Challenges Companies Face in Changing Their HR Policies - Essay Example

? HR report Contents Contents 2 Introduction 3 Discussion 3 Conclusion 8 Introduction Human resources comprises of many functional areas like recruitment, staffing, training, compensation, and development of the staff. Human resource management has evolved over the past 20 years and it still changes according to collective demographics of the professions. Today’s HR professional have changed the way they interact with the employees so that they can bring value to the organisation. HR functions are changing to encompass many allied functionalities which were previously not included. They now have moved out of the traditional functions like record-keeping, employee benefits, payroll etc. They are now more focussed on formulating business strategies like talent acquisition, leadership development activities etc. Human resource functions and departments are typically bounded by a number of organisational factors. It is the job of the HR personnel to determine the functional areas which are critical to the formulation of organisational strategy. They determine the critical functions and how to assign staff to those critical areas. Every Organisation has its own way of operating and hence its HR polices will vary. This report will focus on the HR issues facing organisations like Wal-Mart, the challenges they face in changing their HR polices and the difficulties organisation face while doing performance appraisal. Discussion Answer 2 Effective human resource management would encourage team playing and would enhance collective performance in the organisation along with accentuating the individual performances. In case of performance management, a sound human resources policy would allow individuals to grow along with the growth of the organisation. This would entail involvement of the people in the work that they are assigned and autonomy in the context of the work done. There are several aspects of human resources which have a positive impact on the employees and help them to perform better in the organisation. The HRM can assign challenging and mentally stimulating jobs to the employees so that the employees find diversity and interest in the work that they do. The human resources managers often take several indicators which show that the organisational performance is increasing. Thus they try to make improvement in these indicators to bring an improvement in the overall organisational performance. In case of Wal-Mart for example, the performance of each of the retail outlets is estimated by the HR department of Wal-Mart by analysing the length of the queues in the billing counters, the level of stocks that lie on the shelves and the stocks that are remaining at the end of the day. These are the key indicators that provide the HR department an idea about the areas where the performance can be improved to generate greater profits (Harter, Schmitdt and Hayes, 2002, pp. 268-279). The managers in Wal-Mart act as the immediate superiors of the lowest level and junior level employees. Therefore it is important for the managers to encourage the employees to perform better in the daily activities of the retail store. The employees on the other hand should have respect for the managers and should be motivated by them for the achievement of any target that they need to meet. The human resource policies of Wal-Mart are progressive in nature in the sense that the implementation of the HR policies should be done with efficiency and the goals that the line managers set for the employees have to be in accordance with the organisational policies. Thus it is essential for the managers to have leadership skills which would drive a positive energy in the entire organisation culture. Mutual respect should flow bilaterally for the line managers and the junior employees. The relations of the employees with the organisation and its various elements are some of the major benchmarks of the organisational effectiveness. The Human Resource Departments of the organisations generally engage the employee into participation programmes which is generally considered to be a learning process. The changes in the employment practices of Wal-Mart have also contributed to the overall performance of the employees of the company. The motivation level of the employees, act as major factor which increases the effectiveness of an organisation. Studies have shown that the satisfaction of the employees have relation of causation with that of the performance level that each of the employees deliver. The behaviour and attitude of the employees towards the other members of the team would mould the existing culture of an organisation. In case of the participative organisations, the senior level managers involve the junior level managers in the decision making process, as a result of which there would be a lot of opportunity for feedback in the company. This would create an environment of balance and friendly and cooperative relations would exist across the hierarchy. On the other hand in case of the authoritative management in the organisation, the information flow would take place in the top down manner. Hence the feedback and the opinion of the employees would be considered in case of such organisations. In case of Wal-Mart the participative model of leadership is being followed. This is because for making better marketing strategies the managers have to know the feedback of the customers from the junior level customer contact staff who are involved in the stores. This kind of feedback would help the managers in Wal-Mart in deciding on the level of inventory that they need to put in the stores. On the other hand the lower level employees have to be trained well with the visual merchandising skills so that they can present the products to the customers in a better manner. This would be established with proper relationship with the line managers. Therefore unless a proper relationship is established between the senior management and the junior levels the productivity of the individual employees as well as the entire organisation cannot be ensured. Wal-Mart has for a number of years mismanaged the workplace leading to several law suits, systematic sex discriminations. It has also disregarded its responsibilities towards the communities. Walmart needs to change so that it can maintain its lead in the US market. It has claimed of providing a better living standard for the working families. It faces many challenges of implementing the change. Workers at Walmart must have the right to a healthy workplace practices. No workers should be forced to go to court to get her wage. In Wal-Mart the workers faces discrimination and harassment. They suffer in silence. The Human resource policies of Wal-Mart