J Bus Ethics (2012) 111:109119

DOI 10.1007/s10551-012-1438-8

Exploring the Boundaries of Human Resource Managers

Responsibilities
David E. Guest Christopher Woodrow

Received: 30 June 2011 / Accepted: 28 July 2012 / Published online: 29 August 2012
 Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2012

Abstract This article addresses two longstanding challenges for human resource (HR) managers; how far they
can and should represent the interests of both management
and workers and how they can gain the power to do so.
Adopting a Kantian perspective, it is argued that to pursue
an ethical human resource management (HRM), HR
managers need to go some way to resolving both. Three
possible avenues are considered. Contemporary approaches
to organisation of the HR role associated with the work of
Ulrich are explored as a means of enhancing power, but
rejected on the basis of research evidence as unlikely to
succeed. Promotion of worker outcomes in the context of
developing the link between HRM and performance offers
the potential for a more ethical HRM but has not been
seized by most HR managers. Finally, implementation of
legislative and moral requirements to promote quality of
working life is explored through the case of bullying at
work. This highlights the boundaries of the HR role in a
context of limited power and leads to the conclusion that it
is unrealistic to look to HR managers, or at least HR
managers alone, to achieve an ethical HRM.
Keywords HR policy and practice
HR roles
HR
implementation
Kantian ethics
Worker well-being

Organisational performance
Bullying at work

D. E. Guest (&)
C. Woodrow

Department of Management, Kings College London,
150 Stamford Street, London SE19NH, UK
e-mail: david.guest@kcl.ac.uk
C. Woodrow
e-mail: christopher.a.woodrow@kcl.ac.uk

Introduction
More than 30 years ago, Legge (1978) highlighted a
range of challenges and ambiguities in the role of the
personnel manager. One of these concerned the conflict
inherent in personnel managers responsibilities as an
integral part of management alongside their distinctive
responsibility to take account of the concerns and wellbeing of the workforce. The latter reflects, in part, a
hangover from a welfare and human relations tradition,
perceived by many in personnel management to be a
burden from which they have sought, over many years, to
escape. A second major challenge concerned personnel
managers lack of power to enact personnel management.
An important reason for this was that while personnel
managers could develop policy and practice, line managers had to implement them on a day-to-day basis. This
meant that everyone was, in some sense, a personnel
manager, resulting in ambiguity about the boundaries of
the respective roles and a difficult decision for personnel
managers about how far they should seek responsibility
for implementation in the face of potential reluctance or
even hostility from line managers.
These two key challenges, one concerning the focus of
the role and the other concerning its enactment, present
ethical dilemmas for personnel managers, since rebadged
as human resource (HR) managers, because they can have
an important bearing on their ability to influence the wellbeing of the workforce in any organisation. In the intervening years, there have been a number of attempts to
address them. The aim of this article is to explore some of
the recent attempts and evaluate how far they have been
successful. In so doing, we will consider the boundaries or
limits to what HR managers, who seek to attain ethically
defensible outcomes, can realistically achieve.

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Legges (1978) particular concern had been with how

personnel managers could gain sufficient power and
influence to enact their role. She outlined two main strategies, suggesting that they become either what she termed
conformist or deviant innovators. The conformist innovator
worked within the managerial system and with the weave
of organisational priorities and gained influence by getting
things done for the organisation and its management. The
deviant innovator sought to change the organisation by
drawing on professional standards, including ethical standards, or on a moral stance reflected, perhaps, in legislation. One example of this might be the promotion of equal
opportunities. Drawing on a Kantian perspective, with its
emphasis on the way people, including people at work, are
treated, we will examine and illustrate the moral and ethical implications of both these strategies. However, we start
by exploring the problem of the lack of power of HR
managers and consider how far the dominant contemporary
approach to management of the function is able to enhance
the power of HR and also to address the ethical challenges
which appear to be inherent in the role.

Ulrichs Solution to the Problem of Power: Become

a HR Champion
Human resource managers may wish to behave according
to certain ethical standards such as, for example, those
prescribed by their professional body, and may endeavour
to do so on a day-to-day basis. But when they possess
limited power and lack wider support, they are unlikely to
be in a position effectively to pursue ethical means and
ethical goals. Faced with the challenges presented by a lack
of power and influence, HR managers have embraced the
approach advocated by Ulrich (1997). He famously noted
that Some HR prophets tell the HR professionals that they
are doomed by their incompetence and headed for hell. I
would rather tell them how to repent so that they can go to
heaven. (1997, p. viii) This may in part have been a
reference to a Harvard Business Review article by Skinner
(1981) in which he claimed that over the years HR managers had promised to deliver much to organisations but
had achieved little. By implication, as the importance of
effective human resource management (HRM) for organisational performance became more widely recognised, it
was considered too important to be left to HR managers;
instead senior executives and line managers had to take
responsibility.
Ulrichs biblical rhetoric had an instant appeal and his
ideas and his call to become HR Champions (1997)
became highly influential among the HR community. He
addressed the conflict between managing the interests of
employer and employees, which lies at the heart of the core

