The Pluralist perspective of industrial relations is just as the name suggests, they see organisations as constellations of different groups. The organisation is seen as multi-structured in terms of groups, leadership, authority and loyalty. A miniature democratic state composed of sectional groups with divergent interests over which the government tries to maintain some kind of dynamic equilibrium. The main groups within this perspective that find themselves at the opposite ends of the scales often are the workers and managers. This can be down to a number of issues such as pay, working conditions, bonuses and working hours and it is over issues like these that conflict often occurs. The pluralist perspective during the twentieth century include a widespread distribution of authority and power in society, ownership separation from management, political separation and industrial conflict and an acceptance and institutionalization of conflict in both spheres. The priciple assumption of pluralist perspective Continue reading
HRM Concepts
Necessity for Alignment between Corporate Strategy and HR Strategy
Current business environmental forces such as competition, innovation, globalization, technological advancement etc has created major impact on organizational behavior. These changes come in different forms. Sometimes it required to reorganize the structure of the organization and due to this organization may have to introduce new roles and new people. Sometimes it may require to change the culture of the organization. In all these situations HRM function plays a major role. Further recent development of new concepts such as knowledge workers has increased the complexity of HRM function. Nowadays HR has become strategic assets for organizations. From an IT company’s view point intellectual property that is knowledge of the software developers is crucial for their business than the physical asset of the company. This importance has heightened due to the transition of old economic conditions to knowledge based economy where it considers the intellectual property as one of key success factors Continue reading
Analytical Approaches to Cultural Factors
The reason cultural factors are a challenge to global marketers is that they are hidden from view. Because culture is learned behavior passed on from generation to generation, it is difficult for the inexperienced or untrained outsider to fathom. Becoming a global manager means learning how to let go of cultural assumptions. Failure to do so will hinder accurate understanding of the meaning and significance of the statements and behaviors of business associates from a different culture. For example, a person from a culture that encourages responsibility and initiative could experience misunderstandings with a client or boss from a culture that encourages bosses to remain in personal control of all activities. Such a boss would expect to be kept advised of a subordinate’s actions; the subordinate might be taking initiative on the mistaken assumption that the boss would appreciate a willingness to assume responsibility. 1. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs The Continue reading
Investment in Human Resources
There is much debate as to whether the human resources of an organization can be considered as an asset and treated accordingly in the accounting system. There are two schools of thought. One says that human resource is an asset and the other does not agree with this. Now let us see what is an asset? Asset is anything which is owned by the entity to derive service in future and should have legally enforceable claim. As such there is no guarantee of deriving benefits from the existing human resources in future and has no sales value like other assets. Therefore, legally, human resource is not an asset claims one school of thought. Besides, company law also does not consider it as an asset. But the other school is of the opinion that the “human resource is an asset“. This school of thought puts forth two contentions in favor of Continue reading
Benefits of Performance Appraisal
Perhaps the most significant benefit of performance appraisal is that, in the rush and bustle of daily working life, it offers a rare chance for a supervisor and subordinate to have “time out” for a one-on-one discussion of important work issues that might not otherwise be addresses. Performance Appraisal offers a valuable opportunity to focus on work activities and goals, to identify and correct existing problems, and to encourage better future performance. Thus the performance of the whole organization is enhanced. For many employees, an “official” appraisal interview may be the only time they get to have exclusive, uninterrupted access to their supervisor. Said one employee of a large organization after his first formal performance appraisal, “In twenty years of work, that’s the first time anyone has ever bothered to sit down and tell me how I’m doing.” The value of this intense and purposeful interaction between a supervisors and Continue reading
Human Resource Management (HRM) Best Practices
In recent years business environment has become highly competitive. It has forced the manager to develop different strategies to cope with competitiveness. These strategies help organizations to survive in competitive environment. One area that has been important as a means of providing a competitive advantage is the management of the Human Resource function. Over the past decade there has been a dramatic shift in the field of Human Resource Management, with great emphasis being applied to the human resource management function and its significant contribution to organisational performance. However in order to influence organisational performance it is required that there are certain ‘practices’ of human resource management that must be abided by in order for improved performance to be achieved. Unfortunately there has been no authoritative definition of best practice that has been agreed by academics or practitioners. This leads to a lack of conceptual clarity of the HRM best Continue reading