In this paper, we discuss the challenges faced by HRD practitioners as they seek out more creative and innovative means by which they can enhance productivity and we pose the question ‘Can HRD interventions negatively contribute to the organization’s innovation activities’? In doing so we utilize Institutional Theory (DiMaggio and Powell, 1983; Scott, 2008) to examine the pressures on HRD to replicate practices due of other organizations within the field not as a result of uncertainty in the environment but because of uncertainty associated with their legitimacy. We explore whether HRD can achieve ‘social legitimacy’ when there may be an ethical cloud hanging over interventions that purport to offer greater control over one’s career development at the cost of deferring career limiting ‘family planning’. We highlight the implications for HRD [and HRM] practice and provide some insight into how the profession might focus on developing flexible family friendly interventions that support the reproductive needs of their female members rather than female member becoming more flexible to the organization’s productivity needs.