AN ASSIGNMENT ON Strategic HRM productivity and improvement

                                                              

AN ASSIGNMENT

ON

Strategic HRM productivity and improvement

“As part of the fulfillment of the requirement for the course of HRM 612: International Human Resource Management”

Prepared For:

Dr. M. Ataur Rahman
Professor
Department of Management Studies
Director
MBA (Evening) Program
University of Dhaka

Prepared By:

Name	ID NO.
Md. Sojibur Rahman	1332MBA00875

MANARAT INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY

Date: June 14, 2013

Contents
Titles	Page no.
Introduction of SHRM  productivity and improvement	03
Definition of  Strategy	03
Definition of  Strategic Management	04
Definition of SHRM	04
Definition of Productivity	04
Strategy Development Process	05
Strategic HR Management Process	06
Approaches to Improving Organizational Productivity	08
Steps of Strategic HRM productivity and improvement	08
Stages of Development from Personnel Management to HRM and SHRM	09
Conceptual Framework linking Strategic Human Resource Management, Competitive Strategies and Firm Performance	10
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Multiple choice question	17

Introduction

Employees are human assets that increase in value to the organization and the marketplace when investments of appropriate policies and programs are applied. Effective organizations recognize that their employees do have value, much as same as the organization’s physical and capital assets have value. Employees are a valuable source of sustainable competitive advantage.

Organizations today have increasingly become aware of the importance of strategic human resource management (SHRM).This awareness in a system is a critical dimension in the performance of organizations. The real life experiences substantiate the assumption that no matter how sophisticated and modern the business activities of the organization may become, it will be extremely difficult to sustain its growth and effectiveness unless there are strategies that complement its operations.

Business competitiveness is a recurring theme examined by academicians, consultants and practitioners. The frequent and uncertain changes, greater competition between firms, the need for continuous innovations, quality enhancement and cost reduction force companies to face the challenge of improving their competitiveness and consequently their performance. This realization has propelled SHRM as a major field of study and the renewed interest has facilitated the development of newer approaches in managing organizations and human resource (HR).

Strategy

The word ‘strategy’, deriving from the Greek noun strategus, meaning ‘commander in Chief’, was first used in the English language in 1656. The development and usage of the word suggests that it is composed of stratos (army) and agein (to lead). In a management context, the word ‘strategy’ has now replaced the more traditional term – ‘long-term planning’ – to denote a specific pattern of decisions and actions undertaken by the upper echelon of the organization in order to accomplish performance goals.

1.      According to Dr. M. Ataur Rahman—

 “A strategy is an action plan designed to move an organization toward achievement of its vision.”

2.      According to Glueck-

“A unified, comprehensive, and integrated plan designed to ensure that the basic objectives of the enterprise are achieved.”

3.      According to Md. Sojibur Rahman-

“Strategy may be defined as a realistic tactics where is to have unlimited opportunities with limited resources whereas with competition in order to achieve the long term objectives.”

Strategic Management  

Strategic Management is a process, an approach to addressing the competitive challenges an organization faces.

1.      According to Md. Sojibur Rahman-

“Strategic management consists of the analysis, decisions, and actions an organization undertakes in order to create and sustain competitive advantages”

2.      According to Thomson –

“Strategic mgt refers to the managerial process of forming a strategic vision, setting objectives, crafting a strategy, implementing and executing the strategy and then overtime initiating whatever corrective adjustments in the vision, objectives, strategy and execution are deemed appropriate.”

3.      According to Fred. David-

“Art & Science of formulating, implementing and executing the cross-functional decision process that enable an organization to achieve its objectives.”

Definition of SHRM

Linking HRM with strategic goals and objectives to improve business performance and develop organizational cultures fostering innovation and flexibility.

1.      According to Dr. M. Ataur Rahman-

“A set of action moves crafted or to be crafted for discovering, developing, maintaining and utilizing human resources of an organization.”

