Hard and Soft Human Resource Management - Essay Example

Running Head: Hard and Soft HRM Hard and Soft HRM [Institute’s Hard and Soft HRM Introduction It is possible to trace back theearliest forms of human resource management back to the time when people first started living in groups and societies. Most probably, they would have encountered the problems of utilizing their group or society members effectively. In fact, great civilizations were the ones, which were able to produce and then use trained, qualified, and skilled people, effectively and efficiently. Even the Bible mentions about the problems that Moses had in selecting and training people. However, it was due to the industrial revolution that world witnessed a shift from working in isolated groups to working in large numbers in huge factories, in coalmines and textile mills. As the moved towards industrialization that was more intensive and in search of higher profits and competitive advantage, it became inevitable to recognize the importance of their human resource. Moreover, factors like increasing demand for labor, questionable work place conditions, workplaces deaths, weakening concept of paternalism, led to the foundation of personnel or human resource management as separate departments or field of study. Nevertheless, Human Resource Management has witnessed strong evolution since many decades. It has been able to attract the attention of many critics and has created a heated debate, at times even on its basic ideologies and purpose. Without any doubts, these diverse opinions, beliefs, debates, arguments, models, and perspectives have added to the growth of this field (Köster, pp. 169-178, 2007). This paper is an attempt to explore and examine what it really means by hard and soft model of Human Resource Management. Despite the fact that managers from all around the world boldly claim to have understood the distinction between these two, but at the same time, loads of companies and their managers have appeared to be working under the two models simultaneously. The paper also aims at finding the reasons and consequences of the same. Discussion Hard HRM The hard approach or the Michigan model asks the managers to adapt a very instrumental, rational, quantitative calculative and practical approach and view their employees as passive resources that need to be exploited in order to add value to the overall organizational output and gain competitive advantage in the marketplace. It regards employees as human capital, their salaries as investments and the goal of the business, is to maximize the return on investment (Köster, pp. 169-178, 2007). Many experts believe that these are basic and fundamental functions of Human resource that remain in the spotlight under the umbrella of hard approach of human resource management. Examples include recruitment and selection, job analysis, HR planning, salary and compensation, employee training, employee benefits, employment and labor legislations, Performance management and appraisal, Contract negotiations and others (Guest, 48-51, 1989). A careful analysis reveals that hard version of Human resource management presents a similar picture as Douglas McGregor presented in 1960s regarding the theory X managers. It represents the classical managerial distrust approach towards its employees. These Theory X or hard managers believe that people are self-centered and they need to be forced to serve and act accordingly in the interests of the organization (Maund, pp. 46-49, 2001). Therefore, it becomes important to control and closely monitor these employees and direct them at every stage. Managers believe that the focus of employees is on money and they posses little interest in the development and growth of their organization as a whole. Therefore, monetary rewards, punishments and threats make sense as tools that can improve the performance of employees (Foot & Hook, pp. 253-528, 2009). In addition, a key assumption here is that people inherently dislike work and would like to control and direct (Guest, 48-51, 1989). Even interesting here to note is that we can link back the traces and the main ideology of this Hard approach to the early 20th century. The advocates of scientific management appear to be talking, to some extent, the same language as of the hard approach managers. Henry Winslow Taylor was the father of scientific management who introduced the concept of soldiering, which remains a key assumption and basis of hard approach or theory X managers. In specific, according to experts, “Soldiering refers to the practice of employees of deliberately working less than the full capacity” (Wilson, pp. 16-17, 2005). Taylor also considered employees as objects or means to an end. The main idea was to train employees so that they can become efficient and work in line of the organizational objectives or strategy. For Taylor, people are economic agents that are means to maximize the utility or greatest good (Wilson, pp. 16-17, 2005). Soft HRM When hard Human Resource Management focuses on the basic functions of HR, however, soft HRM emphasizes on the advanced functions of HR. These include functions like organizational development, employee motivation and satisfaction, employee training and development, creation of a learning and high trust organization, leadership development, organizational culture and ethics, relationship building, conflict management, negotiation and bargaining with the labor unions, diversity, equality, employee health and safety and others. Quite clearly, the soft approach asks for a long-term vision from managers in managing people and considers them potential assets and a part of organization rather than merely a variable cost (Foot & Hook, pp. 253-528, 2009). As guest (1989) said that, “The new HRM model is composed of polices that promote mutuality- mutual goals, mutual influence, mutual respect, mutual rewards, and mutual responsibility. The theory is that policies of mutuality will elicit commitment, which in turn will yield both better economic performance and greater human development” (pp. 50). Quite understandably, the soft approach to human resource management is pretty much in line with the description of Theory Y managers. These managers staunchly believe that people are not inherently lazy nor they dislike but they need to be motivated and satisfied. Besides, this motivation and satisfaction would lead to commitment of employees that in turn would result in self-control and self-direction of employees. Additionally, employees are creative and intelligent and if given the control and allowed to do so, then they can come up with creative and innovative ideas to solve the organizational problems. The only goal of employees is not monetary rewards but depending on their position in the Abraham Maslow Hierarchy of needs chart, they may be more interested