ABSTRACT
The human resources function in a business enterprise focuses on a universal set of priorities. The imperatives of a hostile external environment require the human resources function to focus on the relevant issue of survival and the complexity of the decision-making hierarchy of the large corporation. Starting in the mid-1800s, the American industrial enterprise developed by exploiting production, organizational, and/or managerial technologies and leveraging these advantages progressively over a massive domestic market, relatively unchallenged by external competition. Large American corporations were sheltered from competition by their dominance of a large isolated market and the comparative advantage deriving from the dynamics of a favorable global business environment for over 100 years. The traditional human resources department is populated by technical specialists who have narrow expertise in the standard menu of the human resources spectrum—salary, benefit programs, career administration, and so on.