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ethical challenge facing HR managers, by suggesting that

Resolving this conflict requires that all parties recognize that HR professionals can both represent employee
needs and implement management agendas, be the voice of
the employee and the voice of management, act as a
partner to both employees and managers. (op. cit., p. 45)
Ulrich proposed that HR champions need to adopt four
core roles, namely management of strategic HRs, management of transformation and change, management of HR
infrastructure and management of employee contribution.
Despite the appealing rhetoric, the need to fulfil multiple
and potentially competing roles serves mainly to highlight
the challenges facing HR managers and outlining the four
roles does not in itself resolve the inherent conflicts. The
key challenge lies in reconciling the management of
employee contribution with the language in his 1997 book
of acting as an employee champion. The two are rather
different and it is clear that on closer inspection, Ulrichs
emphasis is more on managing contribution, partly by
ensuring provision of appropriate support within the
organisational system. At the same time, the suggestion
that HR managers should be the employees voice in
management discussions and assure employees that their
concerns are being heard (Ulrich, 1997, p. 149) seems to
assume that management and workers interests are aligned
and that any trade union or independent worker representation is absent. This contrasts strongly with the view,
outlined, for example, by Kochan (2007) and Legge
(2007), and more akin to a stakeholder perspective (Donaldson and Preston, 1995), that collective representation is
the only way of effectively ensuring that the views of
employees are fully taken into account. As Kochan has
argued, such representation is an important means of
maintaining the legitimacy of the HR function. This view is
enshrined in the European Unions legislation facilitating
the involvement of the social partners at all levels of
decision-making (Deakin and Njoya, 2008). At the same
time, it must be recognised that an increasing number of
organisations, particularly in the USA, are union free and
Ulrichs writing seems to be directed mainly towards these.
In addition to outlining four core roles for HR managers,
Ulrich (Ulrich and Brockbank 2005) also set out ideas
about how best to structure the function to accomplish
these roles. The recommended structure had three elements. These consisted of a strategic business partner who
would work closely with senior line managers to develop
and implement relevant business and HR strategy; centres
of expertise, with specialists who had distinctive competences in a range of areas such as recruitment and selection,
training and development, and pay and rewards; and shared
service centres which would provide an advisory, information and administration support to line managers and to
staff. Ulrich subsequently acknowledged that this model

Exploring the Boundaries of HR Managers Responsibilities

needed further development to separate the central strategic

role and the element of the business partner role that
required a HR specialist to work more closely with line
managers. This is reflected in the suggestion (Ulrich and
Beatty 2001) that this element of the role be broadened
from partner to player, more proactively providing counselling, advice and support to line managers in enacting
their people management roles. Ulrich and Beatty suggest
extending the HR playing field but they do not clarify the
game being played or the rules of the game. By implication, the game remains maximising shareholder return and
the rules are set by the corporation.
Despite Ulrichs own equivocation, this three-legged
structural framework has been adopted with enthusiasm in
many organisations. A survey of its senior members by the
UK Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development
(CIPD/IES 2007) found, in a sample of 787 organisations,
that 53 % had restructured their function in the previous
year and 81 % had done so in the previous 5 years. In over
half the cases, the restructure had adopted elements of the
so-called Ulrich framework although only 18 % had
introduced all three elements. The survey highlighted both
benefits and problems, particularly in enacting the business
partner role, and indicated that further attempts at
restructuring were likely. This suggests that implementing
structural reforms along the lines associated with Ulrich
have failed to resolve the challenges in the role.
There has been some evaluation of the attempt to adopt
the four role elements outlined by Ulrich. These show that
different constituenciestop management, line managers,
employees and HR managersprioritise different elements
in the role (Buyens and de Vos 2001; Caldwell 2003).
Much of the evaluation has been undertaken in Europe
where there is a more pluralist tradition and some form of
worker representation is more likely to be present. In other
words, there are employee representatives to provide
employee voice. However, the European experience may
also indicate that one way to address the conflicts inherent
in the role is not to attempt to be all things to all people.
Indeed, the preferred contemporary option, strongly advocated by the CIPD, the UK professional body for HR
managers, appears to be to nail the HR flag to the management mast and focus on aspects of the role to which
senior management gives priority.
Perhaps the key point about the enthusiasm for jumping
on the bandwagon started by Ulrich, and seeking to
enhance influence by redefining the HR role, is that it
seems to have failed to enhance the power of HR managers. As Kochan, a senior academic observer argues in the
context of the USA, The two decade effort to develop a
new strategic HRM role in organisations has failed to
realise its promised potential of greater status, influence
and achievement (2007, p. 599). Instead, so he suggests,

