Function of Human Resource Management Assignment

Introduction

Human resource management is the important building block of any organization it is performed to carry out the dealing with the most important asset of an organization human beings, earlier when it was known to be Personnel management the major work they performed was record keeping and keeping the objectives attainable, the aim of this assignment is to look out the various aspects of Human resource Management, of understanding the evolution of personnel management, how to recruit people and reward them, to learn the impact  of legal framework on human resource management, factors determining the pay structure, factors responsible in the job evaluation, and cessation of the employees.

All these will be discussed in the context of Harrods a retail store in London, the following will give a more holistic approach towards the functioning of the  human resource  department and would be helpful in understanding the practical point of view which in turn is the main aim of the assignment.

Majorly these will be the learning outcomes from this assignment.

Task 1

1.1: Differentiate between personnel management and human resource management?

Example: Back in 1892 when coca cola was formed they adopted the tradition working style wherein personnel managers were only concerned with the basic administrative functions like staffing leave management payrolls and record management, after the Hawthorne study was conducted it revolutionized the whole scenario and changed the style of working, the company adopted and let the human resource department become an integral part of the strategy formulation.

These are some major differences between personnel management and human resource management:

• Personnel management deals with the internal work force whereas the HRM is concerned with acquiring the best talent for the enterprise, to retain them, and administer the smooth functioning of the organization.
• Personnel management treats workforce as tools to achieve goals but Human resource management considers them as the most important asset of the organization.
• Personnel management evolved over the years to become Human resource management.
• The decision making process in personnel management is slow where as it is fast in Human resource management.
• Personnel management was basically concerned with the routine jobs like report filing, maintain the smooth functioning, whereas human resource management is more of a strategic function and performs function like strategic planning succession planning, forecasting the man power requirements etc.
• Personnel management was focused more on the working of an individual whereas human resource management is concerned with the team effort and more holistic approach.
• In personnel management collective bargaining used to happen with the union leader whereas in Human resource management that is not the case nor it is required individual negations happen with the individuals.
• Pay structure in case of personnel management was based on job evaluation, it is performance based in Human resource management.

Harrods now is one of the most reputed company in UK it started with 3 employees now employees more than 12000 people the management at that time was easy and can easily be done by a person, now when the company has expanded its footprint managing is complex and needs to be centralized thus HRM now plays an important part in maintain the smooth flow of working. (Ivanceivich,J.,2007)

1.2 Assess the function of the human resource management in contributing to organizational purposes?

The functions of human resource management in the organization are as follows:

Recruitment and selection: 

• Having right people at the right time in the right job is a major contributor towards the successfulness of an organization HRM ensures this.
• The HR manager pens down the Job description for the particular job.
• Job specification for the vacancy are written and advertised through various sources to attract the candidates.
• Candidates are then screened according to the specifications, they then are interviewed and the right one gets selected for the job.

Training and development:

• "The right employee training, development and education, at the right time, provides huge pay-offs for the employer in better productivity, loyalty, knowledge, and contribution. Learn the move toward that will guarantee your training carry out a return on your investment" (Susan M & Heathfield, 2008).
• HR manager ensures that the employees are trained and developed with the latest practices and techniques which help in efficient and smooth functioning of the organization also help reducing the cost incurred by the company and the career development objective for the employee gets fulfilled.

Administrative functions:

• Planning: plan the future requirements of the manpower in the company, managing the excess manpower in one function with the shortage in the other department by the means of job rotation.
• Organizing: Involves identifying responsibilities and assigning duties to coordinate the efforts.
• Staffing: Ensuring right people in the right job at the right time, fulfilling the shortage at one place.
• Budgeting: It is the main department which takes care of the employee’s salary, leaves, taxes bonuses etc.

In Harrods large manpower is required in order to manage its businesses in various places recruiting them at different places by different people can be hectic and costly thus centralized recruitment and selection saves time, training and development keeps them competitive, and various administrative tasks of HR keeps a smooth flow of working.( Writing,A.,2016)

1.3 Evaluate the role and responsibilities of line managers in human resource management?

The various responsibilities of the line managers in the human resource department are.

