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Introduction

Background Information

The Abu Dhabi government established the Masdar Institute as an independent and non-profit research-driven graduate university in 2007. The entity is dedicated to the provision of higher education and research in advanced energy and sustainable technologies. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), through partnership initiatives, plays an integral role in the development of the curriculum. Presently, the university operates in collaboration with MIT to develop research and development (R&D) capacity in Abu Dhabi. According to Anderson (2013), the capacity building is meant to address a number of issues that are of importance to the UAE and the region.

The Masdar Institute is situated in Abu Dhabi, which is the capital of the United Arab Emirates. The institution plays a key role in the UAEs economic diversification. The diversification is realised through the development of a highly skilled human and intellectual capital. The institution intends to be a leader in industry collaboration efforts. Consequently, the university plays a key role in transforming the UAE into a knowledge based economy.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology has played an important role in the establishment and development of the institute. According to Arthur and Boyles (2007, p. 87), the two universities have established partnerships on matters touching on research and curriculum development. Other areas of collaboration include student and staff recruitment initiatives. Upon completion of a degree, graduates from Masdar receive certification from the two partnering institutions.

The joint research initiatives are executed through direct one-to-one projects. For instance, the development of the institutions Doctoral of Philosophy in Interdisciplinary Engineering program was based on the MIT curriculum. To this end, faculty members from MIT are selected to sit on the institutions Research Supervisory Committee. The committee is tasked with the responsibility of assessing Ph.D. students (Arthur & Boyles 2007). The committee also selects a number of Masdar Institute Ph.D. students for an exchange program with MIT.

The University serves as source of innovation and human capital for the region providing qualified students with the opportunity to pursue graduate studies and research in critical areas such as renewable energy, sustainability, environment, water resources, engineering systems and management, advanced materials, among others. The organisation focuses on complex real-world problems that require a multidisciplinary approach for the development of solutions from an integrated technology, systems and policy perspective.

The Institute was officially opened on September 2009 and the first intake of students consisted of 89 students from an initial 1152 application. Presently, the institution is involved with more than 300 research initiatives. For instance, the Solar Beam Down, Innovation Ecosystems and Smart Grids projects are some of the two major research initiatives. Other research ventures include the famous Aviation Biofuels and Carbon Capture & Storage.

One patent has been issued so far, while over 20 applications are pending. In addition, it is noted that 20 invention disclosures are outstanding. Research partnerships have been setup with major multi-national companies like Boeing, IRENA and Toyota Motor Corporation. The institutes fellowship partners include Imperial College London (UK), RWTH Aachen University (Germany), Tokyo Institute of Technology (Japan), University of Waterloo (Canada), the University of Central Florida (USA), International Renewable Energy Company (IRENA), Toyota Motor Corporation, Siemens, ICT Fund, and others.

Overview of the Chapter

The discussion in this chapter is meant to provide a foundation for the entire study. To this end, a background into the institution is provided. Details relating to the history and current status of the institution are also presented. The chapter illustrates the objectives of this research undertaking. To this end, the thesis statement is presented based on the problems at the institution. The ultimate purpose of this research proposal is to assess the cause and effect of lack of integration and misalignment of the HR Strategy in the institution.

Current Scenario

Status of the organisation in terms of the business cycle

When one refers to the Sisson and Storeys business life cycle model, it appears that the organisation is currently moving from the start-up phase towards the growth stage (Budhawar & Boyne 2004). The number of faculty members is steadily increasing in the institution. The same applies to the number of research staff and students. Moreover, the organisations research partnerships and collaborations have expanded tremendously.

Looking at the overall organisation, one realises that there are three major components that make up its structure. The three are Faculty, Research, and the Administration (Chand & Katou 2007). There is an expansion of the Master and Interdisciplinary PhD program, as well as the increase in number of students. There is a substantial rise in the number of faculty members that are needed to deliver them. Moreover, the organisation is becoming popular locally, regionally, and internationally. There is increased level of awareness regarding the existing and ongoing projects and accomplishments. As a result, many organisations are partnering and collaborating with the entity in the form of new research projects. From Honeywell to Boeing, Emaal, and ADNOC, the number of research projects that are focused on sustainability has tremendously increased. A similar increase is seen in the number of research staff.

When it comes to the administrative employees, a look at the manpower shows that it has been decreasing due to high turnover and general dissatisfaction. The administrative staff members are considered a critical support aspect for the faculty and research divisions of the organisation. Due to this high turnover, the progress of the administrative functions to a growth phase is not as fast as the organisation requires. Administrative functions are understaffed and room for improvement and strategic partnership is not as strong as it should be (Chang & Katou 2007).

