Human Resource Management: A Managerial Perspective

Citation

Woodhams, C. (2001), "Human Resource Management: A Managerial Perspective", Employee Relations, Vol. 23 No. 3, pp. 290-302. https://doi.org/10.1108/er.2001.23.3.290.2

The interest in HRM is increasing among managers within other disciplines. Increased devolvement of HR activities to managers has arisen from the understanding that HR practice is one of the few variables that can bring about real competitive advantage in organisations. More managers from a wider base of specialisms have become involved with personnel or HR‐related activities. At the same time, these non‐HR specialists are dealing with an ever‐widening range of these issues. Many activities might be associated with operational HR; conducting appraisals and counselling for improved performance. Others may be more strategic encompassing programmes of change that are driving initiatives such as quality or a customer focus. In such circumstances the non‐HRM specialist will face issues involved in the encouragement of flexibility, commitment or culture change. Underpinning all activities is a consistent concern with maximum utilisation of the HR.

That is not to say that all line managers are converts to the potentials of HRM. There is still a great deal of scepticism and a lack of understanding around people management issues, and a need for education and training of those that are becoming more involved. This need is then reflected in the provision of education for managers in HR‐related theory and processes. The profile of the HRM module within generalist post‐experience and postgraduate courses has been raised.

Human Resource Management: A Managerial Perspective, by Nelarine Cornelius, is one of the few HRM texts to directly concern itself with information that is key to line managers with a need for, or an interest in, HRM tuition. It is an edited text that encompasses a broad theoretical perspective of HRM in a changing context covering the usual range of resourcing, development and relations issues. It also contains five chapters of a more specific nature, on the international context of HRM, the relevance of information technology, a more detailed look at HRM issues within SMEs, an appraisal of issues of change and a chapter on negotiation skills. Finally, it helpfully includes a very useful glossary of terms in an area that is often full of mystifying jargon. It does not, and nor would it claim, to offer a great deal of theoretical depth.

Chapter 1 looks at one of the most traditionally devolved of all HRM activities, the process of recruitment and selection. The business importance of employee diversity to competitively functioning organisations is stressed and the difference between equal opportunities and diversity is explored. It then presents a traditional systematic approach to recruitment in a way that is more associated with equality over diversity, not having the space no doubt to expound a true diversity approach. All aspects of the recruitment processes are analysed for their implications for organisational equality. There is, as one might perhaps expect, an emphasis on the promotion of diversity, rather than a critique.

Chapter 2 also has a perspective to promote, this time arguing the strategic importance of training and the need to foster development activities for competitive advantage, again stressing the “change” context. It takes an altogether different approach, being much less instructive and detailed. It is much more difficult, for example, to pick out the components of the training cycle in the absence of the useful diagrammatic approach of the previous chapter. Nevertheless, it succinctly covers a broad discipline and contains a number of useful mini‐case studies at the end of the chapter.

Chapter 3 offers an introduction to the importance of participation and involvement to HRM followed by five pages of theoretical analysis of different forms of workplace participation. It could be suggested that this section of philosophical analysis will be of less interest to the practitioner audience than the condensed history of employee involvement techniques and the detailed description of those techniques, which follows. Towards the end, the chapter offers two interesting and contrasting cases for analysis.

Chapters 4 and 5 are linked and establish a very much more instructive approach. They provide an overview of performance management procedures; first, at a strategic level, and then with a view to the operational aspects. The first of these chapters looks at the importance and history of performance management in HRM and fits the topic into an organisational context. The chapter looks in some detail at the setting of key result areas and key performance indicators, giving helpful examples of their use in action. It also reviews a number of payment systems, highlighting the advantages and disadvantages of each. Within these chapters the use of the “aside” box is very evident, and all for the better. As an example, motivation theory, the theoretical foundation to reward management, is offered to the reader, but is self‐contained and can be read or ignored without detracting from the main text. These chapters in particular have very obviously been written with an angle on those aspects of performance handling that the line manager will most need or want to know. I suspect that after a few years of owning this book, Chapter 5 will probably contain the most thumb marks. At the same time, the chapter lacks any significant analysis of absence and the section on capability fails to make any reference to the possible legal connections between capability and the Disability Discrimination Act.

