Oxford Handbook of Human Resource Management

(Steven Felgate) #1

or organize, whether consumer-labor coalitions develop around ‘good jobs-good
service strategies,’ and how companies will respond. On the one hand, there are
many opportunities to compete on quality in mass markets—through innovative
uses of information technology or more sophisticated marketing research to
identify opportunities for customization. Moreover, the availability of Internet
databases of company-speciWc complaints provides opportunities for companies
to identify areas that particularly need improvement. On the other hand,Wnancial
pressures push companies to continually take costs out of the business. Outsour-
cing, oVshoring, and shifting labor to consumers are attractive quickWxes to
remedy short-term proWts.
In either case, it is clear that the dynamics between consumers, employees, and
Wrms in the service economy have changed in important ways over the past few
decades. Research in human resource management must be reconceptualized to
take into account the inXuence of consumers in this process.


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