Providing a Model for Shaping Horizontal Alignment among Human Resources Management Practices

Two types of fitness and alignment are essential in human resource management. Vertical alignment that points to the consistent of HRM strategies and activities with corporate strategies and goals and, horizontal alignment that is related to the consistency among various practices of human resource management. With regard to effective results and synergies resulting from consistent and integrated HR practices, identifying the dimensions of horizontal fitness in human resource management practices, providing a desirable and comprehensive model is inevitable. The present study was carried out for this purpose by using qualitative meta-analysis method. So that the most important definitions of the concept of alignment and horizontal alignment, as well as the models and theories related to it, have been identified and investigated. Then their strengths and weaknesses compared with each other and, finally, the proposed model was designed in such a way that includes a comprehensive definition of horizontal alignment and its effective dimensions. The main advantage of the proposed model is that it combines all definitions of the concept of alignment and horizontal alignment, and investigates horizontal integrity dimensions among human resource management practices, including process integrity, architectural and configuration integrity, and executive integrity in a comprehensive manner.