Organization and Human Resource Management

This course aims to provide students with the essential tools to understand and analyse with a critical approach the more advanced issues related to human resource management (HRM) in complex organizations. The objective will be pursued through a theory-grounded study, as well as through the practical and micro-founded analysis of organizational practices. Critical issues and problems related to the applications of the HR operational systems are identified and examined in order to enhance a pragmatic approach. The course is divided into two parts. The first part is dedicated to HRM policies and practices (recruitment and selection, training and development of human capital, performance evaluation, remuneration policies), which will be analysed in connection with the strategy and the internal and external organizational context. The second part is dedicated to the analysis of selected topics such as employee voice and participation, motivation and wellbeing, leadership and organizational change.

At the end of the course the student will be able to understand the policies and practices that companies use to manage human resources in a complex environment. In particular, the student will be able to:
- analyse the HRM system in relation to the competitive strategy of the organization;
- discuss the relations between HRM practices and organizational performance;
- analyse the role of the HR function with respect to the other functional areas of the organization;
- properly use the main methodologies related to every HR operational system (recruitment and selection, training, performance management and remuneration policies);
- understand the common objectives and complementary functions between the use of HRM tools and the structural choices of organisations;
- use the fundamental HR tools in teamwork contexts;
- understand the potentialities and the limits of the high performance HRM practices.