Human resource management in emerging markets: an introduction

Abstract

able to take unilateral decisions affecting emerging economies.As van Agtmael (2007) concludes, it is a matter of time before a block of emerging economies headed by China increasingly calls the shots on global geopolitical and economic issues, as for example occurred at the United Nations climate change conference in Copenhagen in December 2009.Emerging markets at present account for more than 50 per cent of global economic output and emerging market MNCs (EMMNCs) like Tata, Infosys and Wipro of India, Exarro Resources, Glencore, Naspers, SABMiller, Sasol and Sappi from South Africa, Haier in China, Embraer and CVRD in Brazil, and Hyundai and Samsung in Korea, are now global players (Horwitz and Mellahi, 2009).Such developments have global implications, in particular for issues related to employment, war for talent, diversity and inclusion, emergence of EMMNCs, and integration of initiatives such as BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), CIVET (the acronym coined by Michael Geoghegan, former chief executive of HSBC to cluster another group of middle-income emerging markets: Colombia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Egypt and Turkey), and MINT (Mexico, Indonesia, Nigeria and Turkey).For example, as the EMs move from the global economic periphery to the centre it is changing the distribution and character of global jobs.As per an ILO Report (2011), globally there are about 3 billion employees, of which 2.8 billion are employed in developing and EMs.In order to sustain such employment and economic growth firms based in EMs are experiencing massive pressures for continuous salary increases, and need to invest heavily in training as the graduates in EMs lack employable skills, despite a regular increase in the number of graduates produced.This results in a war for talent.Further, it is predicted that China will have an employee shortage of 20 million by 2030 (for details see Berger, 2012).Nevertheless, a significant number of highly educated women are entering the global workforce, which in particular in the EMs context raises the serious challenges of diversity and inclusion (see Hewlett and Rashid, 2011).Further, the EMMNCs, which are growing at a rapid speed, are struggling with the issue of 'employer branding' (where jobseekers prefer to work in developed countries' MNCs over EMMNCs).In the globalised world, there are also HR issues related to the key determinants of HRM policies and practices in different EMs, the context-specific challenges faced by HR managers in different EMs' set-ups, issues of convergence-divergence or crossvergence, and so on.This volume assembles contributions which will provide the reader with a good understanding about such issues.Against such a background, this chapter has four aims: first, building on the above, it will further provide a rationale for the need for this book; 2 Handbook of HRM in emerging markets