Human Resource

Management
Fall 2020
Chapter 1: Introduction and Strategic Role of Human
Resource Management
Learning Objectives:
Concept of organization, manager and HRM
The management process
Functions and importance of HRM
Line and Staff Aspects of HRM
HR Manager’s functions
Types of human resource management specialties
The contemporary trends shaping HRM
The new human resource managers
 Organization:consists of people with formally assigned roles who
work together continuously to achieve predefined goals
Have several departments and structure to accomplish objectives

 Managers: people responsible for accomplishing the organization’s

goals by managing the people and resources of the organization

 HRM: The process of acquiring, training, appraising, and

compensating employees, and of attending to their labor relations,
health and safety, and fairness concerns
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ciAnHfIiFA
 Overall, HR functions consist of:
Job analysis, recruitment and
selection

Fairness Training

Human Resource
Management (HRM)
Health and Safety Appraisal

Labor Relations Compensation

Ref: Google images

HR functions:

Conducting job analyses

Manpower Planning and recruiting job candidates
Selecting appropriate job candidates
Orienting and training new employees
Training and developing managers
Appraising performance
Managing wages and salaries
Providing incentives and benefits
Building employee commitment and maintaining relations
 Personnel Mistakes
Hire the wrong person for the job
Experience high turnover
Have your people not doing their best
Waste time with useless interviews
Have your firm in court because of discriminatory actions
Have some employees think their salaries are unfair and inequitable
relative to others in the organization
Allow a lack of training to undermine your department’s effectiveness
Commit any unfair labor practices
 Why Is Human Resource Management Important?

 Avoid personnel mistakes: Having proper knowledge will help to hire

right person for the job and avoid legal costs and save expensive
resources
 Improve profits and performance: hiring right people for the right jobs
and motivating, appraising, and developing them will ensure they
perform best and bring profits
 You too may spend some time as an HR manager!: having prior
knowledge of HRM will enable you as a manager to take a more strategic
approach towards achieving objectives
 HR for entrepreneurs: managing HR is a crucial element in managing
the overall business
 Line and Staff Aspects of HRM
 Authority is the right to make decisions, to direct the work and to give
orders to others
Managers usually distinguish between line authority and staff authority
 Line authority traditionally gives managers the right to issue orders to
other managers or employees whereas Staff authority gives a manager
the right to advise other managers or employees
Managers with line authority are line managers. Those with staff
(advisory) authority are staff managers
Staff managers generally run departments that are advisory or supportive,
like purchasing and human resource management. Human resource
managers are therefore usually staff managers
 A Line Manager’s HR Duties

1. Placing the right person in the right job

2. orienting new employees in the organization
3. Training employees for jobs that are new to them
4. Improving the job performance of each person
5. Gaining cooperation and developing smooth working relationships
6. Interpreting the company’s policies and procedures
7. Controlling labor costs
8. Developing the abilities of each person
9. Creating and maintaining department morale
10. Protecting employees’ health and physical condition
Figure 1-1: Human Resource Manager’s Duties

Functions of
HR Managers

Line Function Coordinative Staff Functions

Line Authority Function Staff Authority
Implied Authority Functional Authority
 Human Resource Manager’s Duties
There are three distinct functions of a HR manager:
 A line function: directing the activities of the people in his/her own
department
 A coordinative function: coordinating personnel activities, a duty also
known as functional authority through which he or she ensures that line
managers are implementing the firm’s human resource policies and
practices
 Staff (assist and advise) functions: Assisting and advising line
managers, assist in hiring, training, evaluating, rewarding, counseling,
promoting, and firing employees. Administers the various benefit that
helps other line managers to comply with different occupational laws
Figure 1-2: human resource management specialties

Recruiter

Labor relations specialist EEO coordinator

Human Resource
Specialties

Training specialist Job analyst

Compensation manager
 Types of human resource management specialties:

 Recruiters: Search and create profiles for qualified job applicants.