Status of the organisation in terms of the life cycle model

An analysis of the Life Cycle Model by Porter makes is it apparent that the organisation has since its inception been working towards the innovation strategy. The move is necessitated by the unique industry and the entitys line of work. Innovation was deemed a major competency that was a pillar of the organisations framework. With this strategy in mind, the organisations size remained rather small and the growth in manpower was not visible. The development led to increased workload, which was handled by the existing staff members. It caused stress and demotivation in the workforce. Looking into the administrative functions, innovation strategy is not very visible in terms of its translation into organisational practices, which in turn does not provide the necessary support for the other areas of the Institute.

The various factors of Rosemary Harrisons model are apparent in the organisations strategic aspect. In this regard, one should consider seven main steps, including:

1. HR strategic management definition
2. Developing a strategic method to develop human resources
3. Determining HR management mission
4. Respect to culture, structure and HR management,
5. Setting HR management aims
6. An integrative attitude toward HR strategic management
7. A decision on when we need HR strategic management (Chan, Shaffer & Snape 2004).

For the purpose of this research, parts of the above points, such as defining HR strategic management, HR mission, and the strategic approach, are researched and analysed in chapters 3 and 4. The impact of the respect to culture, or lack thereof, and HR management is evident from the interviews conducted. The findings address the challenges and obstacles that are in the organisation.

In addition, the institution is required to factor in the fact that it is an emerging stage. The implication is that which means that its experiencing heavy growth and the HR strategy should support it by putting in place certain practices. The table below shows the proposed practices versus the current scenario of the institution.

Table 1: Comparison between the best practices and the current practice.

Putting the HR department into perspective

In order to put the HR Department into perspective, it falls under the Office for Operations and Finance. The main role of the Office for Operations and Finance is to provide a wide range of services for staff, faculty and students to support the Institutes mission. It manages all fiscal and operational services for student Campus/Housing and financial services/activities including budgeting along with information technology, human resources and business services and procurement (Chang & Huang 2005).

The office also exerts presidential leadership at every level of the institution by negotiating, directing and facilitating substantive progress toward the achievement of Institute-wide goals. It does this by:

1. Providing primary support to Institute leadership in identifying, obtaining and allocating the resources needed to achieve the Institutes mission and the goals and objectives of the Institutes strategic plan
2. Developing and maintaining active relationships with Institutes units, MIT, industry and academic circles to ensure a positive and effective working environment for the Institute
3. Providing oversight to the Institutes accounting processes, including financial relationships with ADFEC and regulatory relationships with the Department of Finance and Abu Dhabi government
4. Interfacing between the Presidents Office and Institute departments to facilitate and act on financial and operational actions
5. Preparing and managing the budget of the Institute
6. Developing and coordinating the Institutes human resources strategy
7. Promoting cooperation and dialogue among staff at all levels of Institute to accomplish the goals of the Institute and its component parts
8. Facilitating an atmosphere of partnership and entrepreneurship between and among all organisational elements of the Institute and between the Institute and other entities in such critical areas as education, business and government
9. Developing outstanding procedures and policies to safeguard Institute resources.

In 2013, the institute moved to its new campus and has been working to equip, testing, and commissioning its sophisticated labs. Due to the rapid growth of the Institute and lack of space, numerous space optimisation exercises have been conducted maximise the space for 28 to 62 faculty members which is not an ideal situation for a research intensive institution. Despite the economic impact of 2008, continuous resource optimisation exercises and cost-cutting initiatives have helped to avoid a major financial impact on research development due to the unforeseen financial difficulties (Truss 2003).

In such a fast growing environment, the VP Office engaged a Business Performance function that is responsible for facilitating business processes, functions and organisation design. This function operates from The VP Office and its focuses primarily on business requirements, workflow and leveraging technology to enable or alter business processes or practices. It identifies the institutional requirements for human resource, technical and financial support necessary to ensure the consistency of all elements of the institutional structure and layers (Truss 2003).

Analysis of the current business environment is needed to detect critical deficiencies and recommend solutions for improvement and also lead analysis of the technology industry and market trends to determine their potential impact on the Institute. The Institute needs to apply new technology to, and reuse existing technology for, business processes. The objective is to perform research and provide information on technical trends and report the major functions within the division. Such analysis will provide strategic solutions for designing business processes, functions and organisational structures, as well as research, identify and internally market enabling technologies based on the Institute requirements (Wan, Kok & Ong 2002).

It will assess near-term needs, using structured interview processes, to establish business priorities; consulting with technical subject matter experts and develop alternative technical solutions and advising on options, risks, costs vs. benefits and impacts on other business processes and system priorities. Due to the success of the its role in the EU-GCC Clean Energy Network, the Institute is looking into the possibility of building a legal entity that represents the GCC partners (Wan et al. 2002). The idea has been seconded by the Energy Team of the GCC Secretariat to be financially supported by the GCC. In addition, a research funding mechanism would be introduced to support the objectives of the GCCs agenda in the clean energy sector.

