of an organization.

The article enlightens on HPWS in practical terms as the integration of the technical and human labor
aspect of carrying out an organization’s goals and a good percentage of human labor in an organization
is HR related.

Bowen and Ostroff fostered a structure for having a more technical and advanced comprehension of
HRM practices; this is by upgrading the inspiration of workers to embrace certain mentalities and
approach that will lead to actualizing a company’s goal. According to (Batt,2002) and (Chuang, 2010). An
advancement into precisive HRM research has proven that the inculcation of HR practices leads to
positive outcomes like lower turnover, better service performance and greater commitment.”

On the other hand, it is also perceived that the introduction of HPWS may negatively affect the human
and individual performance of employees. The system is also perceived to be designed to control human
effort, also how the employees view the HPWS as a system that is designed to outdo human labor effort
may impact negatively their behavioral attitude to work and understanding the intricate processes of
the HPWS.

HIGH PERFORMANCE WORK SYSTEMS AND IRAN

Research shows that current and reliable data on HR practices rely heavily on the western world and its
approach to work and its systems. However, in Islamic countries like IRAN amongst many others, the
cultural and religious differences will make it hard to adopt the western perspectives. HR specialists in
IRAN have struggled with fitting the available data but with the clear cultural and religious differences
there, it has made it very challenging; not mentioning the relationship between Islamic rites, workplaces
and the Quran in the context of meting out policies relating to hiring, firing, workplace conduct etc. for
example, if a parent company in USA has a branch in IRAN, the HPWS in the parent company may not be
adaptable by the IRAN due to factors like communication pattern, cultural differences, high power
distance, uncertainty awareness etc. These factors will affect the seamless transfer of knowledge and
policies which will make local adaptation of global standardized set of HR policies and laws impossible.
“One of the distinctive characteristics of the Islamic concept of HRM is that it needs cover all aspect of
human life and is not only limited to the material exchange in the working relationship but deals with
social and spiritual aspects of life (Behravesh, Tanova, Abubakar, 2020)”.

HIGH PERFORMANCE WORK SYSTEM AND ITS RELATION TO JOB SATISFACTION AND JOB DEMAND

According to Berhavesh et al, HPWS is positively related to an employee’s job satisfaction, job demand
and job search behavior. When an employee is placed in a system that values their wellbeing, growth
and constantly expends resources to improve their skills through training in order to grow along with
technology advancement and understand the process involved in a HPWS, research shows that there is
a higher job satisfaction which leads to lower job demands. Also, a system that grows with technology in
order to reduce the stress level of humans by introducing E-Systems that limits unnecessary human
exertion at work is positively related to job search behavior.

Finally, it is imperative to note that whether or not and to what extent HPWS is linked to employee
turnover is greatly dependent on how managers in organizations invests time, effort and resources to
HR practices and its employees.

CONCLUSION

HR practices over the world is not a one size fits all approach. More in-depth research is needed to
further unveil the complexities of HR practices locally and globally. By so doing, it will be possible to
balance high power work systems and human labor with the growing technology advancement in a local
setting, across the globe and possibly a seamless blend of it all across parent country and their third
country nationals if possible.

REFERENCES

Bowen, D. E., &Ostroff, C. (2004). Understanding HRM-firm performance linkages: The role of the
“strength” of the HRM system. Academy of Management Review, 29(2), 203-221.

Batt, R. (2002). Managing customer services: Human resource practices, quit rates, and sales growth.
Academy of Management Journal, 45(3), 587-597.

Chuang, C., & Liao, H. (2010). Strategic human resource management in service context: Taking care of
business by taking care of employees and customers. Personnel Psychology, 63, 153-196.

Elaheh Behravesh, Cem Tanova & A. Mohammed Abubakar. (2020). Do high performance work systems
always help to retain employees or is there a dark side? The service Industries Journal, 40: 11-12, 825-
845.