Strategic Staffing of Human Resources - Essay Example

Introduction: The main elements that determine to make an organisation are the people, tasks, structure, technologies and the best departments which support the organisation to takes in some of these inputs to derive the desired outputs. Organizations exist for people. They are made up of people and by the people and their effectiveness depend on the behavior and performance of the people constituting them. Man is the only resource which can produce through motivated creativity and their outputs are greater than the sum of their inputs. Human resource is most complex and unpredictable in behavior. “The Human Resources Management (HRM) function includes a variety of activities, and key among them is deciding what staffing needs you have and whether to use independent contractors or hire employees to fill these needs, recruiting and training the best employees, ensuring they are high performers, dealing with performance issues, and ensuring your personnel and management practices conform to various regulations.” 1 Evaluation of organisation, individual and HR function on retention: An individual has emotions, feelings, attitudes, hopes, aspirations and expectations. Interpersonal relations at work, physical and economic condition and ease at work determine productivity. Individual behavior is influenced by group behavior which in turn has impact on behavior of organization. “Employee Relations involves the body of work concerned with maintaining employer-employee relationships that contribute to satisfactory productivity, motivation, and morale.” 2 As the organization has to bring individuals together to achieve a common goal it needs to have certain parameters, guidelines and accepted norms to decide what and how these goals are to be achieved. For this a well defined human resource management is required in every organization. The maximum utilization of human resources is very essential to achieve organizational goals. “Employees are the most important and valuable asset of an organization.” 3 Retention strategies have to be clearly executed. Employee retention will enable the organization to achieve goals. As organizations have different structures and these structures have a bearing on employee attitudes and behavior. The key components that make up an organization structure help in identifying the contingency factors that make certain structural designs preferable in varying situations. Thus a well structured organization provides a sound basis for effective planning and facilitates attainment of objectives through proper co-ordination and it promotes dignity of employment of every employee of an organization and provides opportunities for team work, personal development and career development. Maintenance of a perfect decisions and policy formations should be implied in the retention strategies in a most efficient and effective manner. Satisfaction is the most important influence on retention. Effective communication should be carefully planned and maintained in every level of ongoing business functions and within the employees in the organization. Prompt engaging and keeping the employees together with a clear understanding of the employee culture, dynamics and performance requirements will lead to success with a good and carefully planned retention program. Retention is the major issue. “With most economies on the rebound, the subject of retention is heating up again.” 4 An understanding of how to manage relationships with the individuals effectively has become a most crucial part for the departments of the organization. The implementation of the best relationship management processes has a moderately positive association with both the perceptual and objective company performance. Employee retention is most important as far as any organization is concerned and it is the duty of the human resource department to take care of the employees in the organization. “Retaining a quality workforce continues to be a growing challenge among organizations today.” 5 Employee retention is similar to the steps such as training, recruitment and investment. So failure in the retention of key employees will negatively affect the organizational activity. Retaining of staff is better than looking for new appointments and it is essential to provide all support and solve their work related issues. Organizations have to introduce employee assistance programs in order to offer support and special concern to its employees on a wide range of personal and work related problems. “Employee retention involves being sensitive to peoples needs and demonstrating the various strategies.” 6 Security and stability are greatly valued by most employees. Fairness and equitable treatment and participation are all the factors which contribute retention. Revising salary and providing a standard rate of salary is essential for employee satisfaction. Genuine appreciation has a tremendous impact on overall job satisfaction. “Competitive salary, competitive vacation and holidays, and tuition reimbursement are three basics in employee retention.” 3 Training and development programs are required to be conducted in required manner. “There is a direct link between training and employee retention. Employees involved in ongoing training feel that their employer is interested in them doing a better job, and the employer cares enough about them to make an investment in their development.” 