Ready for globalisation? On developments in Danish firms to meet the challenges of globalisation – a dynamic resource perspective

Abstract

Globalisation has become a dominant concept in interpreting the future threats and possibilities of Danish firms and employees. The response to these challenges could be to strengthen the internal human and organisational resources. This is the fundamental idea in the so called resource based view of the firm. This article sets empirical focus on Danish firms and employees in a longitudinal resource based perspective. The research problem is to explore trends of resource building in the firms and among their employees on dimensions which can be considered important in a dynamic resource based perspective. The dimensions comprise competence developments, changes toward new organisational forms and employee involvement and participation in organisational developments. The foundation of the empirical analysis is four large surveys. The first of the surveys was launched in 1996 (Disko1), the second in 2001 (Disko2) the third in 2006 (Disko4) and the fourth in 2010 (GOPA). These four surveys have used a set of identical questions answered by the firms on the relevant issues. The empirical analysis shows that job demands important for competence development are increased over time for all employee groups in the firms. The growing demands are met by both formal vocational training an experience based learning related to the job demands. Competence development is defined as development of experience, skills, influence, possibilities and responsibilities, related to the job situation, tasks and context of the work situation. From this perspective there is a widespread consciousness among the firms of the importance of learning and competence development, but the empirical developments are somewhat ambiguous. Organisational changes are important in the dynamic resource based perspective and empirically almost 70% of the firms have implemented important organisational changes in the last period surveyed. Looking at the organisational forms implemented the trends are also here ambiguous. The last dimension shows a less ambiguous trend: employee involvement and participation in organisational development. Here, the trend of cooperation between management and employees is strengthened over time which can be an important resource for the firms in the global competitive environment.