Human resource management and the appropriation-learning perspective

This paper posits the concept of "appropriation" to explain the underlying ethos and rationale for seeking to secure the contribution of people to organizational functioning. Human resource management (HRM) practice is therefore largely underpinned by the objective of appropriating the human resource "value." This is ignored by the practitioner-oriented literature which has a financial interest in helping organizations to secure this value, and by the academic literature which is unwilling to confront the contradictions and uncomfortable truths inherent in such activities. The traditional approach to appropriation is characterized by such concerns as skill-formation, commitment to the organization, shared corporate values, and a reliance on formally constituted governance structures with a putative integrative ethos. This paper advocates a reconstitution of the appropriation regime to incorporate the concepts of knowledge and teaming. We draw from the innovation management literature to highlight the problematic nature of appropriation and to clarify the implications of appropriation to the management of the knowledge that resides in people. Finally, we suggest how future research might proceed within an Appropriation-Learning (A-L) perspective.