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Human Resources Management Skills Needed by Organizations

Chapter · December 2017

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-43434-6_33

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Human Resources Management Skills Needed by Organizations

Abstract This article analyses the concept of skills and also investigates the skills
needed by organisations in Human Resources as a strategic area. The relevance of
this research is based on the approach to theories of skills development and the
main purpose is to identify the skills to be developed in Human Resources Cours-
es in Higher Education. The skills needed by the organizations were identified
through document analysis based on prospective studies developed in industry be-
tween 2011 and 2014. The research problem considered the analytical dimension
of skills development in organisations anchored to the following research ques-
tions: What are the skills needed to be developed in Higher Education Courses to
transform the Human Resources function strategic for organisations? This study
is centred on the research of more relevant skills which can contribute to trans-
form the Human Resources function strategic for organisations contributing for
the improvement of their performance and competitiveness in the market.

Keywords: skills, organisations, higher education, human resources management,

human resources development

Introduction
The main objective of this research was to identify skills for organizations need to
development and make recommendations for the higher education human re-
sources management courses.

The identification and development of skills are challenging tasks, either internal-
ly within organizations, and either externally by the universities. In the context of
this article the focus will be in the identification of sets of skills associated to the
human resources area and suggest their development in higher education context.

This are skills that need to be integrated in the human resources management
courses in higher education context and this research tries to analyse if the skills
identified by the organizations as fundamental for their competitiveness are being
developed by the universities.

This article briefly explores the concept of skills, followed by the presentation of
the methodology that was used as the basis for the skills identification in the or-
ganizations and also in the university human resources management courses con-
text and concludes with the research findings.

Literature Overview
In the 80s the concept of skills starts to have a big importance due to technologi-
cal, organizational, and economic factors. It begins to be considered as a resource
– of individual and organizational nature – which would allow competitiveness
and productivity advantages to companies.
2

Historically, the word skills have been used to refer individual characteristics.
However, in the concept of Prochno (2001), although the skills always refer to the
individual, all of them have two dimensions, the individual and the collective (or-
ganizational).
In this way, the concept of skills assumes a rather large scope which makes it
complex and makes its comprehension/understanding and concept delimitation
difficult.

The concept has been studied by several authors as Mulder (2000; 2001) and pre-
vious by Norris, (1991) and Ellström, (1997). Skills development prevails as a re-
search issue in higher education dominion because is the main goal to be achieved
by the students. Skills development is perceived as a strategic management tool to
cope with the current business environment (Nyhan, 1998), mainly because of the
market has changed from one of mass production to one of customisation where
quality, price, and speed of delivery are stressed. This change has brought about
new circumstances in which many organisations struggle to cope: new and emerg-
ing customer segments, cultural diversity in a global marketplace, market volatili-
ty, raised customer expectations about quality of products and services, and the
impact of the internet on an organisation’s core business (Markowitsch et al.,
2001). In the job market there has been a growth in higher-level jobs such as man-
agerial and professional positions that require flexibility and problem-solving
skills.

In this context, the complexity and the uncertainty, partly due to the globalization
and accelerated rhythm of technological change, demand human resources with
skills that help the organizations to overcome the appearing challenges.

Research questions
The following research questions have guided the present study:
RQ 1: What were the Human Resources Management skills identified in the pro-
spective studies?
RQ 2: What were the level of skills development in the high education Human Re-
sources Management courses?
RQ 3: What were the relationships between the perceived HRM skills develop-
ment and various factors such as gender, employed/unemployed, type of organiza-
tion and job variables?

Methodology
In this study, two sources of data were collected as follows: 1) document analysis
and 2) online survey.
1) The main technique used was content analysis from the document analysis of
prospective studies in industry about Human Resources Management skills
needed by the organizations. This methodology was used to analyse the skills
identified by the organizations which participated in the study.
2) The second technique to collect data was an online survey applied to 250 stu-
dents and were obtained 117 valid questionnaires equivalent to 46,8% re-
 3

sponse rate. The statistical analyses Cronbach’s alpha Coefficient, Chi-square

Tests, and Mann- Whitney Tests, conclusions point to generally positive per-
ceptions for organizational development and for student’s development.
In total the questionnaire consisted of 30 questions covering the following ar-
eas:
• Students background information (Question 1-4)
• List of skills development during high education human resources manage-
ment courses (Question 5-30).

