Big Hat, No Cattle: Managing Human Resources

Sixty years of executive attention to human resource management (HRM) theories fail to make employees productive, loyal, and motivated because of unrealistic management expectations, contradictory theories regarding employee performance and relations, the problematic role of personnel management in corporate decision making, and the undermining nature of management assumptions regarding employee motivation. A new approach to human resources planning depends on management's ability to replace mistaken assumptions with premises that emphasize the importance of the personnel function in corporate development, and concentrate on basic HRM skills such as supervision and communication.