• Employee engagement: Disgruntled employee in an organization is the major concern for any HR manager, keeping them engaged and satisfied in their job is a major challenge, the managers who focused more on the strengths and personal interaction with their peers were found to be more engaged than the mangers that didn’t.
• Performance appraisal: Appraisal processes are designed by the HR managers but are executed by the line managers in an organization, employee behavior and performance are directly rated by the line managers they are then forwarded to the HR in a tick box format for the clear understanding and then are appraised based on their performance.
• Performance related pay: Organizations which follow performance related pay structure the role of line manager in estimating the pay raise for their direct reports can be very crucial as their feedback in ascertaining the hike, line managers should make sure they follow the criteria based on the objectives and not on their personal judgment. (Richards,L.,2016) A line manager in Harrods play key role in the day to day operations like keeping track of the employee details, paying them according to industry standards he is responsible for the employee engagement and training and development of his direct reports.

1.4 Analyze the impact of the legal and regulatory framework on human resource management?

There are various legal and regulatory laws which affect the working of the human department in an organization, Harrods look into the legal and regulatory framework so that any adverse impact can be avoided

• Equal pay act: ensures there is no discrimination in the remuneration of the employees on the basis of race, color, creed gender or religion.
• National minimum wage act: makes sure that the employee gets minimum wage per hour, the wage ate depends on the age group for people between 18-21 the wage ate depends on the age group for people between 18-21 year wage is set at £3.8 per hour.
• Employment rights act: enables employees for certain rights at the work place such as clean drinking water, part of labor union, decent working environment, prior notice before termination etc.
• Anti-sexual harassment: act enforces the organization to form a sexual harassment and a separate cell for the women’s who needs to keep track of any such happening and take necessary decision in some cases termination.
• Social security act: was enforced to keep the interest of the older, disabled and children by establishing various varieties of systems.
• Age discrimination act: was in acted to protect the workers above the age of 40    from the wrongful terminations.
• Family and medical leave act: empowers the employees eligible to take the unpaid, job secured leaves up to 12 weeks in the period of 12 months for specified medical and family reasons.
• Civil rights act was: in acted to force the employers to follow and record the documents related to hiring, promotions, and firing. (Beardwell, I.,2004)

Human resource department at Harrods is well aware of the legal framework and works with full adherence to the laws and acts governing, so as to keep a transparent working environment and avoid any legal complications.

Task 2

2.1 Analyzing the reasons for human resource planning?

The various objectives for the human resource planning are:

• To ensure the effective use of existing employees to achieve the organizational objective.
•  To plan and forecast future manpower requirement.
• To make sure that necessary human resources are available as when required.
• To safeguard from future redundancies
• To minimize the cost incurred by the organization.
• To find out which activity needs to be outsourced.
• To cope up with the changing technological and global working conditions.
• Lead time is necessary between the selection process and deployment of the employee to handle new knowledge and work in the organization.
• Large number of employees die, retire and leave the organization are to be replaced with the new people Human resource planning ensures this.
• Despite huge unemployment there is the shortage of human resource in organization because of the required skill and qualification gap.
• Human resource planning is required in order to meet the needs of expansion and diversification of the organizations.
• Human resource planning helps the organization plan out in advance as to who will fill the key managerial positions in the organizations.
• Some of the future problems and consequences can be foreseen with the help of human resource planning and the risk can be mitigated. (Armstrong,M.,2005)

The above discussed are some reasons for the human resource planning in any organization, here at Harrods also these are the prime reasons for which the dedicated line managers are there to take care of any problems which can arrive.