Content Analysis
In order to answer to the research question (RQ 1) What were the Human Re-
sources Management skills identified in the prospective studies?, it was developed
a content analysis from the literature review of prospective studies on Human Re-
sources Management skills. This methodology was used to analyse the presence of
skills associated to the following dimensions: “human resources management
(HRM)”, “leadership” and "human resources development (HRD)”, and the period
considered was between 2011 and 2014. A list of skills were made organized in
the following structure:

Human Resources Management (skills needed by human resources managers and

technicians):
- skills at the level of the definition of Human resources management strategies
integrated in the business strategies;
- skills related to the human resources management practices and techniques:
employees administrative processes,
- capacity to manage strategic deals and alliances within the organization in or-
der to implement HRM strategic practices, to give response to the company
strategy;
- capacity to diversify the business area, identifying new business opportuni-
ties, i.e. HRM consultancy to the other departments of the organization to
maximize the capacities and competencies of the employees;
- social and relational skills, in what concerns the capacity of communication,
leadership and interpersonal relationships.
Leadership (skills needed by all managers)
- skills related to the employees performance development;
- skills associated to the development of new opportunities for the employees
through techniques as coaching and mentoring.
- Skills associated to motivation techniques in order to potentiate the employ-
ees performance;
- skills associated to technique to improve employees satisfaction, special
through recognition instruments
- skills related to the corporate governance;
- communication skills in order to improve the commitment of the employees;
- skills related to the management of employees expectations about their devel-
opment in the organization;
4

- skills associated to the management of the cultural differences among em-

ployees.
Human Resources Development (skills needed by all managers and all techni-
cians)
- skills associated with new forms of work organization, in what regards the
methods of teamwork, flexibility to adapt to changes in the working processes
(as a response to a high rhythm of innovation);
- knowledge about different types of technologies;
- skills regarding a bigger initiative, decision taking and responsibility assum-
ing;
- skills on innovation and creativity in order to develop new products and ser-
vices;
- skills associated with the analysis of information related to productivity, in
what concerns manpower optimization of costs;
- capacity to adapt to organizational change;
- capacity of developing social and relational knowledge which allows the co-
ordination of working teams, taking advantage of all the potential of its ele-
ments.

Survey Analysis
Regarding the survey, the respondents were presented with 24 items representing
HRM skills, leadership skills and HRD skills which emerged from the content
analysis from the prospective studies in industry.
Table 5 shows the dimensions of the questionnaire:
First dimension of the questionnaire integrates the HRM skills needed by the or-
ganizations: HRM strategies, HRM practices and techniques, Management of stra-
tegic deals and alliances, Diversify the business as a HRM consultancy service to
other departments within the organization, Social and relational skills, People
management, and Communication.
The second dimension of the questionnaire integrates the leadership skills: Em-
ployees performance, Development opportunities, Motivation of employees, Satis-
faction of employee, corporate governance, Communication, Managing expecta-
tions, integrating cultural differences.
Finally the third dimension integrates the HRD skills on: new forms and models of
work organization, new technologies, organizational change, initiative, decision
taking and responsibility, creativity and innovation.
Respondents were asked to rate the skills on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from
1= no development; 2=weak development; 3=moderate development;
4=considerable development; 5=strong development.

Results from the Survey

Respondents were primarily from male gender (n=64) and secondly from female
gender (n=53), please see Table 1.

Table 1 Background information on students that participated in the study - Gen-

der
 5

N %
MALE 64 54.7
FEMALE 53 45.2
TOTAL 117 100.0

Most part of the respondents were employed (n=97) and unemployed a minor part
(n=20), please see Table 2.
Table 2 Background information on students that participated in the study – Em-
ployee or Unemployed
N %
EMPLOYEE
97 82,9
UNEMPLOYED 20 17,1
TOTAL 117 100.0

The types of respondent organisations were primarily education (n=18), public

sector (n=18), health and social work (n=13), commercial services (n=12), manu-
facturing non-food (n=16), Transportation, communication (n=11), Financial ser-
vices (n=14) and other (n=15), please see Table 3.

Table 3 Background information on students that participated in the study – Type

of organization
Type of Organisation (n=117) n=117
n %
Education 18 15,4
Public sector 18 15,4
Commercial services 12 10,3
Health and social work 13 11,1
Manufacturing non-food 16 13,7
Transportation, communication 11 9,4
Financial services 14 12,0
Other 15 12,8
117 100,0

Respondents characterised their jobs as Top management (n=12), Middle man-

agement (n=18), executive level (n=20), Technical specialist (n=21), and support
staff (n=13), please see Table 4.

