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ASSIGNMENT

(BBA302 HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT)


Quest1:- Define the concept of HRM? Explain the features and objectives of HRM?
Ans:
concept of HRM:Human Resource Management (HRM) is a process of bringing people and organisations together so
that the goals of each are met. It is the art of procuring, developing, and maintaining competent
workforce to achieve the goals of the organisation.
According to National Institute of Personnel Management, Human Resource Management is that part
of management which is concerned with people at work and with their relationship within the
organisation. It seeks to bring men and women who make up an enterprise enabling each to make his or
her best contribution to its success both as an individual and as a member of the working groups.
According to Byars and Rue Human Resource Management encompasses those activities designed to
provide for and coordinate the human resources of an organisation. Ivancevich and Glueck opine that
Human resource management is the function performed in organisations that facilitates the most
effective use of people (employees) to achieve organisational and individual goals.

Features and objectives of HRM


From the definitions of human resource management, certain features of
HRM are:
a) It is action oriented: It helps the employees by emphasising the
solution of the problem to attain organisational goal and to increase
employee satisfaction.
b) It is individual oriented: It offers services and programmes to meet
every needs of the employee.
c) It is future oriented: It motivates the employees to achieve future
goals.
d) It is people oriented: HRM is concerned with employees as an
individual or a part of a group. It can be behavioural, social, or
emotional aspect. Every level and category of employees is important
for management of human resources.
e) It is a comprehensive function: HRM is concerned with
development of people to obtain job satisfaction. In other words, it is
concerned with human resource development, knowledge and
capacity building, skill and potential development for attaining
employees goal. It is a method of developing potential that aids better
results.
f) It is a continuous function: Since organization witnesses number of
changes in its environment, continuous development of human
resource never stops.
g) It is an auxiliary service: The major purpose of the HR department is to assist the other departments
in terms of all concerns related to the employees. It means it is a staff function. h) It is a pervasive
force: HRM is present in all the levels of an organisation. i) It is development oriented: HRM helps in

developing the full potential of the employees through training, job rotation, etc. j) It is an integrating
function: It helps in maintaining cordial relationship between people at each level of the organisation.
k) It is an inter-disciplinary function: HRM is multidisciplinary. It utilises the (concepts) and
knowledge derived from subjects like psychology, economics, anthropology, accounting, sociology, etc.

Objectives of Human Resource Management


Today, the relationships in the organisations are democratic rather than autocratic. Many organisations
have more enlightened and better educated employees. So the objectives of HRM are also expanding.
The main objectives of HRM are:
a) To help the organisation reach its goal.
b) To make use of skills and abilities of the workforce effectively.
c ) To train and motivate employees of the organisation.
d) To maintain and increase job satisfaction of employees.
e) To help employees realise their full potentials and reach selfactualisation.
f) To ensure that quality of work life is maintained.
g) To maintain ethical policies and behaviour.
h) To communicate HR policies to the employees. Thus we can say that there are various objectives of
HRM. Each objective of it has to be met to ensure that employees are motivated and satisfied.
Ques 2-Explain the objectives and importance of HRP? Describe in detail the steps involved in
selection process?
Ans:Objectives of Human Resource Planning The important objectives of human resource planning are:
i)
To recruit and retain the human resources of required quantity and quality.
ii)
To forecast the employee turnover and take necessary steps to minimise turnover and ensuring
that such vacancies are filled.
iii)
To meet the needs of organisational diversification.
iv)
To forecast technological advancements and its effect on employee and job employee
requirements.
v)
To improve the skills, abilities benchmarks, standards, etc.
vi)
To assess surplus or shortage of human resource
vii)

To minimize imbalance due to non-availability of human resource of the right kind.

