Human Resource Management

Lecture1 Sabnam Basu

 What is HRM
 The process of
• acquiring
• training and development
• performance management and appraising
• compensating employees

 Attending to their labor relations and grievances

 Equal employment opportunity (EEO)
representatives
 Communicating (interviewing, counseling,
disciplining)
 Health and safety, and fairness(ethical) concerns
 Building employee commitment
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Who is a Manager?
 A manger is someone who is Roles by Mintzberg Major Functions
responsible for accomplishing the
organization’s goals, and does so •Figurehead Planning
Interpersonal •Leader
by managing the efforts of the
•Liaison
organization’s people Organizing

Achieves goals through other •Disseminator

people Informational •Monitor
Staffing
•Spokesperson
Henry Mintzberg the roles
performed by the managers are Leading
•Entrepreneur
exceedingly similar •Negotiator
Decisional
•Resource allocator Controlling
Ten different, highly interrelated •Disturbance handler
roles

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 Hiring Training

Why is HRM
important to all
managers
 Competitive and demanding
Performance Management Appraisals workplace, managers can’t succeed
on their technical skills alone. They
also have to have good people skills
 Part of every manager’s job
 People offer competitive
advantage to a firm
 Work with HR managers

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Why is HRM important to all managers
-Avoid Personnel Mistakes
To have your employees not doing their best.
To hire the wrong person for the job.
To experience high turnover.
To have your company in court due to your
discriminatory actions.
To have your company cited for unsafe practices.
To let a lack of training undermine your department’s
effectiveness.
To commit any unfair labor practices.

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 Why is HRM important to all managers
-Improving Profits and Performance
A manager can do everything right
 lay brilliant plans,
 draw clear organization charts,
 set up modern assembly lines,
 use sophisticated accounting controls
But still fail
 Hired the wrong people
 Unable to motivate, appraise and develop them
Company president summed
For many years it has been said that capital is the bottleneck for a developing
industry. I don’t think this any longer holds true. I think it’s the workforce and the
company’s inability to recruit and maintain a good workforce that does constitute the
bottleneck for production. I don’t know of any major project backed by good ideas, vigor,
and enthusiasm that has been stopped by a shortage of cash. I do know of industries whose
growth has been partly stopped or hampered because they can’t maintain an efficient and
enthusiastic labor force, and I think this will hold true even more in the future

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Why is HRM important to all managers
-Start up
 Create new small businesses
 Join small firms
 The owner and his or her other
managers handle tasks of managing
human resources
 Help you to manage a small firm’s
or a startup’s human resources more
effectively

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Hawthorne Effect
 Western Electric’s factory in the
Hawthorne suburb of Chicago in the
late 1920s and early 1930s
 Lighting on worker productivity
 University of Chicago economists in
2009: original results overstated
Line managers and Staff managers
Authority is the right to make decisions, direct others’ work, and give orders
LINE MANAGERS
• Have the authority to issue orders to other
managers or employees
• Creates a superior (order giver)–
subordinate (order receiver) relationship
• Are the final decision makers and they are
more accountable to the effectiveness of
the organization
• Example: Vice President, MD, Team leader
STAFF MANAGERS
• Have the authority to advise other
managers or employees
• Creates an advisory relationship
• Generally run departments that are
advisory or supportive, like purchasing
and human resource management
• Example: HR manager, Accounting
manager, customer service head
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 Line Manager's Human Resource
Activities
The line managers tend to perform certain Human
resource activities
• Placing right people in right places
• Treat people and organizations as resources that need
investment to grow
• Offer on-the-job training to new hires and new operations
for in-house people
• Interpret company policies and procedures
• Ensuring safety and health to employees
• Act as people managers in small firms
• Developing abilities of employees
• Creating and maintaining departmental morale

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 Human Resource Department
 Usually in small firms the line managers can carry out
some of the HR duties
 However, as firms grow or expand, specialized
knowledge is required and thus a full fledged HR
department is required to advice and assist the line
managers
The HR department carry outs three main functions:
The HR manager exerts line authority in his or her unit and
implied authority elsewhere in the organization
Ensures that the organization’s HR objectives and policies
are coordinated and implemented
Provides various staff services to line managers, like
partnering with the CEO in designing the company’s strategy

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 Organization of HR Department
 Two issues become relevant in a discussion on organization of an HR department
(i) status of the HR department in the overall set-up,
(ii) composition of the HR department itself

Status of the HR department in the overall organizational structure depends on

 size of the firm,
 nature of business,
 management-philosophy
 global presence

Composition of the HR department, it may be stated that it depends on the scale of operations and
attitude of the top management towards its personnel

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 Status of the HR department: Size of Business
 In small start-up organizations where employee strength is around 100
 the HR activities are very basic
 functions include recruitment, salary processing, leave management, statutory records keeping, organizing team outings and events, and
other administrative and coordinating activities
 role to handle these is often bundled with front desk (reception) or office administration
the HR functions are largely transactional

Mid-sized firms with a head count of 200-500

will have a structured HR function
key HR activities like staffing, training, compensating, health and safety and the like are clearly established and responsibilities assigned
clear policies, procedures and manuals are established, identifying who should do what and how it should be done
ability to attract and retain talent, managing employee dissatisfaction proactively

In large organizations with employee strength of above 1000

HR function is highly matured and organized
HR processes are well documented, defined and implemented meticulously
sophisticated HR tools are in place and technology is leveraged to ensure that HR is contributing to the goal realization
initiatives around work-life balancing programmes, workplace diversity management initiatives, and institutionalised employee engagement
activities, culture building actions are taken
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Status of the HR department: Nature of Business
 In the brick-and-mortar industry, people-related functions have travelled from the Hawthorne
Experiment days to the contemporary HR functions
The HR function of today has retained a large part of traditional HR activities
However, the HR functions are commonly distributed to three categories:
HR generalists who carry out generic activities like payroll, leave and benefits
HR specialists who assume responsibility for areas like hiring, training and development,
compensation, performance assessment and employee relations
HR heads who head either functions across locations or head HR for a divisions within an organization

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 Status of the HR department: Nature of Business
Knowledge-based organizations witness highly sophisticated HR structures
High dependence on employee knowledge adds to the sophistication
HR professionals swing from aligning to business priorities towards ensuring employee engagement
Matured Human Resource Information System (HRIS) is put in place to ensure automation of the entire HR life
cycles
 Elaborate HR reports with indepth analysis are regularly generated and reviewed to make resource-related decisions

In services sector, HR team is kept lean and simple, and the focus is on transactional people related
activities
HR structure is simple
Expectations from the HR function are the timely hiring, bonding, payroll, benefits administration, and the like

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 Status of the HR department
Philosophy of Senior Management
The degree of importance accorded to the HR head, the place allotted the HR executive at the ‘table’ and the
reporting alignments are all dependent on the attitude of people at the top

Global Presence Organizations

tend to have fully blown and highly elevated HR structures
There is corporate HR department at headquarters and each subsidiary has its own HR team
HR team at the headquarters formulates and institutionalizes company-wide HR policies and processes
Such policies help ensure one organizational culture that knits all subsidiaries together.
The HR teams at local levels implement the companywide policies as well as customize practices to meet local
business needs

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 Composition of the HR Department
Depends on the scale of operations and attitude of the top management towards its personnel
However, a typical HR department is

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Thank you

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