1.      According to Md. Sojibur Rahman-

“Strategic human resource management is the pattern of planned human resource deployments and activities intended to enable an organization to achieve its goals.”

 

Definition of Productivity

The measure of how well resources are being used.

1.      According to Dr. M. Ataur Rahman-

“A measure of the quantity and quality of work done, considering the cost of the resources used.”

2.      According to Md. Sojibur Rahman-

“A ratio of the inputs and outputs that indicates the value added with an organization.”

 Represents output relative to input

l          Partial measures

s         “Labor” productivity = Output ¸ Labor

s          “Capital” productivity = Output ¸ Capital

s         “Materials” productivity = Output ¸ Materials

s         “Energy” Productivity = Output ¸ Energy

s         “Multi-factor” productivity

l          Total Measure

s         Output ¸ (All inputs)

Strategy Development Process

This is a strategy development process that an organization is to follow if he wants to improve the productivity and improvement. An organization has to maintain and utilize above point carefully.

1.      Environmental Analysis:

It is of more importance that an organization has to analysis the environmental factor that generally affects. Generally an organization affected these elements such as:

2.      Company Mission:

Ø  the firm’s reason for being

v  The scope of its products and services

v  The mission defines the firm’s core intent and the business or businesses in which it intends to operate

3.      Business-Level Strategy:

A strategy that seeks to determine how an organization should compete in each of its SBUs (strategic business units).

4.      Corporate-Level Strategies:

Top management’s overall plan for the entire organization and its strategic business units

Strategic HR Management Process

Approaches to Improving Organizational Productivity

1.     Organizational restructuring

2.     Re-designing work

3.     Aligning HR Activities

4.     Outsourcing analyses and assistance

Steps of Strategic HRM productivity and improvement

Hence, I gave 5 steps of Strategic HRM productivity and improvement that may help to achieve the organizational objective by increasing productivity. These steps are in the following

 

1.      Establishing the Philosophy:

Although many organizations do not have written philosophy statements, the oral expressions      and the actions of leaders establish their operating philosophy.

2.      Identifying the Organizational Mission :

The next steps in moving from ideas and values to concerted action occur with the identification and the description of the mission of the organization.

3.      Developing Policy of the organization:

To ensure proper and acceptable operations in working toward the accomplishment of this mission-identified and results, an organization develops a policy.

4.      Formulating & implementing organizational Strategy:

A primary responsibility of the top management of any organization is the establishment of the organizational strategy.

5.      Determining Objectives and Goals:

The next step in the idea-to-output process is to establish Objectives and Goals. Goals are the foundation for further planning.

6.      Defining Work Unit Activities:

Once the organizational work unit objectives have been established, each unit must develop its functional statement.

7.      Grouping tasks into jobs:

From the activities assigned to each work unit come the tasks to be performed by the members of that unit. Work unit activities become segregated and assigned to specific individuals.

Stages of Development from Personnel Management to HRM and SHRM

Wayne Cascio (1989) divides the development from Personnel Management to HRM and

SHRM into three (3) distinct phases:-

Stage One – 1900 – 1940s Welfare and Administration

Stage Two – 1940s- mid 1970s welfare, administration, staffing and training personnel management and industrial relations;

Stage Three – mid –1970s – 1990s HRM and SHRM.

Major features of each developmental stage are discussed below:

Stage One: Welfare and administration (1900-1940s)

Personnel functions were performed by supervisors, line managers and early specialists

(e.g. recruitment officers, trainers, welfare officers) long before the establishment of a national association representing a “profession” of personnel or Human resource management. Scientific Management of J. Taylor (1856-1915), through job design structured reward systems and “scientific” selection techniques, helped the refining of the personnel management practice in the recruitment and placement of skilled personnel employees. Behavioral Science added psychological testing and motivational systems,

While management science contributed to performance management programmed.

Prior to the Second World War in 1945, personnel management functions were largely fragmented and often conducted by line managers as part of their overall management responsibilities.

