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The article analyzes the challenges Slovak businesses and organizations are facing in relation to the Covid-19 pandemic and the resulting human resource management solutions they apply.

The authors present a part of their research conducted in six Central Eastern European (CEE) countries. Based on timely data, the article presents socioeconomic characteristics of Slovakia and the results of the research “HRM Challenges in Times of the Covid-19 Crisis” conducted among employers in Slovakia. The survey method encompassed 247 Slovakian organizations.

The year 2020 was an extraordinary one for businesses, governments, and individuals alike. According to the results of this research, Slovak organizations were not prepared for the Covid-19 crisis. Respondents who had a pandemic action plan at the time of the breakout were hardly found. Measures taken to preserve human health directly impacted the way how work is done and organized. This poses significant challenges for both employers and employees. In general, small organizations used cost and staff reduction tools. On the other hand, some of the respondents, mainly large organizations have been using future-oriented solutions, e.g. organizational development.

In this research the authors analyzed the experiences of a Central European country, namely Slovakia. However, the experiences gained and collected here can be useful in the international arena as well.

Based on empirical data, this study investigates the intention of BA/BSc students in higher education to either pursue their studies or start working.

This paper analyses how students' attitudes towards higher education and studying (quality of undergraduate education and performance in higher education), as well as the intention to meet labour market needs, influence the decision of pursuing studies in a Master's programme.

The main reason why respondents do not intend to pursue their studies is not because they do not want to work. It is primarily the acquisition of knowledge and the motivation to learn that encourages students to stay in higher education. Moreover, individual performance in Bachelor programmes has no influence on the decision made by students to study or work after graduation.

As for the limitations of the study, the authors have to mention that although the survey is based on data from a single country, the similarity of the international and Hungarian previous research results suggests that similar results would have been obtained in an international sample. Furthermore, the impact of the current ongoing epidemic on the further learning of young people in tertiary education at primary level could not be investigated by the authors.

The bivariate logistic regression results show that the correlation between secure job placement in a field of study and the quality of education is not significant. Furthermore, students are primarily motivated by the desire to learn and acquire knowledge. The reasons can therefore be explored based on the analysis of more detailed data, which could be the subject of a subsequent study.

The authors conducted their research in Hungarian higher education at seven universities between 2019 and 2020 to determine the influencing factors of career choice decisions, the degree of students' satisfaction with their selected course, their attitude towards higher education and learning, their job opportunities after graduation and the extent to which their decision is made according to their labour market orientation. Although the study relies on data from a single nation, the similarity between the findings of previous international (Hovdhaugen and Ulriksen, 2021; Sikyr et al., 2019); and Hungarian (Berezvai, 2022; Kiss and Varga, 2022) research suggests that an international sample would have produced similar results.

We explore the effects of three organizational variables (country of origin of the multinational company (MNC), the timing of entry into the European Union and the mode of establishment of the MNC subsidiary unit) on the human resource management (HRM) practices being pursued by subsidiaries of large MNCs operating in selected countries in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and the Former Soviet Union. Furthermore, we examine whether the degree of autonomy afforded to the subsidiary over its preferred HR recipes is related to overall local unit performance.

We profile the HRM practices of 379 foreign owned subsidiaries located in Bulgaria, Croatia, The Czech Republic, Kazakhstan, Poland, Hungary, Russia, Romania, Serbia and Slovakia. Using descriptive statistics, we present the general characteristics of the sample and we then use bivariate statistical analysis to test our hypotheses relating to the impact of different organizational factors on the HR practice mix implemented in the MNC subsidiaries covered in our survey.

We find a significant correlation between the annual training budget, the importance of knowledge flow from headquarters (HQs) to the subsidiary and the perceived criticality of training and development and whether the subsidiary is a greenfield site or an acquisition. A correlation was also found between the national timing of EU membership (older members, newer and then candidate countries and non-EU members) and three HR practice variables: the use of expatriates, external service providers and employee relations practices.

Our research calls attention to the issue of balancing the efficiencies of standardization with the local preferences and traditions of customization which results in more successful MNC control and ultimately higher levels of performance. It also calls attention to the challenges in pursuing research of this nature over time in the CEE region, especially given the dynamic nature of the MNC mix in each of the countries.

Our findings serve to reduce the information gap on foreign-owned companies in CEE and the Former Soviet Union.

Despite some 30 years of transition, there remains a paucity of empirical research on the HR practices of MNCs across a number of countries in the CEE region. For a decade and a half, the CEEIRT group[1] has been systematically gathering empirical evidence. The combination of the breadth (10 countries) and depth (numerous items related to MNC subsidiary relationships with corporate HQs and patterns of HR practices and roles) characterizing the ongoing research effort of the CEEIRT collaboration serves as a mechanism for augmenting the empirical base on HRM in the region.

The outbreak of the COVID-19 virus has been declared a public health emergency which has caused unexpected and enormous changes all over the world. Everywhere, as well as in Hungary, it has led to disease control measures being put in place, including strict lockdown restrictions, which have affected people's daily activities and routines (DPMK, 2020). The partial or regular closure of educational institutions have been administered, resulting in a shift to online education. It has been extremely difficult for the population to handle this new situation and the emerging challenges, not to mention certain social minority groups such as people with cognitive disabilities, for whom and for whose families the current situation has implicated an even bigger burden. The aim of this chapter is to investigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic induced lockdown on children with cognitive disabilities through the point of view of their parents and of the special needs educators/teachers in Hungary. The lockdown measures have affected the perspective of parents and special needs educators/teachers of children with cognitive disabilities with regards to the access and the quality of education for disabled people.