Top Management Teams and Human Resource Management Effectiveness

Attempts at solving the mystery of organizational success have resulted in many studies combining the concept of effectiveness and human resources management (HRM) perspective. It is showed in the literature that gaining a competitive advantage by the organization becomes possible through effective management of human resources. Moreover, the research also indicates that top managers believes and values affect effective HRM system designing and implementation in the organization. Taking into consideration the important role of top managers in making strategic HR decisions and the significance of HRM effectiveness for organizational outcomes, this theoretical paper has two main goals. First goal is to discuss two top management team characteristics: (1) an emphasis on strategic HRM and (2) the capability to manage resource vulnerability as being essential for improving HRM effectiveness. Second goal is to describe the concept of human resource management effectiveness as an antecedents for achieving organizational performance. All theoretical considerations are embedded in resource-based theory and upper echelon perspective which are then referred to the strategic HRM field. In consequence, some theoretical propositions that need to be empirically tested are presented. With these propositions should be possible to stimulate empirical research on HRM effectiveness by answering the question: Do the demographics and characteristics of top management teams matter for HRM effectiveness and, consequently, for organizational performance?