Unit-I

UNIT I : INTRODUCTION

HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT:

DEFINITION:

Edwin Flippo defines HRM as "planning, organizing, directing, controlling of procurement,

development, compensation, integration , maintenance and separation of human resources to the

end that individual, organizational and social objectives are achieved."

1.1 ROLE OF HR MANAGERS:

1• Manages and organizes multiple functional areas within Human Resources including

providing technical direction to technical/professional and clerical staff within assigned areas.

2• Consults with and advises administrators and employee representatives on personnel-related

policies and procedures.

3• Interprets and communicates laws and regulations to ensure the agency is aware of its legal

responsibilities; in conjunction with the Legal Department

4• Develops and implements personnel rules and regulations, and interprets and administers

human resources-related provisions of collective bargaining agreements.

5• Analyzes processes and procedures in assigned functional areas including conducting research

and statistical analyses, and makes recommendations for improvement.

6• Develops, implements, and administers, large and/or complex research studies or projects that

may include the development and validation of selection instrumentation for a variety of

classifications.

7• Establishes collaborative relationships with various functional and departmental areas of the

District.

8• Trains and evaluates subordinates and prepares preliminary budget reports in assigned

functional areas.

9• Represents Human Resources Department at a variety of meetings and advises the Human

Resources Director in alternative courses of action in Human Resources issues.

10• Presents written and oral reports on a wide variety of human resources related issues.

11• May participate in labor negotiations and/or recommend preliminary proposals including

cost implementation projections.

12• May be required to temporarily replace or act in the position of the senior District staff

member to whom this position normally reports, and may be required to perform some or all of

the senior staff member's essential functions in such situations.

Strategic Partner

In today’s organizations, to guarantee their viability and ability to contribute, HR managers need

to think of themselves as strategic partners. In this role, the HR person contributes to the

development of and the accomplishment of the organization-wide business plan and objectives.

The HR business objectives are established to support the attainment of the overall strategic

business plan and objectives. The tactical HR representative is deeply knowledgeable about the

design of work systems in which people succeed and contribute. This strategic partnership

impacts HR services such as the design of work positions; hiring; reward, recognition and

strategic pay; performance development and appraisal systems; career and succession planning;

and employee development.

Employee Advocate

As an employee sponsor or advocate, the HR manager plays an integral role in organizational

success via his knowledge about and advocacy of people. This advocacy includes expertise in

how to create a work environment in which people will choose to be motivated, contributing, and

happy.

Fostering effective methods of goal setting, communication and empowerment through

responsibility, builds employee ownership of the organization. The HR professional helps

establish the organizational culture and climate in which people have the competency, concern

and commitment to serve customers well.

In this role, the HR manager provides employee development opportunities, employee assistance

programs, gain sharing and profit-sharing strategies, organization development interventions, due

process approaches to problem solving and regularly scheduled communication opportunities.

Change Champion

The constant evaluation of the effectiveness of the organization results in the need for the HR

professional to frequently champion change. Both knowledge about and the ability to execute

successful change strategies make the HR professional exceptionally valued. Knowing how to

link change to the strategic needs of the organization will minimize employee dissatisfaction and

resistance to change.

The HR professional contributes to the organization by constantly assessing the effectiveness of

the HR function. He also sponsors change in other departments and in work practices. To

promote the overall success of his organization, he champions the identification of the

organizational mission, vision, values, goals and action plans. Finally, he helps determine the

measures that will tell his organization how well it is succeeding in all of this.

1.2 HR AS A COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE:

If managed effectively,the workforce,provides a very definite competitive advantage to those

firms that are confidence and progressive enough leverage the HR department appropriately.

Human Resources Should be at the Core of Workforce Management

Human Resources (HR) should be at the core of workforce management.HR is the channel for

acquiring and retaining the necessary workforce through job satisfaction, security, compensation,

training programs, appropriate and frequent measurement of the workforce, and finally providing

flexibility with respect to the values of different generations of workers. HR should also take a

leadership role in employee management communications. Too often, HR is seen as a cost center

that ensures that payroll is on time and vacation tracking is accomplished.

EXAMPLE

HR’s Role- An Experience

By far, the best example of a factor contributing to employee personal growth and satisfaction

that I have witnessed has been a culture that promotes a collaborative work environment. The

downside to this is that it takes a lot of time, resources and discipline to convert a typical

structured hierarchical organization to one that emphasizes collaboration.

Unfortunately, in this example, HR was seen as a roadblock to the corporation. Because they

(HR) were not provided with the necessary tools to operate collaboratively in this organization

and be allowed to change policies, the corporation was not competitive in the workforce arena.

Although the culture was very enjoyable to work in, there was personal growth happening with

many employees ,and the amount and quality of work were beyond compare, the compensation

options available were less than admirable.

