Asia Pacific Journal of Human Resources

Over recent decades there has been phenomenal growth in foreign direct investment in the countries of East Asia. This investment has come from coun tries both within the region and outside the region. The implications for HRM have been twofold: first, corporations have often found themselves managing workforces in countries with very different political and economic systems and cultures; and, second, at least in the early stages of their investment, those firms have had the task of placing expatriate managers in countries that were outside those persons' experience. In both matters there have been difficulties. This paper endeavours to provide an understanding of the origin of some of those difficulties by examining the cultural context within which HRM is undertaken in East Asia. It takes a broad-brush approach in looking for dif ferences and similarities both between East Asia and other geographic regions and between countries within the region.

This paper reviews developments in enterprise bargaining in Australia under the period of Labor government and argues that significant changes have been taking place at workplaces outside the formal system. The impact of these changes on employees is then examined.

Conceptual and methodological advances on both the predictor and criterion side and several influential meta-analytic reviews have contributed to a resur gence of credibility for personality as a predictor in employee selection. This paper reviews the prior problems with personality as a predictor, summarizes research findings on the effectiveness of personality in selection, and lays out the circumstances under which personality measures are most likely to be useful. The most consistent findings are that personality measures such as integrity and conscientiousness predict contextual and motivational aspects of performance reasonably well. Suggestions for future research on personality in selection are made, and human resource management implications of personality-based selection are discussed.

This research explores the application of the transactional model of stress to a work setting and considers the results within the context of new directions for stress management programs. Two issues are important. The first is that a transactional approach offers a very different perspective on work stress from traditional approaches. The second is that debate about the transactional model is more to do with how best it should be applied to a work setting than about the model itself. Measures of the individual processes (primary and secondary appraisal) at the core of the transactional model are discussed and the results of using such instruments are considered in terms of their explan atory potential. The implications of such findings raise a number of issues for stress management programs. These include the need to pay particular atten tion to the meaning individuals give to events, to provide adequate coping resources and to take into account issues such as power and control.

There is substantial evidence to suggest that the competency movement is still in its infancy in Australia in 1997, despite federal government initiatives dating back to 1990 to promote the establishment of competency-based stan dards in the professions. There remains a lack of clarity as to what is meant by the term 'competence', originating from the lack of consensus surrounding efforts to define effective management. There is also an underlying uncer tainty about the viability of establishing generic managerial competencies in Australia. This paper examines the merits and de-merits of the competency- based approach to management, focusing on the need to develop an accepted framework within which to define competence. Following this, a review of the literature reveals a number of influential factors to be considered in deter mining managerial competence. This leads to the development of a proposed synthesizing framework of managerial competencies.

Assessment centres have been used extensively to select and develop personnel for managerial and other positions. This paper describes an assessment centre suitable for selecting team leaders, and addresses some of the issues in deter mining standards for their performance. This assessment centre was the first step in a program directed towards changing the role of supervisors from one of directing staff responsible for production to one of emphasizing team pro duction and team development.

This article reports the findings of a recent study of performance appraisal systems in Australian industry, updating earlier research data in view of con temporary organizational and industrial relations changes. Research results suggest that, while substantial forward steps have been made, organizations still have some way to go in their pursuit of 'best practice' appraisal schemes. Performance appraisal (PA) is still a popular HRM tool, with increased employee coverage and an emphasis on Management by Objectives. There is some evidence that organizations are more closely customizing their PA systems, sometimes in conjunction with quality programs, to meet their specific HR objectives. Conversely, the objectives of many PA systems remain short- term rather than strategic, and there appears to be a decline in the use of formal PA feedback mechanisms.

Overall, this survey suggests a focus on performance evaluation rather than training and development, and increasingly a 'hard' HRM perspective capi talizing on current industrial relations changes.