Between Employment Relationships and Market Relationships: Dilemmas for HR Management

The deployment of labour is regulated by rules laid down in labour laws, collective labour agreements and internal company rulebooks. The subject of this article is how changes in the nature of the company and in the nature of the employment relationship affect the type of rules regulating the utilization of labour. Starting point of our analysis is that in both the company and the employment relation, market pressures are increasing. For the company this implies that the borderline between the organisation and its environment is becoming fluid and for the employment relation it implies that elements of market relations are on the increase. In the classic company the model of wage labour under a standard labour contract still dominates, while in the modern network/virtual company contracts for services is becoming a dominant way of utilization of labour. Between these two models many hybrid employment relations are developing, combining elements of both. The hybridisation of the employment relation poses several problems for HRM policy. In this article three new instruments for the management of hybrid employment relations are assessed: competency based appraisal systems; intensification of the dialogue between employee and supervisor; individual choice benefits systems.