ABSTRACT
The economic, political, and social landscape of Asia has been changing rapidly as scholars witness the continuous flow of multinational companies (MNCs) into and from Asian countries over the past few decades. This chapter overviews the dynamic intersection between MNCs and institutions. Following some influential works in strategic analysis of multinationals, MNC-based human resource management (HRM) research has explored how employment policies and practices can facilitate the allocation of resources, distribution of subsidiary roles, and coordination of knowledge transfer across countries. The Asian host countries have offered ample evidence of the diffusion of management practices brought by MNCs from more developed countries. MNCs from developed countries generate their competence by linking up managing people with gaining strategic resources, such as accessing local knowledge bases, as well as creating locally embedded expertise. As MNCs seek to look beyond the extension of home country management regimes, usefulness of the "country-of-origin" effect as a concept needs to be reassessed.