The Solution

This particular corporation continues to operate under the assumption that they are keeping costs

down by paying the minimum compensation necessary to acquire an employee. They think that

people should be happy to have the job in the first place. They believe that people aren’t worth

their pay. On an individual basis this can be true, but they can exist at any level within an

organization. They need to be removed from the workforce, because they are taking money from

the real workers. Corporations are better off with fewer exceptional people all making more

money than they should, than to have the same or lower payroll costs with more people. To

emphasize, it is better to hire one exceptional person at $60,000 than two average people at

$25,000 each.

The result of this shortsightedness was that they could not acquire the folks with the necessary

levels of experience, education and skill levels they required for corporate expansion. They

subsequently opted to hire many consultants (and contractors) to accomplish their goals and

objectives. HR was left completely out of this decision. As if this were not enough, the company

was still reticent to assist employees with career planning and the necessary follow on, quality

training and additional responsibilities.

1.3 HR CHALLENGES OF INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS:

Global organizations are focused on human capital issues. There seems to be an almost global

consensus that people issues are vital to company success. As the "war for talent" intensifies, the

acceptance of the importance of human capital will continue to grow. Among the people

challenges, there is a broad consensus, across international regions, on what the important

challenges are. They include:

The development of "global" leaders

The creation of a high-performance global corporate culture & high-performing teams

Managing talent (recruitment, retention, training, compensation & incentives)

If HR professionals are to be seen to play a crucial role in strategy and operational results they

need to pick up the gauntlet on these people issues and act as "functional leaders". This means

more time spent focusing on the business drivers and less on HR "programs and services".

Adopting the role of global, functional leadership is the great opportunity for HR professionals.

They need to be perceived as being totally committed to improving the business - which they

must understand as well as any other leader - by their expertise in "people issues".

As the area of human resource management becomes more strategic and more global it is

becoming more important and critical to the organization. While not all companies are

recognizing this yet, those that are most effective and most admired, seem to be the ones that are.

As a consequence they are doing many things that make their management of human resources

as effective as possible. In doing so doing, several things are being observed: 1) the roles that the

HR department and its HR professionals have traditionally played are changing substantially; 2)

the competencies required of the HR professionals to play these new roles are also changing

rapidly with dramatic implications for the current HR staff and leaders; 3) the HR professionals

are working more closely, in partnership, with line managers, employees, suppliers and

representatives of labour unions, strategic partners and members of community organizations in

order to be more effective in managing the firm’s human resources; and finally, 4) the structure

of the HR department and the HR function are being reshaped in order to better serve the various

stakeholders of HR in order to make the management of people and the organization more

effective.

Today's Top 10 Human Resource Management Challenges

Due to the fluctuating economy as well as local and global advancements, there are many

changes occurring rapidly that affect HR in a wide range of issues. In the Survey of Global HR

Challenges: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers on behalf

of the World Federation of Personnel Management Associations (WFPMA), several challenges

for human resource management were revealed. This survey, which concluded that "despite

national and regional differences, there was remarkable unanimity," disclosed the following top

10 human resource management challenges:

Challenges % of Companies

1. Change management 48%

2. Leadership development 35%

3. HR effectiveness measurement 27%

4. Organizational effectiveness 25%

5. Compensation 24%

Challenges % of Companies

6. Staffing: Recruitment and availability of skilled local labor24%

7. Succession planning 20%

8. Learning and development 19%

9. Staffing: Retention 16%

10. Benefits costs: Health & welfare 13%

1.4

1.5 GLOBAL HR SYSTEM:

Cross-cultural differences like these in HR practices around the world, one could reasonably ask,

“Is it realistic for a company to try to institute a standardised HR system in all or most of its

facilities around the world?” A recent study suggests that the answer is “Yes”. It shows that the

employer may have to defer to local managers on some specific issues. However, in general, the

fact that there are currently global differences in HR practices doesn’t mean that these

differences are necessary or even advisable. The important thing is knowing how to create and

implement the global HR system.

In this study, the researchers interviewed HR personnel from six global companies—Agilent,

Dow, IBM, Motorola, Procter and Gamble, and Shell Oil Co—as well as international HR

consultants. Their overall conclusion was that employers who successfully implement global HR

systems apply various international HR best practices in doing so. This enables them to create

global HR systems that are globally acceptable, that they can develop more effectively, and that

their HR staffs can then implement more effectively. Let’s look at each.

Making the system more acceptable

First, employers engage in three best practices so that the global HR systems they eventually

develop will be acceptable to their local managers around the world.

Remember that global systems are more accepted in truly global organisations. These companies

and all their managers think of themselves as global in scope and perspective, and all or most

functions and business units operate on a truly global basis. They are not simply aggregates of

numerous more or less independent local entities. For example, truly global organisations require

their managers to work on global teams, and identify and recruit and place the employees they

hire globally. As one Shell manager put it, “If you are truly global, then you are hiring here (the

United States) people who are going to immediately go and work in the Hague, and vice versa.”

