Human resources - Essay Example

Part How does employment security and flexibility affect each type of worker:  To answer this question, one needs to go back to the driving forces of employment flexibility. There are four fundamental variables, which include developments and changes in ICT; the need to respond to business demands and the constant flux in market landscape; the concern for work and personal life balance and state regulations. With all these factors taken into consideration, the impact on workers is tremendous.

For workers with standard employment, the effect could be felt in the scope and diversity of job responsibilities. For example, the rapid technological development requires a constant upgrade of skills in order to keep up with the demands of the job. An unskilled core worker has to undergo training or skills upgrade in order to fit into the organization’s objectives. The employees with non-standard employment tend to suffer in the drive for organizational flexibility. Their job security is often at risk because they are the ones considered to be expendable.

Organizations are less inclined to worry about tenure, employee rights or other related variables entailed in its relationship with standard employees. Another way to determine the extent of the impact on employment security and flexibility is through Atkinson’s model for organizations that classifies employee-employer relationship according to three types of flexibilities: numerical flexibility, functional flexibility and financial flexibility. Numerical flexibility involves the ability of an organization to make quick changes in the number of employees in response to an increase in demand.

This affects non-standard employees as movements of the market can result to an increase in hiring temporary works or in terminating or non-renewal of their contracts. Functional Flexibility involves the changes and adjustment to employees’ tasks. This affects core employees since it could entail a requirement for multiple skills because of an organizational drive to expand job responsibilities, scope, and so forth. This is problematic in certain fields like in the medical profession. This is the reason why there is little evidence of systematic attempts to redefine the jobs of doctors and nurses.

(Corby and White 1999, p129) These types of jobs for core employees are always secure especially in areas with recruitment difficulties wherein organizations want to provide job security to retain their employees. Financial Flexibility allows firms to adjust labour costs to accommodate the movements of the market and enhance the operation of functional and numerical flexibility. (Needle 2010, p191) The impact on job security is particularly adverse to non-core employees. This reinforces the negative effects of numerical flexibility especially in terms of pay rates.

The differential rates between full and part-time employees are highlighted. For core employees, this flexibility also entails schemes like performance-related pay, bonuses or rewards. Part 2: The Negatives of the Model Criticisms to the flexibility model have been fundamentally centered on the following arguments: that it is exploitative relegates labor as an expendable resource the emergence of the neoliberal agenda of corporate and state restructuring new technologies justify layoffs, closures and labor flexibilities.

According to Whitaker (1999), the logic of networking does strongly demand flexibility today both in management and in the workforce. (p75) Unfortunately, the demand for adjustment and constant change implies a permanent insecurity. References Corby, S and White, G 1999, Employee relations in the public services: themes and issues. Routledge, London. Needle, D 2010, Business in Context: An Introduction to Business and Its Environment. Cengage Learning, New York. Whitaker, R 1999, The end of privacy: how total surveillance is becoming a reality.

The New Press, New York.