Using the Harvard HRM model to conceptualise the impact of changes to supervision upon HRM outcomes for different types of Australian public sector employees

TLDR

The study aims to use the Harvard HRM model to map how changes in stakeholder interests and situational factors influence public sector HRM policy decisions. The authors apply the Harvard HRM framework to conceptualise the impact of these shifts on policy choices that shape HRM outcomes for different public sector employee groups. Path analysis shows the model explains about 50 % of variance in nurses’ HRM outcomes but less than 14 % for police officers, revealing a strong link between HRM inputs and outputs that may explain the difficulty in retaining skilled nurses and indicating a need to rethink public sector HRM policies to better address employee well‑being. Keywords: affective commitment, employee perception of well‑being, Harvard HRM model, professional employees, supervision practices.

Abstract

Abstract Within the Australian context of a shortage of skilled professionals, this article uses the Harvard model of human resources management (HRM) to conceptualise how changes in stakeholder interests coupled with changes to situational factors affect public sector HRM policy choices that in turn affect HRM outcomes for different types of public sector employees. The findings obtained using path analysis suggest that the proposed model explained almost 50% for nurses and less than 14% for police officers. In the case of nurses, the strong significant relationship between HRM inputs and outputs may provide a further plausible explanation for one of the long-term consequences of new public management – namely, the inability to retain skilled employees (especially those in the health sector) across numerous OECD countries. The implication of these findings is that the present public sector HRM policy choice should be re-examined because of its impact on HRM outcomes. Moreover, public sector employees should not be regarded as one uniform group that responds alike to the same policy. Whilst the merits of pursuing a strong auditing focus may have benefited organisations financially, the benefits can only remain if public sector employees, including professionals, are prepared to work under those conditions. The inability to retain nurses in numerous countries, coupled with past studies that have identified (poor) management as a contributing factor, suggests that past HRM policy choices may have to be replaced by new HRM policy choices that focus on employees' perceptions of well-being. However, more studies using different types of professionals are required to confirm the generalisability of these findings. Keywords: affective commitmentemployee's perception of well-beingHarvard model of HRMHRMprofessional employeessupervision practices