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This research aims to answer the call for more empirical research on identity theory by exploring the role and impact of human resource management (HRM) policy, and the gap between HRM policy and practice, on organizations and their employees. It looks at the role that soft policy plays in obscuring hard practice and considers the impact of unions and HRM role on policy.

This study uses survey data collected from the senior members of the HRM function in 189 large Australian organisations.

The research found a gap between policy and practice with soft policy being used more often than soft practice. It found that a gap between policy and practice has a negative impact on outcomes. Strategic HRM (SHRM) positively impacts on the implementation of soft practices reducing the gap between policy and practice and impoverished HRM that lacks resources, power and time, has a larger gap between policy and practice. Unions did not improve outcomes by minimizing the gap between policy and practice.

This paper used survey data from HRM managers, who whilst being the best single source of information, may have distorted their responses. Further research is required to confirm these results using several data sources.

Managers and HR functions should increase both soft policy and soft practice and ensure there is no gap between policy and practice. To achieve this, organizations should ensure that the HRM function is both strategic and effectively resourced.

This research makes a theoretical and empirical contribution to debates on the role that HRM rhetoric plays in organizations. It also adds value to SHRM research and practice.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between unions, employee relations and the adoption of high performance work practices (HPWP). Design/methodology/approach – This study uses survey data collected from the senior members of the human resource management (HRM) function in 189 large Australian organisations. Findings – It was found that unions, when coupled with good employee relations, facilitate the adoption of HPWP and consequently have a positive impact on organisational competitiveness, contradicting the simplistic notion that unions are “bad for business”. Research limitations/implications – This study used cross‐sectional survey data from HRM managers, who while being the best single source of information, may have distorted their responses. Further research is required to confirm these results using several data sources collected from a larger sample over more than one time period. Practical implications – This research has implications for Government and organisation approaches to union presence and management in organisations. Social implications – This research contributes to HRM and organisational competitiveness, which has implications for GDP. Originality/value – This paper contributes to the debate on whether the individual and direct voice provided by HPWP is a substitute for union collective voice, with the associated implication that unions are unnecessary and even destructive to organisation competitive advantage.

The purpose of this paper is to highlight the significance of student‐led initiatives in PhD development.

A case study is presented utilizing Kolb's model of learning from experience to identify with student‐led research training within the PhD process.

The experiential role of the student in the development of their personal doctoral training and the resultant social interactions thereof, remain as important as the more structured supervisor‐student relationship and other forms of doctoral training within the PhD research process.

This paper contributes new insights into the process of how PhD students can become more empowered by the process of “doing” a PhD, rather than being confined to their own specific discipline, whilst offering future recommendations for students embarking upon PhD research.

This chapter examines disability rights movement's rejection of a right to physician-assisted suicide (PAS). Supporters of PAS frame the right to enlist a physician's help in determining the nature and timing of one's death as a fundamental liberty interest and as a right to privacy. The disability opposition counters this with disparate impact and slippery slope arguments and stories of disability pride as a rhetorical rejection of a right it deems dangerous and discriminatory. In examining this clash of rights talk, this chapter analyzes the legal and political consequences of anti-rights rhetoric by a movement that is grounded in notions of autonomy and self-determination.

This article presents an application of survey non-response theory to a specific population with disabilities. From 1994 to 1997 the U.S. National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) did a special, two-phase study of disability. This survey format allowed for response patterns of the disabled population to be operationalized into contact, cooperation and proxy/assisted versus self-response categories. Using these data, the authors investigated the effects of severity of activity limitation at first interview on response patterns at second interview, with statistical controls for other characteristics related to the response outcome. The statistical results of the study show that respondents with moderate or severe activity limitation are more likely than those with mild activity limitation to be contacted and to cooperate, yielding higher response rates. However, respondents with a higher degree of activity limitation are also more likely to have proxy/assisted responses at re-interview. Barriers to self-response in household surveys are discussed in the concluding remarks.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce the Special Issue developed from a joint research seminar of the Gender in Management and Identity Special Interest Groups of the British Academy of Management, entitled “Exploring the Intersectionality of Gender and Identity”. It also presents an introductory literature review of intersectionality for gender in management and identity/identity work researchers. The authors highlight the similarities and differences of intersectionality and identity approaches and introduce critiques of intersectional research. They then introduce the three papers in this Special Issue.

The authors review the intersectionality literature within and outside management and organisation studies and focus their attention on three intersectionality Special Issues (Sex Roles, 2008, 2013 and the European Journal of Women’s Studies, 2006).

The authors outline the ongoing debates relating to intersectionality research, including a framework and/or theory for identity/identity work, and explore the shared tenets of theories of intersectionality and identity. They highlight critiques of intersectionality research in practice and consider areas for future research for gender in management and identity researchers.

The authors provide an architecture for researchers to explore intersectionality and to consider issues before embarking on intersectional research. They also highlight areas for future research, including social-identities of disability, class and religion.

Gender in Management: An International Journal invited this Special Issue to make a significant contribution to an under-researched area by reviewing the shared and different languages and importantly the shared key tenets, of intersectionality, gender, identity and identity work from a multidisciplinary perspective.