Maintenance and enhancement of employees? employability in the changing public sector

Topic and purposeTransformation of the public sector and spread of contract-based arrangements make the traditional approach to employee development less effective in contemporary public organizations. Simultaneously, many researchers point to the necessity of employability enhancement for employees? long-term career development. However, knowledge about employees? employability and factors influencing it in the public organizations is still limited. The purpose of this paper is to answer the following questions: what factors determine employees? employability in the public sector and what are the conditions of its maintenance and enhancement in the Polish public organizations.MethodThe aims of the paper are realized by presenting the results of the literature study based on the comparison of approaches to employability in the private sector with the reality of the Polish public organizations? functioning, which is provided in the context of the changes in the practice of HRM in the public sector. The paper reviews concepts of employability and considers how they have evolved over time. It also explains why employability of employees has become a subject of interest in the changing public organizations and seeks to identify factors which decide about employees? employability and conditions of its maintenance and enhancement in Polish public organizations.FindingsThe conducted literature study shows that employability is a complex phenomenon, which can be analyzed from different but interconnected perspectives, i.e. the individual, organizational and socio-economic perspectives. It was also found that transformation of public organizations, change of the required profile of employees? competences and new conditions of the psychological contract result in difficult challenges to employees, which they will be able to face only if they continuously enhance their employability. However, public organizations should support them in these efforts.OriginalityThe downsizing of public employment and the requirements for human resources flexibility, which are accompanied with the difficult situation on the labour market, made maintenance and enhancement of employability of public sector employees? become an important problem, not only on the individual level but also on organizational and social levels. The paper provides deeper insight into specific factors determining employability of public sector employees as well as conditions of its enhancement distinctive for public organizations. It should be noted that these issues have been mostly examined in the context of commercial organizations. *The project was funded from the resources of the National Science Centre (Poland) granted by the decision no. DEC-2013/11/B/HS4/00561.