To understand HRM it is important to understand what managers do. An organization consists of people from different mindset, qualification and cultural backgrounds. These people have different duties to perform in the given time, all these people work together to achieve organization’ goal.

A Manager is responsible for accomplishing organization’ goals, managers do it by managing the efforts of people working in the organization. Researchers agreed upon, managing involves five basic functions, which are, planning, organization, staffing, leading and controlling. These five functions represent Management Process. Let’s briefly go through this process;

·       Planning: It is to establish goals and standards; developing rules and procedures, developing plans and forecasts.

·       Organizing: Assigning every subordinate, a specific task, establishing departments, delegating authority to subordinates, establishing chain of command and communication, coordinating the work of subordinates.

·    Staffing: It is to determine what type of people company should hire, recruiting prospective employees, selecting employees, evaluating performance, training and developing employees, and counseling employees.

·       Leading: getting people to get the job done, motivating subordinates and maintaining their morale.

·     Controlling: It is to standards like, sales quotas, quality standards, product levels, carefully observing how actual performance compares with these standards and taking corrective measures where needed.

In HRM we will focus on staffing function i.e., personal agreement or human resource function.

HRM Definition:

“It is the process of acquiring, training, appraising and compensating employees and attending to their labor relations, health and safety and fairness concerns.” HR manager need to perform certain tasks, which include;

Manager’ Duties:

·         To conduct job analysis (determining the nature of each employee’s job).

·         Planning labor needs and recruiting job candidates.

·         Selecting job candidates.

·         Orienting and training new employees.

·         Managing wages and salaries (compensating employees).

·         Providing incentives and benefits.

·         Appraising performance.

·         Communicating (interviewing, counseling, disciplining).

·         Training employees, and developing managers.

·         Building employee relations and engagement.

And what managers need to know about;

·         Equal opportunity and affirmative action.

·         Employee health and safety.

·         Handling grievances and labor relations.

Why is HRM Important to all Managers:

HRM is important to all managers for several reasons, which are as follows;

Avoid Personnel Mistakes:

Studying HR is important to avoid personal mistakes. Following are some examples; managers don’t want to;

·         Hire wrong employee.

·         Experience high turnover.

·         Having such employees which are not giving their best.

·         Have your company in court due to your discriminatory actions.

·         Have your company caught with unsafe practices.

·         Have untrained employees, who is affecting department’ effectiveness.

·         Commit any unfair labor practices.

Improving Profits and Performance:

It helps managers in understanding the most important thing that is, “you get results – through people”. The bottom- of managing is “getting results”. By studying HRM managers become able to manager their teams, develop better human resource for company, which eventually will increase company profits and performance.

Most of managers make perfect plans, layout clear organization charts, up-to-date technology and use modern accounting software but still fails, it is because they hired wrong people.

O the other hand, other managers succeed without adequate plans and other organizational controls, they were successful because they had the knack for hiring the right people for the right job. 

You may spend some time as HR manager:

Managers may need to spend time in HR department to understand human needs, wants or preferences, their attitudes and values, motivation and satisfaction levels etc. most companies’ CEOs have once worked in HR department to make better decision. HR certifications are,

SPHR (Senior Professional in Human Resources),

PHR (Professional in Human Resources)

SHRM (Society for Human Resource Management)

HR for small businesses:

It is important to learn HR, as you may have to serve as your own HR manager. There are hundreds of thousands small business and many more registering every year. Most of new graduates will work for small businesses or will create new small businesses. As there is no need of proper HR manager in small businesses, so, owner himself or his manager do all the HR tasks.

Line and Staff aspects of HRM:

Authority is the right to make decisions, to direct the work of others and to give orders.

Line authority:

·         It is when someone have authority to issue orders to other managers or employees.

·         It is exercising authority within department.

·         Example: When senior manager from marketing department orders assistant manager to prepare sales reports withing giving time.

·         Managers exercising line authority are Line managers.

 Staff authority:

·         It is when someone have the right to advise other managers or employees.

·         It is to manage all the departments.

·         It is not an ordering relationship, its advisory relationship.

·         Example: HR managers advises plant manager to use a particular selection test.

·         Managers using staff authority are called as Staff managers.

Line Managers’ HRM Responsibility:

Line managers also perform many human resource duties. It is because, from president down to first-line supervisors – handling people have always been part of every line-manager. Line manager’ HR duties involve;

·         Putting right person at right job.

·         Orientation of new employees in the organization.

·         Training new employees.

·         Helping them in improving their performance.

·         To gain creative cooperation and developing healthy working relationship.

·         Interpreting company policies and procedures.

·         Controlling labor costs.

·         To develop the abilities of every employee.

·         Creating and developing departmental morale.

·         To protect employees’ health and physical conditions. 

The Human Resource Department:

In small companies, line mangers perform all these personnel duties, they don’t need assistance. But as the organization grows, managers need assistance, specialized knowledge and advice of separate human resource staff. As shown in the picture below;