The Responsibility to Carefully Scrutinize Information - Assignment Example

1. Introduction There are lots of sources of information that exist today and with so many sources of information come lot of responsibility. The responsibility to carefully scrutinize information and filter the unwanted data is not an easy one. With so many avenues to look for information, one has to be sure of the information that is taken into consideration and that it is not plagiarized. There are dozens of avenues to look for but broadly put there are research journals, internet sources, encyclopedias and other general information books. In my article, I will choose sources that are widely accepted. These widely accepted data sources will form the basis of my assessment and findings for the research topic. 1.1 Research Topic The research topic for my dissertation is Human Resources in Health Care. HRM plays an important role in improving the productive contribution of people in the organization that are strategically, ethically and socially responsible. HRM practices and policies translate change as employee commitment & opportunity. HRM is concerned with the people as every organization is made up of people, acquiring their services, developing their skills and motivating them to high levels of performance and ensuring that they continue to maintain their commitment to the organization in achieving organizational objectives.HRM can practically help organization pull off a great deal of coup by selecting, training and managing excellent people. The task of managing people in today’s world of work is particularly challenging in the light of the changes in efficiency step up. It is difficult to delineate, gauge and evaluate the productivity. To all intents and purposes, cutthroat competition has gained much currency. Never before has the world of work been so challenging. Never before has it been so imperative to our career that we need to learn and develop our skills of management. Never before have had people so many vast opportunities with so many potential rewards. The sources that predominantly support my research are : online databases and hard copy books and journals. The reason I choose these two data sources is that they are highly reliable. There are plenty sources of data but journal and carefully scrutinized research reports do not provide generic information. The differences in information collected from both sources may not be pronounced but it will still help me decide which data source is relatively better for different purposes. 2. Online Databases : Let us first review data collected from online databases. For this purpose I will choose PubMed Central and Medline Plus. Medline is a free online database. The advent of the Internet is dramatically changing scholarly publishing. The growth is because online journals are easier to access and easier to disseminate like EBSCO or JSTOR. The growth of the internet has been dramatic over the past few years. Document sources are easily available everywhere within the internal networks of organizations and on the Internet. The growth itself represents an incredible wealth of information. My goal is to come across potential sources on the Internet. There are a number of options for searching over a large and distributed collection of documents, each with its own strengths and weaknesses. A single search engine builds a full index of the entire collection, by scanning all documents. Some systems (e.g. Web search engines) discard the documents and only retain the index with pointers to the original documents, other systems warehouse the documents themselves, providing users with access to both the index and the documents (Bloor K). However, data available online can have some damages to the authorship. There are various reasons for not publishing data in an online journal because there may exist significant errors in the data, for the safety of individual privacy with medical data, threats from overexploitation of species or resources, national security concerns and some other legal considerations. The problem with online journals will have ethical implications but the local hardcopy texts on periodicals or reports are not as current and up to date as the online databases’ information. I found many articles on online databases but the relevancy of those articles to my research topic was not much because using online database is not an ordinary job. There are several options but the more the options and selectivity is the more difficult it is to find information for research because the research is inclusive of various factors. I choose the option of peer reviewed articles and restricted my search to periodicals and reports. There was plenty of information but the relevancy to my research topic was less. As my research topic is too general for such searches. I came across topics which touched only few aspects of my research. For instance I came across topics such spending style of employees in hospitals. The relevancy of such topic to my research topic is almost zilch. Web-based journals create opportunities to conduct research internationally. However, web-based research requires careful consideration of what data to include to ensure validity of the findings. I collected information and carefully scanned it to ensure that it serves the purpose of my research topic. The process of data collection was difficult as different sources included different information and anonymity of the authors added to the problem of data collection and verification. Data was then carefully scrutinized for its relevancy and validity to the research topic. But the information collected from online databases was not enough. The validity or relevancy is also dependent on the research topic. My research topic was general, had it been a more specific topic for example, Human Resources in health care in England, then the research through online databases would have been more significant. One cannot use a single source of information and form it the basis of the whole research topic. 