ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book demonstrates the manner in which the size of the organisation influences the effort-wage bargain. It analyses the manner in which human resource management theory and practice has been explored in relation to smaller organisations. The book then reviews in more depth the degree to which labour management in small firms has been incorporated into the time series dates captured by the Workplace Industrial Relations survey. It also reveals the growing integration of small firm labour management research into the mainstream debate and it is noted that the first WERs study to be published in the twenty-first century will have again broadened this particular analysis. The book develops an analysis of the labour regulation debate and the degree to which blanket policy imposition, presuming a degree of homogeneity across the economy with a fixed notion of universal best practice, can be effective.
