The scope of this piece of work is an assessment of the view that employee resourcing activity is contingent upon particular organisational circumstances and organisational context
The scope of this piece of work is an assessment of the view that employee resourcing activity is contingent upon particular organisational circumstances and organisational context. In assessing this view the write up is going to look at the employee resourcing activity basing on the two approaches that is the best fit and best practice. Employee resourcing process is a part of human resource Management which addresses one of the core ares of human resource practice, recruitment and selection. The major role of human resource management is acquiring employee services, developing their skills motivating them to the high levels of performance and to ensure that they will continue to maintain their commitment to organisational objectives. Therefore employee resourcing activity depends upon the organisational circumstances and organisational context such as the structure, resources, functions, behavior, culture and management of a changing environment.
According to (Pfeffer, 1994) resourcing is a process which helps management to establish and then change behavior of employees and increase their competencies too. Resourcing strategies are basically two that is recruitment and selection. As stated by (Taylor, 1998) organisational context provides a comprehensive introduction to the external and internal aspects of the organisation. It examines structures, resources and functions as well as behavior and culture, and finishes by addressing the issues involved in the management of a changing environment.
Human resource strategies such as employee resourcing should be strictly in line with the core business especially in this rapidly changing environment. According to (Armstrong, 2008) the best-fit approach emphasizes that HR strategies should be contingent on the context, circumstances of the organization and its type. ‘Best fit’ can be perceived in terms of vertical integration or alignment between the organization’s business and HR strategies. In this rapidly changing environment were there is a robust competitive environment, a successful organisation comprise of a well formulated strategy and better management of human resources, this can be achieved through the implementation of human resource strategies as employee resourcing. Through recruitment and selection of the right people who will directly fit into the organisation the organisation is capable of gaining a competitive advantage since human resources can not be easily imitated. Therefore it is most appropriate to operate flexibly within the basis of the best fit approach other than one best way of doing business.
Organisational context comprises of culture as one of the issues that employee resourcing activity depends upon. The key to using culture so as to improve performance lies in matching culture or attributes to organisational goals, when the culture of an organisation does not fit needs of the organisation. Armstrong (2002) notes that it goes beyond obtaining and keeping the number and quality of the required personnel, but also deals with selecting and promoting people who ‘fit’ the culture and the strategic needs of the organization. Employee resourcing activity take care of the situation through human resource planning so that the right number of people who will fit the organisation. For example organisations differ and are rather differentiated by culture such as flexibility discretion dynamism for instance vehicle manufacturing companies and external oriented differential rivalry are muchly concerned with competitors. As stipulated by (Purcell, 1999) if managers recruit people ‘in their own image’ there is the risk of staffing the organization with conformist clones and of perpetuating a dysfunctional culture, one that may have been successful in the past but is no longer appropriate in the face of new challenges. Thus for the various organisations there is no one best way for resourcing, this depends on organisational circumstances and context.
One of the key resourcing strategies is recruitment which requires adequate planing in terms of resources and recruitment polices through the process of human resource planning. Recruitment as stated by Armstrong and Baron (2002) as the process by which an applicant is attracted towards the company and where the organisation sells it self an an attractive workplace. For instance an organisation like Zim Plats mine may need to attract even the employees from their competitors such as Mimosa mine in the circumstance that it needs competitive advantage, this must be planned, if there is financially capabilities salaries can be slightly raised than those of the competitor. (Lles, 2003) defines employee resourcing as the systematic process of realizing the need to plan for people, acquiring them through recruitment and selection, retaining through membership motivation and putting them to the most effective use through employee motivation to higher productivity in order to help the organization achieve its goals. Therefore basing on this point of view there can not be one best way for recruitment this is determined by the organisational circumstances and context.
After the recruitment process then follows the selection which is another feature of employee resourcing activity, this can be referred to as the quarantining stage. According to Lawler (2003) selection is the process of assessing the candidates by various means and making a choice followed by an offer of employment. For example if a company plans to diversify or is going to change its strategy a careful analysis should be made of the types of people who will be needed to staff the new business and also to check on the availability of such person. More so proper decisions have got to be made on the selection methods which must be job related such as tests, validation of selection procedures and assessment centers. The selection of workers best suited to meeting the needs of the organization ought to form a core activity upon which most other HRM policies geared towards development and motivation should be built (Armstrong, 2010). Henceforth the selection process is determined by the context, circumstances and type of organisation, thus approaching it from the best fit perspective might be well appropriate.
