Human Resources and Organizations

Resources
1. The Role of Human Resources

Human resources (HR) management is important to organizational success because employee skills, attitudes, ideas, and levels of energy and commitment are all assets that allow companies to compete within the marketplace and distinguish themselves from their competitors. HR managers are responsible developing HR strategies and tactics to help organizations meet their goals. This is accomplished in part by identifying, recruiting, and hiring employees that best fit the needs of the organization.

To provide additional context, let’s begin with the following video that explores the basics of Human Resources Management:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3MTtj5PVAo

2.Challenges in HR

HR managers face three main types of challenges when planning and formulating HR strategies: environmental challenges, organizational challenges, and individual challenges.

Expand the tabs below to learn more about each type of challenge:

·  Environmental Challenges

·  Organizational Challenges

·  Individual Challenges

Environmental challenges are forces external to the firm, and managers often have little control over them. Environmental challenges include rapid technological change, globalization, legislation, skill shortages, and workforce diversity.

Given the potential complexity of such challenges, what is the role of HR in resolving these issues? View the video below to recall the goals of HR—to serve the organization’s people and help mitigate challenges like those discussed above.  Then, continue with the module content to explore how strategic planning can help the HR professional make people his or her business.

People are your Business

https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PLB05B4F87560325E6&v=61L-nP4wWEg

3.Strategies and Solutions in HR

A successful HR strategy allows an organization to benefit from its unique strengths, increase overall performance, and reinforce other organizational strategies; however, HR strategies are not “one-size-fits-all.” Managers must develop HR strategies that fit with organizational needs. In order to do this, it is important that HR managers conduct both internal and external analyses. An internal analysis examines an organization’s strengths and weaknesses by assessing organizational culture, competencies, and composition. An external analysis examines the environment the organization is operating within so that managers can address degrees of uncertainty, magnitudes of change, volatility, and complexity.

Before continuing on to learn about strategies for implementing a strategy, expand each tab to reveal additional benefits of strategic planning in Human Resources:

·  Behavior

·  Goals

·  Thinking

·  Perspective

·  Participation

·  Analysis

·  Culture

Encourage proactive and forward-looking behavior.

Once an HR strategy is chosen, HR tactics must be employed to implement the strategy. HR tactics are specific policies and programs that help organizations meet their strategic goals. HR tactics can address issues such as workflows, staffing, employee separations, performance reviews, training, and employee relations. For HR strategies to succeed, the tactics and programs chosen to implement the strategies should be consistent and appropriate. It is also important to periodically evaluate HR programs to ensure they are meeting their objectives.

HR managers must analyze individual jobs, define specific job requirements for each position, and design jobs that enhance and manage organizational workflows. Job analysis procedures allow managers to identify the unique job requirements for each position within an organization. Once defined, job requirements allow managers to effectively recruit, select, train, appraise, and compensate employees based on objective measures. When jobs are designed effectively, organizational productivity increases and employee job satisfaction increases.

Job design often incorporates the Job Characteristic Theory (Hackman & Oldham, 1976), which outlines five core job dimensions aimed at improving employees’ motivation, work performance, and job satisfaction.

Each core dimension impacts employees’ attitudes toward their jobs. Skill variety, task identity, and task significance allow employees to feel that their work is meaningful. Autonomy engenders employees’ sense of responsibility for higher quality work. Feedback enables employees to more accurately judge the results of their work.

There are several different approaches that can be taken with regard to job design. Job rotation, job enlargement, job enrichment, work simplification, and team-based job design are some examples. Each approach has unique advantages and disadvantages. The key to successful job design is to fit the job design approach with the organization’s business strategy and structure. Organizations where employees have highly specialized skill sets will not fit well with a strategy like job rotation.

Flexible work arrangements have also been considered as a way to improve employee motivation, work performance and job satisfaction. Job sharing, telecommuting, flextime, and a compressed workweek are all examples of flexible work arrangements that organizations use to try to balance the needs of the organization with the personal needs of employees. As with the different approaches to job design, each type of flexible work arrangement offers different advantages and disadvantages, and organizations and HR managers must identify which strategies work best based on organizational needs and structures. For example, hospitals are better suited to flexible work arrangements such as job sharing or compressed workweeks than they are to flextime or telecommuting.

A key factor in being able to help keep employees engaged and to resolve potential issues that were discussed earlier in the module is the need for HR professionals to interact effectively with other individuals and departments.  Review the video below for more on this balancing act:

Getting Out of the HR Bubble

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uu83X3bMk1A&list=PLB05B4F87560325E6

Book:
Gomez-Mejia, L., Balkin, D., & Cardy, R. (2012). Managing Human Resources (7th Ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. ISBN-13: 9780132729826