The meat of the instruction out of the way, the book then turns to three special areas that might be considered of particular relevance to line managers, depending on whether they work in a small business, an international business or one that is having its processes revolutionised by IT. Of particular interest is the chapter dealing with the impact of IT, even though (or perhaps because) the discussion contained in the chapter is less about the change to HR processes (which seem to be limited) and more about the wider changes to organisations that will impact on the HR. The arguments in Chapter 8 pertaining to the need to resource and retain staff with a focus on quality in the small business would appeal to most owner/ managers.

Chapter 9 addresses some of the problems with the poor image and credibility of HRM among line managers, by looking more widely at the contribution the HR processes can make to organisational strategy. This chapter is less of a debate of HRM strategy itself, but more of an overview of organisational strategy, change and development and the way that HR can partner and facilitate change. As such it avoids too much theoretical debate from the HR field, limiting itself instead to the discussion of issues that might best engage the line manager audience illustrated by mainstream management theory. This chapter provides a useful and convincing summary to the book.

Having said that, it is followed, almost as an afterthought, by a short chapter on negotiation in the workplace added, somewhat unconvincingly, as “an integral part of the HRM practice of any line manager” (p. 22). It is a guide to best practice in the field. In reality, the contrasting style and different size of this chapter makes it incompatible even within this heterogeneous collection.

Overall, the strengths of this book lie in its content and its coverage of a wide range of HR issues. It presents, in the main, a clear and accessible introduction to those HR issues that are relevant to the non‐HR specialist. In particular it addresses those issues that maximise the potential use of the HR, so, for example, it devotes more space to matters of managing performance and conduct than might be given within a general textbook. One of its particular strengths is the employment law brief at the end of each relevant chapter. These are in an accessible format, easily read with enough detail to satisfy the needs of the more general enquiry. As managers are often primarily concerned with the more tangible aspects of HR practice, and see a need to get right in the minimum, those aspects of employment practice that might have an external impact, i.e. employment law, the book helpfully includes a full legal briefing on the implications of each area at the end of each relevant chapter. With regard to book content, however, it is perhaps surprising that there is only sparse coverage of issues of employee flexibility. The objective of employee flexibility in both attitude and contract surely has to be one of the most important of the current line/HR partnership roles, and yet it is almost completely bypassed without appropriate discussion. The push for employee flexibility has implications within the equality context, the employment relations arena and for training and development processes. It is unusual that one of the areas where there is a real opportunity for HR to expand its credibility in terms of its specialist knowledge working in partnership with the line is so neglected within this text.

Further criticism could be levelled at the structure and style of the book. The internal structure of the chapters shows little consistency. At a superficial level, it is obvious that each author has been given a set of headings to include, such as an introduction, conclusion, summary and set of questions; however, the use of these categories is diverse (compare, by way of a complete contrast, the conclusion and summary sections of the first two chapters). The authors also use, to a varied extent, shaded boxes that offer mini‐case studies, organisational examples, theory or additional explanation. These are helpful, interesting and yet can also be rejected without losing the direction of the main text. It is a shame that they are not used more uniformly throughout all chapters.

More diversity can be found by appraising the style of each chapter. The objective of the book seems to be to offer the line manager a degree of clear instruction combined with a level of theoretical input and debate. The extent to which the chapters mix the two approaches is by no means uniform. The chapters on recruitment and selection, and negotiation, for example, contain quite comprehensive checklists of HR best practice. By way of contrast, the chapter on training and development is preoccupied with the strategic perspective of training and development processes.

The contrasting styles of chapter are of consequence in the consideration of the target market. On the one hand, if it is the MBA‐level reader that is sought, I suspect that the book will disappoint the HR tutor. It does not offer the same quality of perspectives and argument contained in some of the well‐used edited textbooks of the last 20 years. The depth of theory discussed does little to do justice to an area that is rich with theoretical debate. On the other hand, if it is meant as a more instructive (recipe) text, then the reader is certainly left with unanswered questions. The line manager who takes away this book from an HR module and opens it later hoping to find gems that will actually help in his day‐to‐day work, will certainly find some sections more informative than others.