The companies also need to motivate good employees to remain and work with the organization through recognition and reward. Faced with this rapid change organisations need to develop a focused and coherent approach to managing people. Retention of the most valuable assets, human resources is crucial this can be done in various means depending on the organisation’s capabilities such as better opportunities and rewards better than others, developing a positive psychological contract which increase commitment and mutual trust. According to Armstrong and Brown (2007) when employment rates are high companies are desperate to attract, retain and motivate key people. They further mention that “even in tough economic times there are always industries and occupations in which employers feel they need to bend backwards to retain their human capital”. Recognising the vast investment organisations would have poured on some employees through training and development, they can not afford to lose them they strive to protect them in which ever manner they can. Thus as explained by Noe et al (2006) job satisfaction and retention are related to organizational performance. Therefore as an aspect of employee resourcing, retention can be achieved through various means depending with the organisational context, circumstances and types, hence the matching model applies better than best practice approach.
Training and development is another essential aspect of employee resourcing activity which is dependent on circumstances and context. Recognising the organisation’s failure to be competitive enough the organisation might realise their weak spot in lacking appropriate knowledge, skills, expertise and thereby decide on embarking in training and development. To successfully face the increasing uncertainty and competitiveness what is required is performing employees to build performing organizations (Pattanayak, 2008). Investments in intangible goods such as human capabilities were employees work from their heads, an organisation is most likely to gain competitive edge since employees are unique and be easily replaced. The objective of resourcing strategies is to obtain the right basic material in the form of workforce endowed with the appropriate qualities, skills, knowledge and potential for future training (Armstrong, 2010). Through training and development the organisation can now put confidence in their employees. Thus agreeing to the assertion that employee activity is contingent upon particular organisational circumstances and context since we have task based and knowledge based employees.
Employee resourcing activity also stretches to the extent of having joint ventures and alliances as a way of boosting organisation’s performance. For example employee resourcing in particular scenarios and sectors has tended to make use of mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures and alliances, in both international organisations and in different sectors, such as Total and Puma service stations, TM and Pick’n’Pay supermarkets which were now crumbling have formed powerful merges and acquisitions to become competitive. This has improved the reputation and working standards for employees, they now fill motivated even seeing a bright future for their organisations in which they had left with no hope for their survival. Therefore in this case employee resourcing depends specifically on the context, circumstances for their survival.
In conclusion, this piece of work has made an attempt in assessing the view that employee resourcing activity is contingent upon particular organisational circumstances and organisational context. The piece of work is much in agreement with the view since in most cases there is no one best way of dealing with problems it only depends with the circumstances and context of each organisation in other words what worked in another organisation might not work in another maybe because of the resources, structure, functions, culture and management of changing environment.
Faculty of social sciences
PART 4.1
NAMES :Charles Chigova
REG No” :M140202
PROGRAMME :Human Resources Management
COURSE :Employee Resourcing
COURSE CODE :HHRM 402
LECTURER :Mr Mupani
STUDY MODE :Conventional
QUESTION :Assess the view that employee resourcing activity is contingent upon particular organisational circumstances and organisational context?.
MARK……………………………………………………….
COMMENT…………………………………………………..
REFERENCES
Armstrong, M. (2010).Strategic Human Resource Management.(1st Ed.). London: Kogan Page Limited.
Armstrong, M and Brown, D.(2007) Strategic Reward, Kogan Page, London
Armstrong,M and Baron,A(2002).Strategic HRM:The route to improved business performance, CIPD, London
Lawler, E.E.(2003).Treat People Right! How organizations and individuals can propel each other into a virtuous spiral of success, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco
Lles,P. (2008).Employee Resourcing. Edinburg Business School. Heroit-Watt University
Noe, R.A., (2008).Training and Development, (4th Ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill.
Pattananayak,H.(2008).Human Resource Management.(3rd Ed.).New Dehli: Prentice –Hall.
Purcell, J.(1999).Best practice or best fit: chimera or cul-de-sac?, Human Resource Management Journal, 9 (3), pp 26–41.
Pfeffer, J.(1994).Competitive advantage through People.Boston:Harvard Business School Press.
Taylor,S.(1998).Employee Resourcing, Institute of Personnel and Development, London
