Balancing Flexibility With Security in Organizations? Exploring the Links Between Flexicurity and Human Resource Development

Abstract

Recent scholarship in the Human Resource Development (HRD) field considered how practice might respond to contemporary issues facing organizations, such as the emergence of the knowledge economy, and the need for lifelong learning and organizational flexibility. A similar set of challenges have pre-occupied European policymakers, with a notable debate on how to increase flexibility in Europe. The article reviews the theoretical debate on flexibility, and the related policy of “Flexicurity” that aspires to balance flexibility with employment security at the national level. The article argues that the challenges that both nations and organizations face should not be seen as mutually exclusive. Instead, it suggests that labor policy and workplace practice can be mutually enhancing and calls for a research agenda on “organizational Flexicurity.” The article suggests that HRD scholars are best placed to advance such an agenda, as career development and learning lies at the heart of those issues.