ABSTRACT
This chapter examines whether it is possible to speak of certain types of HR strategies and the degree to which these types of strategies may systematically vary across organizations. Analyzing the configuration of HR strategies in terms of typologies is appealing to HR researchers for a number of reasons. The development of empirically grounded typologies is a critical step in theory development, giving researchers the ability to identify relationships among the different typological dimensions. Configurational analyses or analysis across identified types are well established in the field of management and organizational theory. The field of business strategy is, to a large extent, structured around the identification and application of typologies and strategy configurations. Jackson and Schuler argue that employers select HR practices designed to channel employee behavior such that individual role performance is consistent with the HR system objectives. MacDuffie similarly argues HR strategies are manifested in bundles of interrelated and internally consistent HR practices, which may be empirically identified.
