Sample PHD Entrepreneurship Dissertation Proposal

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Entrepreneur’s Attitudes and Understanding towards Human Resources Applications in Saudi Arabia

Executive Summary

Saudi Arabia’s government has also focused on achieving entrepreneurial success, allowing and encouraging individuals to move the entrepreneurial business. The entrepreneurs’ ability is also required to focus on human resource management and significantly influence business performance.

This research will assess how the entrepreneur views and understands human resources applications and how the entrepreneur attributes human resources applications as the catalyst for the success of their business organisation. This research will also assess the most appropriate way for start-up companies and S.M.E.s to implement human resources applications effectively.

This research will be conducted using a secondary qualitative research method to assess the online databases’ data. The literature search for this research will be conducted using the search terms and keywords thematic analysis method for data analysis. The outcomes extracted from this research will contribute to developing an understanding of the entrepreneurs’ attitudes towards human resources applications in Saudi Arabia. The results extracted from this research will help build strategies adopted by the business enterprises in Saudi Arabia.

Introduction

Entrepreneurs play a considerable role in the economic development of countries. In this regard, most developed and developing countries have been focusing on creating an entrepreneurial culture within the public and private sector business entities (Inman, 2016). Like other countries of the world, Saudi Arabia’s government has also been focusing on achieving the entrepreneur’s success, allowing and encouraging the individuals to move the entrepreneurial business (Nzonzo and Matashu, 2014).

Entrepreneurs also play a considerable role in contributing to economic development; therefore, Saudi Arabia’s government also focuses on developing entrepreneurial corporates for boosting the financial condition of Saudi Arabia. The entrepreneurs working across the globe have been focusing on utilising advanced technology for assuring continuous development of information.

An entrepreneur’s success depends on their knowledge, skills, and ability to carry out strategic management. The entrepreneurs’ ability to specifically focus on human resource management also significantly influences business performance (Dizgah et al., 2011).  The evidence reported that the entrepreneurs’ attitudes and understandings towards the human resource application significantly impact business performance.

The entrepreneurs’ attitudes and understanding of entrepreneurs’ human resource management allow the corporates to develop strategies for improving the employees’ perspectives associated with the entrepreneurs’ corporates (McAdam, Crowley, and Harrison, 2018). This research will assess entrepreneurs’ current understandings of the efficacy of human resource management and the association between human resource management on business performance.

Besides, the Saudi Entrepreneurs’ attitudes and understanding analysis is also likely to contribute to implementing human resource applications by the start-up and Small and Medium Enterprises.

Thesis Statement

This research will seek to acquire answers to the following research questions.

• How do entrepreneurs view and understand human resources applications?
• To what extent, entrepreneurs attribute the human resources applications as a catalyst of their company success?
• What is the most appropriate way for start-up companies and small- and medium enterprises to implement human resources applications?

The previously published literature has analysed human resource management’s impacts on business performance (Dizgah et al., 2011). However, the association between human resource management and entrepreneurial corporates needs to be explored in detail. The analysis of previously published literature related to entrepreneurship and human resources revealed a research gap related to human resource management within entrepreneurial corporates (Nzonzo and Matashu, 2014).

The evidence reported that the efficacy of the human resource management strategies within the corporates is strongly dependent on entrepreneurs’ attitudes, perceptions, and views. Furthermore, the previously published literature analysis also revealed that only some of the researchers have considered identifying how the Saudi entrepreneur attributes the human resources applications for improving business performance.

In this regard, the analysis of attitudes and understanding of entrepreneurs towards applying human resources in Saudi Arabia will fill the research gap. The outcomes acquired from this research are also likely to facilitate the start-up business firms and S.M.E.s in implementing human resources applications.

Literature Review

The entrepreneurial orientation is crucial for the survival and growth of an organisation within the business environment. The analysis of current trends towards the knowledge-intensive industries revealed that business organisations’ competition depends on the management of relational bases of the employees associated with the particular business organisation (Nzonzo and Matashu, 2014).

