Strategic Human Resources Management: A Review of the Literature and a Proposed Typology Cynthia A. Lengnick-Hall; Mark L. Lengnick-Hall The Academy of Management Review, Vol. 13, No. 3. (Jul., 1988), pp. 454-470.
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An accurate evaluation of costs a s well a s benefits is rarely presented by proponents of specific strategic human resource management practices. As a result, it is difficult to compare a p proaches. Further, it is difficult to evaluate strategic solutions to human resource problems or human resource solutions to strategic problems relative to the more traditional approach of using human resource management-based solutions to human resource problems a n d strategic solutions to deal with competitive threats. The computer industry provides a n example of using human resources to solve a strategic problem. One of the forces that increases competitive pressure in the computer industry is low

switching costs; in other words, customers face few prohibitive expenses or difficulties in changing from one manufacturer to another. In order to counter this, IBM has, for many years, taught programming skills to customers' employees (Schuler & MacMillan, 1984). As a result, loyalty a n d