Master's programme Human Resource Studies

There are many organisations today that subscribe to the notion that people are their main assets. Huge amounts of time, money, and effort are spent on people management and employee development in order to improve individual and, ultimately, organisational performance. The master in Human Resource Studies provides a theoretical and critical understanding of human resource management and its central idea that employees are their main assets. The program focuses on people, work and organizations and their interactions in HR issues. The master HRS aims to educate academically oriented HR professionals that have a profound knowledge of the effects of modern HR practices on individual employees and subsequently on the outcomes at the individual, team and organisational levels. The master programme is characterized by a continuous interaction between theory, research and practice. Students are expected to contribute to this body of knowledge by doing empirical research for their master thesis.

In the context of massive changes in the societal, organizational and economic environment, the field of work, personnel and organizations has undergone some major transformations in the last decades. Older traditions like personnel management and industrial relations have been replaced by human resource management approaches in which the strategic relevance of human resources for the organizations is emphasized more and more.

The study of work, personnel and organization has a long tradition in social sciences. These themes have extensively been studied in established disciplines like Psychology, Sociology and Economics. The integration of the different insights of these disciplines is a relatively new area and has shown an impressive growth in the last decades. Expressions of this development are the foundation of new academic journals, the establishments of HRS departments in universities and the start of new academic studies like Personeelwetenschappen / HR Studies.

As a field of study, HR Studies have experienced an impressive growth in the last 25 years. Starting with the description and classification of HR practices and polices the focus has been moved to the effectiveness of these practices and policies. This effectiveness has been linked to external factors (fit with the environment), the fit with the strategy of the organization and the internal fit between the various HR instruments. The debate on the relationship between HR and performance has resulted in a number of scientific relevant questions that also have important practical implications. These questions are not only central in the research program of the department (Modern HR Practices and the Individual Employee) but also in the master programme. This programme is focused on questions concerning:

• The mechanisms that might explain the relationships between HR and outcomes (turnover, satisfaction, stress, conflict, productivity) that have been found in empirical studies;
• The individual employee perspective as a vital element in order to open the 'black box' of the relationship between HR practices and outcomes;
• The consequences of the divergence between formal HR policies and actual HR practices;
• The influence of modern HR practices like leadership, workplace learning, diversity programs, and balanced scorecards on organizational outcomes. During the master programme students will not only become familiar with the 'state of the art' of the scientific debate on the effects of modern HR practices but they will also study three core dimensions of HR practices in more detail:
• Workplace learning by employees and teams;
• How to deal with increasing diversity in our societies and organisations: how to deal with this diversity?
• The professionalisation of the HR function. The issue of measuring the effects of HR policies with the help of benchmarking and balanced scorecards.

The master programme has the following objectives. Upon completion of the programme, successful students have developed a critical attitude, have demonstrated competence in doing scientific research, they have a profound disciplinary knowledge and skills in order to work as a HR professional. In preparation for the future jobs, students will be trained in analyzing HR issues. The focus is on recognizing and conceptualizing HR problems, the implementation of new HR policies in the light of organizational change issues; the underpinnings of HR decisions and finally advising on HR decisions.

Programme
The one-year master's programme has a total of 60 ECTS. Teaching involves a combination of lectures, seminars and group work. The list below gives an outline of the courses that make up the programme.

• Human Resource Studies (6 ects)
• Human Capital Valuation (6 ects)
• International Human Resource Management (6 ects)
• Strategic Human Resource Development (6 ects)
• Management of Diversity (6 ects)
• Research Seminar Human Resource Studies (12 ects)
• Master thesis (24 ects)

After graduation
Students who graduate in Human Resource Studies at Tilburg University have good career opportunities. In a society where changes follow changes ever more rapidly, organisations need people who know everything about human resource management and who can research and analyse HR problems in organisations. Apart from management positions in business and (semi)public organisations, there are also excellent opportunities in consultancy and research.