Humn Resourse Mngement 'The World is Flt' - Essay Example

Minford & Riley (2005) suggested that the supply side reforms of the 1990s and 2000s have transformed the way in which the UK labour market operates. The latest date retrieved from statistical analytical repot show that in the last year, the UK has experienced crashing share prices and other economic uncertainties brought on by the threat of war with Iraq. These economic adversities, however, have not been reflected in the overall performance of the UK labour market which shows that the employment rate has been rising and unemployment decreasing in the last year.

In fact, for the three months ending in June 2005, the employment level was estimated to be 27.92 million, the highest level since records began in 1984 (Minford, Riley, 2005:12) . In view of above, extensive research is needed in the area of labour market in search for the ways of mazimizing its efficiency and productivity. One of the ways that has actually been least reviewed in the literature is outsourcing and its effects on the labour market. Three key questions re ddressed. First, wht is the extent of outsourcing nd re there differences between firms in the use of such prctices Second, why do firms outsource Finlly, wht is the impct of outsourcing mintennce work on firm performnce In mny cses the move to outsourcing is prt of wider drive for flexibility, so the rticle begins by reviewing the literture on lbour flexibility nd outsourcing.

fter brief section deling with methodologicl issues, the rticle reports the extent nd rtionle for outsourcing mongst smple of ustrlin firms. These findings re then benchmrked ginst the prctices of Jpnese firms operting in ustrli. The pper concludes by ssessing the impct of outsourcing on enterprise performnce. I. Literture Review2. Lbour flexibility nd outsourcing The theme running through mny of the new pproches to mngement is the development of more flexible workforce. The serch for improved flexibility hs becomes employers' new frontier in the mngement of lbour.

Flexibility cn hve vriety of menings (Brunhes, 2000), but fundmentlly three forms of the concept cn be distinguished (Hrrison nd Kelley, 2004, pp. 213-214). Functionl flexibility is the bility of the enterprise to redeploy lbour to cover new work tsks or new production methods. The second form is wge flexibility, in which the enterprise ttempts to link wge pyments to productivity nd product demnd. Finlly, numericl flexibility is the bility to djust lbour inputs to product demnd. These forms of lbour flexibility hve been well documented in industrilized ntions (see Hrrison nd Kelley, 2004, p. 214). In UK, for exmple, the introduction of enterprise