This book recognizes that organizations do all they can to increase their chances for survival and growth, especially in changing and often tough economic times. The book shows how human resource development can help by being action-oriented and tailored to the organization's changing requirements. Close working relationships are needed between human resource professionals and corporate executives to ensure that employee development policies support the organization and that organizational initiatives take human resource considerations into account. The authors, who have considerable management and administrative experience in dynamic organizations, show how to establish and refine human resource policies and programs to meet the needs of changing organizations.

The book begins by examining directions for organizational change, including mergers, downsizing, restructuring, expansion to new markets, and using new technologies. Individual motivation is described as a way of understanding employees' career goals in relation to changing organizational opportunities. New roles for managers are outlined, including the roles of educator, developer, experimenter, and facilitator. The book then outlines human resource programs that facilitate organizational transformation. These include ways to create a comprehensive human performance system that ties together personnel selection, training, goal-setting, appraisal, feedback, and compensation. Recognizing the changing demographics of the workforce, programs for managing diversity are reviewed. The book concludes with ways to diagnose organizational needs and establish new human resource and training strategies that create a continuous learning environment. The book will be useful to human resource and training departments. Overall, the book offers guidelines for developing people--oneself and one's subordinates--in changing organizational environments.