The document discusses key aspects of human resource management (HRM) including its scope, objectives, and functions. Specifically, it outlines four primary HRM activities: 1) manpower planning to determine staffing needs, 2) recruitment, selection, and placement of personnel to hire the right employees, 3) training and development to prepare employees, and 4) performance appraisal to evaluate employees. The document also provides details on recruitment, selection processes, and the importance of selecting and placing the right candidates.
3. What Is Human Resource Management?
Human Resource Management (HRM) is the function within an organization that focuses on
recruitment of, management of, and providing direction for the people who work in the
organization.
It also deals with issues related to people such as compensation, hiring, performance
management, organization development, safety, wellness, benefits, employee motivation,
communication, administration, and training.
It also has a strategic and comprehensive approach to managing people and the workplace culture
and environment. Effective HRM enables employees to contribute effectively and productively to
the overall company direction and the accomplishment of the organization's goals and objectives.
Human Resource Management: Nature
Human Resource Management is a process of bringing people and organizations together so that the goals of
each are met. The various features of HRM include:
It is pervasive in nature as it is present in all enterprises. Its
focus is on results rather than on rules.
It tries to help employees develop their potential fully.
It encourages employees to give their best to the organization.
It is all about people at work, both as individuals and groups.
It tries to put people on assigned jobs in order to produce good results.
It helps an organization meet its goals in the future by providing for competent and
wellmotivated employees.
It tries to build and maintain cordial relations between people working at various levels in the
organization.
It is a multidisciplinary activity, utilizing knowledge and inputs drawn from psychology,
economics, etc.
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4. Human Resource Management: Scope
1. Personnel aspect-This is concerned with manpower planning, recruitment, selection, placement,
transfer, promotion, training and development, layoff and retrenchment, remuneration, incentives,
productivity etc.
2. Welfare aspect-It deals with working conditions and amenities such as canteens, crèches, rest and
lunch rooms, housing, transport, medical assistance, education, health and safety, recreation facilities, etc.
3. Industrial relations aspect-This covers union-management relations, joint consultation, collective
bargaining, grievance and disciplinary procedures, settlement of disputes, etc.
Human Resource Management: Objectives
To help the organization reach its goals.
To ensure effective utilization and maximum development of human resources.
To ensure respect for human beings. To identify and satisfy the needs of individuals. To
ensure reconciliation of individual goals with those of the organization.
To achieve and maintain high morale among employees.
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5. To provide the organization with well-trained and well-motivated employees. To
increase to the fullest the employee's job satisfaction and self-actualization. To
develop and maintain a quality of work life.
To be ethically and socially responsive to the needs of society.
To develop overall personality of each employee in its multidimensional aspect.
To enhance employee's capabilities to perform the present job.
To equip the employees with precision and clarity in transaction of business.
To inculcate the sense of team spirit, team work and inter-team collaboration.
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7. Human Resource Management: Functions
HRM is the part of the organization concerned with the “people” dimension. HRM
can be viewed in one of two ways. First, HRM is a staff or support function in the
organization. Its role is to provide assistance in HRM matters to line employees, or
those directly involved in producing the organization’s goods and services. Second,
HRM is a function of every manager’s job. Whether or not one works in a formal
HRM department, the fact remains that to effectively manage employees, all managers
must handle the activities we’ll describe in this book. That’s important to keep
in mind!
Every organization is comprised of people. Acquiring their services, developing
their skills, motivating them to high levels of performance, and ensuring that they
maintain their commitment to the organization are essential to achieving organizational
objectives. This is true regardless of the type of organization—government, business,
education, health, recreation, or social action. Hiring and keeping good people is
critical to the success of every organization.
To look at HRM more specifically, we propose that it consists of four basic functions:
(1) staffing, (2) training and development, (3) motivation, and (4) maintenance.
In less academic terms, we might say that HRM is made up of four activities: (1) hiring
people, (2) preparing them, (3) stimulating them, and (4) keeping them.