Strategic model for the operations and finance division

Recently, the institute developed and began to adopt an excellence strategy that has been development by the Office of the VP. The excellence model is to be cascaded to all the support functions under that office. The purpose of this model is to maximise operational excellence through optimisation of:

• Systems: It looks into putting in place more effective Automated Systems to support the Divisions and Departments.
• Standards: It deals with defining, developing and implementing policy, procedures and processes.
• Structure: It defines roles and responsibilities with focus on knowledge development and transfer to local workforce.
• Controls: It can be achieved by tightening budgetary and procurement controls
• Compliance: It includes developing, implementing and monitoring a quality frame work which incorporates local and international practices.

Translation of the Strategic Model in to Initiatives

Table 2: Administration strategy of excellence model.

The role of the HR department

The Human Resources Department is established to support the mission of the Institute to be a top educational and research institution by providing leadership that assures efficient and effective management of the Institutes human resources. The HR provides advisory and consulting services to all members of senior management, line managers and unit heads as well as employees on all the HR-related services. Most of the HR functions are centralised within the HR Department and little HR responsibilities are delegated to the line managers. A small number of HR tasks, such as faculty recruitment and faculty performance management, are handled by the Deans Office with the support of the HR Departments (Ulrich & Brockbank 2005).

Moreover, Research staff recruitment is the responsibility of the Faculty member. Based on their budget and the research project needs, faculty members source, interview and select the Research staff that are needed to accomplish their project. The HR Department is responsible for the on boarding and the employee affairs aspect of their employment.

The HR mission and vision

The mission and vision of the Human Resources (HR) Department is to engage in best practice human resource management to provide excellent services, innovative solutions and visionary leadership in support of excellence for the Institutes educational mission. The Institutes mission is in keeping with the ideals of the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, founding father of the UAE, who believed strongly in responsible conservation, sustainable development and the importance of education. He believed that the real asset of any nation is its people. He especially believed on the importance of educating the human resource. To this end, he argued that the success of an individual should be determined by their level of education (Sheehan 2005).

Only by developing its human capital will Abu Dhabi achieve its long-term environmental and economic sustainability goals. The Institute is serving both these objectives by providing Abu Dhabi and the UAE with highly talented individuals and cutting-edge, world-class research in the field of renewable energy and sustainability.

The HR services

The HR Department aims to provide value-added services to management, faculty and staff in the following areas:

1. workforce planning
2. recruitment and retention
3. induction
4. performance management
5. training and development
6. employee relations
7. compensation and benefits
8. health insurance
9. housing
10. payroll.

HR as a business partner

HR also strives to progressively enhance the value of these services which include:

1. Attracting, developing, and retaining outstanding faculty and staff who are committed to achieving excellence and who are engaged to achieve the vision, mission and values of the institute.
2. Facilitating and supporting an organisational culture and work environment that advances the achievement of the institutes vision and mission while exemplifying the institutes values.
3. Advancing working conditions in a manner that is sustainable for the university, effectively balancing needs and resources.
4. Building and nurturing productive relationships internally and externally with stakeholders who impact the Institutes workplace and work culture.
5. Developing organisational capacity to position the Institute for the future.

HRs Emiratisation strategy

The institutes Emiratisation strategy is not modelled on a quota-based system rather a skill-based Emiratisation policy has been developed to support the nationalisation initiative. The Emiratisation policy involves the capacity building with respect to skills. The policy ensures that enough nationals are empowered with skills necessary for the economic development. The Institute follows a long-term structured and holistic approach in its Emiratisation strategies and incorporates it in all its functions. The Emiratisation percentage has increased from 29% in 2010 to over 40% in 2013. Also, a fresh UAE national graduates program was introduced as strong relationships were created with local universities to acquire the top students from different majors (Salvi 2013).

Although there is a document that states the mission and vision of the HR Department, it seems that the HR strategy has not been declared on any document. This makes it difficult for the HR Department to cascade this strategy to its functions or to ensure its alignment to the cross-functional departments is difficult. The current unwritten HR strategy is a reactive strategy that responds to events and changes as and when then happen (Salvi 2013).

Problem Statement

In this section, the author briefly describes the main HR problem in the institution and the sub-problems that stem from them.

Problem statement

The major issue is the inability to integrate the unwritten reactive HR strategy to the organisations strategic objectives and directions as well as the difficulty in aligning it to the functions. This issue hinders the HR Department from supporting the vision and mission of the organisation and creates barriers in meeting the organisations human capital requirements.

