Mohammad Mosaddek Hussain :
Since the genesis of the department or division of personnel management in different industrial and manufacturing organizations after the industrial revolution the importance of this department had been growing at a rapid speed in the European and American territories. Harvard Psychologist Elton Mayo and other experts had researched the behaviour, attitude and trends of different levels of employees for managing them properly with a view to achieving stability and growth of the manufacturing and production oriented organizations and enterprises. Actually, psychological factors of personnel are crucial for the development of an organization whether it be a production or service oriented organization. Handling the personnel properly is the major challenge for the personnel department or the Human Resource department along with the top management as well. But it is necessary to determine the role, position and the real structural framework for smooth function of the department nowadays. Otherwise, various issues may engulf in the functioning process of the department. In course of time, in the decade of 1980, personnel management is namely turned into human resource management.
It is worth mentioned that Paul S. Greenlaw and John P. Kohl revealed three distinct, interrelated fields of interest addressed by the HRM discipline: human relations, organization theory, and decision areas. Human relations deals with individual motivation, leadership, and group relationships. Organization theory refers to job design, managerial control, and work flow through the organization. On the other hand, decision areas encompass interests related to the acquisition, development, compensation, and maintenance of human resources. Although the method and degree to which those areas of interest are handled vary among different HRM departments, a few general rules characterize the responsibilities, positioning, and structure of most HRM divisions as a whole.
The responsibilities bestowed upon the HR department, other than related legal and clerical duties, can be classified by individual, organizational, and career areas. Individual management entails helping employees identify their strengths and weaknesses, help to omit their shortcomings, enhance capability and then make their best contribution towards the development of the organization. In reality, these duties are carried out through a variety of activities such as performance reviews, counseling, advising, mentoring, motivation, training, and testing. Moreover, the essence of organizational development (OD) focuses on fostering a successful system that maximizes human, and other, resources in the organization. Above all, to say that this important duty also includes the creation and maintenance of a change program, which allows the organization to respond to evolving outside and internal influences in different periods and situations that should be observed and monitored carefully for the future experience. The third responsibility, career development, involves matching individuals with the most suitable jobs and career paths as per their interests, attention, skill and propensity.
Among other activities in the organization, the positioning of HRM departments is ideally near the organizational central point, with maximum access to all divisions and top management levels. In larger organizations the HRM function might be headed by a vice president, while smaller entities will have a middle-level manager as head of HRM. In any case, because the HRM department is charged with managing the productivity and development of workers at all levels, the top HRM manager ideally has access to, and the support of, key decision makers. In addition, the HRM department should be situated in such a way that it has horizontal access, or is able to communicate promptly with all sections and divisions within the company with a priority access to the top management having a central decisional role for effective employee management and higher productivity.. Horizontal access allows HRM to integrate, educate, and train the workforce, and to facilitate changes that affect one division and indirectly influence other segments of the company or institution as well.
Needless to say that the structure of HRM departments differs according to the objectives, span of operation, nature and mode of operation, type and size of the organization. But many large organizations organize HRM employee development functions around various clusters of workers-they conduct recruiting, administrative, and other duties in a central location. Different employee development groups for each department are necessary to train and develop employees in specialized areas, such as sales, engineering, marketing, or executive education. In contrast, some HRM departments are completely independent and are organized purely by function. The same training department, for example, serves all divisions of the organization to impart training of different types of employees and based on the need of the organizations as a whole.
With a view to achieving goals, HRM professionals and departments engage in a variety of activities in order to execute their human resource plans in line with the organizational objectives as a whole. In this regard, all executive level employees should be trained to comply with the up-coming challenges. Implementation activities are really complex and critical for the managers those are bestowed upon the responsibilities to implement the plans as per guidelines. Actually, HRM implementation activities fall into four main functional groups, each of which includes related legal responsibilities: acquisition, development, compensation, and maintenance. Besides, if we see the real implementation process we can see many sub-activities and sometimes new course of actions are emerged during the implementation stages. So, proper implementation needs proper monitoring in every stage of implementation process.
This is a very critical and complex task for the managers of this department. Acquisition duties consist of human resource planning for employees, which includes activities related to analyzing employment needs, present position of employees, determining the necessary skills for positions, identifying job and industry trends, and forecasting future employment levels and skill requirements for the organization. These tasks may be accomplished using such tools and techniques as questionnaires, interviews, statistical analysis, building skill inventories, and designing career path charts. Four specific goals of effective human resource planning are:
Sustaining stable workforce levels during ups and downs in output, which can reduce unnecessary employment costs and liabilities and increase employee morale that would otherwise suffer in the event of lay-offs.
