Global Consistency Versus Local Responsiveness: Deutsche Telekom's Human Resource Management Strategies in Central and Eastern Europe

• Published in: Journal of East-West business 2010-01, Vol.16 (1), p.45-66
• Main Authors: Ross, Peter K., Büchner, Lutz Michael
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Central Eastern Europe; Eastern Europe; Economic history; Germany; Human resource management; Human resources; institutional path dependency; international industrial relations; Labor relations; Management techniques; Multinational corporations; Multinational enterprises; Personnel management; Post-communist societies; strategic international employment relations; strategic international human resource management; Strategic management; Studies; Subsidiary; Telecommunications; Telecommunications industry
• ISSN: 1066-9868; 1528-6959
• DOI: 10.1080/10669860903558268

This article analyses the competing demands faced by Deutsche Telekom for global consistency and local responsiveness as it attempted to coordinate its human resource management strategies across its Eastern European subsidiaries. It considers the degree to which the former economic and political histories of Eastern Europe continue to influence and/or constrain multinational corporation strategies and practices in the post-2000 era. Institutional path dependency, strategic international human resource management, and international industrial relations theories are used to assist in analyzing the data. The study concludes that managerial constraints associated with the historical and economic legacies of these former socialist countries are rapidly declining, thereby allowing multinational firms to implement "Western-style" human resource management strategies. It further suggests that industrial relations institutions at the European Union level, rather than individual country level, have the greatest potential to impact on international human resource management strategies in the region. Multinational corporations should therefore engage in more-integrated strategic international human resource management and international industrial relations approaches.