The success of start-up businesses, the Small- And Medium-Enterprises (S.M.E.s), and the business entities are performing business on a large scale depending on the organisational culture, organisational values, and commitment of the employees associated with any organisation. In this regard, human resource management is the most appropriate aspect for any business organisation’s success.

The practical applications and management of human resources enable start-up companies and Small- And Medium-Enterprises to achieve their goals inefficiently (Yousuf Danish and Lawton Smith, 2012). Besides, the mismanagement within the human resource applications results in employee dissatisfaction, contributing to its downfall.

The attitudes and behaviours of entrepreneurs towards managing human resources associated with any organisation have significant impacts on acquiring human resources and deployment, specifically within the start-up businesses (Dizgah et al., 2011). The entrepreneurs possessing efficient knowledge about human resource management have improved the survival rate of new ventures and are also likely to impact resource allocation positively.

Besides, entrepreneurs’ knowledge and attitudes related to the appropriate management of human resources also assist towards the direction of growth, specifically within rapidly expanding firms.

The attitudes of entrepreneurs towards human resource applications are strongly associated with the business organisation’s success (McAdam, Crowley, and Harrison, 2018). Human resource application is categorised into internal and external elements, such as in some business organisations.

Human resource management is carried out by the particular internal department, whereas some business entities rely on out-source parties to manage human resource-related functions.

The research conducted by Ahmed (2016) assessed the mediating effects of the organisational commitments on the relationship between corporate entrepreneurship and the policies for managing the human resource associated with an organisation in Saudi Arabia. This research was conducted by considering the sample population consisting of 250 employees working in the telecommunication sector.

The research outcomes revealed that human resource practices’ appropriateness strongly influences the efficacy of corporate entrepreneurship. This association is mediated by the organisational commitment levels (Ahmed, 2016).

The evidence further reported that the human resource’s effective management is considered one of the most vital managerial decisions impacting corporate entrepreneurship. The research conducted by Dabić et al. (2011) stated that the entrepreneurs’ attitudes and knowledge about managing human resources had been analysed from the past few decades.

Dabić et al.  (2011)  mentioned that Schuler and Jackson (1987) assessed the influence of entrepreneurs’ knowledge and attitudes on organisational performance and revealed a direct relationship between human resource management policies. Schuler and Jackson (1987) found that the human resource policies related to planning, appraising, staffing, compensating, the relationship between labour and management, and development and training significantly influence the entrepreneur’s performance.

Potential differences in human resource practices within the entrepreneur corporates are based on the entrepreneurs’ knowledge about the significance of human resource management.  The characteristics of employees associated with the entrepreneur corporate have been associated with the successful entrepreneurial efforts, the entrepreneur’s ability to take and manage risks, and the entrepreneurs’ ability to adopt a flexible attitude towards change (Dizgah et al., 2011).

For this reason, the success of business operations performed by the entrepreneur organisation is significantly dependent on the attitudes and behaviours of the entrepreneur toward the practices carried for human resource management.

The entrepreneurship researchers have analysed human resource management issues from the corporations engaged in business operations on a large scale (Nzonzo and Matashu, 2014). In this regard, managing the human resource is considered in light of firms’ policies, procedures, and strategies to address the issues and conflicts related to the human resource.

The evidence also reported that the small and medium-sized enterprises and the organisations engaged in the start-up business lack particular departments for managing the human resource.

Theoretical Framework

De Kok and Uhlander (2011) have combined a range of theories related to organisational behaviour and human resource management into a particular framework of human resource management-related practices. The framework provided by De Kok and Uhlander (2011) revealed that any organisation’s business performance is influenced by management’s ability to fulfil the demands of human resources and the supply of financial resources.

In this regard, this framework proposed that the enterprises’ effective business performance on a small scale or large scale is strongly associated with human resources management. The human resource theory revealed the requirement of providing facilitation to the employees, assisting them in delivering the best performance, and improving business firms’ performance (Diamantidis and Chatzoglou, 2011).

