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This work examines the intersection between traditional human resource management and the novel employment arrangements of the expanding gig economy. While there is a substantial multidisciplinary literature on the digital platform labor phenomenon, it has been largely centered on the experiences of gig workers. As digital labor platforms continue to grow and specialize, more managers, executives, and human resource practitioners will need to make decisions about whether and how to utilize gig workers. Here the authors explore and interrogate the unique features of human resource management (HRM) activities in the context of digital labor platforms. The authors discuss challenges and opportunities regarding (1) HRM in organizations that outsource labor needs to external labor platforms, (2) HRM functions within digital labor platform firms, and (3) HRM policies and practices for organizations that develop their own spin-off digital labor platform. To foster a more nuanced understanding of work in the gig economy, the authors identify common themes across these contexts, highlight knowledge gaps, offer recommendations for future research, and outline pathways for collecting empirical data on HRM in the gig economy.

This study examines the effects of incentive compensation and guanxi, a type of informal personal relationship between people, on the objectivity of Chinese internal auditors. Given that the objectivity of internal auditors is essential for promoting financial reporting quality, it is important to investigate the effectiveness of internal audit functions, especially in emerging markets where the corporate governance mechanisms designed to promote objectivity are less mature.

The research employs a 2 × 2 between participants experiment with 116 graduate accounting student participants.

After controlling for internal auditors’ ethicality, we find that close-guanxi between management and internal auditors and incentive compensation in the form of bonuses based upon meeting earnings targets both have the capacity to impair the objectivity of Chinese internal auditors. Participants were more tolerant of management’s attempts to manage earnings when there was close guanxi or bonus compensation. Further, compensation structure only influenced internal auditors’ support of management when guanxi was distant, but when there was close guanxi between internal auditors and management, internal auditors were unlikely to challenge management regardless of the compensation structure.

This chapter draws together the main themes and conclusions from the book to provide an interdisciplinary analysis of the impacts of the gig economy. The effectiveness of the dynamic structural model of the gig economy for structuring and understanding of this heterogenous and somewhat hidden economy is also addressed. This chapter identifies the primary locations in which boundaries are shifting and suggests the onward impact of this, as well as ways in which organisations may be able to ameliorate the effects. It focusses in particular on the implications for the human resource management community and key stakeholders in the wider economy, in relation to future of work debates. Reflections on the utility, benefits and opportunities for interdisciplinary research within the current constrain of journal rankings and higher education performance regimes are also explored. Finally, a number of potential avenues for further research to advance our understanding of, and engagement with this form of commerce, are identified.

In the previous chapters, we discussed the gig economy, knowledge economy, and its characteristics of each. The concept of knowledge workers is discussed in detail and their role in the knowledge economy and in creating knowledge. This chapter will explain how the knowledge economy and gig economy are connected and how the concept of knowledge workers and professional gig workers are connected. We will differentiate skilled gig workers from low-skilled workers and their role in economic development and productivity. Furthermore, we will explain their involvement in the organisation and how they can manage them and utilise their knowledge to increase productivity. The end of this chapter will discuss the platform economy concept and explain the platform economy's aspects in detail. This chapter emphasises how working globally is facilitated by digital transformation and IT infrastructure and how managing the professional workforce will create the opportunity to connect to a variety of job demands, particularly from developed countries.

This chapter considers how observers can effectively and safely engage with unethical organizational behaviors. Engagement methods need to be aligned with the situational contexts of specific cases. Micro-level individual, meso-level organizational, and macro-level environmental contextual obstacles to effective and safe engagement are considered. Five types of observer ethics engagement methods are considered in the context of specific cases and contextual obstacles. Engagement methods considered are as follows: (1) evocation and framing of dialogic engagement as consistent with the identity, vision, and values of the organization; (2) win–win incentive and ethics networking methods; (3) internal and external whistle-blowing methods; (4) if the observer is in a position of organizational power, top-down forcing methods; and (5) linking of observed unethical behaviors with strong external social movements.

Purpose – To critically examine various ethical decision making models and use them to arrive at five hypotheses to understand the methods used by small and medium enterprise (SME) owner-managers in Australia when faced with ethical issues or dilemmas.Design/methodology/approach – This analysis involves literature reviews of rational decision making process, alternative methods of decision making and various ethical decision making models including Rest’s four-component model to arrive at the five hypotheses.Findings – The five hypotheses contend that SME owner-managers tend to resolve ethical issues using methods similar to Rest’s four-component model. Some may utilise all four components while others may skip one or more components of the model. Others may engage in intuition and heuristic methods of decision making. Ethical decisions by SME managers may be influenced by factors such as organisational factors, moral exemplars and reflection. The final hypothesis contends that SME managers could consider using the Balanced Scorecard as an instrument to monitor and manage business ethical issues.Research limitations – The literature reviews are not exhaustive but provide sufficient information for the purposes of this chapter.Practical implications – The significance of this study is that the hypotheses can be used to conduct interviews with SME managers and findings from the interviews could be developed into a practical tool for practising managers and a standard or guidelines for managing ethical issues in an SME.Originality/value – This chapter fulfils the need to understand the ethical decision making process and methods used by practicing SME managers in Australia.

Purpose — The purpose of this chapter is to outline the findings of research into knowledge transfer across countries and culture and the implications of the findings for human resource practitioners.

Methodology/approach — Use of a qualitative case study methodology approach was employed.

Findings — The findings highlight the inherent difficulty of knowledge transfer and the broad range of factors that influence the knowledge transfer process and which are connected together in a complex and non-linear manner.

Research implications — The research revealed insight into those managers most likely to be effective at knowledge transfer and what characteristics and experiences had supported this openness to knowledge from outside of their cultural context. The lessons from the research can be incorporated into the selection and development processes for expatriates.

Originality value — The study affirmed the critical importance of face-to-face interaction in knowledge transfer. The research also resulted in the development of a practical model and tool, which pulls together the broad range of factors that impact on knowledge transfer.

In this chapter, the author examines benevolent sexism as a form of performative kindness. Taking a feminist polemical approach, the author illustrates how being a ‘good girl’ requires submitting to occupy a subject position that attracts benevolent sexism. Benevolent sexism focusses on gendered discourses, such as what women wear and how they act, and it can be mistakenly construed as kind or flattering attention. Such gendered discourses are designed to keep women compliant and conforming to gendered roles, while limiting their voice and agency. A case study is presented which draws on biographical and popular press resources to illustrate how three highly placed American female political leaders, Francis Perkins, Federal Labor Secretary (1933–1945), Hillary Clinton, Secretary of State (2009–2013), and Kamala Harris, Vice President (2021–current), contend with sexism and public interest in their mode of dress and role as mothers. The author demonstrates how these women are punished with hostile sexism, historically and contemporarily, requiring them to tenuously negotiate between accepting benevolent sexism to avoid hostile sexism.

We provide a review of the research in this volume and suggest avenues for future research.

Review of the research in this volume and unstructured interviews with health care executives.

We identified the three central themes: (1) trust in leadership, (2) leading by example, and (3) multi-level leadership. For each of these themes, we highlight the shared concerns and findings, and provide commentary about the contribution to the literature on leadership.

While relation-oriented leadership is important in health care, there is a danger of too much emphasis on relations in an already caring profession. Moreover, in most health care organizations, leadership is distributed and scholars need to adopt the appropriate methods to investigate these multi-level phenomena.

In health care organizations, hands-on leadership, through role modeling, may be necessary to promote change. However, practicing what you preach is not as easy as it may seem.

We provide a framework for understanding current research on leadership in health care organizations.