ABSTRACT

Whereas the previous chapter was intended to give the software engineer some knowledge of employee relations in the wider economy, attention will now be directed at software workers and their management. The theme is the importance of hum an resource management in software development and production. Criticism that the term does not accurately reflect prevailing reality has already been noted. For present purposes, this is beside the point. We might as well accept that, in the broadest sense, human resource management is a managerial crusade that, with difficulty, might be chal­ lenged on the grounds that it equates profitability or value for money with social desirability. The prescriptive and procedural elements of human resource management do, nevertheless, provide a model framework for the development of sound management practices. T hat is to say, whatever might be the reality of management practices in industries that are competing by redundancy and rationalization, its ostensible emphasis on the management of people, staff training and development, a strategic approach and the notion of the “learning organization” do suggest that hum an resource m an­ agement is particularly appropriate for software work. To what extent this is so is the main theme of this chapter.