Besides, the social exchange theory presented that the employment relationship assists the employees in reciprocating organisations’ inducements by adopting discretionary role behaviours to contribute to organisational success appropriately (Ana-Maria, 2012). However, facilitation operations management’s efficacy is strongly dependent on the knowledge and attitudes of the corporate management for managing the human resource.

Methodology

Review Analysis

This secondary qualitative research will analyse the entrepreneur’s attitudes and understanding of human resources applications in Saudi Arabia by extracting previously published research data. This research will extract the previously published research focused on Saudi Arabia entrepreneurs’ knowledge and attitudes towards applying human resources.

This research will review a previously published study, specifically related to Saudi Arabia, published in 2010. The research questions considered for this research reveal the explicit nature of research; therefore, data extraction will be carried out using particular inclusion and exclusion criteria.

Inclusion and Exclusion Criteria

As this research is specific to Saudi Arabia’s entrepreneurs, the criteria for including the research articles will ascertain that the research articles considered within this research will be published either in 2010 or after 2010. Also, the inclusion criteria will ascertain that the research articles published only in the English language will be included in this literature review.

The exclusion criteria for this research will ensure that the exclusion of research articles published before 2010, published in languages other than English, and focused on the entrepreneurs’ attitudes belonging to countries other than Saudi Arabia.

Data Sources

For this literature review, the research journals and articles will be extracted from the online databases. The online databases will be considered data sources for this research to extract relevant research aims and objectives. Following online databases will be searched for this research.

• CINAHL
• EBSCO
• Google Scholar

Search Terms

The literature search will be converged using search terms and keywords to retrieve the most relevant research articles related to the research topic.  The search terms will include ‘ entrepreneurs’, ‘attitudes of entrepreneurs’,’ perceptions of entrepreneurs’, ‘human resource management, ‘human resource applications, ‘ and ‘Saudi Arabia’.  The literature search will be further refined using the Boolean operators “AND” and “OR.”

Potential Difficulties Associated with Research

While conducting this research, the research will likely experience ambiguities in data collection due to a lack of accessibility to the online databases. Besides, the researcher will also experience difficulty in data collection, as a limited number of research articles have been published on this research topic.

Methods of Analysis of Evidence

The research articles extracted from this literature review will be conducted by using different methodologies. For this reason, the utilisation of meta-analysis for synthesising the primary evidence will be considered as an effective choice for analysing the extracted literature.

On the other hand, the data analysis by utilising the qualitative research method will permit the evaluation of the methodological quality of the research papers (Vaismoradi, Turunen, and Bondas, 2013).  Besides, the thematic analysis will also facilitate in assessing the researches performed by using different methodological approaches.

Ethical Considerations

This research will not direct the research participants’ involvement; therefore, there will be no direct ethical considerations for this research. However, specific ethical guidelines will be followed for extracting and collecting data related to the research topic. The current research will ensure that the data collected from the academic databases will be collected ethically. In addition, only those research articles will be considered for this research, which has followed the ethical considerations.

References

Ahmed, N.O.A., 2016. Human Resource Management Practices and Corporate Entrepreneurship: The Mediating Role of Organisational Commitment. International Business Management, 10(9), pp.1632-1638.

Ana-Maria, B.E.R.C.U., 2012. Trends and Challenges in Human Resource Management and Organisation Performance. TABLE OF CONTENT MANAGING INNER FORCES AND OUTER THREATS OF THE COMPANY, p.16.

Dabić, M., Ortiz-De-Urbina-Criado, M. and Romero-Martínez, A.M., 2011. Human resource management in entrepreneurial firms: a literature review. International journal of manpower, 32(1), pp.14-33.

Diamantidis, A.D. and Chatzoglou, P.D., 2011. Human resource involvement, job-related factors, and their relation with firm performance: experiences from Greece. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 22(07), pp.1531-1553.

Dizgah, M.R., Gilaninia, S., Alipour, H.R. and Asgari, A., 2011. High-performance human resource and corporate entrepreneurship: the mediating role of organisations citizenship behaviour and procedural justice. Australian Journal of Basic and Applied Sciences, 5(3), pp.492-499.

