THE MANAGEMENT PROCESS

The 5 basic functions of the management process are:

CONTROLLING

LEADING

STAFFING

Organizing
Planning
 Human Resource Management:
Activities designed to provide for TRAINING
and co-ordinate the human
resources of an organization such P. RESEARCH & INFO SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT
as recruiting, selecting, developing,
counseling, rewarding; acting as
liaison with unions and government
organizations and handling other EMPLOYEE ASSISTANCE JOB DESIGN
matters of employee well being.
HR AREAS
“ A strategic and coherent
approach to the management of
an organization’s most valued COMPENSTION BENEFITS HR PLANNING
assets: the people working there
who individually and collectively
contribute to the achievement of UNION RELATIONS SELECTION & STAFFING
its objectives for sustainable
competitive advantage”
(Armstrong)

The Human Resource Wheel

 Evolution of human resource management.
 Heavy weight bureaucracies and stagnant
businesses ( 19 60’s & 70’s)
 Hierarchies being delayered and functions
being outsourced
 Business became more than slim
 There is now a move towards redressing that
balance in search for an equilibrium between
the needs for financial viability and success in
the market place on one hand and the need
to maximize human capital on the other.
 On one hand HRM is used generically to describe
the body of management activities.
 On the other hand the term is equally used to
denote a particular approach to the management of
people.
 HRM used generically:
Staffing objectives, Performance objectives, change
management objectives, administration objectives &
delivering HRM objectives
 A distinctive approach to the management of
people:
 Personnel management is workforce centered while
HRM is resource centered.
 Hard HRM:
The close integration of human resource policies with business
strategy which regards employees as a resource to be
managed in the same rational way as any other resource being
exploited for maximum return.
a) Management of people is business oriented
b) Employees to be treated as economic resource in the same manner as other
resources
c) A pluralist viewpoint.

 Soft HRM:
A process whereby employees are viewed as valued assets
and as a source of competitive advantage through their
commitment, adaptability and high level of skills and
performance
a) Based on human relations
b) Employees as means rather than objects
c) A unitarist viewpoint.
 The Michigan model:
The matching model of HRM was developed by the Michigan
school in 1984. It held that HR Systems and the organizational
structure should be managed in such a way as to match or be
congruent with the organization’s business strategy.

 The Harvard model:

A longer term perspective in managing people and consideration
of people as potential assets rather than merely a variable cost.
 For discussion: Following was sent to the letter page of
personnel managemnent.
 Hark, I think I detect the first cuckoo of a recessionary spring on
your pages (‘Making time for productivity’, March), with such an
unashamed reassertion of Taylorism. Come on, all you personnel
folk. Off with your HR nomenclature; away with all this nonsense
about the success culture, employee involvement, maximizing
people power, establishing the right climate and sharing gains
(all drawn from the CIPD’s current national priorities). Get out
your sticks and stopwatches, precisely time those tea breaks,
slash that overtime, enforce bell to bell working, put in a few
more controls and disincentives……Surely employee
involvement is not just an illusion created by the 1980’s boom
which we can ignore, now times are tough.
 What are the characteristics of the approach to HRM which the
letter identifies? Why might economic recession lead managers
to adopt such an approach.
  RECRUITMENT:
Process of seeking and attracting a pool of
people from which qualified candidates for
job vacancies can be chosen.
• INTERVIEWS:
 SOURCES OF QUALIFIED PERSONNEL

• Structured
interview
• Unstructured
Internal sources, External sources may interview
recruiting from within the include advertising,
organization which may employment agencies,
include job posting and employee referrals/walk-
• Stress interview
bidding ins and campus recruiting
• Board/panel
interview
• Group interview
 FORMAL TESTING:
 APTITUDE TESTS.
Means of measuring a person’s capacity or latent ability to learn
and perform a job.
 PSYCHOMOTOR TESTS:
Test that measures a person’s strength, dexterity and co-
ordination
 JOB KNOWLEDGE:
Tests used to measure the job related knowledge of an applicant.
 PROFICIENCY TEST:
Tests used to measure how well a job applicant can do a sample
of the work to be performed in the job.
 INTEREST TEST:
Tests designed to determine how a person’s interests compare
with the interests of successful people in a specific job.
 PERSONALITY TEST:
Tests that attempts to measure personality traits.
 POLYGRAPH & GRAPHOLOGY:
 Advantages of internal recruitment:
 Company has a better knowledge of
strength & weaknesses of a job
candidate
 Candidate has a better knowledge of
the company
 Morale & motivation of the employees
is enhanced
 The return on investment that an
organization has in its present
workforce is increased
 Advantages of external recruitment:
 The pool of talent is much larger
 New insights and perspectives can be
brought to the organization
 Sometimes it is cheaper and easier to
hire technical, skilled or managerial
employees from outside.
 Disadvantages of internal
recruitment:
 Inbreeding can stifle new ideas and
innovation
 People might be promoted to a point
where they cannot successfully perform
the job
 Infighting for promotion can negatively
affect morale.
 Disadvantages of external
recruitment:
 Attracting, contacting and evaluating
potential employees is more difficult
 Adjustment or orientation time is longer
 Morale problems can develop among
those employees within the organization
who feel qualified to do the job.
 JOB ANALYSIS:
Process of determining and reporting pertinent
information relating to a nature of specific job.

