Organisational Change, Innovation and Human Resource Development as a Response to Increased Competition

This paper draws upon a questionnaire survey, conducted 1996 in 1900 Danish Firms, on technical and organisational change. The topics in the survey were among others if firms been through significant organizational change, how the firm had developed its human resources, and what were the motives for organizational change. Our analysis shows that more intense competition is a primary driving force behind organisational change and technical innovation. Firms are divided into three groups (the C-firms, the A-firms and the S-firms), according to how fare the intensity of competition had changed in recent years. The propensity to change and adapt is much higher among the firms that have experienced the strongest rise in competition (the C-firms). Further we show that there is a very clear and consistent direction of change among the C-firms. The C-firms tend to change towards what in broad terms is called organisational and functional flexibility. The C-firms emphasise human ressource development, apply modern management tools and introduce innovations related both to products and processes, to a much higher extent than the other firm types. But they are also more selective in their hiring of new labour. At the end some policy implications that relate to the marginalisation of the unskilled workers are sketched.