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Strategic Human Resource Management

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Introduction

Strategic human resource management refers to that act of employing and developing

individuals such that they become valuable to the firm (Martín Alcázar, Miguel Romero

Fernández, and Sánchez Gardey, 2013, pp. 46). It involves conducting an analysis on jobs,

planning the needs of the personnel, hiring competent and skillful individuals for a task, training

and developing the workers, controlling the wages and the salaries, ensuring that they avail

benefits and incentives, conducting cross- evaluation on performance, solving disagreements, as

well as regularly coming into contact with employees from all levels.

Understanding of Human Resource Management.

Throughout the learning session, my understanding on the HRM has dramtically

changed. This has enabled me to deduce the changes that have occurred and still occurring in the

Human Resource Management has stipulated below (Marchington, Wilkinson, Donnelly, and

Kynighou, 2016, pp. 341). The Huma Resource Management has changed adversely with key

factors that are involved in the changes being; the diversity of the work-force, the changes in

technology and the economic changes, regarding globalization, the structure of the organization,

and the nature of work which keeps changing. The environment in which businesses are being

conducted is changing, and the same applies to the setting of the Human Resource Management.

Human resource management was considered to be more straightforward in the past since

its work-force created a strong impression of being homogeneous. Currently, the HRM

workforce is made up of individuals who are of different sex, age, with separate social classes,

different personal characteristics, tribes, marital status, and from different religions. Diversity in
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the workforce is thus linked to the strategic direction of the organization. The difference has

enhanced creativity and improved on means of making even better decisions, thus boosting the

competitiveness of the firm. With many women being incorporated in the workforce, this has

necessitated preparations of flexible working schedules.

The changes in the economy and technology have to a large extent altered employment

and the patterns of occupation. With changes in technology, the current organizations have

adapted the technology-driven slogan where men have taken the place of machines for example

in manufacturing technology where has resulted to automation and robotics (Paillé, Chen, Boiral,

and Jin, 2014, pp. 460). These advancements have curbed many jobs. Additionally, computers

and the management information system have resulted in changes in nature which office work

operates.

Globalization as well has raised the levels of competition in the business sector

internationally. Firms that formerly competed locally today they need to have the ability to

compete with overseas firms. As a result of the following conditions, Human Resource

Management is faced with a major challenge of selecting, training, and coming up policies to

compensate exiled employees, to tap the world labor force.

Restructuring of the organization enables it to gain competitive advantage. From this,

firms have continuously merged and acquisitions as a restructuring method so that they remain

competitive (Brewster, Houldsworth, Sparrow, and Vernon, 2016, pp.220). Some organizations

have put measures to flatten their firms such as eliminating the several layers of management.

All these methods of restructuring lead to redesigning of jobs and employees are affected. HRM
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is thus posed with difficulties in dealing with consequences of human due to organizations

restructuring. This among many include the human cost which results from downsizing.

As globalization and technology have greatly changed, changes have also taken like jobs.

The work-force has greatly improved from the usual manual work to work that is mental or

requiring a lot of knowledge (Kehoe, and Wright, 2013, pp. 384). The organizations are then

tasked with giving priority to their human capital including training methods, acquiring the

necessary skills, and knowledge among others. The high attention to education and the priority

on human capital have led to the economy to be service-oriented.

Limitations of Human Resource Practices

There is uncertainty in the future. At present, there many factors that affect employment

which includes political, cultural, and even the changes in technology. Thus, organizations only

rely on Human Resource as a factor for offering guidelines but cannot entirely rely on it.

There is excess regarding to workforce (Alfes, Shantz, Truss, and Soane 2013, pp. 327).

Thus, firms try by every means to eliminate the imbalance by terminating, lying off, and even

through the removal of existing employees. As a result, this builds a sense of insecurity among

employees, resulting in loss faith of an organization by the employees.

Human resource management is usually an expensive process. This is because it takes up

the right responsibility from when the need for manpower arises, looking for employees, training

the employees, choosing the most qualified workers, up to the final placement of the workers

(Sparrow, Brewster, and Chung, 2016, pp. 72). This process is tedious and usually, time-

consuming since it researches on the personnel required for each department then takes up the

duty of looking for suitable sources that will satisfy this need.
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Future transformation of Human Resource Management

Every organization needs to transform the way their HR functions due to the business

landscape which is changing. This will help them gain a competitive advantage over other

companies in this changing environment. With the evolvement in organizations, those who head

the Human Resource should be keen to shape the strategic capabilities of individuals. The future

transformation of the strategic human resource management is as below;

The focus is to create a compelling experience for the employees. The employee

experience should be made to account for the physical environment which the employees

conduct their daily duties. This includes adopting tools, and any other technology that enables

them to achieve the goal more productively. There should be continuous training and learning by

the employees to ensure that they acquire the necessary skills required in the business

environment which they operate. The focus should be as well be on rewarding of employees

wherever they perform extemporary in their duties (Kavanagh, and Johnson, 2017, pp. 361).

Thus, if the workplace is converted into an experience, the firms will be able to embed their

culture and values in the same workplace, using this as a tool to recruit and even retain top

talents in the company.

Partnering with the real estate to enhance culture will as well transform the future

environment of HRM. The aim is to incorporate both the introverts (persona who are highly

talented with distinct characteristics) and the extroverts in the workspace (Markoulli, Lee,

Byington, and Felps, 2017, pp.394). The workers have control over their place of work and have

the duty of selecting the best workspace that best suits their task. Transformation here is giving
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employees opportunity to choose where to work. Thus Human Resource is mandated to extend

the culture of the company and efficiently engage the employees.

The future of Human Resource Management can be transformed by applying a consumer

marketing lenses to the Human Resource (Armstrong, and Taylor, 2014, pp. 30). The department

should make use of consumer marketing tools which include thinking about design and analysis

of sentiments thus creating compelling employee experience.

The organization culture also has a great effect in defining the future for HR. a firm’s

culture refers to the personality of a firm. This includes the type of employees who work in that

firm, the experience that is acquired when a person works in the firm, how the employees are

treated, and the relation of employees and management (Benschop, Holgersson, Van den Brink,

and Wahl, 2015, pp. 557). All this put together, a positive review of an organization’s culture

will shape the future of Human Resource Management whereby the task of managing employees

will be effective since there are cooperation and trust. Additionally, a culture that takes up the

feedback of the workers and device considerations to let them grow would as well determine the

future of HRM.

Training of the workforce will increase the skills and knowledge of the employees.

Hence, competition will be key in hiring the most experienced and skilled individuals by the

Human Resource so that they deliver to their best ability the tasks which have been assigned to

them. These will create a shift in the future where a large investment has to be made to educate

the employees through training, promotions when duties are well performed, and even rewarding

the employees.
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Conclusion

Strategic human resource management is crucial and important to any organization as an

organization is made up employees and not buildings. Hence, the employees are to be managed

and guided throughout their duties (Jackson, Schuler, and Jiang, 2014, pp. 24). However, with

the changing environment, HRM is basically to be affected in the future due to changes in

technology, the workforce, changes in culture, and even new means of management. As a result,

Human Resource Management has the duty of taking up their task, ensuring that they change and

keep up with the new changes.

Bibliography

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