Arresting turnover rate among younger recruits.
Resolving problems by replacing key decision makers in the event of an unexpected absence.
Making it possible for financial resource managers to efficiently plan departmental budgets.
Impart training of employees for raising motivation and confidence level
Further, the acquisition function also encompasses activities related to recruiting workers, such as designing evaluation tests and interview methods. Ideally, the chief goal is to hire the most-qualified, trained and experienced candidates without encroaching company regulations or allowing decision makers to be influenced by unrelated stereotypes. HRM departments at some companies may choose to administer honesty, sensitivity or personality tests, or to test potential candidates in different ways. Recruitment responsibilities also include ensuring that the people in the organization are honest and adhere to strict organizational regulations pertaining to discrimination and privacy. To that end, human resource managers establish and document detailed recruiting and hiring procedures that protect applicants and diminish the risk of lawsuits, if any.
After the first process the second major HRM function, human resource development or management development, refers to performance appraisal and training activities. The basic goal of appraisal is to provide feedback to employees concerning their performance. This feedback allows them to evaluate the appropriateness of their behavior in the eyes of their coworkers and managers, correct weaknesses, and improve their contribution to the enterprise. HRM professionals must devise uniform appraisal standards, develop review techniques, train managers to administer the appraisals, and then evaluate and follow up on the effectiveness of performance reviews. They must also tie the appraisal process into compensation and incentive strategies, and work to ensure that given procedures and regulations are observed during this key functions.
On the other hand, training and development activities include the determination, design, execution, and analysis of educational programs with a view to prepare the employees knowledgeable, skillful and confident. Orientation programs are usually necessary to acclimate new hires to the company. The HRM training and education role may encompass a wide variety of tasks, depending on the type and extent of different programs. In any case, the HRM professional ideally is aware of the fundamentals of learning and motivation, and must carefully design effective training and development programs that benefit the overall organization as well as the employees individually. Training initiatives may include apprenticeship, internship, job rotation, mentoring, and new skills programs. Other types of training programs are also helpful as per need of the different level of employees and units.
Compensation, the third major HRM function, refers to HRM duties related to paying employees and providing incentives for them for their services. HRM professionals are typically charged with developing wage and salary systems that accomplish specific organizational objectives, such as employee retention, quality, satisfaction, and motivation. Ultimately, their aim is to establish wage and salary levels that maximize the company’s investment in relation to its goals. This is often successfully accomplished with performance based incentives, yearly bonus and other profit sharing. In particular, HRM managers must learn how to create compensation equity within the organization that doesn’t hamper morale and confidence to the company and that provides sufficient financial motivation. Besides financial compensation and fringe benefits, effective HRM managers also design programs that reward employees by meeting their emotional needs, such as recognition for good work, appreciation, motivational rewards and inspiration.
Process Of Maintenance
The fourth principal and significant HRM function, maintenance of human resources, encompasses HRM activities related to employee benefits, safety and health, welfare and social programmes and worker-management relations. Employee benefits are non-incentive-oriented compensation, such as health insurance and free parking and are often used to transfer non-taxed compensation to employees. Tax of employees may be paid by the company for employee helps. The three major categories of benefits managed by HRM managers are: employee services, such as purchasing plans, recreational activities, and legal services; vacations, holidays, and other allowed absences; and insurance, retirement, and health benefits. To successfully administer a benefits program, HRM professionals need to understand tax incentives, retirement investment plans, and purchasing power derived from a large base of employees.
In reality human resource maintenance activities related to safety and health usually entail compliance with prevalent laws that protect employees from different types hazards in the workplace. Regulations emanate from the government and organization’s policy. HRM managers must work to minimize the company’s exposure to risk by implementing preventive safety and training programs. They are also typically charged with designing detailed procedures to document and handle injuries in the interest of the organization.
In real sense, maintenance tasks related to worker-management relations primarily entail: working with labor unions, handling grievances related to misconduct such as theft or sexual harassment, and devising systems to foster cooperation. Activities in this arena include contract negotiation, developing policies to accept and handle worker grievances, and administering programs to enhance communication and cooperation for the stability and growth of the organization..
As researchers show that HRM functions are very critical and complex in reality because of the different types of employees those come from various environments, economic situation, education, family diversity, social background, attitude, psychological state of mind, propensity and behavioural streams. So, the HR managers and professionals should handle the employees carefully through their experience, employee’s situation analysis, skill and knowledge with a view to achieving the goal of the organization.