This makes it easier for managers everywhere to accept the global imperative for having a more

standardised HR system.

Investigate pressures to differentiate and determine their legitimacy. HR managers seeking to

standardise selection, training, appraisal, compensation, or other HR practices worldwide will

always meet resistance from local managers who insist, “you can’t do that here, because we are

different culturally and in other ways”. Based on their research, these investigators found that

these “differences” are usually not persuasive. For example, when Dow wanted to implement an

online employee recruitment and selection tool in a particular region abroad, the hiring managers

there told Dow that there was no way their managers would use it. After investigating the

supposed cultural roadblocks and then implementing the new system, what we found is that the

number of applicants went through the roof when we went online, and the quality of the

applicants also increased.

However, the operative word here is “investigate”—it does not mean racing through a change

without ascertaining whether there may in fact be some reason for using a more locally

appropriate system. Carefully assess whether the local cultural or other differences might in fact

undermine the new system. Be knowledgeable about local legal issues, and be willing to

differentiate where necessary. Then, market-test the new HR tool.

Try to work within the context of a strong corporate culture. A strong corporate culture helps

override geographical differences. Companies that create a strong corporate culture find it easier

to obtain agreement among far-flung employees when it comes time to implement standardised

practices worldwide. For example, Procter and Gamble has a strong corporate culture. Because

of how P&G recruits, selects, trains, and rewards them, its managers have a strong sense of

shared values. For instance, Procter & Gamble emphasises orderly growth, and its culture

therefore encourages a relatively high degree of conformity among managers. New recruits

quickly learn to think in terms of “we” instead of “I”. They learn to value thoroughness,

consistency, self-discipline and a methodical approach. Because all P&G managers worldwide

tend to share these values, they are in a sense more similar to each other than they are

geographically different. Having such global unanimity makes it easier to develop and

implement standardised HR practices worldwide.

Developing a more effective system

Similarly, researchers found that these companies engaged in several best practices in developing

effective worldwide HR systems.

Form global HR networks. The firm’s HR managers around the world should feel that they are

not merely local HR managers, but are part of a greater whole, namely, the firm’s global HR

network. These six firms did this in various ways. For instance, they formed global HR

development teams, and involved them in developing the new HR systems. In fact, these

researchers found that in developing global HR systems, the most critical factor for success is

creating an infrastructure of partners around the world that you use for support, for buy-in, for

organisation of local activities, and to help you better understand their own systems and their

own challenges. Treat the local HR managers as equal partners, not just implementers.

Remember that it’s more important to standardise ends and competencies than specific methods.

For example, (with regard to screening applicants) the researchers conclude that “while

companies may strive to standardise tools globally, the critical point is (actually) to standardise

what is assessed but to be flexible in how it is assessed. Thus, IBM uses a more a less

standardised recruitment and selection process worldwide, but details such as who conducts the

interview (hiring manager vs. recruiter) or whether the prescreen is by phone or in person, differ

by country.

Implementing the global HR system

Finally, in actually implementing the global HR systems, several best practices can help ensure a

more effective implementation.

Remember, “You can’t communicate enough.” For example, there’s a need for constant contact

with the decision-makers in each country, as well as the people who will be implementing and

using the system.

Dedicate adequate resources for the global HR effort. For example, do not expect local HR

offices to suddenly start implementing the new job analysis procedures unless the head office

provides adequate resources for these additional activities.

International staffing: Home or local?

Multinational companies (MNCs) employ several types of international managers. Locals are

citizens of the countries where they are working. Expatriates (expats) are non-citizens of the

countries in which they are working. Home-country nationals are citizens of the country in which

the multinational company has its headquarters. Third-country nationals are citizens of a country

other than the parent or the host country—for example, a British executive working in the Tokyo

branch of a US multinational bank. Expatriates still represent a minority of multinationals

managers.

Thus, most managerial positions are filled by locals rather than expatriates in both headquarters

or foreign subsidiary operations. There are several reasons to rely on local managers to fill your

foreign subsidiary’s management ranks.

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1. Define Human Resource Management.

2. Mention any two roles of HR?

3. List the top 10 Human Resource Management Challenges?

4. What do you meant by strategic partner?

5. Is International staffing: Home or local?

Elucidate HR as a competitive advantage and explain with an example.

Briefly explain about the global HR system?

Elucidate the HR challenges of international business.

How intercountry affects HRM? Explain in detail.

Explain the best practices to implement the global HR system?

How the cultural factors affects HRM?

Write short notes on:

a. Strategic Partner

b. Employee Advocate

c. change champion.