Hiring Challenges
Discuss about the Challenges faced by Human Resouce Mangement.
As the business world is drastically absorbing changes, there are several challenges that are continually emerging. These challenges are making human resource management to be more and more tasking and challenging. While some of the problems can easily be overcome, others are hard to go by, and require specialized approach in order to ensure that the organization retains its reputation while promoting the productivity of employees. Some of the problems revolve around training of employees, hiring of employees, remuneration, handling trade union and other parties that represent the welfare of employees as well as balancing between attending to the employees and executing managerial functions.
The number one problem faced by human resource managers is hiring. Getting the right candidate for a job is almost impossible, especially in this age and time. This is because there are very many parameters that are required to be used in order to come up with a list of candidates, as well as the fact that with the increased appetite for education, there are very many qualified people that narrowing down to the best becomes increasingly hard. Other factors that need to be considered while hiring include gender balance, inclusion of minority groups and non-discrimination (Daley, 2012; Zheng et al., 2011).
According to Zheng et al., 2011, the problems related to hiring can be address by ensuring that there is a clearly stipulated protocol for hiring. In addition, the business should ensure that the hiring panel consists of experienced people who would easily be able to tell who is best for what position. Employers can also subject candidates to a probation period within which the employer may be able to further analyze the appropriateness of the candidate in order to be more than sure that the person selected for a specific job is there best that could possibly be found in the interview.
Dealing with trade unions and other representatives of workers is also proving to be a modern pain in the flesh for human resource managers. Trade unions are external contacts selected by employees to intervene and help to fight for the welfare of the employees. Sometimes, and in fact most of the times, these trade unions have no understanding of the internal operations and procedures of the business. As a result, their are relentless in their demands for change, and may often engage rough means of communication in order to pass a message to the employers (Stone & Deadrick, 2015). Trade unions are involved in demanding for increased payment, enhanced working conditions and better treatment by the employer among other demands. In the process, there is bound to be several misunderstandings between the employer and the trade unions (Menz, 2012). This traps the human resource managers between two as they do not want to offend the trade unions which have a say among the employees, while as the same time they do not wish to give in to the demands as this would make the employees seem to have more control over the business as compared to the employers.matching the demands of the trade unions with those of the management is a task that can prove difficult (Maister, 2012).
Dealing with Trade Unions
According to Lee et al., 2015, in order to overcome this challenges, the employer could choose to deal with trade unions through a representative as well. Acting through mediator helps to calm the situation as the mediators re all at the same level of understanding. Reducing direct confrontation may reduce chances of misunderstanding between the employer and the trade unions which could spill into bad blood between the employer and the employees.
In addition, the complexity of the working population has become so hard that human resource managers not only need to ensure that their employees are paid in time and in type, but they also need to ensure that the emotional welfare of their employees are well attended to. This is unlike the previous centuries where emotions were not part of the list of considerations for employers. The business world is coming to terms with the fact that productivity is directly related to emotional well-being. Being able to satisfy different people emotionally considering their difference in attitudes and personalities is a hard task.
Keeping the employees emotionally satisfied is one of the key human resource management tasks that cannot be overlooked. In order to ensure that this emotions are well addressed, the human resource managers should encourage interpersonal interaction among the employees in order to help as many employees as possible to express themselves and create helpful relations. In addition, offering counselling services to employees undergoing emotional problems and ensuring employees work under the best conditions should be key (Maister, 2012). Harassment and discrimination should be dealt with in the most effective manner which would sound a warning to other employees, while at the same time ensuring the the manner in which the issues is dealt with does not harm the emotions of those who are to be reprimanded.
There is also a problem related to keeping up with the changing legal systems that touch on the operations of human resource departments. As political and business leaders get to understand more the contribution of workers to the economy, several changes are introduced. These changes include minimum wage, non-discrimination policies and specialized welfare for different minority groups. These periodic and often uneventful changes require the human resource managers to be alert every time in order to ensure that they are no behind as this may land them into legal troubles (Klikauer, 2008).
In order to avoid law suits caused by failure to comply with updated employment and human resource laws, it is very important that businesses ensure that they are always abreast with the government legislation, whether local, national or international. This can be accomplished by carrying out regular research into the changes that could have been made in the past that affect human resource management, and also seeking legal assistance from layers and advocates in different legal matters in order to ensure that the decisions made and steps taken do not contravene the legal provisions. Resources that could be of greatest help in this include the U.S. Department of Labor’s Employment Law Guide.
Emotional Welfare of Employees
Another great problem that human resource mangers are facing is lack of adequate and proper training of employees. Sometimes, the training is offered but it is not as effective as it should be. This is reflected in the fact that employees are unable to execute their activities in the best way possible. In addition, later in their career when these employees are required to execute duties that are core to their careers they tend not to be able to execute them with expertise and ease. This affects the operations of the business and greatly affects the productivity of the individual employees.
In order to mitigate this problem, human resource departments should establish collaborations with other departments to arrange for periodic training of employees in order to prepare them for future roles. More specifically, the human resource departments should pay attention to training the employees for leadership positions (Hendry, 2008). This will ensure that the business does not lack leader in future. Training of young employees is especially important as it helps to ensure that when the old employees are relieved of their duties, the business is still able to remain operational and make profits. In addition, training enhances a feeling of self-worth and appreciation for one’s job (Lawler, 2008). Therefore, in order to ensure that employees are always motivated and know what they are expected to do, employers through the human resource departments should ensure that employees are well trained at all times and that they are equipped with skills that are pertinent to their current and future roles (Wright et al., 2014).
As can be seen, there are very many challenges that are evolving in the human resource departments. However, most of these challenges have solutions, thus they only need to be addressed with caution and prowess. Failure to address human resource challenges can escalate into major problems that can cause a collapse of companies. Looking at all the aspects of the working environment as well as the personal requirement of the employees helps businesses to ensure that they reduce the challenges that they could be facing by a great deal. The businesses can ensure they reduce their challenges starting by hiring the best, training the hired employees and maintaining excellent working conditions and relations for the employees.
References
Daley, D.M., 2012. Strategic human resources management. Public Personnel Management, pp.120-125.
Hendry, C., 2012. Human resource management. Routledge.
Klikauer, T., 2008. Human Resource Management–Ethics and Employment. Transfer: European Review of Labour and Research, 14(3), pp.506-508.
Lawler, J., 2008. Strategic human resource management. Handbook of Organization Development, 353.
Lee, S.M., Tae Kim, S. and Choi, D., 2012. Green supply chain management and organizational performance. Industrial Management & Data Systems, 112(8), pp.1148-1180.
Maister, D.H., 2012. Managing the professional service firm. Simon and Schuster.
Menz, M., 2012. Functional top management team members: A review, synthesis, and research agenda. Journal of Management, 38(1), pp.45-80.
Stone, D.L. and Deadrick, D.L., 2015. Challenges and opportunities affecting the future of human resource management. Human Resource Management Review, 25(2), pp.139-145.
Wright, P.M., Coff, R. and Moliterno, T.P., 2014. Strategic human capital: Crossing the great divide. Journal of Management, 40(2), pp.353-370.
Zheng, W., Yang, B. and McLean, G.N., 2010. Linking organizational culture, structure, strategy, and organizational effectiveness: Mediating role of knowledge management. Journal of Business research, 63(7), pp.763-771.
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