Effects of the problem statement on HR functions

Some of the effects that the problem has on the HR are the:

1. Misalignment between HR strategy and Organisations strategic objectives
2. Weak Vertical and Horizontal integration to the Institutes functions which in turn affects the
3. Line management
4. organisational strategy

Research Objectives

The objectives of the research proposal are:

1. To understand the level of alignment and integration that is currently present in the organisation
2. To compare the current practice in the organisation with the literature on HR Strategy
3. To investigate the cause and effect of any lack integration and misalignment
4. To provide recommendations on the way forward

Scope of Research

The scope of this research will include a brief look at the institutions strategy and how HR can support that through an integrated approach. It will also include interviews from members of the senior management, functional directors as well as an HR focus group. This input would cover the following stakeholders:

1. Senior Management (Horizontal Alignment)
2. Functional Directors (Vertical Integration)
3. Faculty Representatives (Stakeholders)
4. HR Representatives (Subject Matter Experts, HR Strategy Implementers)

Due to the fact that this research proposal is focused on the HR strategy, further information will not be needed at this stage but surely for implementation there will be more input from other stakeholders.

Research Design

The section will look at the structure of the research proposal and a brief of the content of the upcoming chapters. The research strategy that is employed in this research proposal is a case study based strategy, which is the exploration o a single subject or case in an organisation and exploring it from various angles (Anderson 2013).

Chapter Summary

The current chapter lays a foundation for the entire study. Background information is provided to outline a historical perspective of the study. The problem statement provides the central argument of the dissertation. The chapter also outlines other foundational aspects of the study like the research questions and brief overview of human resource integration. The extent to which the study covers is illustrated. The next chapter provides details touching on previous studies on human resource integration. The literature review is an extension of the background information.

Literature Review

Overview

In this section, existing literature on human resource strategies and integration is examined. A total of ten peer reviewed articles and three books on human resource will be used to discuss the subject. In this regard, several human resource strategies are outlined. The chapter also examines theoretical concepts around this concept. Some of the articles will help shed light on what brings about the lack of integration and how it can be resolved. The review aims at providing a roadmap for the HR integration, which is useful for the current study.

History of Human Resource Strategy Integration

Over the years, human resource integration has evolved from rudimentary elements to the current complex nature. Studies carried out by Rothwell (2001), Budhwar and Boyne (2004), and Chand and Katou (2007) illustrate this concept clearly. Human resource strategy integration is primarily understood from a number of perspectives.

Definition of Human Resource Strategy

Organisational strategy is a critical concept for every business entity and institutional set-up. Strategies provide an organisation with a sense of direction and purpose to guide employees. It is a dynamic and fluid concept that is designed according to the requirements of the organisation. Organisational strategy is the pattern of decisions in a company or institution. The decisions help to define and realise its core objectives and goals (Ulrich & Brockbank 2005). Consequently, the strategies help an organisation to come up with policies and plans aimed at realising the objectives identified.

The Concept of Human Resource Strategy

Debate on human resource strategy is not a new discourse. According to Budhwar and Boyne (2004, p. 346), these controversies date back to the early seventies. The seminal paper by Devanna (as cited in Budhwar & Boyne 2004, p. 34), is known to have elicited intense debate on the subject. Major discussion on human resource strategies included how best they could be integrated into an organisation. To this end, Truss, Mankin, and Kelliher (2012) argue that SHRM (Strategic Human Resource Management) should be viewed as an all encompassing concept. It provides a connection between the management and deployment of individuals within the organisation. It also highlights the link between the firm and its environment (Truss et al. 2012).

The argument by Truss et al. (2012, p. 88) clearly outlines the link between the HR strategy and that of the entire organisation. In this regard, human resource strategies are seen to provide a link between the workforce and how they fit in realising the goals of an organisation. The elements focused on include recruitment, performance and development towards achieving the strategic goals. HR plays a critical role in informing this aspect of the strategy because it manages all the activities that will make this happen. Human resource strategies take into account the employees in perspective of the organisation as a whole as well as the external environment.

The definition of human resource strategies is required to factor in industry policies and how they relate to an organisational set up. In this regard, HR strategy is characterised by underpinning policies and processes. The organisation implements these processes in order to manage the employees (Salvi 2013). In addition to the HR strategys influence on the organisation as a whole, this emphasises its importance in cascading the direction of the institution down to the more tactical aspects of HR, such as policies, procedures and processes.

The definition of a human resource strategy helps to illustrate the importance of the link between the people management and how they can realise an organisations core objectives. The link includes all the policies and systems required to meet the strategic objectives of a given organisation (Budhwar & Boyne 2004, p. 349). Contemporary scholars in the field argue that earlier definitions lack the visionary approach that should be associated with HR strategies. To this end, the subject has been re-defined to incorporate a more proactive strategic partnership approach.

Human resource strategies ought to be created and designed

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