Since the genesis of the department or division of personnel management in different industrial and manufacturing organizations after the industrial revolution the importance of this department had been growing at a rapid speed in the European and American territories. Harvard Psychologist Elton Mayo and other experts had researched the behaviour, attitude and trends of different levels of employees for managing them properly with a view to achieving stability and growth of the manufacturing and production oriented organizations and enterprises. Actually, psychological factors of personnel are crucial for the development of an organization whether it be a production or service oriented organization. Handling the personnel properly is the major challenge for the personnel department or the Human Resource department along with the top management as well. But it is necessary to determine the role, position and the real structural framework for smooth function of the department nowadays. Otherwise, various issues may engulf in the functioning process of the department. In course of time, in the decade of 1980, personnel management is namely turned into human resource management.
It is worth mentioned that Paul S. Greenlaw and John P. Kohl revealed three distinct, interrelated fields of interest addressed by the HRM discipline: human relations, organization theory, and decision areas. Human relations deals with individual motivation, leadership, and group relationships. Organization theory refers to job design, managerial control, and work flow through the organization. On the other hand, decision areas encompass interests related to the acquisition, development, compensation, and maintenance of human resources. Although the method and degree to which those areas of interest are handled vary among different HRM departments, a few general rules characterize the responsibilities, positioning, and structure of most HRM divisions as a whole.
The responsibilities bestowed upon the HR department, other than related legal and clerical duties, can be classified by individual, organizational, and career areas. Individual management entails helping employees identify their strengths and weaknesses, help to omit their shortcomings, enhance capability and then make their best contribution towards the development of the organization. In reality, these duties are carried out through a variety of activities such as performance reviews, counseling, advising, mentoring, motivation, training, and testing. Moreover, the essence of organizational development (OD) focuses on fostering a successful system that maximizes human, and other, resources in the organization. Above all, to say that this important duty also includes the creation and maintenance of a change program, which allows the organization to respond to evolving outside and internal influences in different periods and situations that should be observed and monitored carefully for the future experience. The third responsibility, career development, involves matching individuals with the most suitable jobs and career paths as per their interests, attention, skill and propensity.
Among other activities in the organization, the positioning of HRM departments is ideally near the organizational central point, with maximum access to all divisions and top management levels. In larger organizations the HRM function might be headed by a vice president, while smaller entities will have a middle-level manager as head of HRM. In any case, because the HRM department is charged with managing the productivity and development of workers at all levels, the top HRM manager ideally has access to, and the support of, key decision makers. In addition, the HRM department should be situated in such a way that it has horizontal access, or is able to communicate promptly with all sections and divisions within the company with a priority access to the top management having a central decisional role for effective employee management and higher productivity.. Horizontal access allows HRM to integrate, educate, and train the workforce, and to facilitate changes that affect one division and indirectly influence other segments of the company or institution as well.
Needless to say that the structure of HRM departments differs according to the objectives, span of operation, nature and mode of operation, type and size of the organization. But many large organizations organize HRM employee development functions around various clusters of workers-they conduct recruiting, administrative, and other duties in a central location. Different employee development groups for each department are necessary to train and develop employees in specialized areas, such as sales, engineering, marketing, or executive education. In contrast, some HRM departments are completely independent and are organized purely by function. The same training department, for example, serves all divisions of the organization to impart training of different types of employees and based on the need of the organizations as a whole.
With a view to achieving goals, HRM professionals and departments engage in a variety of activities in order to execute their human resource plans in line with the organizational objectives as a whole. In this regard, all executive level employees should be trained to comply with the up-coming challenges. Implementation activities are really complex and critical for the managers those are bestowed upon the responsibilities to implement the plans as per guidelines. Actually, HRM implementation activities fall into four main functional groups, each of which includes related legal responsibilities: acquisition, development, compensation, and maintenance. Besides, if we see the real implementation process we can see many sub-activities and sometimes new course of actions are emerged during the implementation stages. So, proper implementation needs proper monitoring in every stage of implementation process.
This is a very critical and complex task for the managers of this department. Acquisition duties consist of human resource planning for employees, which includes activities related to analyzing employment needs, present position of employees, determining the necessary skills for positions, identifying job and industry trends, and forecasting future employment levels and skill requirements for the organization. These tasks may be accomplished using such tools and techniques as questionnaires, interviews, statistical analysis, building skill inventories, and designing career path charts. Four specific goals of effective human resource planning are:
Sustaining stable workforce levels during ups and downs in output, which can reduce unnecessary employment costs and liabilities and increase employee morale that would otherwise suffer in the event of lay-offs.
