Responding to Change in the Work Force and the Economy: The Challenge for Personnel Executives

Abstract

These quotations seem somehow to summarise the condition in which personnel management finds itself today. On the one hand, there is the alienation of work and the alienation of workers. On the other hand, we have the employee who has read Maslow, but has so far failed to achieve her self-actualisation. With his focus on eight hours, one assumes that William Faulkner knew nothing of shorter working weeks, flexible working hours, part-time work, job sharing and the like. At times, I suspect we would prefer not to have heard of them either. In contrast to the great American author, the modern American editor expects work to provide her with life experience, as well as an income. This paper is about such dilemmas which personnel executives must face.