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the role has changed from manager of the social contract to

handmaiden (Storey 1992) of top management and with
this change has come a loss of moral authority. By implication, they have gained no additional power or influence
but are likely to have become less concerned to prioritise
the concerns and well-being of the workforce. One consequence of this is that HR managers are ever more likely
to seek influence by acting as what Legge termed conformist innovators. Moreover, by doing so under the primary guise of strategic partner rather than employee
champion, any concern for workers is likely at best to be
instrumental.
Aligning with management as strategic partners might
lead to the conclusion that HR managers have no distinctive responsibility for employees. Nevertheless, whether
they like it or not, HR professionals are often ascribed
responsibility for HRs. Indeed, this is reflected in variants
on the title such as people manager or workforce manager. However, the alignment with management interests
implies a utilitarian moral stance towards the workforce.
Nevertheless, it may be possible, even taking account of
management priorities, to adopt a different ethical stance.
We explore this possibility by considering two of the
current issues that are extensively analysed within the
academic discourse on HRM. One concerns the relationship between HRM and performance and its implications
for employee well-being. The second concerns the challenge of implementing HR policy and practice designed to
promote worker well-being and quality of working life.
Both of these topics can usefully be explored within
what is essentially a Kantian framework.
Kantian ethics offers some core universal maxims suggesting that you should always treat others as you would
have them treat you and that people should always be
treated as ends in themselves and never as a means to an
end. A further maxim is that what is right for one is right
for all, implying a set of general rights. Kants concept of
categorical imperatives implies that there are standards of
behaviour that should always apply, irrespective of context.
In his writing, the source of categorical imperatives is
somewhat unclear but he suggests they derive from the
autonomy of the moral agent implying that each of us
provides our own source of moral authority on the
assumption that we strive to be virtuous. He acknowledges
that this will not always be easy, given what he terms the
warped wood of human nature [Kant, cited in Mellahi and
Wood (2003, p. 17)].
The universal Kantian ethical principles would appear to
have relevance in organisational settings and particularly
for those such as HR managers with responsibilities for the
way workers are treated. However, they are open to a
number of criticisms. As MacIntyre (1966) notes, the quest
for a moral order independent of a social order is likely to

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be illusory. Work organisations are ordered social systems

in which complex and often ambiguous decisions have to
be made. One commonly cited dilemma for HR managers
(see, for example, Lamsa 1999) that challenges the Kantian
standpoint concerns the need to make a minority of staff
redundant to preserve the jobs of the majority. As Legge
(1998) has noted, even with the best of intentions, the
outcome is a form of utilitarianism. One response might be
to challenge the need for any redundancies but that raises
questions about power relations and the ability of HR
managers to mount a challenge to a decision usually
reached elsewhere in the organisation. This type of
example suggests that application of Kantian ethics is
likely to be bounded or constrained by the realities of
organisational systems. But it would at least suggest that
HR managers should pay close attention to the process
whereby the redundancies are handled by, for example,
seeking voluntary redundancies and by offering help in
finding alternative employment.
Acknowledging the practical challenges to engaging
constantly in ethical conduct, Winstanley and Woodall
(2000) call at least for ethical sensitivity and reasoning,
which they define as the ability to reflect on human
resource management and be able to identify the ethical
and moral dilemmas and issues (p. 8). This would appear
to be a good starting point for the following analysis. We
first review the debates around HRM and performance and
the question of whether workers are a means to an end or
whether workers interests can realistically be viewed as an
end in themselves. The second topic is closer to a Kantian
issue of general rights, accepting that there are rights,
such as the right to equal opportunities and to a safe
working environment, to which all workers are entitled.
The core challenge for HR managers is that practices
designed to promote the quality of working life are viewed
as entitlements, and sometimes enshrined in legislation but
may not appear to serve management or organisational
interests. The challenge for HR managers is to decide how
far to go in promoting such entitlements, particularly in
organisational contexts where the interests of competing
stakeholders, including the public and local community as
well as shareholders, have to be taken into account.

HRM and Performance and the Potential for Worker

Well-Being
The discovery, highlighted in a seminal paper by Huselid
(1995), of an association between the presence of a greater
number of HR practices and firm performance offered a
new route for HR managers to gain greater influence. It is
further enhanced through the resource-based view of the
firm (Barney 1991; Barney and Wright 1998) which argues

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that the key resources for competitive advantage are those

