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Among the highlights in section two on career planning and recruitment are: an article outlining the dual‐career ladders scheme operated by BP Exploration; a look at the role of interim managers or “executive temps”; and advice on a systematic approach to effective recruitment.

Institutional structures of professional career paths often support breadwinner–homemaker families, with a stay at home wife available full time to support the professional (and children), so the professional can devote complete energy and time to developing a career. This research examines how two partners in the same narrowly structured, fast track occupational culture such as those occurring for dual military officer couples shape how women and men negotiate decision making and life events. Data from interviews with 23 dual U.S. Navy officer couples build upon Becker and Moen’s (1999) scaling back notions. With both spouses in these careers, placing limits on work is extremely difficult due to fast track cultures that demand higher status choices and structures that formally do not reliably consider collocations. Trading off occurs, but with distress due to the unique demands on two partners in the fast track culture, which means career death for some. Two partners in fast track careers may not yet have given up on two careers as many peers may have, but they lose a great deal, including time together and their desired number of children. But they ultimately posit individual choice rather than focusing on structural change. The pressured family life resulting is likely similar to that for partners in other narrowly structured, fast track cultures such as in law firms and academia.

Reviews and integrates UK and North American research on job relocation relating to managerial and professional employees. Notes evidence which indicates an increasing level of reluctance by such employees to relocate for job reasons. Examines barriers to domestic relocation, including those related to financial and personal reasons, and organisational interventions designed to overcome them. Recognises that traditional forms of organisational intervention to alleviate barriers to relocation may be becoming less effective despite careful targeting. Analyses research data from the UK local authority sector to explore the effectiveness of organisational interventions to overcome barriers to relocation. Uses force field theory to evaluate the relationship between these barriers and organisational interventions in relation to organisations in general and UK local authorities in particular. Draws conclusions about the nature and use of organisational interventions to overcome barriers to domestic relocation, and discusses the applicability of the findings drawn from the UK local authorities research data.

The purpose of this paper to examine the responses that international HRM needs to make to the challenges it faces with increasing responsibilities in the globalised environment. It covers the key areas of recruitment, selection, training and retention and uses examples from the author's involvement in working with a major multinational in the recruitment of potential international managers.

Analysis of the concerns expressed about an international career and the coping strategies offered by employers.

The paper highlights the paramount aim of international companies to reduce failure on assignment overseas and maintain retention on return to the home country.

Analysis and review of current trends to meet challenges facing international HRM.

The increased competition to recruit potential high quality international managers, to prepare them for overseas assignments to ensure successful appointments and to plan their repatriation and retention.

Emphasises with real-life examples the key challenges and analyses what is being done to meet them.

It is now well recognised by academic and organisational practitioners that the effective management of job changes and relocations will be among the most important tasks facing Human Resource Managers in the 1990s. To cope with the challenges of the 1990s many organisations will have to retain effective, committed, flexible and mobile managerial workforces. Hence, companies, personnel managers and individual employees can all benefit from a clearer understanding of the personal dynamics and outcomes of job changes and mobility. Also, whilst a number of guides to the legal and financial aspects of relocation are now available, none has systematically addressed the personal problems faced by employees, their families and other dependants. Hence, the focus is upon the personal and familial aspects of these dual transitions. The aim is to provide an understanding of the main issues and themes surrounding job changes and the personal side of relocation and provide detailed guides on “good practice” for employers, personnel managers, employees and their dependants.

In recent years separate bodies of literature on vacancy notification and employee mobility have evolved for Migration and Human Resource Management specialisms. Whilst the foci of these investigations have had much in common, examination of the literature suggests that many authors appear to have limited knowledge of the work undertaken outside their specialism. Concentrates on those two aspects of the recruitment process where integration of the literature is likely to be of most benefit: vacancy notification and subsequent employee mobility. Compares and contrasts the specialisms′ approaches to examining the recruitment process and highlights a series of issues where knowledge and understanding of how these aspects of the labour market operate is limited. These include the use of information channels, the impact of labour market factors on employee mobility and the ability of incentives to overcome employee inertia.

The purpose of this study is to examine justice perceptions using potential employee conflict over provision of a work‐life benefit, and to link the findings to existing theory and research in organizational justice.

A total of 208 undergraduates at a liberal arts college responded to a version of the scenario. There were six versions, representing varied organizational conditions, with hypotheses based on both theory and previous empirical work.

Students were asked whether they preferred equity (contribution), equality or need as the allocation norm to be used in the scenario. Under all organizational conditions, equity is favored over the other two norms, but some differences emerge. Organizational conditions that are less empowering and more stressful lead to higher preference for equality and need than when organizations are seen as treating employees well. In contrast with some earlier findings, women are more likely than men to prefer equity as the basis for the decision; but women's choices differ significantly between the long hours and family‐friendly scenarios, with a pronounced shift to need as the allocation norm in the long hours condition.

Although some researchers have examined organizational justice norms in relation to work‐life benefits, little attention has been shown to the mechanisms involved in creating perceptions of unfairness relative to these benefits. The study demonstrates the importance of organizational context in determining when these benefits may be perceived as being fair, thereby averting the potential for conflict between employees.