Importance of Human Resource Planning


HRP is emerging as a critical area of HRM because of the significance of its contribution to the
survival and welfare of any and every organization. Following are the points that highlight its
importance:
a) It makes a careful and accurate assessment of future human resource needs: BSNL had selected a
large number of line-men that went around repairing faults in land line in the mid-90s. Because of
advent of mobile phones, the number of land lines has gone down and people are not critically
dependent on the existing ones. As a result, BSNL is now under loss. The selected employees draw
high pay, have no job and hence are of no use to the organisation. Had the authorities of BSNL done a
careful HR planning looking into the technological changes, they would not be going through the

current crisis.
b) It is a part of strategic planning: Business today is strategic. Carefully designed strategies are
essential for the survival and wellbeing of organisations. Human resource planning is central to
strategic planning because the accomplishment of the mission, vision and goals of the organization
highly depends on the quality of its human resource. When the strategies are made, input from human
resource planning helps it by taking into account the quality and kind of man-power needed. On the
other hand, once the strategy has been made, executives need to make resource allocation decisions.
HR managers are, consequently, essential facilitators of the strategic planning process.
c) Creating highly talented personnel: Nature of jobs has changed dramatically in the last 30 years.
Today we require highly qualified, versatile professionals to do day to day work. There was a time
when an organisation would be having hundred unskilled workers for every five qualified engineers
and managers. Today IT organisations like Infosys and TCS have absolutely no unskilled staff. All their
employees are highly qualified and skilled personnel. Such skilled people keep on changing jobs
rapidly. Thus organisations face shortage of man power on regular basis. Human resource planning
helps in preventing such
shortages by developing appropriate retention strategies. Further, there is a constant need to train and
retrain such workers in order to make them competent as per the market requirement. Human resource
planning helps in identifying training needs and creating highly talented personnel.
d) Succession planning: Human resource planning is essential to facilitate succession planning.
Retirement of a chief executive is full of uncertainties. Many organisations died once their successful
Chief Executive Officer retired. Through planning we can identify suitable candidates much before any
eminent executive retires so that the candidates can be provided with the required knowledge, skill,
ability and exposure. This ensures that the organisation keeps on moving in its well defined course
despite any retirements/exits.
e) Foundation for personnel functions: All the functions of human resource such as recruitment,
selection, transfer, promotion, training and development evolve from human resource planning. It is the
information provided by the human resource planning that should be the base for designing and
implementing such functions.
f) Increasing cost of human resource: Few decades back, the capital cost of any organisation (land,
building, machinery) was a major component of the total cost with manpower cost being minimal.
Today, capital costs have reduced but the cost of human resource has gone very high. An organisation
invests heavily in providing training and development to its employees. It therefore, is essential that
these employees are used effectively throughout their career.
g) International strategies: Globalisation and liberalisation has resulted in growing trends towards
global operations. This has enhanced the need for, as well as the need to blend human resource
planning more closely with organisations strategic plans. The increasing staffing needs from foreign
countries, employees speaking different languages and with different cultural norms have resulted in
complexities that make human resource planning even more important.
h) Emergence of challenging personnel: Personnel today have new definitions of self-evaluation,
loyalty and dedication. This has resulted in greater difficulty for the organisations to move its
employees around
anywhere and anytime it wants. This also makes human resource planning important which should
come up with handy strategies to tackle the challenging personnel.
i) Uncertainties and changes: Human resource planning overcomes uncertainties and changes to
maximum extent and facilitates organisations to have right men at right time and in right place.
j) Redundant employees: Because of changing needs for knowledge and skill, employees are getting
redundant at a fast pace. Throwing them out of job is inhuman as well as illegal. Human resource
planning helps in identifying such redundancies and also in providing alternative employment.

