Human Resources in Organizations - Coursework Example

Running Header: Human Resources in Organizations Student’s Name: Instructor’s Name: Course Code & Name: Date of Submission: Human Resources in Organizations Human resource management is a branch of management concerned with functions, practices, operations, principles, factors, decisions, methods and activities which relates to managing all types of people who are employed in an organization. Ankul (2009) observes that all activities whose objective is to add value to the quality of work, life for employees and optimizing the resources are handled by this branch. Human resource management is also concerned with all dimensions that relate to relationship of people in the employment and all types of changes that flows from it. As suggested by Nor, human resource management department performs different roles depending on organization size and the priority of the organization (2011). Activities such as formulating policies for the organization, foreign operations, training and transferring of personnel are still handled by the human resource. The human resources is therefore multidimensional in nature since it involves combining knowledge, creative ability, talents, aptitudes and skills obtained in the people. This paper seeks to discuss the role of human resource in an organization. Human resource management is core part of administration. According to Fombrun, Tichy and Devanna (1984, p.11), due to global recession and increased competition, professionals, labor supplies and the activities involved in the organizations, the human resource management have to opt on an aggressive strategy aimed toward optimizing production.. Human resource management would therefore aim towards maintaining good relationship among employees in an organization by creating and applying policies, programs and procedures related to human resources in order to maximize their contribution in the achievement of the organizations’ goals. It is concerned with achieving better results on employees and their associations within the business. It helps to optimize each individual’s improvement, good relationship among employees and effective modeling employees. It is also involved with motivation, recruitment, selection, utilization development and compensation of employees in an organization. Hendry observes that the key human resource management systems are geared toward selecting, appraisal training (including development) and rewards of the human resource (1995, p.6). The department has the potential to relate behavior of each individual employee towards achievement of a specific goal that is directly or indirectly related to the success of the company goals. It aims to align each individual based on performance toward company achieving its goal. To achieve this objective, the human resource management team introduces ideas of organizational culture. It then practices explicitly or implicitly to create an organizational culture and reinforces everyone in the team to live by this culture. Integration is one of the key elements of human resource management. Renni observes that integration combines management of resources, administration and stakeholders (2003, p.9). In decision making cycle, strategic human resource management is a key feature. It is through this that policies and strategies of the organization are formed. Integration requires that the managers in human resource think systematically on what they want to achieve rather than tactically and functionally. Human resource management has the role of helping the employees in transiting from old ways of doing things to the new culture. It does this by developing courses that address the new way of doing things. Human resource management helps in achievement of the goals set by the organization. Due to profound changes in economy over years, companies have come up with new strategies and ways to achieve their goals (Carnoy et al. 1993, pg. 38). Through manpower planning, it ensures every part of the organization has enough qualified employee and the necessary physical resources to help the organization meet its objectives in good time. Human resource management is therefore charged with the responsibility of deciding the right number of employees in all sections of the organization and availing the proportional amount of working tools. It staffs the organization while at the same time reviewing the progress of each employee in the organization with the aim of optimizing each individual’s contribution. Organizations aim towards maximizing the development of the human resources. If this is achieved, the organization outcome for every employee increases which is very important towards the company growth. Recruitment, placement and selection of personnel are the responsible charged with human resource management to. By understanding that different individuals in the organization have different interest and talents the human resource has to place the right persons in the right jobs. Information is key thing towards the success of any company. According to Weddy, it matters how much the organization is informed for the company to decide on which way to go (2003, p.12). Today, information economy has been more open and competitive. Not only is information easy to duplicate, but has also been easy to replicate. For the firms to be successful, the human resource management has to always keep innovating more ways of doing things ahead of their competitors and copycats. New products are emerging in few days and the power of the market has become progressively more based on using of ideas instead of rationing few material goods. This has resulted to new type of competition, therefore challenging the human resource management. Research and development, intensive knowledge of production and trade, rise in information technology, the internet and value added to production have been cited as the major indicators of information economy (Rennie 2003 p.42). Knowledge management is the capability to learn and transform that learning into achievement rapidly. Rise in knowledge of the workers fundamentally changes the way the work is done and agendas of the management. Since managers are the custodians of the knowledge, they have to protect and take care of all resources in the organization. Gates observes that once you equip worker with knowledge, technology will help the worker to put all his or her potential ability while working for the company (1999, p.20). When resources are intellectuals, the role of the manager also changes. Work based on knowledge happens differently from that of mechanical labor. Training and development therefore is an important role played by the management in making knowledge workers in every employee in the organization. Mentoring is one way through which employees are trained and developed (Rennie, 2003. A mentor is a person who is in charge of the development of career of another person, in many cases junior, through counseling, teaching, sponsoring, protecting or providing psychological support. Mentoring is a compassionate learning where a caring individual shares wisdom, experience and knowledge with someone else who is willing to benefit from this sharing. Human resource management recruits, develops knowledge and retain workers in the company. It plays a primary role in bringing knowledge management, human capital and intellectual capital to the organization. Unlike in past when human resource management used to perform most functions by themselves, today this role is taking the role of consultant to line management whereby, the line manager does many functions that were traditionally handled by the professionals in human resource management. Also, many businesses are detaching all activities that are indirectly related to main business. This has seen outsourcing of most functions that were initially done by human resource management. One striking area that have seen this happen is when the company is involved with clients and employees globally. Nash observes that with global access to internet, it is possible for even smallest company to establish itself globally (1998, p. 24). Dealing effectively with human resource globally is one essential issue for success of any organization. Human resource management ensures that the company is adaptable to workforce and is smart enough to remain competitive globally. Because of these kinds of problems, human resource management would focus on planning, selection and recruitment. For global organization to achieve its mission effectively, it requires global planning, selection and recruitment of adequate employees. With the surfacing of global village, organizations and companies have found the need to realize the importance of focusing on outsourcing their core business. Outsourcing is a deal in which one company gives services to another organization or company which could be provided in-house. The global business environment has evolved rapidly via the market liberalization and the globalization of economies has caused a new, aggressive business setting for firms (Asgari, Ahmad & Gurrib 2010, p 68). With popularity of information technology, outsourcing is increasingly becoming popular for services that have always been regarded essential to management of a business. With the alternative of outsourcing to recruitment, human resource will be charged with the responsibility of selecting a trustworthy team that will optimize profit to the company yet delivering the services required efficiently. In conclusion, human resource management is like a small group of people which takes full responsibility of the employees in a company or organization. It shares responsibilities and roles of all departments and acts as the internal consultant. It makes decisions that support the strategic growth of the business in the required direction. Human resource managers now take the leading role in planning strategically for expansion or the way that enhance the value and image of the organization. The department of human resource management base its achievement is on results. It is concerned with all aspects of human employees as far as they are involved with the company. It recruits and employs people in the organization. This includes testing, interviewing and temporary labor coordination. It also trains and develops employees’ skills through skill training, orientation, and productivity enhancement and performance management. It also compensates the human resource through salary and wages administration, executive compensation, job evaluation, incentive pay and job descriptions. Through international human resourcing, acquisitions, planning and outsourcing, human resource management makes strategic plans for the company. It is important that any company seeking to achieve optimum results to invest in a good human resource management team. References Asgari M, Ahmad, S & Gurrib, M, 2010, ‘Explaining the internationalization process of Malaysian service firms’, International Journal of Trade, Economics and Finance, Vol. 1, no.1, pp. 68-73. 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