that are rare, valuable, inimitable and non-substitutable and
that these are primarily HRs. By implication, HRs, leveraged through the presence of the right set of HR practices,
are the key to high performance. There is now a strong
body of evidence confirming the association between the
presence of a greater number of HR practices and firm
performance (Boselie et al. 2005; Combs et al. 2006). By
championing this approach, HR managers have the
opportunity as conformist innovators to increase their
influence; but in doing so they risk neglecting workers
interests.
As research on the relationship between HRM and
performance has grown, workers have moved centre stage
as it has become accepted that HR practices have their
impact mainly via their effect on workers attitudes and
behaviour. Indeed, the dominant model suggests that the
core purpose of HR practices is to promote workers
ability, motivation and opportunity to contribute to high
performance in their jobs (Becker et al. 1997; Guest 1997;
Wright and Boswell 2002). This model, sometimes
described as the AMO model, is helpful in pointing to the
kind of HR practices that should be present. For example,
ability might best be ensured through careful selection and
training. The central role ascribed to workers means that
what are often termed high-performance work practices
must at least to some extent also be high-involvement
(Lawler 1986) or high-commitment (Walton 1985) practices since they depend on workers being sufficiently
engaged to respond positively to them. The language
is potentially important since high-commitment or
high-involvement HR practices imply a focus on winning
the hearts and minds of workers as a route to high performance and are therefore more likely to attract a positive
response from employees; in contrast, high-performance
practices focus more on behaviour than on attitudes and
imply less concern with workers well-being. This can be
illustrated through the distinction between seeking discretionary or voluntary effort on the one hand and required and
highly controlled effort on the other. The former may be
found in many professional roles, the latter is represented by
the stereotypical call centres. Despite the presence of the
conceptual distinctions between high-performance, highcommitment and high-involvement HR practices, as Combs
et al. (2006) and Guest (2011) note, research has failed to
resolve which practices have the main effect on outcomes.
As a result, the terminology is inconsistent. However, the
increasingly common use of the term high-performance
work systems reflects the dominant focus on organisational
rather than employee outcomes.
The whole focus on HRM and performance has been
criticised as excessively managerialist and the concern for
high involvement or commitment viewed as manipulative

Exploring the Boundaries of HR Managers Responsibilities

and unethical (see, for example, Keenoy 1990; Legge

2001). On the other hand, as it has evolved to provide a
more nuanced approach that places workers at the centre of
the analysis, it opens the way for a more ethical stance. In
considering the implications of this analysis for the wellbeing of workers, a distinction has been made between an
approach that seeks to promote performance and employee
well-being through HR practices that are welcomed by
employees, thereby developing a form of mutuality more
aligned to a variant of a stakeholder perspective (Greenwood and De Cieri 2007); and one that focuses on performance outcomes without taking account of workers
interests. These distinctions have been described in terms
of a high road or low road approach or an optimistic
versus a pessimistic approach (Peccei 2004). More pertinently, Osterman (1994) and Nishii et al. (2008) distinguish
between approaches aimed primarily at achieving high
performance through employee well-being versus employee
efficiency. As Legge (1998) has previously noted, this
suggests that there is an opportunity for HR managers to
adopt a more ethical approach advocating HR practices that
have as their goals both higher performance and higher wellbeing of workers. This should, of course, not preclude policies and practices designed, as their primary aim, to promote employee well-being. Warr (2002) has offered an
evidence-based list of 10 such practices including, for
example, opportunity for personal control, opportunity for
skill use and supportive supervision.
The question of intent is important from a Kantian
perspective and the case for a more ethical approach is
reinforced by the research of Nishii et al. (2008) who found
that employees response to HR practices was influenced
by the attributions they made about why they had been
introduced. They distinguish between beliefs that management introduce HR practices to enhance quality, to
reduce costs, to exploit workers, to comply with union
demands or to enhance worker well-being. They show that
workers respond more positively when they make positive
attributions such as enhancement of worker well-being
rather than negative attributions such as exploiting
workers.
Despite different management motives and employee
attributions, research consistently reports a positive association between workers accounts of more HR practices in
place and their attitudes and behaviour (Liao et al. 2009;
Wright et al. 2005). There is good evidence that more HR
practices are associated with higher levels of job satisfaction and commitment to the organisation. There is also
some evidence that more practices are associated with
higher well-being, defined in terms of lower levels of
anxiety and depression (Guest et al. 2010). On the other
hand, there are also accounts of an association between
more HR practices and increased levels of stress (Godard

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2001; Ramsay et al. 2000; Harley et al. 2007) suggesting

