2.

1 Introduction to human
resource management

IB Business Management
By the end of this topic, you should be able to:
• Define the terms human resource management, supply of labour,
and human resource (HR) planning.
• Outline external factors that impact on the supply of labour.
• Outline internal factors that influence HR planning.
• Outline the changes in work patterns, practices, and preferences.
• Outline how innovation, ethical considerations, and cultural
differences may influence human resource practices and strategies
in an organization.
• Outline possible reasons for resistance to change in the workplace.
• Outline human resource strategies to reduce the impact of and
resistance to change.

2.1 Introduction to human resource management

• Strategic management of an organization’s workforce to
help gain competitive advantage.
• Involves the planning, organization, and development of
all what is required to promote the effective and efficient
performance of the workforce.
• It aims to recruit capable, flexible
and committed people, manage
and reward their performance and
develop their skills for the benefit
of the organization.

Human Resource Management

• Total number of people willing and able to work.
• Available resource that grows and shrinks according to the
situation of the market.
• Difficult to measure nowadays because of different external
factors such as technology, work practices, economic and
political environment, etc.
• Considered as an increasing global,
informal, and impersonal
resource.

The supply of labour

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The supply of labour

• Define the term workforce planning.
• Process of analyzing and forecasting the number of workers and
the skills of those workers that will be required by the
organization to achieve its objectives.

Knowledge check
• State the external factors that have an impact on the pool of labour.
• Technological change
• Government regulations
• Demographic change
• Social trends
• The state of the economy
• Changes in education
• Labour mobility
• Occupational
• Geographical
• Immigration
• Flexi-time, remote working, gig-economy contracts

Knowledge check
• State the internal factors that influence the HR planning.
• Changes in business organization
• Changes in labour relations
• Changes in business strategy
• Changes in business finance

Knowledge check
• State some factors that change the working environment.
• Privatization
• Migration
• Participation of women
• Educational opportunities
• Urbanization
• Aging population

Knowledge check
• Optimal arrangement of an individual’s on-the-job and
private time to facilitate health and personal satisfaction
without negatively impacting productivity and professional
success.
• Amount of time spent working compared with the amount of
time spent with the family and doing things you enjoy.
• Benefits:
• Fewer health problems
• More engagement
• Less “burnouts”
• More mindfulness

Work-life balance
IB learner profile – Communicator
• Talk to your parents about work-life balance.
• Do they believe in work-life balance?
• Or do they believe more in work-life
integration or work-like harmony?
• Or do they believe in another way to
address both aspects in life?
• Take notes about their ideas and be
ready to share them with the rest of
the class.

Workpoint
• Distinguish between work patterns, work practices, and work
preferences.
• Work patterns refer to the types of jobs required by business as
well as the types of jobs people want.
• Work practices refer to the level of flexibility in the work routine.
• Work preferences refer to the employees’ decision to adapt their
work routine to their lifestyles.

Knowledge check
• State two work practices in decline and two practices on the
increase.
Work practices in decline Work practices on the increase
Full-time work Part-time work
Permanent contracts Temporary
Freelance
Teleworking
Homeworking
Flexitime
Casual Fridays
Three-day weekend
Knowledge check
• State two examples of work preferences.
• Career breaks (sabbatical)
• Job share
• Downshifting
• Study leave

Job sharing

Knowledge check
 Performance
Salaries and appraisal Right to
financial
privacy
remuneration

Ethical
Health & issues in Lay-offs and/or
safety the HR redundancies
plan

Discrimination Restructuring
Employment
 Power
distance

Dress Individualism

Body Cultural
Masculinity
language differences

Personal
Uncertainty
space

Long-term
Humour
orientation
• State six possible reasons that employees may resist change.
• Discomfort
• Fear
• Insufficient reward
• Lack of job skills
• Loss of control
• Mistrust
• Poor communication
• Poor timing
• Prior experience

Knowledge check
• Outline the steps to reduce the impact of and resistance to
change.
• Assess the potential impact of the change, identifying employees’
possible reactions and determining the degree of control over the
process.
• Develop a vision for the change process and the desired outcomes.
• Forecast and allocate the necessary resources.
• Involve employees in the change process from the outset.
• Regularly communicate how the change process is unfolding.
• Train employees in advance.
• Routinely communicate the benefits of the changes.
• Be aware of the stress caused and provide support.

Knowledge check
• Part of business decision-making involves analysing data.
• Quantitative means that are used to summarize a given set of
data.
• Process of using and analysing given statistical data.
• Help to present a large amount of quantitative data in a
simplified or manageable form.
• This analysis can be applied to many different forms of data.
• In BM, the following measures will be used:
• Mean • Pie charts
• Mode • Infographics
• Median • Quartiles
• Bar charts • Standard deviation

Descriptive statistics
• Presents data with rectangular-shaped bars, plotted vertically
or horizontally, proportional in length to their values.
• Compares different categories and is a powerful way to show
data visually.
• Bar charts are used to
show data that are
independent of each
other, such as the sales
per store or region, or
the profit per product.

Bar chart
• Imagine we have the following data:
• Product A $50 000
• Product B $30 000
• Product C $80 000
• Product D $10 000
• Product E $30 000
• This can be presented as a bar chart.
• The bar chart immediately shows the scale of one item (in this
case the sales of a product) compared to another.
• The relative size of the bars is clear and this can help with the
analysis.
• In the example, Product D’s sales are clearly low relative to the
others and managers will want to know why.
• As with all data, the context behind it is important. Product D
may be in the launch or decline stage of its product life cycle
and these sales may be expected.
• Alternatively, this could be a major cause for concern if it had
been expected to be the bestselling product line in that
period.

Bar chart
• Clark, P. and Golden, P. (2009). Business and management Course
Companion. Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press
• Gutteridge, L. (2009). Business and Management for the IB Diploma.
Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press
• Lominé, L., Muchena, M., and Pierce, R. (2014). Business Management.
Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press
• Lominé, L., Muchena, M., and Pierce, R. (2022). Business Management.
Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press
• Stimpson, P., Smith, A. (2015). Business Management for the IB Diploma.
Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press
• Surridge, M., Gillespie, A. (2022). Business Management. Hodder
Education
• Thompson, R. and Machin, D. (2003). AS Business Studies. London, United
Kingdom: Harper Collins Publishers

Sources