Table 4 Background information on students that participated in the study – Job

Job Characterisation of respondents (n=117) n %
Top Management 12 10,3
6

Middle management/line manager 18 15,4

Executive level 30 25,6
Technical specialist/engineer/quality control 21 17,9
Staff/carry out primary work process 12 10,3
Support staff 13 11,1
Other 11 9,4
117 100,0

RQ 2: What were the level of skills development in the high education human re-
sources management courses?

According to the perceived skills development the resulting mean scores varied
for human resources management skills between 2.5 and 3.2, for leadership skills
between 2.9 and 3.27, and human resources development skills between 2.3 and
3.4, as outlined in table 5. Therefor all the skills identified by the prospective stud-
ies had a moderate development in the high education human resources manage-
ment courses.

Table 5 Perceived development of skills by the students (1=no development;

2=weak development; 3=moderate development; 4=considerable development;
5=strong development) - (Cronbach’s alpha (number of items) Mean (1–5) (SD))
Rank Skills Cronbach Mean S.D.
Alpha
Human Resources Management Skills 0,71 (n=7)
1 HRM strategies 3.10 1.23
2 HRM practices and tech- 3.10 1.22
niques
3 Management of strategic 3.10 1.18
deals and alliances
4 Diversify the business as a 2.50 1.23
HRM consultancy service
5 Social and relational skills 3.20 1.18
6 People management 3.20 1.16
7 Communication 3.20 1.16
Leadership Skills 0,78
(n=10)
1 Employees performance 3.27 1.19
2 Development opportunities 3.22 1.25
3 Motivation of employees 3.15 1.23
4 Satisfaction of employee 3.12 1.26
5 Corporate governance 3.12 1.25
 7

6 Communication 3.07 1.25

7 Managing expectations 3.07 1.21
10 Integrating cultural differ- 2.97 1.22
ences
Human Resources Development Skills 0,80 (n=7)
1 New forms and models of 3.10 1.22
work organization
2 New technologies 3.40 1.24
3 Organizational change 3.25 1.25
4 Initiative, decision taking and 2.30 1.20
responsibility
5 Creativity and Innovation 3.20 1.26
6 Analysis of information 3.19 1.23
7 Social and relational 3.19 1.22
knowledge

RQ 3: What were the relationships between the perceived HRM skills develop-
ment and various factors such as gender, employed/unemployed, type of organiza-
tion and job variables?

Cronbach’s alpha (α) for all 117 respondents’ HRM skills items was calculated
and a value of 0.1 was obtained, which allows for the creation of a new variable
by combining the 7 items. Similar calculations were made for the 10 leadership
skills items and the 7 HRD skills items to achieve scores of 0.78 and 0.80 respec-
tively.

The differences between various factors of interest and these three new key varia-
bles were assessed using Mann- Whitney U Test (gender, employment situation,
job organization and type of organization). The results showed significant rela-
tionships between perceived HRM skills development and job (X2 = 180.81; df. =
47; Sig. = 0.00); perceived leadership skills development (X2 = 175.33; df. = 51;
Sig. = 0.00); and perceived HRD skills development (X2 = 170.25; df. = 40; Sig.
= 0.00). No significant differences were found between the three skills variables
and type of organization, gender, and employed/unemployed variables.

Conclusion
The motivation for this research has its roots in a lack of a systematic development
approach about universities and industry. There was little or no support for con-
necting these two dimensions, which have made it a very interesting challenge to
embrace.

In this context two approaches to skills development can certainly be identified:

the organisational development approach and the universities development ap-
 8

proach, which can be complimentary, approaching the industry to the university

context.

This research identified three types of skills through document analysis of pro-
spective studies in industry – human resources management, leadership and hu-
man resources development, and tries to analyse the perception of the students
from higher education human resources management courses about the level of
development of those skills.

According to the students, the skills identified had a moderate development in the
high education human resources management courses. This conclusion leads us to
rethink the pedagogical model of these courses that are taught at higher education
level.
It’s also possible to conclude that there are significant relationships between per-
ceived human resources management skills development and the student’s job, but
no significant differences were found between the three skills dimensions – human
resources management, leadership, and human resources development - and the
type of organization, gender, and employed/unemployed variables.

This study will help universities and industry to be more integrated and to rethink
their strategies according to skills development in order to respond to the chal-
lenges of the market.

References
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