either that employers are using different routes in their
pursuit of high performance or that some practices, such as
the provision of greater autonomy may simultaneously
result in more satisfaction and more stress. In a thorough
review testing of the mutuality hypothesis, Pecccei et al.
(2012) distinguished what they termed happiness wellbeing and health-related well-being. The former includes
measures of job satisfaction and commitment, the latter
includes stress and anxiety. Concentrating on good quality
studies, they found consistent evidence that application of
more HR practices was associated with both high-performance and high-happiness well-being but little evidence
supporting an association between both higher performance
and higher health-related well-being.
There is sufficient evidence in this body of research to
show that it is possible to achieve both high performance
and positive levels of employee satisfaction and wellbeing. At the same time, the evidence confirms that some
organisations adopt a low-road approach, resulting in
increased work intensification and stress. Given the body of
evidence of a positive association between HRM and performance and the potential to simultaneously enhance both
performance and well-being if practices are applied with
due concern for workers interests, it might seem that HR
managers would seize the chance to increase their influence
by promoting such practices. There is, it might be suggested, an ethical opportunity. However, the survey evidence points to a rather low level of adoption of the range
of those HR practices that have the potential to lead to
positive outcomes, at least in the UK (Kersley et al. 2006).
There has been a growing advocacy of an evidencebased approach to management practice (Pfeffer and
Sutton 2006; Rousseau 2006). One contribution that HR
managers could make is to utilise the evidence to suggest
that by taking account of workers interests and well-being
in developing HR practices, there is the potential for a win
win situation. However, HR managers tend to be either
ignorant of or all too ready to reject the evidence (Guest
and King 2004). Indeed, research suggests that they have
not even been conformist innovators. Analysis of a series
of UK Workplace Employment Relations Surveys confirms
that while these show an association between the presence
of certain HR practices and more positive outcomes, there
is no evidence that HR managers are associated with and
by implication responsible for the adoption of these practices (Guest and Bryson 2009).
Returning to the ethical implications of this analysis, it
seems likely that most of those who introduce HR practices
designed to improve organisational performance do so
from a predominantly managerialist perspective. The purpose of this analysis has been to demonstrate that there is
the potential for mutual gains and for the adoption of a

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more Kantian perspective reflected in an explicit attempt to

promote worker well-being. Within the framework of
conformist innovation and alignment with management,
the minimal ethical HR management position should
arguably be to ensure no harm is done to workers and that
where possible mutual gains are assured. It has been suggested that HR managers should act as ethical stewards
(Woodall and Winstanley 2001). The interest in HRM,
performance and workers well-being, and the growing
body of evidence about the potential for mutual gains,
provides an opportunity to enact this role. The evidence
suggests that more often than not HR managers have failed
to do so.

The Focus on Quality of Working Life and HR

Implementation
In the previous section, we argued that certain HR practices,
designed to enhance performance, also have the potential to
improve the well-being of workers. A further set of HR
practices have, as their primary goal, the protection of
workers or the enhancement of their quality of working life.
Many of these can be traced back to an earlier welfare tradition, but in the 1970s they began to be integrated within a
focus on the quality of working life (Davis and Cherns 1975;
OToole 1973). This had its roots in a broad body of research
by organisational psychologists and sociologists allied to the
emergence of a belief, particularly in Europe, in progress
through social partnership (IDE 1993).
Reflecting societal norms, but also actively promoted by
trade unions, it has been accepted that workers have a right
to fair treatment and equal opportunities at work, to a safe
working environment, to working hours that are not
excessive, to a minimum level of pay, to participation in
decisions likely to affect workers well-being and to protection from unreasonable treatment. All these rights have
become enshrined in European legislation and have been
legislated for, to a greater or lesser extent, in many other
countries. Their key feature in the present context is that
they promote workers rights and do so potentially at the
expense of organisations. Their implementation in organisations typically falls under the responsibility of the HR
manager. In so far as such practices are largely externally
driven, and can be seen to run counter to the organisational
imperative towards profit maximisation, the role of the HR
manager in promoting them can be viewed as a form of
what Legge described as deviant innovation. From an
ethical perspective, the idea that all workers have a similar
right to a decent quality of working life and that HR
managers have a responsibility and indeed an obligation to
ensure this reflects a more explicitly Kantian view of the
HR manager role.

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The question that arises is how far HR managers either

seek to or are able to promote these ethical outcomes. We
explore this through a case study of policy and practice to
address bullying and harassment in the workplace. The
context is a hospital, where the imperatives differ from
those of commercial profit-oriented organisations, and
might be expected to make the task of the HR manager
somewhat easier, especially if it can be shown that bullying
harms both staff and patients in the context of a presumed
duty of care to both.
For most quality of working life HR practices, the issue is
not their presence in an organisation, since this is often
mandated by law, but the extent to which policy and practice
is effectively implemented. This can be considered within a
broad four-stage framework of implementation outlined by
Guest and Bos-Nehles (2012). It starts with the decision to
introduce or to amend an HR practice. In the case of bullying
and harassment, in many countries there is no formal legislation requiring that a relevant policy is in place but there is a
strong presumption, particularly in the public sector that
such a policy should exist. Furthermore, there is an obligation to ensure the health and safety of the workforce, and
bullying can damage both physical and mental health (e.g.
Kivimaki et al. 2003). The second stage determines the
quality of the policy and associated practices. For example, a
policy on bullying may be a minimalist statement of good
intentions or it can be extensive and clearly set out with a link
to appropriate and specific practices. The third stage concerns implementation of the practice on the ground. While it
may have been endorsed by senior executives, local line
managers may choose to ignore it, perhaps because they are
too busy or find it too difficult to deal with. The final stage
concerns the quality of any implementation. If an issue of
bullying arises, the local manager can no longer ignore it but
must still decide whether or not to treat it seriously and
attempt to resolve it or just plaster over it.
It is commonly assumed that many line managers are
reluctant to accept their responsibilities for implementing
HR practices and there is good evidence to support this
view (McGovern et al. 1997; Brewster and Larsen 2000).
In contrast, there is evidence that, at least in a country like
The Netherlands, this is not always the case (Bos-Nehles
2010). Ulrich was keen for HR managers to cease to be
policy police and regulatory watchdogs (Ulrich 1997, p.
viii) suggesting that they should not be monitoring implementation. Nor should they be cajoling or holding the hand
of line managers to help them with implementation,
although he later somewhat modified this view by advocating the role of player alongside partner. But is it
ethically acceptable to set the boundaries of HR management responsibility in this way? Have HR managers met
their ethical responsibilities by ensuring that high-quality
HR practices are in place, leaving implementation largely