Inman, K., 2016. Women’s resources in a business start-up: A study of black and white women entrepreneurs. Routledge.

McAdam, M., Crowley, C. and Harrison, R.T., 2018, July. The Emancipatory Potential of Female Digital Entrepreneurship: Institutional Voids in Saudi Arabia. In Academy of Management Proceedings (Vol. 2018, No. 1, p. 10255). Briarcliff Manor, NY 10510: Academy of Management.

Nzonzo, J.C. and Matashu, M., 2014. An Insight into the Human Resource Management Practices Adopted by Entrepreneurs in South Africa. Journal of Small Business and Entrepreneurship Development, 2(3), pp.73-87.

Vaismoradi, M., Turunen, H. and Bondas, T., 2013. Content analysis and thematic analysis: Implications for conducting a qualitative descriptive study. Nursing & health sciences, 15(3), pp.398-405.

Yousuf Danish, A. and Lawton Smith, H., 2012. Female entrepreneurship in Saudi Arabia: opportunities and challenges. International Journal of Gender and Entrepreneurship, 4(3), pp.216-235.

Bibliography

Ahmed, N.O.A., 2016. Human Resource Management Practices and Corporate Entrepreneurship: The Mediating Role of Organisational Commitment. International Business Management, 10(9), pp.1632-1638.

Ana-Maria, B.E.R.C.U., 2012. Trends and Challenges in Human Resource Management and Organisation Performance. TABLE OF CONTENT MANAGING INNER FORCES AND OUTER THREATS OF THE COMPANY, p.16.

Dabić, M., Ortiz-De-Urbina-Criado, M. and Romero-Martínez, A.M., 2011. Human resource management in entrepreneurial firms: a literature review. International journal of manpower, 32(1), pp.14-33.

Diamantidis, A.D. and Chatzoglou, P.D., 2011. Human resource involvement, job-related factors, and their relation with firm performance: experiences from Greece. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 22(07), pp.1531-1553.

Dizgah, M.R., Gilaninia, S., Alipour, H.R. and Asgari, A., 2011. High-performance human resource and corporate entrepreneurship: the mediating role of organisations citizenship behaviour and procedural justice. Australian Journal of Basic and Applied Sciences, 5(3), pp.492-499.

Inman, K., 2016. Women’s resources in a business start-up: A study of black and white women entrepreneurs. Routledge.

Kayed, R.N. and Kabir Hassan, M., 2011. Saudi Arabia’s economic development: entrepreneurship as a strategy. International Journal of Islamic and Middle Eastern Finance and Management, 4(1), pp.52-73.

Kayed, R.N. and Kabir Hassan, M., 2011. Saudi Arabia’s economic development: entrepreneurship as a strategy. International Journal of Islamic and Middle Eastern Finance and Management, 4(1), pp.52-73.

McAdam, M., Crowley, C. and Harrison, R.T., 2018, July. The Emancipatory Potential of Female Digital Entrepreneurship: Institutional Voids in Saudi Arabia. In Academy of Management Proceedings (Vol. 2018, No. 1, p. 10255). Briarcliff Manor, NY 10510: Academy of Management.

Nzonzo, J.C. and Matashu, M., 2014. An Insight into the Human Resource Management Practices Adopted by Entrepreneurs in South Africa. Journal of Small Business and Entrepreneurship Development, 2(3), pp.73-87.

Rahatullah Khan, M., 2013. Mapping entrepreneurship ecosystem of Saudi Arabia. World Journal of Entrepreneurship, Management and Sustainable Development, 9(1), pp.28-54.

Yousuf Danish, A. and Lawton Smith, H., 2012. Female entrepreneurship in Saudi Arabia: opportunities and challenges. International Journal of Gender and Entrepreneurship, 4(3), pp.216-235.

Zamberi Ahmad, S., 2011. Evidence of the characteristics of women entrepreneurs in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia: An empirical investigation. International journal of gender and entrepreneurship, 3(2), pp.123-143.