Even the smallest entrepreneurial organization with one or two employees must
recognize responsibility for all four HR functions. In organizations that are too small
for a formal human resource management department, these functions will be the
responsibility of each line manager. Line managers will always have many of these
responsibilities whether a formal human resources department exists or not. HR
departments are generally responsible for assisting the line manager in these activities.
Organizational strategy, structure, or culture may dictate that such activities, although
supportive of line management, will be more effective if handled in a more centralized
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8. In order to achieve the above objectives, Human Resource Management undertakes the following
activities:
1. Human resource or manpower planning.
2. Recruitment, selection and placement of personnel.
3. Training and development of employees.
4. Appraisal of performance of employees.
5. Taking corrective steps such as transfer from one job to another.
6.Remuneration of employees.
7. Social security and welfare of employees.
8. Setting general and specific management policy for organizational relationship.
9. Collective bargaining, contract negotiation and grievance handling.
10. Staffing the organization.
11. Aiding in the self-development of employees at all levels.
12. Developing and maintaining motivation for workers by providing incentives.
13. Reviewing and auditing manpower management in the organization
14. Potential Appraisal, Feedback Counseling.
15. Role Analysis for job occupants.
16. Job Rotation.
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9. Human Resource Management:
Primary Activities
Human resource management (HRM)
Manpower Planning
Manpower Planning which is also called as Human Resource Planning consists of putting right
number of people, right kind of people at the right place, right time, doing the right things for which they are
suited for the achievement of goals of the organization. Human Resource Planning has got an important
place in the arena of industrialization. Human Resource Planning has to be a systems approach and is carried out
in a set procedure. The procedure is as follows:
1.Analyzing the current manpower inventory
2.Making future manpower forecasts
3.Developing employment programs
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10. 2. Recruitment, selection and placement of personnel
Recruitment
This is the process of searching for and obtaining sufficient number and quality of potential job seekers or
applicants to enable the organization to select the most appropriate people to fill its job needs. It is
pertinent to note that the process of recruitment must begin with a clear specification or understanding of
manpower needs. It should consider the time that the manpower requirement must be met for instance the
Labor market for fresh graduates with less than year experience in the National Youths Service Corps.
Labor market simple means an area where employers could easily get the type of workers they need to
carry out relevant duties and employees are available to sell their labor or seek employment .
Selection and Placement
Selection is a process of gathering information for the purposes of evaluating and deciding who should be
employed or hired for the short and Long-term interests of the individual and the organization.In other words
it is the process of getting the best of most qualified candidates from the pool of job seekers adjudged to
have potential for job performance.
The importance of selection and placement;
To fairly and without any element of discrimination evaluate job applicants in view of individual
differences and capabilities.
To employ qualified and competent hands that can meet the job requirement of the organization
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11. To place job applicants in the best interest of the organization and the individual.
To help in human resources manpower planning purposes in organization.
To reduce recruitment cost that may arise as a result of poor selection and placement exercises.
3. Training and development of employees.
Employee Training and Development is a key ingredient in performance improvement. However, the first
step in designing an employee training and development program is to identify the training needs. The
training needs are based on what is needed to achieve the organization’s strategic objectives. Key
steps for performance improvement include
Assess and define performance improvement issues and gaps
Gain management commitment for performance improvement
Develop a business plan to manage performance improvement
Establish best practices for work processes and performance standards
Provide employee training and development to develop required skills
Establish new practices that support improved performance
Measure and monitor results and provide coaching where needed
4. Appraisal of performance of employees
Once an annual ritual, performance appraisal has become a continuous process by which an employee
understands of a company’s goals and his or her progress toward contributing to them are measured.
Performance measurement is an ongoing activity for all managers and their subordinates.
Performance measurement uses the following indicators of performance, as well as assessments of those
indicators.
I. Quantity: The number of units produced, processed or sold is a good objective indicator
of performance.
II. Quality: The quality of work performed can be measured by several means. The
percentage of work output that must be redone or is rejected is one such indicator. In a sales
environment, the percentage of inquiries converted to sales is an indicator of
salesmanship quality.