7 Employees must not face any problems from their immediate boss or managers as it will increase the employee turnover. The quality of supervision an employee receives is a critical factor in employee retention. Managers must encourage and assist in developing strategies for employee empowerment and development. Induction must be conducted seriously for creating a feeling among new employees that they are supported and recognized. “It has long been established that the early experiences of organizational socialization can have a significant, long-term impact on a new comer’s well-being and commitment to an organization. An effective induction period is crucial in helping a person to integrate successfully into an organization, and this has a strong influence on their perceptions of the culture of ht organization. Induction also has a strong influence on the intentions of an employee to remain with or leave an organization.” 8 Employees are always concerned about their future career and development. Morale and motivation can be increased by rewarding and recognition of the employees. Recognizing employees’ strength and helping them to overcome their weakness are all essential for business success. Similarly recognizing of outstanding performance should be appreciated immediately. “A key component of HRs role is to manage the talent! To do this you have to define knowledge and skill sets for each major functions, key performance criteria, rate people against both dimensions and ensure that effective management processes are in place for different categories of employee.” 9 Increased motivation and job satisfaction lead to gain productivity through better use of employees full potential, skills and experience. Team work is essential for commitment and achieving goal. Team work can reduce turnover by motivating team culture and help to improve the relationship among team members. One of the primary reasons that the employees stay in an organization is the strong values, comfortable, friendly and flexible workplace. Identifying the areas where the employee turnover is high and calculating attrition rate can be helpful for taking steps for reducing employee turnover. Failure to retain a key employee is unbearable for any organization. Various estimates show that losing a senior level employee in an organization translates to a loss of up to five times his salary. Employers who take steps for effective communication and ensuring employee participation will bring stronger work relationship. Employee commitment has a major role in retention. “One of the foundation stones of companies which attract, retain and motivate high performing employees is a positive and valuing attitude toward them.” 10 Reasons for employee turnover and solutions: One of the reasons of employee turnover is lack of career opportunities and boring monotonous job. Other main reasons are inability to handle stress, company policies, and problems with managers. It is more important to retain the existing talents than hiring the new ones. There are plenty of opportunities available for the talented and experienced employees and any kind of dissatisfaction or problems will make them decide to leave the organization. Employer must understand that those employees who leave the organization are taking all knowledge and skills with them and going to give it to the company’s competitor. “Employee Retention involves taking measures to encourage employees to remain in the organization for the maximum period of time.” 11  In order to reduce the turnover it is essential to find the exact reason of turnover. Exit interviews can provide the reason of turnover. When a key employee resigns, it will affect the company in very bad way. When such case occurs it is essential to make some discussion on the issue by management to resolve the issue, if possible. Similarly steps can be taken to avoid such cases in the future. Employee turnover problem cannot be totally overcome by retention measures of the management. It is essential to adopt some innovative measures to retain the staffs; some strategies can be adopted to retain the employees. “One thing to remember is that people have a real desire to do work that is valued and really contributes to a special cause. They want to work in an environment that lifts their spirits. They want to be proud of themselves and have a boss they admire and emulate. This is the real secret of employee retention.” 12 In order to retain employees, it is essential to take some important steps before recruitment itself and other steps are essentials to retain them after the recruitment process. Recruitment of the right candidates at the right place will reduce majority of the employee issues. A well structured recruitment plan can reduce the issues and challenges in the organization. Recruitment involves series of activities such as advertising, searching, identifying and attracting talented peoples. “If an employer faces difficulties in finding the right candidates it is important to evaluate the current recruitment tools and explore other avenues to widen the field of candidates, such as internal advertising, newspapers, trade magazines, internet sites and recruitment agencies.” 13 Right candidates can be selected through competency screening. “Smart companies recruit employees they can retain, and retention depends on getting the right people in the right job in the first place. So, while getting large pool applicants is important, getting the right type of applicant is even more important.” 