Associate Professor Brendan Boyle

© 2019, Emerald Publishing Limited. Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the control mechanisms used by multinational corporations (MNCs) from emerging economies to manage their subsidiaries in developed countries and their implications for human resource management practices. Design/methodology/approach: The paper draws on data collected through in-depth case studies and interviews with senior subsidiary managers of 12 major Indian information technology (IT) MNCs operating in Australia. Findings: Indian IT MNCs rely heavily on the use of people-centric controls exerted through global staffing practices (via the transfer of parent-country nationals), which, in turn, influence their subsidiary¿s discretion over their HR practices. The use of people-centric controls allows Indian IT multinationals to replicate parent-country HRM practices in their Australian subsidiaries in an ethnocentric manner and significantly leverage the people-based competitive advantages from India through short- and long-term expatriate assignments. Research limitations/implications: The study investigates control and HRM practices from a single country and a single industry perspective. It provides an insight into the normative means of control in foreign subsidiaries of MNCs and enhances our understanding by explaining the integrated relationship that control mechanisms (and their people-centric components) have with HRM practices including the global staffing approaches and expatriate management practices of emerging MNCs. Practical implications: Indian MNCs are using their business model to leverage the Australian immigration and skilled visa programme to maintain cost advantages. However, the immigration legislation in developed countries needs to be capable of allowing emerging multinational corporations (EMNCs) to maintain such advantages as developed countries seek to attract foreign direct investment from emerging economies. Originality/value: The results indicate that the control practices of EMNCs are similar to the controls exerted by MNCs from developed countries. They also show that EMNCs do not adopt a portfolio approach to global staffing, and that the people-centric components of their control have a clear impact on their subsidiaries¿ HRM practices.

© 2017, © Ashish Malik, Brendan Boyle and Rebecca Mitchell. Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine innovation in the resource-constrained context of India¿s healthcare industry. It is argued that the process of innovation in addressing healthcare management challenges in such a context occurs through organisational ambidexterity and that human resource management (HRM) plays an important role. Design/methodology/approach: A qualitative research methodology is applied to explore the role of HR practices in facilitating contextual ambidexterity and subsequent innovations in healthcare in India. The unit of analysis is the ¿case¿ of healthcare providers in India and in-depth interview and documentary data in two case sites are analysed to reveal the role of HRM in facilitating contextual ambidexterity and innovation. Data analysis was undertaken first at a within-case and then at a cross-case analysis level using interpretive manual coding based on how the data explained the role of HRM in delivering innovative outcomes and supporting organisational ambidexterity. Findings: The authors found evidence of the use of sets of high-involvement HRM practices for exploration of new ideas and efficiency-driven HRM practices for creating contextual ambidexterity in the case organisations. Further, managerial/leadership style was found to play an important role in creating cultures of trust, openness, risk-taking and employee empowerment, supported by an appropriate mix of intrinsic and extrinsic rewards. Finally, training was also reported as being central to creating an ambidextrous context for delivering on various innovations in these healthcare providers. Originality/value: This study represents an exploration of innovation in the context of India¿s healthcare sector through intersecting literatures of ambidexterity, innovation and HRM practices. In light of the emerging economy research context, an important empirical contribution is palpable. Moreover, through a study design which included collecting data from multiple informants on the role of human resources in facilitating innovative outcomes, the authors reveal the role of HR-related initiatives, beyond formal HR practices in creating contextual ambidexterity. This study also reveals the degree to which contextual idiosyncrasies enhance our understanding of the role of HR in facilitating innovation in emerging economies.

The results of research on diversity in teams suggest that it offers both a great opportunity for organisations as well as an enormous challenge. However, current research is plagued by a lack of overall consistency, indicating that the relationship between diversity and team performance is not well understood. This study examines the components of cognitive conflict in order to assess whether construct operationalisation may explain this inconsistency. Analysis of the existing operationalisations of cognitive conflict reveals that it incorporates both disagreement about information and reasoning, and debate of rival hypotheses or recommendations. We propose that functional diversity leads to cognitive disagreement but not debate, and that debate enhances knowledge creation, with which cognitive disagreement shows no relationship. Our results support these hypotheses, which provide a powerful explanation for the contrary results found by researchers investigating cognitive conflict. Given that extant measures of cognitive conflict include scale items which measure both debate and cognitive disagreement, cognitive conflict may be viewed as an aggregate measure of these two distinct constructs. This study contributes to research on diversity and conflict by providing an explanation for contrary results, and by providing and a detailed operationalisation of cognitive conflict and its component constructs. It also contributes to research into creativity and innovation by providing insight into the dynamics underpinning knowledge sharing and creation.