III. Timeliness: How fast work is performed is another performance indicator that should be
used with caution. In field service, the average customer’s downtime is a good indicator
of timeliness. In manufacturing, it might be the number of units produced per hour.
IV. Cost-Effectiveness: The cost of work performed should be used as a measure of
performance only if the employee has some degree of control over costs. For example, a
customer-service representative’s performance is indicated by the percentage of calls that
he or she must escalate to more experienced and expensive reps.
V. Absenteeism/Tardiness: An employee is obviously not performing when he or she is not
at work. Other employees’ performance may be adversely impacted by absences, too.
VI. Creativity: It can be difficult to quantify creativity as a performance indicator, but in
many white-collar jobs, it is vitally important. Supervisors and employees should keep
track of creative work examples and attempt to quantify them.
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12. VII. Adherence to Policy: This may seem to be the opposite of creativity, but it is merely a
boundary on creativity. Deviations from policy indicate an employee whose performance goals
are not well aligned with those of the company.
VIII. Gossip and Other Personal Habits: They may not seem performance-related to the
employee, but some personal habits, like gossip, can detract from job performance and
interfere with the performance of others. The specific behaviors should be defined, and goals
should be set for reducing their frequency.
IX. Personal Appearance/Grooming: Most people know how to dress for work, but in
many organizations, there is at least one employee who needs to be told. Examples of
inappropriate appearance and grooming should be spelled out, their effects upon the
employee’s performance and that of others explained, and corrective actions defined.
X. Manager Appraisal: A manager appraises the employee’s performance and delivers the
appraisal to the employee. Manager appraisal is by nature top-down and does not
encourage the employee’s active participation. It is often met with resistance, because the
employee has no investment in its development.
XI. Self-Appraisal: The employee appraises his or her own performance, in many cases
comparing the self-appraisal to management's review. Often, self-appraisals can highlight
discrepancies between what the employee and management think are important
performance factors and provide mutual feedback for meaningful adjustment of
expectations.
XII. Peer Appraisal: Employees in similar positions appraise an employee’s performance.
This method is based on the assumption that co-workers are most familiar with an
employee’s performance. Peer appraisal has long been used successfully in
manufacturing environments, where objective criteria such as units produced prevail.
Recently, peer appraisal has expanded to white-collar professions, where soft criteria
such as “works well with others” can lead to ambiguous appraisals. Peer appraisals are
often effective at focusing an employee’s attention on undesirable behaviors and
motivating change.
XIII. Team Appraisal: Similar to peer appraisal in that members of a team, who may hold
different positions, are asked to appraise each other’s work and work styles. This
approach assumes that the team’s objectives and each member’s expected contribution have
been clearly defined.
XIV. Assessment Center: The employee is appraised by professional assessors who may
evaluate simulated or actual work activities. Objectivity is one advantage of assessment
centers, which produce reviews that are not clouded by personal relationships with
employees.
XV. 360-Degree or “Full-Circle” Appraisal: The employee’s performance is appraised by
everyone with whom he of she interacts, including managers, peers, customers and
members of other departments. This is the most comprehensive and expensive way to
measure performance and it is generally reserved for key employees.
XVI. MBO (Management by Objectives): The employee’s achievement of objective goals set
in concert with his or her manager is assessed. The MBO process begins with action
statements such as, “reduce rejected parts to 5 percent.” Ongoing monitoring and review
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13. of objectives keeps the employee focused on achieving goals. At the annual review,
progress toward objectives is assessed, and new goals are set.
5. Remuneration of employees
Employee Remuneration refers to the reward or compensation given to the employees for their work
performances. Remuneration provides basic attraction to an employee to perform job efficiently and
effectively. Remuneration leads to employee motivation. Salaries constitute an important source of income
for employees and determine their standard of living. Salaries affect the employee’s productivity and work
performance. Thus the amount and method of remuneration are very important for both management and
employees.
