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“Capitalising On the Workforce”. Human Capital Valuation and the Metrification of Human Resource Management

Sicheng Long (2025)

PhD thesis. Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh
Advisors: Isabell Darmon, Isabelle, Angelica Thumala & Theo Bourgeron

Abstract. The purpose of this thesis is to provide a critical analysis of the financialisation of human resources through an examination of Human Capital (HC). This thesis builds on the analysis of major institutional initiatives promoting HC reporting and emerging forms of HR management featuring intensifying metrification of HC and monitoring of employees. It links this managerial trend with the conception of value of the workforce derived from the changes in financialised capitalism. From a valuation perspective, this thesis situates the notion of value amongst the rhetorical apparatus that constitutes its intelligibility (theories that define what “true value” is) and the economic reality formed accordingly (operations that ascertain such value). The value of HC, in this context, is not intrinsic but produced by actors who promote it and results from practical valuation activities. Human capital as a prevalent concept has been increasingly recognised in financial reporting and management, but its validity in financial valuation remains contested and its measurement is dominated by non-financial metrics. Based on a comparative analysis of organisational documents of several initiatives to promote HC across governments, transnational agencies and professional associations, as well as interviews with key actors who are directly involved in designing and measuring HC metrics, the research shows that the emphasis in the conceptions of HC differs across scholars and practitioners involved as key actors in shaping and promoting HC, depending on whether they are located in finance and accounting, management, or whether they are investors. Drawing on a growing body of literature in the economics and sociology of conventions (EC/SC) and valuation studies, I argue that the valuation of HC is situated in the coordination of three different conventions: the convention of financial accounting (shared by accounting professions), the convention of management accounting (shared by management professions) and the convention of financial value estimation (shared by investors). They have all come into play in the constitution of HC value and the way it is measured. The financialisation of HC is driven particularly by the convention of financial value estimation which conceptualises the value of HC from a financial market perspective through the “investor’s gaze”. This study aims to contribute to existing scholarship in several aspects: 1) understanding the emerging trend of quantification and metrification in human resources management (HRM) from a valuation perspective, exploring the process of how HC as a concept derived from finance and economics is adopted in management and facilitates the financialisation of the valuation of the workforce, allowing the colonisation of financial valuation over non-financial metrics. 2) Providing a critical analysis of how the conception of HC is received and reacted to at organisational level, a level that has not been addressed much in existing scholarship where study in critical social sciences on HC often focus on the ideological and disciplinary effects of this idea over individuals. 3) Applying a pragmatist approach to develop a sociological critique of HC value in the research stream of economics and sociology of conventions (EC/SC) to reveal the configuration of HC and thus contribute to a better understanding of the financialisation of human resource.

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