Technological progress, organizational change and the size of the Human Resources Department

provided by Research Papers in Economics

Technological Progress, Organizational Change
and the Size of the Human Resources Department*

Raouf Boucekkine∣ Patricia Crifo+and Claudio Mattalia§

June 2008

Abstract

Innovative workplace practices based on multi-tasking and ICT that have
been diffusing in most OECD countries since the 1990s have strong conse-
quences on working conditions. Available data show together with the emer-
gence of new organizational forms like multi-tasking, the increase in the pro-
portion of workers employed in managerial occupation and the increase in
skill requirements. This paper proposes a theoretical model to analyze the
optimal number of tasks per worker when switching to multi-tasking raises
coordination costs between workers and between tasks. Firms can reduce
coordination costs by assigning more workers to human resources manage-
ment. Human capital is endogenously accumulated by workers. The model
reproduces pretty well the regularities observed in the data. In particular, ex-
ogenous technological accelerations tend to increase both the number of tasks
performed and the skill requirements, and to raise the fraction of workers de-
voted to management.

Keywords: Information Technology, Organizational Change, Human Cap-
ital, Multi-Tasking.

Journal of Economic Literature: J22, J24, L23, O33, C62.

*We are grateful to Jean-Bernard Chatelain, David de la Croix and seminar participants at
Louvain-la-Neuve for stimulating suggestions. We acknowledge the financial support of the Bel-
gian French speaking community (Grant ARC 03/08-302) and of the Belgian Federal Government
(Grant PAI P5/10)).

^Department of economics and CORE, Catholic University of Louvain, and University of Glas-
gow. [email protected].

⁺Ecole Polytechnique, UHA and IRES, Catholic University of Louvain. Patri-
[email protected].

^§ Dipartimento di Statistica e Matematica Applicata “Diego de Castro”, University of Torino
and IRES, Catholic University of Louvain. [email protected].

1   2   3   4   >>

More intriguing information