Exploring the Boundaries of HR Managers Responsibilities

to line managers, or should and could HR managers

become players, involved in day-to-day implementation?
And if so, do they have the resources and ability to fulfil
this role? We explore these questions using the case of
bullying and harassment in healthcare.

Implementing Bullying and Harassment Policy

In most parts of Europe, in contrast to the US, healthcare
operates in a public, not-for-profit environment with the
consequence that performance indicators differ from typical commercial settings, with the quality of patient care
being the prime concern. Most research on business ethics
is concerned with business organisations where the inherently competing interests of capital and labour are highlighted; but this does not apply to healthcare and as a result,
we might expect a stronger focus on employee interests.
Furthermore, healthcare in particular is an environment
bound by strong ethical standards promoted by the medical
professions and in which patient outcomes would appear to
provide an alternative dominant performance criterion to
the private sector focus on financial success. For many
years, one of the characteristics of the public sector in the
UK was its role as a model employer (Bach et al. 2009) in
the forefront of implementing policies and practices
designed to protect and enhance worker well-being. This
has been challenged by the new public management
(Hood 1991) and its attempt to introduce what are perceived at government level to be the positive characteristics
of the private sector. In particular, critics of the new public
management have suggested that far from promoting better
public services for all, it has often acted as a vehicle to
serve career goals of a select few (Hood 1991).
Bullying and harassment (hereafter bullying), sometimes labelled mobbing (Einarsen 2000), is a pervasive
problem in a number of countries, sectors and organisations. However, the UK National Health Service has what
appears to be among the highest levels of bullying of any
sector (Zapf et al. 2003). Bullying is not a behaviour that
equates to moral worthiness in the Kantian sense: it implies
treating others without respect or consideration of their
interests as rational human beings. Indeed, there is general
agreement that the situation is morally reprehensible and
needs addressing. However, the reported levels of bullying
have remained stubbornly high. The UK Department of
Health has supported a national survey of staff for several
years with most questions being repeated annually, making
it possible to track the number of staff reporting bullying
and to identify correlates that can plausibly be categorised
as causes and consequences. This survey reveals that each
year for several years, about one in six members of staff
report bullying by another member of staff.

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Analysis of the survey data shows that there are a

number of antecedents of bullying. Two of the main ones
are lack of perceived organisational support and lack of
faith in the HR system to address the issue in a supportive
way if a complaint is made (Woodrow and Guest 2012a).
This suggests that, at least in the view of staff experiencing
bullying, neither line management nor the HR department
is doing enough to address the problem.
Three other points are worth highlighting. Firstly, bullying by staff is experienced more negatively than violence
from patients and public, presumably because violence is
more visible, more readily addressed and more likely to be
a one-off event (Woodrow and Guest 2012b). In contrast,
bullying can be invisible and persistent, and when it comes
from colleagues it can be a continuing source of unhappiness and distress. In this context, the second point to note is
that in the health sector, the source of bullying is equally
likely to be a superior in the organisational hierarchy or a
peer. As we might expect, the consequences are more
severe when someone reports bullying from both colleagues and boss. Thirdly, apart from the obvious harm to
staff who are bullied, the experience has consequences for
patients since bullied staff report lower motivation and less
inclination to provide a high quality of service. Awareness
of this could, potentially, be used as evidence to convince
senior managers to give a higher priority to the need to
address the issue.
The high levels of bullying in the UK National
Healthcare Service have not gone unnoticed and there has
been guidance from the Department of Health and pressure
from trade unions to put in place policies and practices to
address bullying. Reviews of the existing literature highlight several lines of action that can be taken by organisations (Cartwright and Cooper 2007; Raynor and McIvor
2008). These include a zero tolerance policy, training for
managers and appropriate complaints and support systems.
A study of some of the large London hospitals, where
levels of bullying are particularly high, reveals that these
policies and practices are already in place. Indeed, in this
respect they could be described as models of good practice
(Woodrow and Guest 2012a).
The challenge that arises is that, although the HR
departments have put in place the recommended policies
and practices for dealing with bullying, and campaigns
have sought to raise awareness of the severity of the
problem, levels of reported bullying remain stubbornly
high. Even high-quality policies and practices do not seem
to be working. This seems to be further evidence of the
gap, noted by Khilji and Wang (2006) between intended
and implemented practices. It would appear to reflect what
Bauman (1993) described as the bureaucratisation of ethics
whereby a set of policies and practices serve as evidence
that obligations have been met. Therefore, should HR