2.2 Outlining the stages involved in planning human resource requirements?

There are various stages involved in the human resource planning-

• Collecting data on organizational stages and future plans of where it wants to be and how to achieve it.
• Auditing this stage involves scanning the internal environment in the context of strategic objectives, it looks at the historic data to find out the turnover ratio and estimate the cost of human resources and setting a budget for future.
• Next step is estimating the  demand and supply  of the man power in terms of quality and quantity of people despite being huge unemployment there is the gap between the expectations and availability, so hiring the people as to cover for the turnover.
• HR plan is formulated to hire people from either internal sources or the external sources, to formulate the succession plans so that the organization never suffers from key personnel.
• Job evaluation is done and accordingly job profile and job specifications are penned down as per the requirements.
• They are then advertised to call up for the resumes, through various sources, which are then screened.
• Monitoring and controlling is the final stage of HR planning, HR has to follow up to the plans and adhere to the final deadlines so as to keep the delta in check and steer the organization to the highest trajectory.

The Human Resource Planning differs from company to company. Harrods screens the candidates based on their CVs the selected candidates are then sent to the stores to work for a day given set of activities to complete, based on the internal selection the candidate is then interviewed and selected for the right match.

McDonalds on the other hand screens the candidate for interviews by the manager they are then sent to McDonalds store for on job experience after 2 days they go through the interview and the best one is finally selected for the job. (Armstrong,M.,2012)

2.3 Compare the current recruitment and selection process in the organization with another organization you recommending?

In the Virgin Media, candidates are given a telephone interview before a face to face interview and are asked various questions before they are screened for final interviews after they are done with the face to face interviews they go through the psychometric tests and aptitude tests which shouldn’t be the case they should be done in advance before the interviews as knowing about the candidates mental state before the interviews would make the process more robust and simple and help screen them which in turn would save a lot of cost for the organization.(Virgin Media,2016)

As practiced in Harrods,Harrods advertises its vacancies through the company website, and career boards in stores, also through offline media such as television, radio, newspapers and makes it simple for candidates to know about available vacancies apply for the same. It chooses the most appropriate applicant from those that apply for a vacancy, An applicant who passes screening participate in an assessment and is given a set of activities to complete in the Centre, based on the internal selection by the managers based on their performance in the subsequent activities the candidate is then interviewed and selected for the and this time it is assured that the selected candidate is right for the job.

2.4 Evaluate how effective is the organization recruitment and selection techniques with another organization you recommending?

Recruitment and selection process at Harrods is much more robust as compared to the organization the case is about, The two major reasons for the robustness  in the process include cost effectiveness and finding the right skill set in the candidates, Harrods saves lots of cost by doing internal recruitment for a particular position. Also for external recruitment the company advertises through the website those who follow Harrods culture know this, this allows screening of the candidates who are not aware about the same. Assessment task and interview process further filters the candidates on who are not required by the organization hence best fir for the position is found easily and effectively,

The screened candidate are then sent on the job evaluation where they are given a piece of work from the original work and as=re asked to perform which helps the manager evaluate based on the performance so as to who is best suited for the job, the managers then through the check list picks up candidates ho they think are best, they are then interviewed and the selected candidate joins the job. ( Blackwood,T.,1995)

Task 3

3.1 Assess the link between motivational theory and reward at Virgin Media or your chosen organization. Your answer must show if you think there is a link, what connects the two?

There are various factors which motivates the individual McClelland’s three need theory explains the same-

• Need for power: it motivates the people who want power instead of monetary benefits, they gets motivated to exercise control and display the sense of superiority they are usually politicians and cops.
• Need for affiliation: these people don’t want power or money but social recognition and love, usually people in NGOs and nonprofits are seen to have this need helping people drives their effort.
• Need for achievement: these people thrive for the name and popularity typically scientists actors are usually seen to be controlled by this need.