During this period, society was generally stable, though disrupted by the First World War and the Great Depression. Unemployment was low until the 1930s when labor became readily available for employers. Trade unions were active largely focusing on issues of pay and working conditions. Personnel functions were mainly restricted to administrative areas (e.g. wages/salary records, minor disciplinary procedures and employee welfare activities).

Stage Two: Welfare, administration, staffing and training (1940s-mid 1970s)

The Second World War referred to above, had significant repercussions on both those that stayed behind particularly on business and the labor market. During the Second

World War, not only was there a scarcity of labor for essential industries such as munitions and food but there was also a corresponding increase in problems and performance of existing employees. Many more women had become involved in all areas of industry, to replace their husbands and brothers who were in the military service. Financial, social and family pressures began to hinder productivity and output of such employees and they became increasingly harder to recruit. When the war ended, returning soldiers flooded the labor market, often with inadequate work skills.

Employees were spurred on by government initiatives and their own post-war in a developing economy. Welfare services for employees were seen by some employers as a means of attracting and maintaining employees and ensuring their continued productivity.

Training courses were launched to equip practitioners with the necessary skills.

More organizations began to employ specialists to conduct recruitment, training and welfare activities, removing these functions from line managers.

This stage is characterized by the expansion of necessary personnel functions for the post-war economy; a gradual move from specialist to more general approaches; the adoption of theories including scientific management, behavioral science and human relations. This period marked the resurgence of unionism. Unions focused on pay and work conditions issues, forcing further expansions of personnel activities to include industrial relations considerations. Although personnel activities expanded, they were largely separated from those concerned with industrial relations and professional philosophy did not exist.

Stage Three: Human Resources Management and Strategic Human Resources

Management (mid 1970s – 1990s)

This period was characterized by fierce competition in the world labor markets. The influences of the “Excellence” theory referred to earlier were beginning to affect management of employees. Personnel management transformed into human resource management, in 1970s, representing a change towards the integration of personnel functions, strategically focused on overall organizational effectiveness.

Unlike previous periods, this stage represents the integration of personnel management

And industrial relations into a coordinated and strategic approach to the management of an organization’s employees and this led to the development of Strategic Human Resource Management (SHRM). SHRM can be perceived as a “macro” perspective (e.g. strategies and policies), whereas Human Resources Management represents more of micro approach.

Conceptual Framework linking Strategic Human Resource Management, Competitive Strategies and Firm Performance

The measurement of organizational performance is not easy for business organizations with multiple objectives of profitability, employee satisfaction, productivity, growth, social responsibility and ability to adapt to the ever changing environment among other objectives. Although performance has been traditionally conceptualized in terms of financial measures, some scholars have proposed a broader performance construct that incorporates non-financial measures including among others market share, product quality, and company image.

Extant research findings have shown that perceived measures of performance can be a reasonable substitute of objective measures of performance and have a significant correlation with objective measures of financial performance. Additionally, cross-industry organizational performance is influenced by external economic factors hence subjective evaluations may be even more appropriate than objective measures in this study that recognize the difficulty in obtaining objective measures of performance and suggest asking managers to assess their own firm’s performance relative to others in the same industry or sector. To minimize the effects of random errors, researchers have suggested the use of multiple items to assess performance. Given this scenario, the researchers in this study have opted to use multiple items in order to assess the performance of the organizations to be studied. These items relate to profitability and sales growth.

 

                     Independent                                                                            Dependent variable

                       Variable

                                                              Moderating variables

Reference:

1. Rahman, Ataur, Dr. M, (2011-2012), “Human Resource management” (1^st Edition), Neela Publications, Dhaka.
2. Rahman, Ataur, Dr. M, (2011-2012), “Strategic Human Resource management” (2^nd Edition), Zahin Publications, Dhaka.
3. Dessler, Gary, (2006-2007), “Human Resource management” (10th Edition), New Delhi, Prentice-Hall of India Private Limited.
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12. http://www.shrm.org/
13. http://www.shrmglobal.org/
14. www.gogle.com