Essays on organizational hybridization: the role and configuration of strategic human resource management

Abstract

Hybridität ist ein Phänomen, welches die Organisationslandschaft in den letzten Jahrzehnten zunehmend geprägt hat. Dies spiegelt sich in der Entstehung hybrider Organisationsformen wider, die institutionelle Grenzen überschreiten, indem sie unterschiedliche institutionelle und organisationsfremde Logiken sowie Akteuridentitäten innerhalb einer Organisation kombinieren. Diese Kombination führt zu (paradoxen) Spannungen aufgrund widersprüchlicher organisationaler und individueller Ziele, Werte, Identitäten und Fähigkeiten, deren Management zu einer Kernaufgabe hybrider Organisationen wird. Die Literatur zum Strategischen Human Resource Management (SHRM) legt nahe, dass abgestimmte Personalsysteme und -praktiken sowie klar definierte HR-Rollen zur Erreichung der Unternehmensziele beitragen können. Im Einklang mit der oben erwähnten Hybridisierung von Zielen sowie Werten und Identitäten stellt sich jedoch die Frage, wie sich dieses in hybriden Organisationen manifestiert. Bislang hat sich die SHRM- und Hybridliteratur nur geringfügig mit dieser Frage befasst und den Beitrag des SHRM im Zusammenhang mit hybriden Organisationen und ihren vielfältigen und widersprüchlichen Zielen weitgehend vernachlässigt. So bleibt weitgehend unbekannt, wie HR-Rollen in hybriden Kontexten konfiguriert werden und wie SHRM auf das Management der Hybridisierung ausgerichtet ist. Das Ziel dieser Dissertation ist es, diese Lücke zu adressieren, indem die Konfiguration von HR-Rollen in hybriden Organisationen sowie der Beitrag des SHRM zum Management von Spannungen, die sich aus der Hybridisierung ergeben, untersucht werden.

Hybridity is a phenomenon that has increasingly shaped the organizational landscape in recent decades. This is reflected in the emergence of hybrid organizational forms that span institutional boundaries by combining different institutional and non-organizational logics as well as actor identities within an organization. This combination leads to (paradoxical) tensions due to contradictory organizational and individual goals, values, identities, and skillsets whose management is becoming a core responsibility for hybrid organizations. The strategic human resource management (SHRM) literature suggests that aligned human resource (HR) systems and practices, as well as clearly defined HR roles, can help achieve organizational goals. However, in line with the above-mentioned hybridization of goals, values, and identities, the question is how this is manifested in hybrid organizations? So far, the SHRM and hybrid literature has missed addressing this question and has widely neglected the contribution of SHRM in the context of hybrid organizations and their multiple and conflicting goals. As such, it remains largely unknown how HR roles are configured in hybrid contexts and how SHRM is aligned to manage hybridization. The aim of this dissertation is to address this gap by exploring the configuration of HR roles in hybrid organizations as well as the contribution of SHRM to the management of tensions stemming from hybridization. The conceptual elaboration and the empirical data of this dissertation are based in particular on findings from nonprofit hybridization. This nonprofit context was chosen because these organizational forms are subject to particularly strong hybridization processes driven by financial shortages and changing political demands, thereby taking professionalization steps toward becoming a more market oriented enterprise, which creates various tensions. Thus, nonprofit hybridization can be regarded as an ideal research context that provides rich insights into how HR roles are configured in hybrid contexts for contributing to (nonprofit) hybridization as as how SHRM is aligned to manage tensions of hybridization. This dissertation consists of four individual research articles: The first article addresses the roles of HRM in hybrid organizations through a systematic literature review. This article contributes by introducing three specific HR roles for hybrid contexts. Specifically, by outlining the research field of hybridity, this article provides insight into the configuration of HR roles and functions that contribute to the development of hybrid goals that are associated with the management of tensions. The second article, a conceptual article, is devoted to the conceptualization of the requirements different types of nonprofit hybrids pose on the configuration of SHRM. In this article, a typology of nonprofit hybrid types is developed, which, in view of their different combinations of profit and social welfare logics, tensions, and management approaches, pose different requirements for the vertical and horizontal fit of SHRM. In this sense, this article contributes to a more holistic understanding of SHRM in hybrid organizations by highlighting how SHRM can be aligned with tension management approaches in different types of nonprofit hybrids. The two remaining empirical articles draw on a case study conducted in a German nonprofit organization to first, provide deeper insights into how the capabilities to hybridize lead to differences in hybridity levels within the organization and second, the tensions that emerge with regard to HR role transformation when nonprofit HR practitioners are required to adopt professionalized roles. In particular, by applying an embedded case approach the third article examines how differences in hybridization capabilities, referred as the capabilities to combine (profit and social welfare) logics lead to intraorganizational hybridization differences, generating tensions between the embedded units. By showing how and why differences in the extent of hybridization capabilities lead to different levels of hybridity within the organization, this article contributes to theory development on nonprofit hybridization. Finally, the fourth article applies a holistic case approach and examines the tensions that arise due to hybrid requirements concerning the transformation (adaption and retention) of the HR role itself. Hereby, the article contributes to the discussion on HR role development within nonprofit hybridization and provides a better understanding of cognitive and structural-induced tensions by developing an empirically grounded model of HR role transformation. Specifically, the model illustrates role flexibility as a mechanism that creates tensions and influences the adoption and retention of new professionalized HR roles. Moreover, this article offers insights into how role flexibility can be adjusted to support the role transformation of HR professionals within nonprofit hybridization processes. Overall, this dissertation contributes to the SHRM and hybrid literature by developing conceptual models for contemporary HR roles and fit-based tension management approaches in hybrid (nonprofit) contexts and types, as well as an empirically grounded framework that demonstrates how hybridization capabilities influence how (profit and social welfare) logics are combined, and, if these capabilities are pronounced to different degrees, leading to different levels of organizational hybridity. In addition, it provides insights into how and why tensions of HR role transformation emerge when nonprofit HR practitioners are required to adopt professionalized roles and how these tensions can be managed. As such, this dissertation contributes to both the SHRM and hybrid literature by highlighting the unique requirements the hybrid context poses on the configuration of HR roles as well the way SHRM can support the hybridization of (nonprofit) organizations and the management of tensions.