Studying HRD Practitioners: A Social Capital Model

The work of the human resource development (HRD) practitioner is continuously evolving. Human resource development is now expected to make a strategic level contribution and contribute to individual and organizational effectiveness. Human resource development practitioners are increasingly required to network and build relationships to obtain support, resources, information, and knowledge. The accumulation of social capital is considered important in determining individual career success and role performance. Given the importance attached to the relationship-building dimension of HRD practitioners’ roles, we posit that those with access to valuable social capital will be more successful in their careers and role performance. We propose a model that incorporates network and content perspectives of social capital. We argue that various characteristics of the HRD practitioner’s network results in network benefits. These network benefits mediate the relationship between characteristics of the practitioner’s social capital and role and career outcomes. The article then highlights the implications of our model for HRD research and practice.