14 Performance based incentives and good working environment can also attract the candidates. Immediately after the recruitment, it is essential to address new employees about company’s history, top officials, goals, future plans, and mission and vision statement. This is essential for the new entrants to identify the growth opportunities and clear idea about the company. In addition, HR policies and practices must be properly explained to them and format of the required forms for claims etc must be given to them. These kinds of steps are essential for new employees to gather knowledge and adjust with the new work environment. A good employee-manager relationship must be developed at the time of selection of the candidate. Retention measures must be started at the time of selection of the candidate. “A skilled staff is regarded as one of the most inevitable commodities for the longevity of a business organization. Regardless of the size of the organization, key staff retention is highly essential for the long term health as well as the success of a business enterprise.” 15 An organization management is always concerned with the people at work and with their relationships within an organization. Human resource management aims to achieve both efficiency and justice neither of which can be pursued successfully without the other. It seeks to bring together and develop into an effective organization the individuals who make up an organization enabling each one of them to make their best contribution to its success both as an individual and as an employee of a working group. Every organization has certain objectives and goals which it strives to accomplish and for this people work together and create a better relationship which helps them to ensure effective work performance. “Basically, an organization is a group of people intentionally organized to accomplish an overall, common goal or set of goals. Business organizations can range in size from two people to tens of thousands.” 16 It helps them to relate to each other, co-ordinate their activities and achieve the organizational goals and objectives by minimizing confusion, nurtures suitable work behavior and minimizes effectiveness. Every business organization’s aim is to increase its productivity as well as to make profits. For the effective running of the organization there should be proper relationship between the human resources and work. Losing an employee will affect the working conditions of the organization. Providing with the necessary welfare facilities, bonus and others facilitates to employees will help the organization in maintaining its employees and if the organization provides better facilities then the employee commitment will also increase thereby leading to the development of the organization. The behaviors of individuals are the primary concerns of the management and it is essential that managers have a better understanding of the factors influencing the behaviors of the individuals they manage. The main problem that managers facing is how to diagnose, prevent and reduce needless stress. They can cope more effectively with stress by using some relaxation devices and getting enough sleep, exercises and proper nutrition. HRM practices such as job designing, training and development programs, design, compensation and incentives, performance parameters, employee retention, employee productivity, product quality, speed of delivery and operating cost have influence on the operational and financial performance of the organization. Focusing on the knowledge and skills of the employees seems to be critical; then specific retention plans are to be established to retain the knowledge and skills. It is the duty of the HR executives to analyze the risks and to determine the critical areas in the organization. “Changing workplace demands now challenge human resource developers to extend the scope of their practice from predominantly one of training individuals, to one of facilitating learning of individuals, teams, and organizations.” 17 An employee reward system consists of an organization’s integrated policy, processes and practices for rewarding its employees in accordance with their contribution, skill and competence and their market worth. It is developed within the framework of the organization’s reward philosophy, strategies and policies and contains arrangements in the form of processes, practices, structures and procedures which will provide and maintain appropriate types and levels of pay, benefits and other form of reward. “Organizations that are committed to the ongoing growth of their employees, recognize empowerment as one of their most important strategic methods to motivate employees.” 18 Thus employee retention saves both time and money which enhances efficiency of the organization and best quality applied by the employees strengthen the overall business structure of the organization. Securing better employee retention should be an organization’s major objective. For keeping the employee retention rates, employee assessments, hiring solutions and employee search, HR department is the key ingredient which is typically in charge of these components. In the context of relationship marketing, employees’ satisfaction is often viewed as a central determinant of employee retention. “Employee Retention involves a lot of energy, efforts & resources but the results are ‘WORTH IT’.” 19 Conclusion: Strategic staffing of human resources entails moving them into positions that best utilize their specific skills and abilities. Employees may have their own expectations and perceptions about the role of the human resource department. HR executives should express concerns and take up activities that integrate rather than alienate employees into organizational purposes and they should be geared to make employees to feel that the management genuinely cares for them. HR strategies should be formulated in which they cares the individuals as well as by giving support to develop the achievements of the organisations objectives thus the every process involved as got a two way process which indicates a interrelated concepts. Bibliography CHALMERS, P J. 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