Quest3-Discuss the characteristics of an effective incentive system? Discuss any two types of
incentive schemes/plan?
The characteristics of an effective incentive system are stated below:
1:Approval of Management, Workers and Trade Union: All the interested parties must accept, support
and co-operate in the incentive plan. In the absence of employee support, the programme of incentive
can not be implemented smoothly. The plan should be formulated through discussion and participation
between management and workers. Workers should get full explanations about the programme and they
should be trained by the management to ensure smooth working of the plan.
2: Organisation and Methods Analysis: Before a work standard is established, a standardised procedure
or method should be evolved on the basis of organisation and methods analysis of each operation and
activity. Employees must be taught how to perform the work according to the standard methods and
procedure and how they can earn more incentives by performing more than the standards.
3 Work Standard: The norm or standard upon which incentive is based should be fixed through careful
work measurement devices e.g., time and motion studies, work sampling etc.
4 Guaranteed Base Wage: To provide security of income, the wage or salary levels should be fixed so
that the worker is sure about his regular earnings. Only then does the worker get motivated to work
more for extra earnings in the form of incentives.
5 No Unwarranted Rate Cutting: The work standard or quota should be guaranteed by the management
against unjustified and unwarranted or groundless rate cutting. The practice of rate cutting by the
employers at their will during the early days of scientific management killed the very purpose of
incentive plans, i.e, higher productivity and lower unit cost of
labour. A change in the work standard is justifiable only when there is a change in the method, tooling,
equipment or design of the product.
6 Easy Calculation of Earnings: An incentive plan should facilitate ready and easy calculation of the
employees earnings. This builds up the confidence and trust of the workers in the programme.
Management should try to simplify the calculations as for as possible and communicate the same to
workers so that they too calculate their earnings and can rely on their remuneration systems.
7 Grievance Procedure: An incentive plan of payment should have effective grievance procedure to
deal with complaints and dissatisfaction experienced by employees. The work standard or the incentive
rate that are too difficult to be met can be adjusted through grievance procedure.
The chances of full success of a new incentive system are very poor unless mutual confidence and good
relationship exist between management and workforce in an organization. Thus, attempts should be
made to build up harmonious relationships between the workers and management and to have open
communication between the two.
Types of Incentive Schemes There are a number of different types of incentive plans. Some of the
important ones are:
i)
ii)

Halsey Premium Plan


Gantt Task Plan

Halsey Premium Plan: This is a bonus plan which is ordinarily used when accurate performance
standards have not been established, where the employee is rewarded based on the time saved. The
employee is assured of a minimum wage. A standard output within a standard time is fixed on the basis
of previous experience. This plan is based on time rate basis. The bonus is based on the amount of the
time saved by the worker. The minimum premium is 33.33 per cent of the time saved. Under this plan it
is optional for a worker to work on the premium plan or not.

Example: Suppose the standard time is 8 hours, the number of units to be completed is 16 and the
hourly rate is Rs 40. Mr. Akash completed producing the 16 units in 6 hours. Then, the working of the
scheme will be as follows: Standard time to complete the work 8 hours Standard number of units to be
completed 16 Standard rate of wages per hour Rs. 40 Standard wage for eight hours 8 x 40 = Rs. 320
Number of hours saved 8 - 6 = 2 hours Bonus payable to Mr. Akash 33.33% x 2 x 40 = Rs 26.66 Total
wages payable to Mr. Akash 320 + 26.66 = Rs 346.66
Merits: The merits of this plan are:
It guarantees a fixed time wage to slow workers and at the same time offers extra pay to efficient
workers.
Keeps the motivation of employees high as there is a guaranteed opportunity to earn extra bucks.
The cost of labour is reduced because of the percentage premium system; the piece rate of pay
gradually decreases with increased production.
The plan is simple in design and easy to introduce.
As the wages are guaranteed, it does not create any panic among such workers who are unable to
reach the standard.
Demerits: the disadvantages of the plan are:
It depends upon past performance instead of making present new standards.
The workers can defeat the purpose by restricting themselves to the guarantee of their daily wages.
In this plan, the worker is left alone to decide whether or not to produce more after the standard has
been reached thus, management does not have a control over the worker.
Gantt Task and Bonus Plan: This plan was introduced by H.L. Gantt. Under this plan, fixed time
rates are guaranteed. Workers completing their job within the standard time or less receive the wages
for the standard time plus a bonus that ranges from 20 to 50 percent of the time allowed performing the
task. When any worker fails to produce the required quantity, the worker simply gets the time rate
without any bonus.
Under this plan there are three stages of payment:
(a) Minimum guaranteed wage below the standard performance.
(b) 20 percent of time-rate as a bonus when standard performance is achieved.
(c) Higher piece rate but with no bonus when the standard is exceeded.
Merits:
It guarantees hourly base rate. Substandard worker gets guaranteed wage.
It is simple to understand and easy to be introduced.
It offers both- security and incentive. It facilitates planning and supervision.

Ques4:- What are the various benefits of Training? Discuss the Principles of wage and salary
administration?
Ans- Benefits of Training :existing employees not only benefit the individual employee but also the
organisation at large. No organisation can get employees who perfectly fit their job and organisational
requirements. Training them makes it possible for the employees to meet the requirements. Some of the
benefits of training are:
i.
It helps the organisation to stay ahead of competition.
ii.
. It improves morale of the workforce.
iii.
Helps people identify with organisational goals.
iv.
Increases productivity and performance of employees.

v.