The more robust the reward system the better, The main aim of the HR department at Harrods is on motivating the employees by paying monetary and non-monetary rewards as per the industry standards. Loyal employee base at Harrods is created by establishing a reward system and remunerating them efficiently if they have achieved the targets. Organization is highly dependent on employees in order to run their  business contract  and tend to provide them with good work life balance by offering them flexi timing and additional health benefits. Staff survey is performed to know the satisfaction level of the employees so that measures can be taken to improve it. Some of the key steps taken by Harrods include,

• Candidates are offered with Career breaks for the duration of 6 months to 5 years where in they are allowed to join back the organization after their career making time.
• To offer long term benefits employees are given pension schemes.
• Lifestyle break is given to the employees for 4 to 12 weeks so that they can take enjoy with their families. (Harrods,2016)

3.2 Evaluate the process of job evaluation and other factors determining pay at Virgin Media or your chosen organization?

Harrods group profile is most widely recognized and used in over 7000 companies to find the effective method to evaluate the job and find the right match in a workplace, there are three factors which are given prime importance when evaluating the job,

• Knowledge and skill set required to perform the job
• Responsibilities assigned with the job and their level in the hierarchy.
• Aptitude and creative thinking required to solve complex work situations.

These three factors are called as the knowhow of the jobs which form an integral part of job valuation methods, knowledge being the input for the jobs, responsibilities is the processing part and creative thinking to solve the complex problems as the final output.

There are many more factors which are considered when determining the pay,

• Cost of living in the area is among the most important factor in determining the pay of an individual.
• The supply of people in the market required for the particular job is a very important factor, the lesser the supplies the more u have to pay and vice versa.
• Government regulations also determine the pay.
• Bargaining power of the labor unions also plays an important role when determining the pay structure.
• Size and budget of the organization is a major determinant of the pay the large the organization the higher to pay can it afford the smaller the budget lesser it pays.

There are many more factors which effect but above discussed points are some important ones. (Harrison, R., 2002)

3.3 Assess the effectiveness of reward systems in virgin media or your chosen organization?

Harrods has high focus towards rewarding the employees and keeping personal goals aligned with the organizational goals, these are the following rewards offered to them,

• Those employees who are involved in the completing of the organization objectives are rewarded.
• High performing employees are identified and rewarded in order to keep them retained with the organization.
• Linking the reward system with the industry keeps the fair completion within the organization and help the employees link their performance in the marketplace.
•  Career planning and succession planning help eliminate the personal worries of the employees and helps them grow in the organization.
• ESOPs are offered to the employees so that they get a feeling of being a part in the profit sharing of the company.
• Filling the vacancies through internal recruiting gives them a confidence of being at the key managerial positions within the organization.
• Golden handshake is also a way of rewarding employees for their contribution in the business development
• At Harrods there is employee of the month who gets awarded, this is a reward which boasts the need of achievement in an individual.
• Recognizing the efforts put in by the employee can be a major determinant in the future performance as recognizing motivates him/her to perform better to earn more recognition.

Looking at the reward sharing structure of the organization it won’t be wrong in saying that Harrods boasts some very effective reward system in the marketplace. (Harrods,2016)

3.4 Examine the methods organizations use to monitor employee performance?

Harrods award the employees based on their performance and targets achieved compared to the set targets of performance in the beginning of the year, these are the factors which Harrods has identified to measure the performance,

• Appraisal from the superior.
• Effectiveness in cost saving if an employee has helped save cost for the organization he is awarded for it.
• 360degree feedback including self-appraisal it included reviews from peers, from superiors, from customers, and subordinates.
• Amount of leaves taken (absenteeism) the higher the leaves lesser rewards he get and vice versa.
• Work submission according to timelines if an employee adheres to the deadline shows his dedication towards his work he gets awarded for it.
• Quality of work.
• Management by objectives.
• Forced check method is used to appraise the performance.
• Critical incidents methods in some cases are used.
• In some employee cases, ranking methods are used,
• Whereas in some paired comparison method are used.

All these factors are important and suitable in the context of job evaluation at Harrods employees are rated and reviewed on the following parameters and then rewarded to keep them motivated.(Harrods,2016)

Task 4

4.1 identify the reasons for termination of Faisal’s employment contract with The Chicken Master and generally explain other reasons for cessation of employment?

