Comparing Prescriptive Models of SHRD
1. Introduction
The theory and practice of human resource development (HRD) has experienced two
major changes. The first change happened in 1950s. In the book The Practice of
Management, Drucker first put forward the concept of HRD instead of the traditional
personnel management (Drucker,1954). Drucker also points out that the personnel
management has already becoming a part of the history. A new revolution based on how to
discover the full potential of human resource is coming. Based on this theory, the
process-oriented and administrative approach gradually became popular(Gold et al, 2011).
However with the fast development of technology, organizational structures and labor
market, a more strategic and overall interest-oriented HRD system is needed. Thus it came
to the second change in 1980s. Devannaet al. (1982) was the first scholar to argue for the
strategic human resource development (SHRD).Beer ‘s book Managing Human Assets
makes the SHRD system an important branch of HRD. Since then, SHRD has gradually
become the mainstream of human resource management.
Recent years have seen the rapid development of SHRD. More and more scholars devoted
to the research of SHRD and the number of companies adopted the SHRD system is
growing. Based on the literatures in hand, further research of SHRD has strong theoretical
significance and practical value. In the aspect of theory, SHRD gets rid of traditional
personnel management. It puts people first instead of work. From the perspective of
practice, SHRD plays an important role in enhancing the core competitiveness of
enterprises. There is a growing recognition that people play an important role in
determining an organization’s success. Many traditional competitive advantage resources
(such as technology and financial power) can hardly create more value than human
resource which is not only rare but also difficult to replicate ( Garavan,2007). Different
from other HRD systems, SHRD enables an organization to combine different knowledge
elements together and makes the HRD in line with the strategy of the organization to
ensure the sustained competitive advantage(Davenport, Prusak& Wilson, 2003).
In the development of SHRD, a lot of prescriptive models have been proposed. The two
primary prescriptive models are Garavan(1991)’s model and the McCracken and Wallace
(2000)’s model. The two models both define 9 characteristics of SHRD. This paper will
explore the differences between the two models to understand the defining features of
SHRD. It also addresses the advantages added to a business by applying SHRD through
the examplesof world famous companies.