 Equal employment opportunity (EEO) coordinators: Investigate and
resolve EEO grievances; examine organizational practices for potential
violations and work on EEO reports
 Job analysts: Collect and examine information about jobs to prepare job
descriptions and job specifications
 Compensation managers: Develop compensation plans and handle the
employee benefits and rewards program
 Training specialists: Plan, organize, and arrange training activities based on
employee needs
 Labor relations specialists: manage and coordinate all aspects of union
management relations
Trends Shaping Human Resource Management

Globalization
and Competition Trends

Workforce and Trends in HR Technological Trends

Demographic Trends Management

Copyright © 2011 Pearson Education

The contemporary trends shaping HRM

 Globalization: the process by which businesses or other

organizations develop international influence or start
operating on an international scale
 Competition: globalization brings more competition, and
more pressure to improve quality
For consumers it means lower prices and higher quality
products but workers have to work hard and jobs are less
secured
 The contemporary trends shaping HRM
 Technological advancement: new technologies are
increasingly been used for many human resource
management applications, such as facebook & linkedin
recruitment, online screening tests, online payroll system,
human resource information system
 Online training platforms are used to provide training to
employees
 Mobile applications are being used to track employee
locations and employee health
Workforce and Demographic Trends

Trends Affecting Demographic Trends

Human Resources

Copyright © 2011 Pearson Education

 The new human resource managers
They focus more on strategic, big picture issues
They manage ethics
They manage employee engagement
They use evidence-based human resource management to
measure HR performance and results
They add value
They have new competencies
Mission statements of some famous companies
 Strategic Human Resource Management
 Strategic HRM helps the company to achieve it’s overall
long-term objectives (it’s vision and mission)
 Today’s human resource managers are more involved in
longer term, strategic big picture issues, so human resource
management has now become more strategic
 formulating and executing human resource policies and
practices that produce the employee competencies and
behaviors the company needs to achieve its strategic aims
 Managing Ethics
 Ethics
◦ Standards that someone uses to
decide what his or her conduct
should be
 HRM-related Ethical Issues
◦ Workplace safety
◦ Maintaining employee laws and
regulations
◦ Employee theft
◦ Employee privacy rights
Copyright © 2011 Pearson Education
 Employee engagement
 Today’s human resource managers need the skills to foster and manage
employee engagement because employees are valuable assets of the
organization
 Engaged employees have a sense of energetic and effective connection
with their work, and instead of being stressed they look upon their
work as challenging
 engaged employees are generally more motivated and more likely to
deliver improved business performance.
  more engaged the employees are, the higher are profit, revenue growth,
customer satisfaction, productivity, innovation, staff retention,
efficiency and health and safety performance
 Engaged employees boost up profitability and performance of the company
Evidence-Based HRM
 Measuring HR performance and results:
Human resource managers nowadays need performance
measures (or metrics) to measure skill and talent
Human Resource (HR) metrics are measurements used to
determine the value and effectiveness of HR initiatives,
typically including such areas as turnover, training, return on
human capital and expenses per employee
Adding Value
 Managers focus on performance, measurement, and evidence
 It has become necessary that HR managers must add value,
particularly by boosting profitability and performance in
measurable ways
 High-performance work system: a set of human resource
management practices that together produce superior
employee performance
 The human resource manager’s competencies

 Leadership and Navigation The ability to direct and contribute to initiatives and processes
within the same organization
 Ethical Practice The ability to integrate core values, integrity and accountability throughout all
organizational and business practices
 Business Acumen The ability to understand and apply information with which to contribute to
the Organization’s strategic plan
 Relationship Management The ability to manage interactions to provide service and to
support the organization
 Consultation The ability to provide guidance to organizational stakeholders
 Critical Evaluation The ability to interpret information with which to make business decisions
and recommendations.
 Global and Cultural Effectiveness The ability to value and consider the perspectives and
backgrounds of all parties
 Communication The ability to effectively exchange information with stakeholders
 Take home points:
 An organization consists of people who work together to achieve particular goals and it has several
departments and structures; a Manager manages the people and resources to achieve the objectives of
the organization
 Human resource management is the process of managing and looking after all the core activities
related to human assets so that organization’s goals can be accomplished
 There are five core managerial activities and seven main functions of human resource management
 Human Resource Management is important to avoid personnel mistakes, improving profits and
performance, to take a more strategic approach towards achieving objectives and managing HR is a
crucial element in managing the overall business
 HR managers are usually staff managers with line function, coordinative function and staff function
 There are six different types of HR specialties
 Trends such as globalization, competition, technological advancement, workforce and demographic
changes are affecting human resource management
 The new HR managers are more strategic, take talent management approach, manage ethics, measure
performance, and focus on evidence and measurements to take actions
 The new HR managers have a set of competencies which enable them to manage resources effectively
 Supplementary reading:
Chapter 1 & 3, Dessler, G. (2017), Human Resource
Management. Pearsons.
Employee engagement and motivation; CIPD factsheet
[given in google classroom]
Hults, B. (2011), Why HR Really Does Add Value, Harvard
Business Review. [retrieved from
https://hbr.org/2011/12/why-hr-really-does-add-value]