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managers be doing more, and if so what; or have they met

their managerial and ethical responsibilities by putting in
place high quality policies and practices?
One way in which more might be achieved is to adopt
Ulrich and Beattys (2001) role of players, working
alongside line management to implement good HR practice.
Many organisations, including hospitals, have introduced
this local business partner role, but the evidence suggests
that they have difficulty enacting it, mainly because they
tend to get involved in short-term reactive issues (CIPD/IES
2007). For example, in some hospitals, these HR managers
spend a high proportion of their time filling staffing gaps
and dealing with local grievances. One of the ethical
dilemmas lies in how to determine priorities. The need to fill
gaps in staffing is a critical issue in hospitals where patients
need urgent care, and understandably this therefore has
priority, including priority over addressing bullying. Furthermore, HR managers have to consider the implications of
seeking to discipline someone who may be a bully but who
is also an excellent doctor, since action which diverts the
doctor from their work may result in some risk to patient
care. It should also be noted that in professional bureaucracies, of which hospitals are a prime example, it can be
extremely difficult for HR managers to exercise control
over the key professionals, in this case doctors, who value
and indeed insist on their professional autonomy and who
tend to view HR managers as an administrative and problem-solving resource. Much of the early research on HR
managers (see, for example, Ritzer and Trice 1969; Legge
1978) reported that other managers placed considerable
emphasis on the personal qualities of HR managers and on
how these enabled them to gain credibility and exert
influence. It is unclear whether most HR managers have the
qualities or, indeed, the skill and inclination to pursue ethical outcomes in the context of issues like bullying where
the powerful professionals may be among the main transgressors. Indeed, part of the ethical dilemma can lie in
deciding how far to put their local reputation and relationships with key clinicians on the line by seeking to address
an issue such as bullying that many clinicians might view as
an essentially trivial and largely inevitable consequence of a
highly pressured work environment.
Policy concerning bullying is just one among a number
of areas, including equal opportunities, where organisations
have a transparent duty of care and can put in place
sophisticated policies and practices that may be ineffectively implemented. A Kantian imperative would highlight
the need to go further along the stages of implementation
and ensure that policies and practices are not just present
and of high quality but also that they are effectively
implemented on the ground. The problem highlighted
in this analysis is that in most cases, HR managers lack
the power, the appropriate structure of their role and

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D. E. Guest, C. Woodrow

sometimes also the inclination to ensure this key stage of

ethical policy implementation. Decades of analysis of the
HR role suggest that HR managers need help if they are to
achieve this.

Towards Effective HR Implementation: The Role

of a Strong HR System
One way in which fuller implementation of HR practices
might be achieved has been proposed by Bowen and Ostroff (2004) who have outlined the conditions necessary to
enact what they describe as a strong HR system. They
suggest that HR policies should be distinctive, so that they
can be easily recognised, they should have clarity of purpose, reflected in transparent meansends associations, and
they should be communicated clearly and consistently
throughout the organisation. In effect, this recognises that
while HR managers might have responsibility for the first
and second stages in the implementation process ensuring
the presence and quality of HR practices, going beyond this
requires more active support from the senior management
team and in so doing might appear to let the HR department off the hook. Indeed, it reflects the view expressed by
Skinner (1981) that HRM is too important to be left to HR
departments.
Stanton et al. (2010), in a qualitative study of three
Australian hospitals, provide some evidence in support of
Bowen and Ostroffs propositions by highlighting the role
of leadership. This supports Scheins argument that leaders
play a key role in the management of organisational culture
(Schein 1985). While a strong HR system implies a
strong culture, there is always the risk that a strong culture
can reinforce an inappropriate HR system and there is, in
any case, much debate about how far organisational culture
can, in practice, be managed (Martin 1992). Any attempt
to change organisational culture is likely to be particularly
challenging in professional bureaucracies such as hospitals,
with their highly complex structures and deeply entrenched
values. Indeed, it can be argued that doctors are, in effect,
socialised into a culture that condones bullying of staff
(British Medical Association 2006). One excuse that is
cited is that patients must come first, even if this is at the
expense of staff welfare, providing parallels with the priority given to profits in the private sector. There is therefore a form of negotiated order in which bullying becomes
trivialised and normalised to the point where no one takes it
very seriouslyexcept, of course, those who suffer from it
as a result. Arguably, until the zero tolerance policy is
enacted and a senior doctor is disciplined for bullying, this
state of affairs will continue.
More generally, few organisations, including most hospitals, seem likely to have a strong HR system in place

