Essay On Human Resource Management & Practice

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Introduction

Organizations call for the specialization of the roles conducted by the management in order for them to attain their goals both in the short term and otherwise. The specialization in the orientation of the management is dependent on the degree of how well suited a person is for a given job. Specialization is a means to the attainment of the goals of the company at the same time. Simultaneous attainment of the goals of the organization is an instrumental aspect in the determination of the competitiveness of the company and the ultimate survival. The main asset that most of the organizations have is the human resource. Effective management of this resource is one of the ways that organizations can use in the streamlining of the activities going on to the company agenda. This paper gives a difference between the human resource management and personnel management as specializations in the management of British Airways. This United Kingdom based airline has operations in Europe and outside the continent.

1.1 Explain the difference between personnel and human resource management and discuss the HRM function based on its contribution to organizational purpose.

Human resource management entails the control and coordination of all the decisions that involve the people or directly affect the human resource. Therefore, this management specialization deals with the people centric issues in the management. Personnel management also lays most of its focus on the people aspect of an organization (Torrington et al. 2005). However, many differences come out after a close look into the roles of both human resource management and personnel management. One of the areas where the two differ is in the nature of the relations that are involved. In personnel management, the relations are individualist since it looks at the interests of the people issues using approaches that are unique to the person that is in question. However, human resource management adopts a unitarist approach when dealing with the people aspect of the organization. The other area of difference in the human resource management and personnel management is the areas of emphasis. Personnel management focuses on the transactional leadership approaches. The leader is a mere task oriented individual in the management structure and the evaluation of the suitability of the employee is dependent on the outcome of the tasks given. The approach adopted by human resource management is different from the one adopted by personnel management in that the focal point of the leadership is the transformation aspect. This allows for the sharing of management goals between the staff and the management.

1.2 Analyze the role and responsibilities of a line manager in your chosen organization.

British Airways has been on a restructuring mission that aims at reducing the bureaucracy in the management. The management approach also calls for the clear definition of the roles and duties of the managers and other staff members. The company came up with a human resource management approach that included the use of line managers. The line managers are managers that operate in the lower cadre of management and sometimes in the middle management. The position of the managers in the organizational chart is an indication that the company uses the managers in working at specialized lines of the company. The main lines that the company operates are cargo freight and the air travel. In the lines, other lines are used as means of supporting the operations of the company (Sims 2007). The differentiation of the management approaches is important for the company in the attainment of the smooth operation threshold that the airline business demands. The duties of the line managers in British Airways are similar irrespective of the line. the roles of line managers include monitoring of the day to day activates of the people such as the reporting time, managing the costs of operation in the line, checking on quality of the service, rating the performance based on the targets and past achievements and availing technical expertise that the line demands.

1.3 Examine the organizational factors that affect the HRM functions in your organization, outlining the impacts of legal and regulatory framework of the country.

The nature of the human resource management approach that an organization adopts is dependent on the organization. The approach that the human resource management of a production company is not identical to the operations of the human resource management functions in a service industry. British airways are a service-oriented company. This has a bearing on the human resource since the assessment of service quality is a result of the consistency in the delivery. This makes the staffing function of the human resource management to be different from other staffing approaches that are used by production firms or any other firm that is not in the air travel business. The ownership structure of the company also has a bearing on the human resource. The company is owned by investors that come from countries outside the United Kingdom. The need of balancing the employees is also a matter that is put in consideration when the organization is staffing (Sharma 2009). This is a move that it uses on order to appease all the owners. The location of the headquarters of the company in Britain is also an influence on the human resource management. The government of the United Kingdom and the well-developed labor system place constraints on the minimum wage, hiring and dismissal policies and other policies that are core in the human resource management.

2.1 Discuss how important is the role of human resource planning in your organization outlining the stages of the planning process.

Human resource planning is an enabling factor in the forecasting of the labor at the disposal of the company in ways that will be instrumental in the attainment of the goals of the organization. This planned move has to be followed systematically by the managers. The orientation of the human resource planning and development is organized that allows it to be congruent with the organizational goals. In the case of the British Airways, it was usually accused of being a bureaucratic company owing to its large size (Kumar 2011). The management of the company adopted a series of steps that aimed at reducing the rigidity of the company and its operations. The changes that it adopted focused on both the human resource sector and the organization as a whole. The steps that the management followed in the implementation of human resource management plan entailed the finding out the needs of the employs in both the end and short run. The approach that the company adopted included the adoption of the company level and departmental level of change. It chose a change approach, which is Kurt Lewis three-step model. The model included freezing and refreezing of some of the activities that it used in the previous times.

2.2 Analyze the recruitment and selection process in your organization comparatively with another organization and evaluate their

effectiveness.
The company has different approaches that it uses in coming up with a determination on the person that has the best qualifications for a given job in the company. The main goal that the process aims at is the selection of the best viable candidates and selecting the most qualified from the already pooled candidates. The processes of selecting and recruiting employees are enshrined on the attainment of the standards of fairness and objectivity. The processes also look at the applicants in a wholesome manner to determine the suitability of the applicants in other roles that accompany the one that they are using (Kleynhans 2006). The selection process of the company involves biding for the qualified graduates of various institutions. This approach is also a determinant of the lowest bar that qualifies a candidate as a viable applicant. The applicants are selected based on their performance in the interviews and the grades attained in the institutions. The applicants that pass the test are recruited but placed under a period of probation. In the case of Kenya Airways, the applicants are trained a fresh and retained for some time. The differences in the recruitment processes of both organizations are dependent on the environment. However, the approach used by British Airways is better than the one used by Kenya Airways since the chances of obtaining the best employees for the roles are high.

