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Human Resource Management in perspective – Chapter 1

Human resource management (HRM):


 The process of managing human capital to achieve an organizations
objectives
 Doing the best to capture, store and leverage what employees know
 Engaging employees so they feel emotionally attached to the organization

HRM responsibilities
 HR planning
 Recruitment/ selection
 Orientation/ training
 Performance management
 Compensation and benefits
 HR managers perform these functions in 4 ways:
 1) Advice and counsel
 2) Services
 3) Policy maker
 4) Employee advocacy

Competitive challenges – top 7


1) Responding strategically to changes in the marketplace
 Ex of organizational responses: six sigma (quality control)
 Reengineering (increase efficiency in business process)
 Downsizing (typically to reduce costs  normally happens to quickly, and
 Outsourcing (an outside company handles certain operations)
 Need to be effective at change management – for proactive and reactive
change
2) Competing, recruiting, and staffing globally – language barriers, labor
laws
3) Corporate Social Responsibility and sustainability goals
4) Advancing HRM with technology
 Big data enabled through cloud computing
 Collaborative software, internet and social media
 Advanced technology – from ‘touch labor’ to ‘knowledge workers’
 Biggest changed in the human resource information system (HRIS) – ERP
systems (PeopleSoft, SAP, Oracle)
5) Containing costs while retaining top talent and maximizing
productivity
 Downsizing
 Furloughing – employees are asked to take time off
 Outsourcing
 Offshoring (also near shoring and home shoring) (geography)
 Employee Leasing
 Productivity Enhancements – efficiency maximizing your outputs from the
inputs incurred
6) Responding to demographic and workforce diversity challenges
 Immigration
 Age and generational differences – challenges around knowledge capital,
difference in values,
 Gender
7) Adapting to educational and cultural shifts affecting the workforce
 Education of workforce – widening skills gap
 More diversity in cultural values – needs to be reflected in policies
 Increase in employee rights and privacy
 Changing nature of work, changing attitudes

TEXTBOOK NOTES

Human resources management (HRM): The process of managing human talent to


achieve an organization’s objectives

Human capital: The knowledge, skills, and capabilities of individuals that have
economic value to an organization

Six Sigma: A set of principles and practices whose core ideas include understanding
customer needs, doing things right the first time, and striving for continuous
improvement

Reengineering: The fundamental rethinking and radical redesign of business


processes to achieve dramatic improvements in cost, quality, service, and speed

Downsizing: Planned elimination of jobs


Outsourcing: Contracting out work that was formerly done by employees

Change management: Change management is a systematic way of bringing about


and managing both organizational changes and changes on the individual level

Reactive change: Change that occurs after external forces have already affected
performance

Proactive change: change initiated to take advantage of targeted opportunities

Globalization: The trend to opening up foreign markets to international trade and


investment

Corporate social responsibility: The responsibility of the firm to act in the best
interests of the people and communities affected by its activities

Collaborative software: software that allows workers to interface and share


information with one another electronically

Knowledge workers: workers whose responsibilities extend beyond the physical


execution of work to include planning, decision-making, and problem solving

Human resources information system (HRIS): A computerized system that


provides current and accurate data for purposes of control and decision making

Offshoring: The business practice of sending jobs to other countries

Near shoring: The process of moving jobs closer to one’s home country

Furloughing: A situation in which an organization asks or requires employees to


take time off for either no pay or reduced pay

Employee leasing: The process of dismissing employees who are then hired by a
leasing company (which handles all HR- related activities) and contracting with that
company to lease back the employees

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