Exploring the Boundaries of HR Managers Responsibilities

because of the strength of competing professional medical

systems. Set against this, there is evidence that even in
hospitals with high levels of reported bullying, there are
quite large variations between divisions that cannot be
accounted for by their clinical characteristics. For example,
in one hospital we examined, where the proportion of staff
reporting bullying was consistently above 25 % over several years, despite attempts to reduce it, the figures for the
clinical divisions within the hospital for one of these years
ranged from 13 to 35 %. In other words, the management
of bullying appears to be taken more seriously in some
divisions than others, which can lead to better outcomes.
This implies that divisional management can have a key
role in managing the HR system within their sub-culture
and therefore when appointing people to such positions,
there is much to be gained by paying careful attention to
their approach to people management. However, we await
more research to know how far the Bowen and Ostroff
model can realistically be implemented and there are historical grounds for caution in seeking solutions through a
form of moral leadership from the top of commercial organisations or from the leadership of the increasingly
pressured public sector.

Discussion and Conclusion

The aim of this article has been to explore how far it is
realistic for contemporary HR managers to pursue ethical
goals, defined in Kantian terms as ensuring in particular
that workers interests are accorded some primacy so that
workers well-being is reflected in the way they are treated
and workers are not viewed simply as means to achieving
other ends. In doing so, we have highlighted a number of
constraints, endemic in many if not most organisations, that
present boundaries or limits on what they can realistically
achieve. We have utilised the framework developed initially by Legge to illustrate two possible routes to achieving a more ethical HRM. The conformist route is illustrated
by promotion of the link between HRM and performance
and the now widely accepted view that this has to be
achieved through employees. Positive employee responses
can be viewed as a necessary means to the end of performance or they can be prioritised as ends in themselves. In
this article, we have utilised, and by implication advocated
a Kantian perspective, one feature of which is that people
should not be viewed as a means to an end but rather, their
well-being should be an end in itself. While the research
suggests there is the potential to pursue the dual aims of
high performance and worker well-being, the evidence also
indicates that HR managers have generally not played a
major role in promoting the relationship between HRM,
performance and workers well-being.

117

The second approach built on moral, legislative and

research grounds has resulted in HR practices designed to
promote workers quality of working life and well-being
rather than organisational goals. This offers a more
explicitly Kantian view, allied to a broader notion of a
general rights approach, focussing on the promotion of
fundamental rights and entitlements at work. Because of
the external referent for such practices, this was classified,
in Legges terms, as deviant innovation. Using the case of
bullying and harassment, we concluded that even where
relevant high-quality practices are in place and widely
endorsed, they can be difficult to implement on the ground.
This is especially important for those practices with a
welfare component that organisations have a moral obligation to implement, but which may have no transparent
link to performance or even, in the context of healthcare, to
patient outcomes. As Bauman (1993) noted, these apparently ethical practices can become bureaucratised; the
policies and practices are in place but there is often an
absence of what he termed the moral impulse to ensure
that they are implemented fully and consistently.
This brings us back to the question of power. It was
argued over 30 years ago by Legge (1978) and Watson
(1977) that HR managers lack the power and influence to
be the principle upholders of ethics in organisations and it
is unrealistic to expect them to do so. More recently,
Watson (2007) has again repeated this argument, maintaining that we should accept that the power and influence
of HR managers is bounded. In the intervening years, as
Watson notes, HR managers have become more firmly
aligned with the management of the organisation and the
focus on, and pressures to ensure high performance have
grown. Despite its popularity, the promise offered by
Ulrichs advocacy of a HR champion role does not appear
to have enhanced the power or influence of HR managers:
nor has it encouraged them to promote employee interests.
As a result, and given contemporary pressures, an ethical
stance has become even more difficult to sustain.
Inevitably, as critics of a deontological Kantian perspective have argued, it is unrealistic to expect implementation of Kantian ethics in contemporary organisations.
For HR managers, this is not just a problem of power or a
question of their identity as managers; it is also a reflection
of the complexities, challenges and ambiguities of organisational life and the consequent stream of dilemmas that
HR managers face. Despite this, we would argue that the
Kantian ethical principles serve as a valuable reference
point and a standard to which ethically sensitive HR
managers can aspire in arriving at decisions about the
management of people at work.
In summary, therefore, what we have argued is that
using Kantian ethical criteria, there are ethical possibilities,
even in contemporary HR developments. It can be argued

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that the nature of the HR managers role, and any aspiration to what Kochan (2007) terms social legitimacy,
requires them to retain an ethical stance and to pursue the
ethical possibilities that arise. They might do this through
seeking a strong HR system, through alliances for policy
formulation and implementation, by seeking opportunities
to promote worker well-being and more generally by
seeking to make ethical choices whenever the opportunity
arises. To do so requires a strong sense of self-efficacy to
sustain even an element of an ethical stance in challenging
times and unfavourable contexts. Realistically we must
accept that the constraints on and the boundaries of the HR
role confirm that we should not look with any confidence to
HR managers to ensure an ethical HRM.
Acknowledgments We would like to thank the editors and the three
anonymous reviewers for their helpful feedback and guidance.

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