Arresting turnover rate among younger recruits.
Resolving problems by replacing key decision makers in the event of an unexpected absence.
Making it possible for financial resource managers to efficiently plan departmental budgets.
Impart training of employees for raising motivation and confidence level
Further, the acquisition function also encompasses activities related to recruiting workers, such as designing evaluation tests and interview methods. Ideally, the chief goal is to hire the most-qualified, trained and experienced candidates without encroaching company regulations or allowing decision makers to be influenced by unrelated stereotypes. HRM departments at some companies may choose to administer honesty, sensitivity or personality tests, or to test potential candidates in different ways. Recruitment responsibilities also include ensuring that the people in the organization are honest and adhere to strict organizational regulations pertaining to discrimination and privacy. To that end, human resource managers establish and document detailed recruiting and hiring procedures that protect applicants and diminish the risk of lawsuits, if any.
After the first process the second major HRM function, human resource development or management development, refers to performance appraisal and training activities. The basic goal of appraisal is to provide feedback to employees concerning their performance. This feedback allows them to evaluate the appropriateness of their behavior in the eyes of their coworkers and managers, correct weaknesses, and improve their contribution to the enterprise. HRM professionals must devise uniform appraisal standards, develop review techniques, train managers to administer the appraisals, and then evaluate and follow up on the effectiveness of performance reviews. They must also tie the appraisal process into compensation and incentive strategies, and work to ensure that given procedures and regulations are observed during this key functions.
On the other hand, training and development activities include the determination, design, execution, and analysis of educational programs with a view to prepare the employees knowledgeable, skillful and confident. Orientation programs are usually necessary to acclimate new hires to the company. The HRM training and education role may encompass a wide variety of tasks, depending on the type and extent of different programs. In any case, the HRM professional ideally is aware of the fundamentals of learning and motivation, and must carefully design effective training and development programs that benefit the overall organization as well as the employees individually. Training initiatives may include apprenticeship, internship, job rotation, mentoring, and new skills programs. Other types of training programs are also helpful as per need of the different level of employees and units.
Compensation, the third major HRM function, refers to HRM duties related to paying employees and providing incentives for them for their services. HRM professionals are typically charged with developing wage and salary systems that accomplish specific organizational objectives, such as employee retention, quality, satisfaction, and motivation. Ultimately, their aim is to establish wage and salary levels that maximize the company’s investment in relation to its goals. This is often successfully accomplished with performance based incentives, yearly bonus and other profit sharing. In particular, HRM managers must learn how to create compensation equity within the organization that doesn’t hamper morale and confidence to the company and that provides sufficient financial motivation. Besides financial compensation and fringe benefits, effective HRM managers also design programs that reward employees by meeting their emotional needs, such as recognition for good work, appreciation, motivational rewards and inspiration.
Process Of Maintenance
The fourth principal and significant HRM function, maintenance of human resources, encompasses HRM activities related to employee benefits, safety and health, welfare and social programmes and worker-management relations. Employee benefits are non-incentive-oriented compensation, such as health insurance and free parking and are often used to transfer non-taxed compensation to employees. Tax of employees may be paid by the company for employee helps. The three major categories of benefits managed by HRM managers are: employee services, such as purchasing plans, recreational activities, and legal services; vacations, holidays, and other allowed absences; and insurance, retirement, and health benefits. To successfully administer a benefits program, HRM professionals need to understand tax incentives, retirement investment plans, and purchasing power derived from a large base of employees.
In reality human resource maintenance activities related to safety and health usually entail compliance with prevalent laws that protect employees from different types hazards in the workplace. Regulations emanate from the government and organization’s policy. HRM managers must work to minimize the company’s exposure to risk by implementing preventive safety and training programs. They are also typically charged with designing detailed procedures to document and handle injuries in the interest of the organization.
In real sense, maintenance tasks related to worker-management relations primarily entail: working with labor unions, handling grievances related to misconduct such as theft or sexual harassment, and devising systems to foster cooperation. Activities in this arena include contract negotiation, developing policies to accept and handle worker grievances, and administering programs to enhance communication and cooperation for the stability and growth of the organization..
As researchers show that HRM functions are very critical and complex in reality because of the different types of employees those come from various environments, economic situation, education, family diversity, social background, attitude, psychological state of mind, propensity and behavioural streams. So, the HR managers and professionals should handle the employees carefully through their experience, employee’s situation analysis, skill and knowledge with a view to achieving the goal of the organization.