Various reasons for Faisal’s termination are,

• Misconduct in the behavior is the main reason for Faisal’s termination.
• Using office property for personal use was against the rules.
• Not following the basic office timings, irresponsibility towards his work and subordinates is another major reason. (Doyle, A.,2016)

These are the reasons for termination there are other possible reasons as to which the employee can be cessationated.

• Sometimes due to budget constraint, organization layoffs its employees to reduce the losses.
• When two companies merge together the excess man power from both the organizations are parts of cessation programme.
• Employees who do not meet the set organizational objectives and target set for them for quite some time are often asked to leave.
• Misconduct on the part of the employees is one of the biggest reasons for the cessation.
• Sometimes the employees refuse to work in the place where they are promoted in that case it becomes very difficult to keep them aligned with the organization hence they are cessationated. (Marching ton, M.& Wilkinson, A. ,1996)

4.2 Describe the employment exit procedures used by The Chicken Master and another organization of your choice?

The various exit procedures used by the organizations in general are as follows,

• Termination: when an employee in the organization doesn’t work well or is involved in the activities which against the conduct he is then his then asked to leave, there are various legal complications for terminating the employee, various warning letters should be issued, he must have gone through various consulting sessions and only after the exit interview can he be terminated from the job.
• Retirement: after the age of 65 an employee cannot legally work in an organization hence he has to leave, some people take early retirement from work due to various reasons like family issues, heath issues, starting their own business or just to enjoy the life.
• Resignation: when an employee in an organization doesn’t want to stay and floats a notice stating the same is said to be resigned, there are certain laws he has to follow for ex he/she has to give a notice in advance for the same, sometimes due to some confidential of  knowledge information  about the company he/she is not allowed to work in the same industry for a period of time.
• Transfers: sometimes on the employee demand and organizational need an employee is sent from one location to another or from one department to another, transfer in a way help people to develop in various verticals of the business they can then choose what verticals they want to work into, since MNCs have offices in different places in the world it helps the employees to work in various places and explore.

These are the some of exit procedures used by the organization. Harrods follow the same techniques as other company does. (Reader, A., 1998)

4.3 Consider the impact of the legal and regulatory framework on employment cessation arrangements with an organization such as The Chicken Master if Faisal’s claim was proven to be true?

Incase Faisal wins the suit for wrongful termination against the chicken master these can be the following consequences,

The chicken master may be asked to pay the damages which include the basic pay, bonuses, benefits entitled to the employee, additional claim amount if the court of law finds the termination has led to the compromise in the reputation of an employee, also certain charges may be asked by the employee,

• Loss of earnings for the time being, loss on consulting the psychiatrist for the termination, redundancy pay for 2 years for the early termination, loss of earning for the paid sick leaves.
• If Faisal’s due to wrongful termination faced some emotional stress he can even ask for the emotional distress damages.
• Also the attorney fee and court fee can be claimed in case the employee wins.
• The chicken master can also be asked to reinstate the employee if satisfied that termination was based on age and regional discrimination.

These are the legal complications which the company may face if an employee succeeds to prove that he was wrongfully terminated. (Reid, M. and Barrington,H.,1997)

Conclusion

This assignment talks about various aspects of Human resource management, its evolution from being routine function to more of a strategic unit now, How human resource planning helps the organization in its smooth functioning, and helps mitigate the risk of excessive human resource turnover, also various aspects like salary negations, job evaluation, job planning, further it talks about the impact of legal framework on the Human resource management, in the times of generation Y where people shift the jobs so often this assignment talks about the various motivational theories which help them in retaining good employees through a robust performance evaluation and reward structure, various components of pay are discussed, process of recruitment and selection and how line managers are associated with it are discussed, various reasons why cessation of employees takes place and what would be the impact if an employee files a suit for wrongful termination in that case what damages could an organization suffer, what are the acts which are applicable and the quantum of their effect on the structure of an organization. All these are discussed keeping in context of Harrods a retail store in London, how are these functions carried out in there so as to give all the theory a practical perspective.

References

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