People or things?
How human resources and their role in organisations should be viewed
Resources almost comparable to other raw materials in the productive cycle, or women and men committed to achieve a common goal? The role of human beings within organisations (and production, too), has always been a topic for discussion, and continues to be seriously debated today, as so-called “human resources” need to get to grips with the work reorganisation demanded by digitalisation.
As such, the management of human resources becomes a crucial factor in the transition experienced by any productive organisation, as well as an element that characterises any culture of production.
Giovanni Masino’s contribution in Humans, resources, or what else? eBook of the research program “The organization workshop (a collection of research studies curated by Massimo Neri), centres around this “misleading dichotomy” between resources and people.
Masino starts from an observation: “The so-called ‘management of human resources’ and, more broadly, the study of the relationship between people and organisations, is an issue that relevant literature discusses using, intentionally, terms such as ‘resources’ and ‘human’. These are terms that embody a certain conceptual premise and that, indirectly, lead towards different ways to study and interpret organisational undertakings and how they are planned, transformed and managed.” A company’s raw materials, then, or its vital part?
Masino continues by scrutinising the importance of “human deliberateness” as a feature of “human resources” and thus the significance that goals set to organisations, and therefore to people, acquire. This is where, according to Masino, the targets that managers establish for themselves within a company, as well as its working methods, come into play. “It is a matter,” writes Masino, “of changing the way we think when we set objectives.” Sharing and contribution, then, as elements that are increasingly gaining a foothold in modern and engaging corporate cultures.
Risorse o persone? Una dicotomia fuorviante (People or things? Una dicotomia fuorviante” (People or things? A misleading dichotomy)
Giovanni Masino, University of Ferrara
in Humans, resources, or what else? eBook of the research program “The organization workshop, Massimo Neri (curated by), University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, 2021
How human resources and their role in organisations should be viewed
Resources almost comparable to other raw materials in the productive cycle, or women and men committed to achieve a common goal? The role of human beings within organisations (and production, too), has always been a topic for discussion, and continues to be seriously debated today, as so-called “human resources” need to get to grips with the work reorganisation demanded by digitalisation.
As such, the management of human resources becomes a crucial factor in the transition experienced by any productive organisation, as well as an element that characterises any culture of production.
Giovanni Masino’s contribution in Humans, resources, or what else? eBook of the research program “The organization workshop (a collection of research studies curated by Massimo Neri), centres around this “misleading dichotomy” between resources and people.
Masino starts from an observation: “The so-called ‘management of human resources’ and, more broadly, the study of the relationship between people and organisations, is an issue that relevant literature discusses using, intentionally, terms such as ‘resources’ and ‘human’. These are terms that embody a certain conceptual premise and that, indirectly, lead towards different ways to study and interpret organisational undertakings and how they are planned, transformed and managed.” A company’s raw materials, then, or its vital part?
Masino continues by scrutinising the importance of “human deliberateness” as a feature of “human resources” and thus the significance that goals set to organisations, and therefore to people, acquire. This is where, according to Masino, the targets that managers establish for themselves within a company, as well as its working methods, come into play. “It is a matter,” writes Masino, “of changing the way we think when we set objectives.” Sharing and contribution, then, as elements that are increasingly gaining a foothold in modern and engaging corporate cultures.
Risorse o persone? Una dicotomia fuorviante (People or things? Una dicotomia fuorviante” (People or things? A misleading dichotomy)
Giovanni Masino, University of Ferrara
in Humans, resources, or what else? eBook of the research program “The organization workshop, Massimo Neri (curated by), University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, 2021