Internationalising HRM Framework for SMEs: Transcending High-Performance Organisation Theory’s Economic Utilitarianism Towards Humanism

Previous Business and Management studies’ decades-long focus on an economic utilitarian approach has neglected human-centric issues such as staff and management resilience building and socio-cultural competence capacity in addressing SMEs’ performance-related challenges during internationalisation. Such prolonged omission in the debates has partially led to the wrong measures being adopted and SMEs’ unsustainability when they trade across borders. By critiquing and applying High-Performance Organisation Theory’s characteristics of management planning, commitment, productivity, compliance and collaboration onto SMEs’ internationalisation, this chapter highlights the dual theory-practice gap of people-centric and economic barriers which have contributed to the fundamental management and staff performance challenges faced by SMEs. To contribute to both the SME internationalisation literature and resolve this gap, this chapter proposes an ‘Internationalising HRM’ framework consisting of four interdependent cardinal principles which highlight four aspects that are crucial in resolving SMEs’ internationalisation challenges, namely competency, R & TD, social and resilience capacity. Each of these aspects highlights what the economic utilitarian approach of HPO Theory has missed over the years and develops a framework that can help SMEs’ managers and decision-makers to address both the economic and human elements that are vital for a more sustainable SMEs’ internationalisation. The chapter also contributes to facilitating a more resilient SME internationalisation culture as it shifts the focus from economics to people given the increasing need for smaller firms’ member to develop sustainable resilience to perform in the longer term. This perspective is new and should be included in international HRM, Strategic HRM and SMEs’ entrepreneurship. Implications of the study’s findings, its framework and future research areas are highlighted.