3. Hardcopy Journals and reports : Contemporary sources of information are plenty but the old sources of information and data which have formed the basis of researches in past should not be discarded. A lot relevant information by scanning different books and journals came to the forefront. I found out information which was pretty alarming for me regarding my research topic. Human being is a major resource leading to the development of the country. A careful analysis of the factors, which led to tremendous development of the most developed countries, shows that they have a very large number of skilled workers and qualified persons. Human resource implies the proper development of human beings both physically and intellectually. In other words, it shows that attentive focus be paid on human capital as it plays a vital part in national development resulting in its apex owing to the health and qualified manpower. This entire procedure requires a big and methodical planning. Noticeably and interestingly, a factory or a titanic architectural landmark takes almost 5 to 6 years in this modern technology era but a well qualified and experienced engineer or doctor takes some 14 to 16 years with a great many works under his debt. Development means both productions of needed skill and climate conducive for optimum utilization of these skills. The first and foremost prerequisite for human resources progress is the proper attention to the health sector. No nation can dream of acquiring preeminence in any field with sick and disabled persons so developed nations invest quite a hefty amount in their health sector. In online journals, unfortunately, due attention was not paid to this important sector. The contents and substances of the education are yet another set of means that needs to be looked into more closely but were overlooked in the online journals. 4. Conclusions : I analysed whether the choice of database has an effect on the results of my research study. When focusing on the common observations across all databases, the differences disappear almost completely. I realized that information available on online databases can be either too general or too specific. The risk of including irrelevant data exist with all sources of data but it if particularly in the data sources available on internet. When looking for information on online journals it is difficult to narrow your research to content you want to include because there are so many options to filter the search engine. Also, the anonymity of authors also makes it difficult for the researcher to blindly trust that information and include in thesis. However, on databases that are local and not on internet I found more relevant information. I took out books that addressed Human Resources practice in world and its history and then I researched about the Health Care personnel. The research can be automated by so many technologies. But when writing a research topic that has so many multifarious nature of information to be considered, the better choice will be to select books and periodicals available locally. Through my research using online databases I found out that there must be a strong realization within the organization that people can participate in achievement of its objectives by virtue of their information, knowledge and skills. They need to be encouraged to display creativity, responsibility and act as agents as well as subjects of change management. Higher-level executives need to make organizations a better place to work. The ultimate goal of productivity improvement as a driving force of economic growth is to perk up the quality of life of the populace. However, I was unable to find correlation of human resource with health care in online databases. I found some interesting information of human resource but not in relation to the health organization. The hardcopy journals and reports however did produce promising information with specific correlation between health care with health care organization around the world. Today, the pace of human progress is even faster. So, organizations in different countries are losing opportunity to seize competitive advantage through human resource strategies and practice initiatives. In Pakistan there is poor work ethics and the environment for honest work is least conducive. The existing labor laws aiming at the protection of the rights of workers and to promote their welfare are in adequately implemented. If our kingdom is staid to make any advancement in the present world of acceleration with any degree of strength and confidence than the government should seriously think in terms of human resource development. In end it must be said that there is forever room for step up. Those who are attuned to walking an extra mile can definitely take the lead. En route for, utter that to revolutionize human resource is extremely imperative is a statement of fact but to convert this into reality is very important for superior output (Abbasi, Zareen). However, online databases can be out into efficient use if practical aspects of it are considered carefully. Time constraints, keywords, data availability etc are just few of them. In online searches time is not a major issue and data is plenty. However, time can be saved while searching books for information if a book with relevant details is looked for. Appendix : Online Databases 1. EBSCO Host 2. PubMed 3. Medline Plus Internet Sources 1. Bloor K & Maynard A. Charting consultant activity. Health Service Journal 2002; 112: 10-11 Books 1. Human Resource Management in Pakistan by Zareen Abbasi (2009) Read More