must be upgraded so that they can listen to the complaints of the workers. Wal-Mart is facing the difficulties of changing their HR policies across the nations. They must cater to civil rights, labour issues, women’s safety, minority issues etc. and develop a code of conduct for the company to protect the worker’s rights by maintaining legal and human standards (Barney, 1991, pp. 99–120). The quality of the job should be so deigned that it maximizes the economic security of the workers. The Training should try to increase the productivity, reduce turnover and equal opportunity, which will contribute to the better wages, benefits to the workers. There must be a good faith between the workers and the company. The current levels of high turnover strategy, low wage will impoverish the families of the workers. Wal-Mart should develop pay and benefit programs which will promote the economic well-being of the communities and working families. Equal opportunities should be provided to all the workers. This is a core American value. Local sourcing should be practiced by Wal-Mart for stocking their stores which will reduce the environmental impact and help in creating jobs. Technology will help in sourcing of products from virtually anywhere. Many of the products of Wal-Mart are produced and sourced from outside the state so that they can maintain its pricing strategy. Walmart should source products form local sources which will reduce the environmental footprint and also create local jobs. Sourcing should be based on quality, product safety and productivity. The organisation should create an accountability project so that the can remain honest. It is impossible to change the deep rooted rules unless everybody knows the truth. It becomes important to discern the myth from the reality. They should try to build local community coalitions to implement community standards for the company. This will enforce core American values like worker’s rights, workplace fairness, quality jobs and corporate social responsibility for the company. Organisations are now living in uncertain economic times. Both private companies and Government are thinking outside of the box to improve their operational efficiency. To achieve this kind of success, every employee in the organisation is expected to contribute. This contribution in many cases is recognized through Performance Management. Performance management is a process of creating work environment where the employees are enabled to achieve their best towards organisational goals. Through performance appraisal the company can communicate its goals to the employees. It helps the organisation in making critical decisions like professional development, worker’s pay and promotions. But most managers who assess performance of an employee are aware of the subjective nature of this process (Dessler, 2005, pp 76-78). There are many challenges to the process. The Halo effect occurs when a manager rates and employee based on one of its characteristics. Here the performance is done on the basis of the one dimension of the employee rather than on all its qualities. Central Tendency is the process of judging all the employees as average even though their performance varies. This may demotivate the employees. Leniency error is evaluating someone in a group higher than what the person should be actually rated or when the rater is unjustifiably easy on the performance. In contrast to it the severity error is unjustifiably harsh method of evaluating an employee’s performance. Contrast error is the tendency of rating employees relative to each other rather than on performance standards. For example if everyone in a group is doing an average job, then a person who performs relatively better is rated as excellent because of the contrast effect. Regency error occurs when a manager evaluates an employee based on the recent performance. This happens when the performance appraisal is not frequent enough for the rater to remember the performance (Storey, 1992, pp. 22-31). Organisation must try to eliminate the problems associated with the performance appraisal. The rater must be made aware of the potential problems through the training programs which are beneficial in overcoming the errors. Mangers must be in continual discussion with the employees so that they get to know the expected outcomes, standards and in turn provide coaching and feedback. For an organisation it is important to recognize the influence of cultural factors on the performance appraisal so that they can maximise the productivity and engagement of the organisation. In implementing any performance appraisals mangers face challenges like diverse workplace, communication challenges etc. Mangers should try to give concrete examples to clarify the issues of the employees. This helps employees who come from organisations which may not resemble the country where the company is based on. This goes a long way on clarifying how the organisation measures the performance of the employee. Sometimes managers don’t give specific details or instructions to the workers on how they would like to proceed with the work. This creates information void for the workers. Some workers may come from cultures whether is only one way flow of information on the basis of power structure within the organisation. The company should try to implement a uniform information inflow so that everyone can easily communicate with their seniors and peers. Conclusion Human resource management is fast changing in today’s environment. It encompasses many issues previously not included within the system. HR polices are now designed to adapt to such changing times. Many companies have to attain healthy relationship with the line managers. It is essential for the line managers to have leadership skills which would drive a positive energy in the entire organisation culture. Companies like Wal-Mart faces many HR related issues which it needs to change to maintain its leadership position. The performance appraisal is another HR issues which helps the employees to get motivated. The Importance of HR in an organisational keeps on increasing as human capital is recognized to be the premier resource for any organisation to succeed. References Barney, J., 1991. Firm resources and sustained competitive advantage. Journal of Management, Vol. 17, pp. 99–120. Dessler, G.,2005. Human resource management. Boston: Pearson Prentice Hall. Harter, J., Schmitdt, F.L. and Hayes, T.L., 2002. “Business-unit-level relationship between employee satisfaction, employee engagement and business outcomes: A meta-analysis”. Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 87(2), pp. 268-279. Storey, J., 1992. Developments in the Management of Human Resources. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. Read More