It is the determination of the tasks which

comprise the job and of the skills, knowledge,
abilities and responsibilities required of the
holder for successful job performance.

The end product of a job analysis is written

description of the actual requirements of the
job.
 Relationships among different job components:

Micromotions
.
Elements
.
Tasks
.
Duties
.
Positions
.
Jobs
.
Occupations
 Micromotion:
Simplest unit of work; involves very elementary
movement, such as reaching, grasping,
positioning, or releasing an object.

 Element:
An aggregation of two or more micromotions.

 Task:
Consists of one or more elements; one of the
distinct activities that constitute logical and
necessary steps in the performance of work by
an employee
 Products of job analysis:
 Job description
Written synopsis of the nature and
requirements of a job
A potential problem with all job descriptions
is that they may become outdated.
 Job specification:
Description of the competency, educational,
and experience qualifications the incumbent
must possess to perform the job.
 Job holder should be involved in the job
analysis process.
 Contents of a job description:
 A job description should be a formal, written
document, usually from one to three pages
long. It should include the following:
 Date written
 Job status
 Position title
 Job summary
 Detailed list of duties and responsibilities
 Supervision received
 Supervision excercised
 Principal contacts
 Related meetings to be attended
 Competency or position requirements
 Required education or experience
 Career mobility
 Job analysis methods:
 Observation
 Motion study and time study
 Work sampling
 Interviews
 Questionnaires.

 Functional job analysis

Uses standardized statements and terminology to
describe the contents of the job.
What gets done and what employees do to get
things done.
Jobs are performed in relation to data, people and
things.
 Learning and development:
Shift from identifying training needs to identifying
learning needs.

 The nature of learning:

 Four perspectives:

1) The behaviorist perspective

2) Cognitive approach
3) Social learning theory
4) Constructive perspective
 Behaviorist approach:
Researchers sought to associate rewards
with certain behaviors in order to increase the
display of that behavior.

Has been derived from experiments on

animals such as that of pavlov.

The problems with the perspective are that it

is overtly manipulative, simplistic and limited.
 Cognitive approach:
Is based on an information processing perspective
and is more concerned with what goes in the
learner’s head.

Strengths are learner’s motivation, learner’s control

and effective feedback.

Weaknesses are that it is based on supposition of

learning neutrality and learning being unproblematic.

Ignores emotions, more mechanical and rational.

 Social learning theory:
Learning is a social activity and this is based on our
needs as humans to fit in with others.

We learn to fit in with things such as dress codes,

behavior in meetings etc.

Role models, mentors and peer support are used by

organizations to intensify will to fit in.

Disadvantages of this perspective are that it ignores

the role of choice for individuals and it is based on
pretension.
 Constructivist perspective:
An information processing perspective, but
does not regard learning as a neutral
process.

Based on how one perceives information. We

tend to pay attention to things which fit with
our meaning structures and ignore or avoid
things that don’t fit.

We develop mechanisms to protect ourselves

from this threat, thus protecting ourselves
from learning.
 Learning from experience:
Learning is passive while problem solving is active.
Based on this, Kolb developed a four staged
learning cycle. The individual learning styles have
been identified as:

1) Activists
2) Reflectors
3) Theorists
4) Pragmatists
Activists are always ready to try something out. Keen
on role play exercises and likes taking risk

Reflectors listen and observe intently. Good at

analyzing what happened and why.

Theorists build a concept on the basis of their

analysis.

Pragmatists not only learn but also plan how to put it

into practice.
 Planned and emergent learning:

Planned learning
high low

Sage Adventurer
High

E.L
Warrior Sleepers
Low
 Learning curves:
The idea of the learning curve is that technically an
individual learns new things rapidly but there is
always a saturation point where the learning curve
takes a shape of a plateau.

However realistically, learning is usually

characterized by a mix of improvements and
setbacks. So dips are usually expected.

Understanding that sometimes things get worse

before they get better helps to carry us through the
dips
 Identifying learning needs:
The systematic training cycle was developed to
remove any ad hoc non evaluated training.

The cycle is not necessarily the most appropriate to

use as it is too ideal and do not tend to fit in most
of the busy organizations.

There are various approaches to analyzing needs:

1) Problem centred approach
2) Individual’s competency profile.
 The problem centered approach focuses on any
performance problems, due to which lack of skills
are identified.

 The profile comparison approach takes a much

broader view.