Resources for What? Understanding Performance in the Resource-Based View and Strategic Human Capital Resource Literatures

Barney’s presentation of the resource-based view (RBV) profoundly shaped the trajectory of management scholarship. This article considers the RBV’s impact specifically on the field of strategic human capital resources. Although Barney is still highly relevant, I suggest that research has not sufficiently appreciated the role that individual and collective performance behavior and outcomes play in linking human capital resources to competitive advantage. An alternative, what might be called RBV2.0, posits that research needs to recognize that human capital resources are distinct from performance behavior and outcomes. Such an observation raises the question, “Resources for what?” Answering this question leads to several important insights. First, a given type of human capital resource is only important to the extent it is related to performance behavior and outcomes that contribute to competitive advantage. Second, performance behavior is largely strategy-specific and thus firm-specific. Third, firm specificity is not a characteristic of human capital resources but rather a function of the proximity of the resource to firm-specific performance behavior and outcomes. Consequently, “Performance” is the answer to the question, “Resources for what?” This emphasis on understanding human capital resource-performance relationships adds considerable precision into the RBV, helps resolve puzzles in the strategic human capital literature relating to firm specificity and performance mobility, and promotes a deeper understanding hiding latent within Barney’s original view.