. It is cost effective, as it is cheaper to train existing employees compared to recruiting new


employee with the required skills. vi. It helps in updating knowledge of employees on new
technology and machines. vii. It helps employees meet their needs of growth through learning.
viii. Increases job satisfaction and recognition ix. Helps a person handle stress, tension,
frustration and conflict.
the Principles of wage and salary administration:
Principles of wage and salary administration Formulating an effective wage and salary structure takes
effort and planning. There has to be consistency in the salary structure. For this, certain principles have
to be applied while preparing the wage and salary structure.
Important principles of wage and salary administration are:

Wage policy should match the needs of all the stakeholders of the organisation such as
employer, employees, consumers and the society.

Wage and salary plans and policies should be adequately flexible. It should adapt to changes in
the environment.

. It should satisfy needs of employees.

It must be based on job analysis and job evaluation.

. It should comply with the legal regulations of the country.

. Wages and salary must be paid promptly.

. Wage and salary administration plans should be formulated in such a way it matches to the
plans and programmes of the organisation.

. Wage and salary administration plans must be compliant to the economic and social situations.

It must be structured in such a way that the costs are in balance to the profits made by the
organisation.

It must be alert to the changes in the national as well as local environment.

. The wage plans should help in simplifying and accelerating other administrative processes.

A grievance management system must be in place to address complaints..


Q.5 Identify the various advantages of employee empowerment and also discuss the elements of
employee empowerment?
Ans Advantages of employee empowerment More and more of organisations across the world are
encouraging employee empowerment. It is very useful to promote organisational and human relations
in industry. It helps in minimising disputes and conflicts because now employees themselves are given
authority and accountability. Apart from these, the advantages of employee engagement are:

It enhances the employees morale and motivates them to contribute towards organizational
development positively.

ii) It has a positive impact on productivity that results in higher wages for workers, higher
profits for the organisation and lower price of goods for the customers.

iii) It reduces internal conflicts and ensures industrial peace and harmony.

iv) It increases employee loyalty and commitment towards the organisation.

v) It also reduces employee turnover as employees do not prefer to leave organisations that
provide them with authority and freedom.

vi) It encourages implementation of innovative ideas and concepts as the organisation does not
exercise undue control.

vii) It helps in discovering and utilising latent human resource. This is the key to build great
organisations and a great nation.

viii) It strengthens labourmanagement relationship.


ix) It satisfies social and esteem needs of workmen and helps them to move towards selfactualisation.
i)
x) It helps in building a nation through entrepreneurship and economic development. xi)
Resistance to change is minimal as the employees are given right to participate in the decision
making bodies.
Elements of employee empowerment Employee empowerment aims at providing industrial
democracy essential for promoting justice for organisational employees. It also promotes effective
relationship between the management and employees. The concept of employee empowerment consists
of certain elements. The major elements of the concept of employee empowerment are:
i)
Command over work environment: The workforce of the organisation must be allowed
to have a sense of command and authority over their immediate work environment. This
will help them to understand the situation in which they are supposed to perform their
responsibilities.
ii)
Proficiency and competence: The employee must be provided with complete set of
capabilities of successfully performing the assigned task. The employees must have
confidence in their performance. They should not accept responsibility for making
decisions until they are confident of their abilities.
iii)
Purposefulness: The empowered employees must feel the significance and importance
of the task assigned to them. They should not only know the value of the work for
themselves but also to the organisation. Every employee must know how that their task
fits into the larger scheme of things.
iv)
Belief system and trust: The employee must clearly understand the impact of the
decision taken on the performance and effectiveness of the organisation. The impact is
felt when employees perceive that their behaviour has caused important outcomes.
v)
Participation: Workers must be allowed to take initiative. Proper training must be
provided to the workers so that they can take part actively and also are able to express
their suggestions and ideas.
vi)
Innovation: Management must encourage employees to try out new ideas and make
decisions that help in finding new and improved ways of doing things. Even when
employees fail in their attempts, management must encourage and support the
employees.
vii)
Information: Employees must have adequate access to information and resources that
they need to improve their talents. viii) Accountability: Empowered employee must be
held responsible for the results. This helps the organisation to ensure that their
employees put in the best efforts and behave responsibly to each other.
Q.6 Explain the three dimensions of International HRM? What are the various challenges of
International HRM?
ANS.
Japan. According to Morgan, there are three dimensions of International Human Resource
Management. The three broad International Human Resource Management activities are procurement,
allocation and utilisation of human resource which include HR planning, recruitment and
selection, training and development, compensation, performance appraisal and employee
relation.
The three national categories involved in International Human Resource Management activities
are where the subsidiary may be located, the home country where the firm has its headquarters

