Now you see it now you don’t: comparing traditional and discourse readings of HRD in small organisations

Abstract

Research into human resource development within SMEs has been dominated by representationalist perspectives of organisation, by narrow definitions of HRD as training and by quantitative research methods. There have been more recent exhortations to advance the understanding of SME HRD through qualitative and longitudinal methods but, as a consequence of limited theorising on HRD, there has also been a lack of clarity over what might be researched. Within the small firms literature, intensive studies of the workplace are comparatively rare, yet, as Curran et al. (1996) argue, snapshot approaches based on survey evidence have frequently been used to formulate views on HRD activities. How then can research be encouraged that involves in-depth scrutiny of HRD within SMEs and small organisations more generally?

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