Nature and Concept of HRM: Human Resource Management

Human resources means the people. However, different management experts have defined human resources differently. For example, Michael J. Jucius has defined human resources as “a whole consisting of inter-related, inter-dependent and interacting physiological, psychological, sociological and ethical components”.

According to Leon C. Megginson “From the national point of view human resources are knowledge, skills, creative abilities, talents, and attitudes obtained in the population; whereas from the view-point of the individual enterprise, they represent the total of the inherent abilities, acquired knowledge and skills as exemplified in the talents and aptitude of its employees”.

In simple words, HRM is a process of making the efficient and effective use of human resources so that the set goals are achieved. Let us also consider some important definitions of HRM.

The National Institute of Personnel Management (NIPM) of India has defined human resource/personnel management as “that part of management which is concerned with people at work and with their relationship within an enterprise. Its aim is to bring together and develop into an effective organisation of the men and women who make up an enterprise and having regard for the well-being of the individuals and of working groups, to enable them to make their best contribution to its success”.

According to Decenzo and Robbins “HRM is concerned with the people dimension in management. Since every organisation is made up of people, acquiring their services, developing their skills, motivating them to higher levels of performance and ensuring that they continue to maintain their commitment to the organisation are essential to achieving organisational objectives. This is true, regardless of the type of organisation-government, business, education, health, recreation, or social action”.

Thus, HRM can be defined as a process of procuring, developing and maintaining competent human resources in the organisation so that the goals of an organisation are achieved in an effective and efficient manner. In short, HRM is an art of managing people at work in such a manner that they give their best to the organisation for achieving its set goals.

• The first definition of HRM is that it is the process of managing people in organizations in a structured and thorough manner. This covers the fields of staffing (hiring people), retention of people, pay and perks setting and management, performance management, change management and taking care of exits from the company to round off the activities. This is the traditional definition of HRM which leads some experts to define it as a modern version of the Personnel Management function that was used earlier.
• Personnel management is essentially “workforce” cantered whereas human resource management is “resource” cantered. The key difference is HRM in recent times is about fulfilling management objectives of providing and deploying people and a greater emphasis on planning, monitoring and control.

Objectives of HRM

The primary objective of HRM is to ensure the availability of right people for right jobs so as the organisational goals are achieved effectively.

1. To help the organisation to attain its goals effectively and efficiently by providing competent and motivated employees.
2. To utilize the available human resources effectively.
3. To increase to the fullest the employee’s job satisfaction and self-actualisation.
4. To develop and maintain the quality of work life (QWL) which makes employment in the organisation a desirable personal and social situation.
5. To help maintain ethical policies and behaviour inside and outside the organisation.
6. To establish and maintain cordial relations between employees and management.
7. To reconcile individual/group goals with organisational goals.

Werther and Davis have classified the objectives of HRM into four categories as shown in table 1.2.

Table 1.2: HRM Objectives and Functions:

Scope of HRM

The scope of HRM is, indeed, very vast and wide. It includes all activities starting from manpower planning till employee leaves the organization. Accordingly, the scope of HRM consists of acquisition, development, maintenance/retention, and control of human resources in the organization (see figure 1.1). The same forms the subject matter of HRM. As the subsequent pages unfold, all these are discussed, in detail, in seriatim.

The National Institute of personnel Management, Calcutta has specified the scope of HRM as follows:

1. The Labour or Personnel Aspect

This is concerned with manpower planning, recruitment, selection, placement, transfer, promotion, training and development, lay-off and retrenchment, remuneration, incentives, productivity, etc.

2. Welfare Aspect

It deals with working conditions, and amenities such as canteen, creches, rest and lunch rooms, housing, transport, medical assistance, education, health and safety, recreation facilities, etc.

3. Industrial Relations Aspects

This covers union-management relations, joint consultation, collective bargaining, grievance and disciplinary actions, settlement of disputes, etc.

Functions of HRM

We have already defined HRM. The definition of HRM is based on what managers do. The functions performed by managers are common to all organizations. For the convenience of study, the function performed by the resource management can broadly be classified into two categories, viz.

(1) Managerial functions, and

(2) Operative functions

These are discussed in turn.

(1) Managerial Functions

Planning

Planning is a predetermined course of actions. It is a process of determining the organizational goals and formulation of policies and programmed for achieving them. Thus planning is future oriented concerned with clearly charting out the desired direction of business activities in future. Forecasting is one of the important elements in the planning process. Other functions of managers depend on planning function.

Organizing

Organising is a process by which the structure and allocation of jobs are determined. Thus organising involves giving each subordinate a specific task establishing departments, delegating authority to subordinates, establishing channels of authority and communication, coordinating the work of subordinates, and so on.

Staffing

TOs is a process by which managers select, train, promote and retire their subordinates This involves deciding what type of people should be hired, recruiting prospective employees, selecting employees, setting performance standard, compensating employees, evaluating performance, counseling employees, training and developing employees.

Directing/Leading

Directing is the process of activating group efforts to achieve the desired goals. It includes activities like getting subordinates to get the job done, maintaining morale motivating subordinates etc. for achieving the goals of the organization.

Controlling

It is the process of setting standards for performance, checking to see how actual performance compares with these set standards, and taking corrective actions as needed.

(2) Operative Functions

The operative, also called, service functions are those which are relevant to specific department. These functions vary from department to department depending on the nature of the department Viewed from this standpoint, the operative functions of HRM relate to ensuring right people for right jobs at right times. These functions include procurement, development, compensation, and maintenance functions of HRM.

Procurement

It involves procuring the right kind of people in appropriate number to be placed in the organisation. It consists of activities such as manpower planning, recruitment, selection placement and induction or orientation of new employees.

Development

This function involves activities meant to improve the knowledge, skills aptitudes and values of employees so as to enable them to perform their jobs in a better manner in future. These functions may comprise training to employees, executive training to develop managers, organisation development to strike a better fit between organisational climate/culture and employees.

Compensation

Compensation function involves determination of wages and salaries matching with contribution made by employees to organisational goals. In other words, this function ensures equitable and fair remuneration for employees in the organisation. It consists of activities such as job evaluation, wage and salary administration, bonus, incentives, etc.

Maintenance:

It is concerned with protecting and promoting employees while at work. For this purpose virus benefits such as housing, medical, educational, transport facilities, etc. are provided to the employees. Several social security measures such as provident fund, pension, gratuity, group insurance, etc. are also arranged.

It is important to note that the managerial and operative functions of HRM are performed in conjunction with each other in an organisation, be large or small organisations. Having discussed the scope and functions of HRM, now it seems pertinent to delineate the HRM scenario in India.