and other countries which may be a source of labour or finance.


The three different types of employees of an international firm can be host country
nationals, parent country nationals and third country nationals. For example, IBM employs
Australians for Australian operations, sends US citizens to Asia-Pacific countries and may send
Singaporean to
Challenges in International Human Resource Management Managing HR activities in an
international company is a very difficult task. There are various ethical and legal issues which
vary from country to country depending upon their cultural values and beliefs. Let us now see
the challenges of International Human Resource Management:
Managing human resources: One of the most difficult tasks for an International HR Manager is
to manage human resources. Right from the process of planning to recruitment and placing the
employees, it is difficult for an HR manager to ensure that all the legal and organisational needs
are met, at the same time satisfy people of different nationalities and culture.
ii. Managing communication: Communication is the most important facilitator of information in
any organisation. More than anything, employees require face to face communication with their
superior officers so that there is a better ground for clarification and supervision. Although in
international HRM, we make use of the most recent technology and try to create a virtual
atmosphere, it does not replace the benefits of face to face communication. One of the biggest
challenges when organisations expand cross borders is to maintain employee motivation and
ensuring that employees feel involved with the organisation.
iii. Imparting parent organisation characteristics: It is important the parent organisation values
are imparted to all the off-shore employees also. There has to be uniformity in the values and
attitudes of the employees across the organisation. It is difficult to monitor the imparting of
values and attitudes of employees across the world. Uniformity in behaviour of the employees
comes from accepting the parent organisations values and attitudes.
iv. Maintaining Uniformity and Fairness: In a global company it is easy for employees to feel
that the remuneration that they receive is not comparable to the amount the employees in
foreign countries receive. Currency conversion can also be a big challenge for the global human
resource manager. Even promotions, transfers can be grounds for dissatisfaction of employees.
v. Maintaining parent to off-shore relationships: It is important that the employees of the offshore organisations must maintain good relationship with their parent organisation. This is
necessary to maintain trust and loyalty among the employees towards the organisation as a
whole. This can prove to be a big challenge as the human resource manager has to device
innovative practices that foster communication and also ensure that there is co-operation
between parent and off-shore organisation
vi. Transfer of knowledge: It is important for an HR manager to ensure that there is enough
opportunity for transferring the business knowledge and skills from the parent organisation to
the off-shore branches. This is a difficult task as the skill set and level of understanding of the
employees in different countries may be very different from the employees of the parent
organisation.
vii. Maintaining motivation and commitment: Every employee has a motive for being a part of
the organisation. Their level of commitment may vary depending on their motivation. It is
difficult for the HR department to ensure that all the employees are satisfied with their job and
to maintain their commitment level, despite differences in their motivation level.
viii. Deployment: To send employees from one country to another requires a lot of careful
planning and convincing. The acceptance of deployment sometimes depends on the socio

cultural perceptions of the employees. Family pressures also affect the success of deployment of
employees. The HR department also has to ensure that all arrangements are carried out for the
employee to ensure smooth transition of the employees.
ix. Managing safety of employees: The HR department is responsible for the safety of all the
employees in the parent and off-shore organisations. With increasing terrorist activities and also
internal wars in many of the countries it is difficult for the HR personnel to ensure the safety of
all the employees. They are also responsible for emergency evacuations of employees from
dangerous situations.
x. Auditing human resource activities: Auditing HR activities across the organisation is a
challenge as the organisation will not have the same HR activities in all the countries.
Consolidating the activities and auditing it is a difficult task. Performance standards of the HR
department of the different countries itself varies. Analysing the challenges and initiatives taken
up by the HR departments across the organisation can also call for expert knowledge in the area.

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