3.1 Using examples assess the link between motivational theory and reward within the context of your chosen organization

Most of the business organizations use the rewards as a source of motivation. This is agreement with the motivation theory that states that the people have the impetus to work at a task in a different and keener manner in the event that there is an incentive of some sort (Armstrong 2011). This is the case in the British airways since the company has turned its policies to work in agreement with the motivation theory. The policies seek to reward performance in different ways. This is evident in the performance appraisal policy that the company applies in the determination of the people who deserve some rewards of some sort at the end of the operating cycle. The company applies the use of different incentives as means of ensuring that the company attains the goals of increased productivity and customer’s satisfaction. The incentives that the company uses works by stimulating greater productivity and earnestly to attain the performance targets that they have in the end and short run. The company provides the best performing employees with trips overseas, better remuneration, and titles. The best performing department also has a chance of being feted in the ceremonies. This increases competition on quality among the departments due to the motivation.

3.2 Analyze and determine how your organization determines pay using the process of job evaluation and assess the effectiveness of the reward system in the chosen organization.

The company applies a payment system that advocates for equal payment for equal amount of work done. The other aspects that come out in the jobs payment system is that the people that conduct work that is more important receive more pay than the ones conducting jobs that are of comparatively low significance. The principles as applied in the company imply that the company pays for the jobs that the people undertake. British Airways applies the use of a job structure for the different forms of job groups in the company. The consideration that the company applies in the determination of the pay rates is the content of the job and the academic requirements as well as the experience that it demands (Martin 2009). For instance, pilots are paid a comparatively high income than the people in lower management because of the technical nature of their jobs. The classification of groups of jobs according to their importance and the nature is a major determinant on the pay rate systems that it will get. The structure as also serves as a means of rewarding the performance of the employees since the ones that perform better than the others have an increased chance of moving to the next level of the hierarchy that has a different mode of compensation.

3.3 Discuss how employee performance is measures and evaluate the methods used to monitor performance in the chosen organization.

The performance of the employees follows the determination of the number of units that the employees have been able to handle. This is the case in the sales job for the company tickets and the maintenance of the company equipment. The other mode that the company applies in measuring the performance is the timeliness; this is attained by monitoring the affinity and frequency of the employees in meeting the time limits that the company has set. The monitoring of timeliness as a means of measuring performance may have exception in the event that the causes of the delays are non-avoidable (Jackson et al. 2011). The other approach that the company uses is the adherence of the employees to the set standards. The standards are mainly the ones that are stipulated in the company policy. The performance is also measured by use of the absenteeism. This is because an employee does not perform in the event that he or she is always out of the company premises. In the event that a particular employee has a tendency of being tardy, the company fires the employee or applies any other punitive measures. The company uses automatic checking systems in detecting the lateness and absenteeism rates in the employees.

4.1Examine cause of termination of employment with an organization and discuss the exit procedures used by two organizations

British Airways use a termination process in the cessation of services rendered by the employees. The process involves a notification of the employees on the reasons that are behind the cessation. This notification comes in a formal way by organizing a meeting with the employee the immediate supervisor and other members of the company (Analoui 2007). The meeting that leads to the termination of the services of the employee comes after a series of warnings to the employee. When an employee is summoned to the meeting, he or she has the chance of a fair hearing. The reasons that underlie his or her contravention of the standards set by the company are the heard and the judgment of the viability of the reasons is arrived at by the members of the meeting. In the event that the reasons for the contraventions are not convincing enough to vindicate the employee, the employee may be suspended and then terminated or he or she may receive a letter of termination of services. The reasons that may lead to the cessation of employee services include incompetency and lack of acknowledgement of the company policies. In the case of Kenya Airways, the termination process is the same.

4.2 Assess the impact of legal and regulatory framework when arranging employment cessation or termination.

Termination of the employees constitutes one of the most difficult decisions that the employers have to make. The management has to make a consideration of the effect of their bid to terminate the employees in the end. There are issues that relate to the reputation of the company and the possibility of the company being sued for wrong dismissal of the employee (s) in question. The grounds of the termination are not sufficient in the determination of the legality of the termination. The mode that the company uses in the termination is also important in the determination of the legality. One of the main causes of suits on wrongful dismissal is the according the employee a fair hearing (Amos 2008). The employee in question ought to have a chance of defending himself against any of the accusations leveled against him or her. The employee should also have a clear understanding of the basis on which the termination of the services is founded. These bases must be clearly seen in the contract that the employee singed at the hiring time. The counterchecking of the details is a crucial aspect of the termination process since the employee cannot claim that the cessation is not the one on the contract.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the human resource management is an important part of British Airways. This is because the effective management of the human resource is the main determinant of the success of the company. The company applies the use of different approaches that are meant to attain the most returns out of the human resource. This includes the use of line managers to look into a specialized sector of the organization. The other approach is by applying reward as a means of attaining the rewards that the company envisions in the policies. The company also uses strategic human resource management as a way of attaining the goals that are in both the short term and long term.

References

Amos, T. 2008. Human resource management. Wetton, Juta, Cape Town.
Analoui, F. 2007. Strategic human resource management, Thomson, London.
Armstrong, M. 2011. Armstrong's handbook of strategic human resource management, Kogan Page, London.
Jackson, S., Schuler, R. and Werner, S. 2011. Managing human resources, South- Western, Mason, Ohio.
Kleynhans, R. 2006. Human resource management, Pearson/Prentice Hall, Cape Town, South Africa.
Kumar, R. 2011. Human resource management, I.K. International, New Delhi.
Martin, J. 2009. Human resource management, SAGE, Los Angeles.
Sharma, S. 2009. Human resource management, Global India Publishers, New Delhi.
Sims, R. 2007. Human resource management, Information Age Pub., Charlotte, N.C..
Torrington, D., Hall, L. & Taylor, S. 2005. Human resource management, FT Prentice Hall, Harlow, England.