Originally published as Personnel Review
Volume 35 Number 2, 2006
ISBN: 1 84544 916 9
Guest edited by: John Burgess and Julia Connell, University of Newcastle, Australia.
This Special Issue examines a range of issue, challenges and responses relating to temporary workers and human resource management.
Although the issues and challenges are significant – including regulatory compliance and safety management – there is a shortage of literature examining temporary work and HRM. Although an OECD (2002) report suggested that there was a growing share of temporary employment in many countries worldwide, this special issues drew research mainly from the UK and Australia.
Contents:
Temporary work and human resources management: issues, challenges and responses
The purpose of this paper is to introduce the special issue volume that examines a range of concerns, challenges and responses relating to temporary workers and human resource management (HRM).
The nature and experience of agency working in Britain: What are the challenges for human resource management?
This article examines the experience of agency employment for workers and employers' use of agency workers in Britain to evaluate competing claims made about this form of work.
Temporary agency work and HRM in Australia: “Cooperation, specialisation and satisfaction for the good of all”?
The purpose of this paper is to examine the management of agency workers in Australia and, in particular, to identify the challenges presented to HRM by agency work.
Human resource solutions?: Dimensions of employers' use of temporary agency labour in the UK
This article seeks to explain the rapid increase in the use of agency “temps” by employers during the 1990s. It tests the thesis of profound change in employers' labour use decisions.
The changing world of the temporary worker: the potential HR impact of legislation
Temporary workers have many human resource and labour market implications. These consequences are further influenced with the introduction of new legislation relating to temporary workers. The purpose of this article is to present research on the impacts of the legislation on temporary workers in the labour force.
Managing temporary workers in higher education: still at the margin?
This article explores a neglected but important area of the workforce. The paper notes that some supposed benefits of numerical flexibility might be illusory, such as the deployment of allegedly “cheap and disposable” substitute workers which may be offset by unintentional consequences including rigidities in an organisation's human resource systems.
About Personnel Review
In all parts of the World, academics are seeking to understand how organizations utilize their human resources in order to gain a competitive advantage. Personnel Review considers and develops all the aspects of Human Resource Management (HRM). Against this background of change and development, the need for a resource such as Personnel Review is greater than ever before. This highly respected journal presents the latest research and developments and takes a broad view of the aspects, whilst still allowing for extra considerations and an academic rigour that is a hallmark of the journal.
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