Human Resource Management 2025

Addressing Contextual Pressures and Challenges in Social Care: The Prospects of Multi‐Actor Engagement With Strategic HRM

Alina Baluch¹; Dora Scholarios²; Ian A. Cunningham²; Philip James³; Eva Jendro²; Stewart Johnstone²

¹ University of St Andrews · ² University of Strathclyde · ³ Middlesex University

Abstract

Drawing on an exemplary case of strategic HRM in a nonprofit social care provider responding to a recruitment and retention crisis, this article offers evidence for a multi‐actor, recursive model of HRM implementation. We examine how multi‐actor engagement with strategic HRM reinforces or modifies intended HRM, and how this engagement is shaped by external and internal contextual pressures in nonprofit social care organizations. Through an in‐depth qualitative study, we shed light on the internal process dynamics that not only engender a shared understanding of intended HRM strategy and practice among key organizational actors ( convergence ) but also allow for local deviation ( divergence ) that forges a more adequate response to workforce challenges. Our study contributes to theory on the social dynamics of HRM implementation within wider institutional contexts while highlighting the limits of a business‐oriented HRM system for delivering a sustainable workforce within social care.

DOI

10.1002/hrm.70000

Sources

openalex

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APA 7 MLA 9 Chicago (author–date) Harvard Elsevier Harvard (JFE, JBF…) The Accounting Review Academy of Management American Marketing Association INFORMS (Management Science) Copy citation Copied ✓