دانلود رایگان ترجمه مقاله مدیریت منابع بشری و مزیت رقابتی (نشریه الزویر 2010)

مدیریت منابع بشری و مزیت رقابتی: کاربرد از نظر منابع مستقر در صنعت كشتيرانی

Human resource management and competitive advantage: An application of resource-based view in the shipping industry

Abstract

The resource-based view (RBV) of the firm has been established as one of the main approaches to strategy formulation for the development of sustainable competitive advantage. Moreover, human resource management can be conceptualised as a source of competitiveness. This paper proposes that RBV could contribute to the confrontation of the hindrances that shipping companies face in the management of their human resources, and to the formation of sustainable competitive advantage. The paper analyses the findings of a field study, regarding the different human resource and crew management practices that are applied by Greek-owned shipping companies. Finally, based on the RBV of the firm, it proposes an integrated framework for managing human resources in the shipping industry in a way that could lead to the formation of sustainable competitive advantage.

1 Introduction

One of the basic goals for companies operating in the shipping industry has always been the ability to produce low-cost services. The highly competitive business environment of this industry, along with the international regulations and other institutional arrangements, keeps affecting till today the companies’ strategies to operational cost reduction. Considering the fact that manning expenses represent almost 50% of the operational cost [1], and that it is presumed as the most flexible cost [2], one could understand why shipping companies seek to employ low-cost seamen. Especially nowadays that the global maritime labour market offers a variety of officers and ratings, the quest for cheap labour seems to be easy—in terms of quantity, but also risky—in terms of quality. While this variety should be considered as strength seeing from a human resource management (HRM) view, in many cases in practice, it is treated more as a hindrance. Factors that contribute to it, apart from the companies’ strategic approach with respect to their human resources (HR), are various structural characteristics of the shipping sector, which will be discussed later on.

This paper proposes that the resource-based view (RBV) could contribute to the confrontation of several hindrances that shipping companies face in the management of their HR, and to the formation of sustainable competitive advantage. The paper analyses the findings of a field study, and compares the different approaches that shipping companies apply with regard to the management of their personnel. The contribution of RBV and HRM in the achievement of competitive advantage are introduced in Section 2, where references to shipping companies’ HR are also made. The structural characteristics of the shipping industry and maritime labour market, are further examined in Section 3. Section 4 presents the methodology, discusses the results and gives the basic outcomes of the field survey. Section 5 proposes an integrated framework for managing HR in the shipping industry, in a way that could lead to the formation of sustainable competitive advantage. Finally, conclusions follow in Section 6.