Resumo

The Human Resource Business Partner concept emerged in the 1980s with the aim of bringing HR closer to the business area, making HR a strategic business partner, as well as an administrative specialist, employee advocate and change agent. However, a new phase emerges, there is a gradual evolution toward alternative “pluralistic,” “green” and “sustainable” models and “democratic” HRM practices, which have not yet gained practitioners or academic acceptance (Aust, Muller-Camen, & Mathews, 2019).

We review existing literature addressing "sustainability" and "business partner," keywords. We look for studies that relate Sustainable HRM and BP, which we infer is a possibility to assist in the implementation of the emerging model of Sustainable HRM. No previous studies were found relating these two constructs. Previous research does not address the relationship and alignment between BP function and the Sustainable HRM model. Therefore, this study proposes to investigate this gap by answering whether is it possible to implement the Sustainable HRM model through the BP function.

The evolution of the HR function in corporations has been studied since last decades (Ulrich & Dulebohn, 2015). The HR business partnership role creates value for the line manager (Galbraith & Lawler, 1995; Ulrich & Dulebohn, 2015), Sustainable HRM can be defined as "the adoption of HRM strategies and practices that allow the achievement of financial, social and ecological goals, with impact inside and outside the organization and in a long-term time horizon” (Ehnert, Parsa, Roper, Wagner, & Muller-Camen, 2016, p. 90).

We found 66 articles in peer-reviewed journals, which 26 were excluded for not meeting the inclusion criteria. We found specific characteristics for the BP and Sustainable HRM. All the praxis and practices characteristics of the BP were found in articles by Sustainable HRM. However, the Sustainable HRM characteristics "flexibility" and "justice and equality" were not found in BP articles. This divergence can be an opportunity for the BP to improve when operationalizing the Sustainable HRM, after all, one does not necessarily need to exclude the other one, but rather complement each other.

It is not possible to state with this study that Sustainable HRM is an evolution of strategic HR, of which BP is part of it. However, the two models share similarities, such as connecting the strategies of the corporation to HR practices, seeking flexibility, and changing stakeholder attitudes, boosting business performance, influencing strategy, managing changes, and improving the implementation of SDGs in organizations.

Aust, I., Muller-Camen, M., & Mathews, B. (2019). The path to true sustainability in HRM: Introduction of a typology. Vienna, Austria. Ehnert, I., Parsa, S., Roper, I., Wagner, M., & Muller-Camen, M. (2016). Reporting on sustainability and HRM: A comparative study of sustainability reporting practices by the world’s largest companies. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 27(1), 88-108. Ulrich, D., & Dulebohn, J. H. (2015). Are we there yet? What’s next for HR? Human Resource Management Review, 25(1), 188-204. doi:10.1016/j.hrmr.2015.01.004