in their social, self-esteem or self-actualization needs. Theory Y managers would direct their energies towards activities that increase satisfaction, motivation and participation of their employees. Mutual trust, as mentioned above leads the way and dominates the scene (Poole, pp. 19-23, 1999). This soft approach to management came on to the scene when the human relations gained prominence after the first quarter of the 20th century. Mary Parker Follet was the first one to come with the idea of “power with” rather than “power over”. She also gave the concept of “integrative unity” according to which the organization should work as functional whole, rather than all parts of the organizations working separately to achieve the organizational objectives. Quite understandably, this “functional whole” also involves employees as major stakeholders. Hawthorne studies were also a major development in this regard. A set of three studies from 1924-32 that aimed at exploring new dynamics of scientific management, hard management to some extent, ended up concluding that “personal attention” can boost productivity and efficiency to a great deal (Ulrich, pp. 124-135, 1998). Hard and Soft Version in Practice Despite the clear differences between these approaches yet at times, it becomes extremely difficult for observers to draw a line between the organizations that are using the soft approach and the ones, which are using the harder one. In fact, surprisingly, many organizations are using a mix of both (Maund, pp. 46-49, 2001). In other words, even the organizations that appear to be using the soft approach are driven by the hard approach. For example, Karen Legge had summarized it in just the perfect way. “Human resource policies should be integrated with strategic business planning and used to reinforce an appropriate (or change an inappropriate) organizational culture, that human resources are valuable and a source of competitive advantage. Moreover, that they may be tapped most effectively by mutually consistent policies that promote commitment and which, as a consequence, foster a willingness in employees to act flexibly in the interests of the “adaptive organization’s” pursuit of excellence” (Foot & Hook, pp. 253-528, 2009). Many authors have repeatedly mentioned more inclination of companies towards hard version of human resource rather than the softer version. Quite clearly, one of the most basic pillars of human resource management is the concept of human relations and introducing employees to the aims and objectives of the organization. For example, many companies that appear to be using the soft approach, creating an environment of mutuality and taking to great heights about employee involvement; even those companies the power remains with the employer because at the end of the day he has all the right to either, run or close the business then where does the mutuality go? (Poole, pp. 19-23, 1999) The softer approach of managing people asks for taking a more humanistic, considerate and relationship-orientated approach and forces the managers to consider their employees as a “part” of the organization. However, unfortunately, this does not change the facts. At the end of the organizations and corporations, measure their progress and success by their balance sheets, income statements, profit and loss statements, return on investment and other financial ratios. Additionally, even the performance appraisals focus, directly or indirectly, on the financial perspective of the performance on their employees. Few organizations put great emphasis on factors like building relations, developing employees, satisfaction and their motivation and others (Poole, pp. 19-23, 1999). Quite understandably, we are living in a world where the competition is reaching to greater heights everyday, and as economics tells, resources are scarce; therefore, it is inevitable that the employees would be used as a means to end. Moreover, when organizations are trying to survive in such intensified competition then for maximizing its own profits and survival, someone will eventually have to lose out since the bitter reality is that in a world of scarce resources, when one wins the other has to lose. In this case, mostly the employees are the one on the losing side (Torrington, Hall & Taylor, pp. 74-79, 2007). Another reason for the prevalence of hard approach in disguise is due to our cultural prejudices, biasness, and our educational institutions. Our business schools have been focusing too much on data, facts, figures, and evidences to make decision-making. For these students soft skills are the “hard” skills. They fail to manage change, develop individuals, and make teams work under tough settings. However, the senior management remains clearly unbothered if the manager is achieving his number. Rarely, a manager has been fired for not having effective soft skills and rarely, a manager is hired for not having hard skills. The same is the reason that students are not taking interest in developing these soft skills because they are not sure whether this will get them jobs or not (Köster, pp. 169-178, 2007). Another way of looking at the topic is by looking at the bottom line of the issue. Even the companies like Google and Johnson & Johnson that seem be providing endless benefits to their employees, what are they interested in at the end of the day. Are they focusing on employee motivation, satisfaction, and development for the sake of it? Are they not interested or nor interested to the same extent as other companies with hard approach, in their financial statements and return on investment? Quite understandably, the goal of all the organizations, whether using hard approach or soft, is the same and that is to exploit the resources in highest possible way to get maximum returns out of them. Using soft approach is just another way of exploiting these resources and getting the maximum out of them, in this case the focus in on long term and sustainable profits (Ulrich, pp. 124-135, 1998). References Foot, M. & Hook, C. 2008. Introducing Human Resource Management. Prentice Hall. Guest, D. 1989. ‘Personnel and human resource management: can you tell the difference? Personnel Management – January. Pp.48-51. Köster, Marco. 2007. Human Resource Management versus Personnel Management. GRIN Verlag. Maund, L. 2001. Introduction to human resource management: theory and practice. Palgrave. Poole, Michael. 1999. Human Resource Management: Critical Perspectives on Business and Management. Routledge. Torrington, D., Hall, L., & Taylor, S. 2007. Human Resource Management. Prentice Hall. Ulrich, D. 1998. A new mandate for human resources. Harvard Business Review. Volume 76, Issue 1, pp. 124- 135. Wilson, John P. 2005. Human resource development: learning & training for individuals & organizations. Kogan Page Publishers. Read More