There are mainly two types of Employee Remuneration
1. Time Rate Method
2. Piece Rate Method
1. Time Rate Method: Under time rate system, remuneration is directly linked with the time spent or
devoted by an employee on the job. The employees are paid a fixed pre-decided amount hourly, daily,
weekly or monthly irrespective of their output. It is a very simple method of remuneration. It leads to
minimum wastage of resources and lesser chances of accidents. Time Rate method leads to quality output
and this method is very beneficial to new employees as they can learn their work without any reduction in
their salaries. This method encourages employee’s unity as employees of a particular group/cadre get
equal salaries.
2. Piece Rate Method: It is a method of compensation in which remuneration is paid on the basis of
units or pieces produced by an employee. In this system emphasis is more on quantity output rather than
quality output. Under this system the determination of employee cost per unit is not difficult because salaries
differ with output. There is less supervision required under this method and hence the per unit cost of
production is low. This system improves the morale of the employees as the salaries are directly related with
their work efforts. There is greater work-efficiency in this method.
LINE & STAFF: Formal Relationships: The relationship with which the managers in an
organization deal with one another are broadly classified into LINE & STAFF
Informal Relationships are those that emerge from formal relationships and are
established unofficially by persons employed.
Line Managers : Authority -Making decisions-Directing work,
Giving orders -Accomplishing goals
Staff Managers : Assisting and advising line managers.
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14. STAFF RELATIONS : STAFF RELATIONS : The staff concept is an old / ancient one. Line
has to perform all their functions and concentrate on management of people and activities. This
gives rise to securing advice and help from specialists. - This creates staff relationships.-
The relationships between two managers when it is created for Taking/giving advice,
information, counseling etc for achieving organizational goals is called staff relations.
Staff Managers analyze problems, collect information and develop alternative suggestions and
help the line managers to make right decisions.
Staff responsibility is monitoring and reporting ---results and information to the line managers
to reduce their work load.
How External Influences Affect HRM
The four HRM activities are highly affected by what occurs outside the organization.
It is important to recognize these environmental influences, because any activity
undertaken in each of the HRM processes is directly or indirectly affected by these
external elements. For example, when a company downsizes its workforce in response
to a downturn in the economy (sometimes referred to as rightsizing), does it lay off
workers by seniority? Does the layoff affect an inordinate number of minority
employees?
Although any attempt to identify specific external influences may prove insufficient, we
can categorize them into four general areas: the dynamic environment, laws
and regulation, labor unions, and current management practice.
The Dynamic Environment of HRM
It has been stated that the only constant during our lifetimes is change. We must therefore
prepare ourselves for events that have a significant effect on our lives. HRM is no
different. Many events help shape this field. Some of the more obvious include globalization,
technology, workforce diversity, changing skill requirements, continuous
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15. improvement, decentralized work sites, teams, employee involvement, and ethics.
Laws and Regulation
Today, employees who want to take several weeks of unpaid leave to be with their newborn
children and return to their jobs without any loss of seniority have an easier time
making it a reality. Although some employers may think such leaves negatively affect
work flow, government legislation has given employees the right to take this leave. Laws
supporting this and other employer actions are important to the HRM process. Listed
in Exhibit 2-4 are laws that have had a tremendous effect on HRM in organizations.
We’ll explore this critical area in depth in Chapter 3.
Labor Unions
Labor unions were founded and exist today to assist workers in dealing with the management of an
organization. As the certified third-party representative, the union acts
on behalf of its members to secure wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of
employment.
Another critical aspect of unions is that they promote and foster what is called a
grievance procedure, or a specified process for resolving differences between workers
and management. In many instances, this process alone constrains management from
making unilateral decisions. For instance, a current HRM issue is the debate over
employers’ ability to terminate employees whenever they want. When a union is present
and HRM practices are spelled out in a negotiated agreement, employers cannot
fire for unjustified reasons. Because of the complexities involved in operating with
unionization and the special laws that pertain to it, we will defer that discussion until
Chapter 14, when we will explore the unique world of labor relations and collective
bargaining.
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