Introduction
Human resource management is one of most rapidly developing fields of management. According to the opinion of A.Haslinda (2009), “human resources are organization’s greatest assets, because without them everyday business functions such as managing cash flows, making business transactions, communicating through all forms of media and dealing with customers could not be completed”(180). Despite the fact that modern HRM stresses high value of human resources, it is still criticized for treating people just as a means or a tool instead of considering their personalities. In this assignment we will consider the way modern HRM treats people and find out whether preconditions exist to consider HRM view of people different from the one, developed in terms of other scientific disciplines.
Discussion
The view of personality in philosophy and ethics
The terms “human being” and “personality” found their definitions in variety of sciences, including philosophy, psychology and law. The simplest and most wide-spread definition of human being says that human being is the one, which combines both animal and rational features. World’s most known theory of a human being (a human nature) was developed by an author of significant works in the fields of philosophy, ethics and religion Immanuel Kant. As it was analyzed by A. Wood (1999), Kant’s view of “human nature” includes such elements as animality, humanity and personality (118). The presence of animality is predetermined by people’s functioning as living beings, driven by instinctual forces. Kant emphasized that the existence of human beings would be impossible if they did not have animality-related features. Humanity encompasses a variety of rational capacities of the person with no special emphasis on morality. Humanity is what unites animality and personality.
According to Jerry M. Burger (2008), personality can be defined as a combination of consistent behavior-related patterns and intrapersonal processes, which stem from an individual (4). So, personality can be considered to consist of two major elements, which are behavior-related patterns and interpersonal processes. Researchers also address personality in terms of differences, inherent for an individual. Modern science has developed six main approaches to personality. They are trait, psychoanalytic, biological, humanistic, behavior and cognitive approaches. To my mind, these approaches can be viewed not only as separate personality theories, developed in terms of humanities, but as interconnected parts of multidimensional interdisciplinary personality study. Trait theory of personality is based on the premise, according to which traits are considered to be blocks, which form personality as a whole. Trait theory addresses traits as being continuous, describing individual differences, being bipolar (each trait has its opposite) and being different from person’s states.
Modern psychoanalytical approach to personality is based not only on classical Freud’s works, but the research by Neo-Freudians, ego psychologists and relations. However, despite new developments, the adherents of this approach still emphasize the importance of considering personality’s structure (the id, the ego and the superego) and clearly childhood experiences. One of most serious criticism about this approach lies in underestimation of culturally-predetermined differences in personalities.
Biological personality approach advocates personality being determined by inherited predispositions and peculiarities of psychological processes. One the other hand, behavior (or social learning) approach emphasizes importance of surroundings in person’s development.
As it is stated by Ellen E. Pastorino, Susann M. Doyle-portillo (2008), humanistic approach stresses the individual, his/her personal choice and freedom in shaping his/her personality (469). Humanistic perspective also includes a belief, according to which all human beings are characterized with the natural inner drive for personal growth. Moreover, it claims that person’s subjective perceptions are more important than the objective reality. Key terms of humanistic approach are self-actualization and self-determination (autonomy).
As almost all personality theories, cognitive approach underlines the fact that personality is what determines the differences between people. However, this perspective concentrates only on those differences, which relate only to the ways people perceive information (or their cognitive peculiarities).
Evolution of attitude towards employees in HRM
When considering evolution of HR management, it is crucial to research into what HR management and related concepts mean. Historically, one of the first HRM-related concepts dealt with human capital. According to L.A.Weatherly (2003), “a company’s human capital asset is the collective sum of the attributes, life experiences, knowledge, inventiveness, energy and enthusiasm that its people choose to invest in their works” (1). Human capital is believed to encompass such values as tacit knowledge, education, vocational qualifications, professional certification, work-related know-how and work-related competence.
A difference exists between the notions “human capital management” and “human resource management”. According to the definition by R.Dransfield (2000), “human resources are the people that work for an organization, and the contributions that they make through their skills, their knowledge and their competences” (3). From the definition itself it is seen that human resources are not viewed as a valuable asset, which encompasses tacit knowledge, education, vocational qualifications etc., but is mostly about people, who chose to work for an organization and the contributions they make into its functioning. Here it is important to mention that the term “people” is put before the term “contributions. To our mind, such a fact testifies to more attention to people themselves than to contributions they make into organization’s functioning.
An important difference between the attitude towards people in human capital and human resource management was mentioned by Andrew Mayo (2001), who claimed that the core difference between the concepts under study lies in the fact that human capital management treats people as assets, whereas human resource management sees them as costs. In the opinion of P.Kearns (2005), human capital management perceives people as “value adders”, while in the theory of human resource management it is important to emphasize personal value of each of the company’s team members. Moreover, modern management fully recognizes the fact that human resource managers implement separate and extremely important function, which cannot be implemented in terms of general management of the enterprise.
Despite the fact that the opinion, according to which human resource management treats people as costs, is quite a wide-spread one, we would like to express our disagreement with it. To support our opinion, we would like to emphasize that the concept of human resource management itself includes the theses, which states that competitive advantage of the organization is ensured with the help of its most valuable resources, which include people. To empower employees, aiming at reaching competitive advantage, HR managers use a variety of techniques, capable of strategic development of capable and committed employees.
Furthermore, one of most recent trends of HR management lies in the development of its new branches –strategic human resource management and human resource development. Strategic HR management deals with designing proactive ways of managing HR, so that employees’ needs were met, when considering company’s goals and company’s HR management strategies do not contradict strategies of business’ development. Human development is aimed at developing employees’ knowledge, skills and competence, so that they can make more valuable contributions into company’s activities.
Separation of such branches of HR management as strategic HR management and HR development helps the enterprises single out activities, which relate to aligning the development of people of the organization to its mission, vision, goals, values and business environment, so that they can be addressed with necessary consideration and apart from basic HR management activities, which tend to concentrate on traditional staffing. Important issues, which should be taken into account by HR manager, include ensuring productivity and job satisfaction of employees along with combating turnover and absenteeism. Such tasks of modern HR management predetermine the need to consider personalities of employees and provide them with most comfortable terms and conditions of employment.
Conclusion
Concluding we would like to state that treating an individual as human being and personality means taking into account all the aspects of his/her human nature and dimensions of personality. The trends of human resource management development are connected with an important shift in the treatment of employees. Human capital management treated employees just as assets, which could be evaluated along with all other assets of an organization, whereas modern HR management emphasized people and their contributions into the functioning and development of organization. Constant struggle for the competitive advantage, increasing productivity and job satisfaction, along with the need to combat turnover and absenteeism in employees called forth the development of such branches of HR management as strategic HR management and HR development. Moreover, many large organizations, which are especially interested in reaching competitive advantage through the development of their employees, elaborate not only on professional development of employees, but creating comfortable and empowering terms and conditions of employment.
Recommendations
After having analyzed the way human capital and HR management treat employees and tracked relating trends, we would like to share two important recommendations. First of all, any company, which operates in a competitive environment, should pay special attention not only to traditional staffing issues management, but HR development and aligning such development to different levels of company’s strategy. Secondly, it is worth taking account current challenges HR managers face, mentioned in the body of the report (ensuring productivity and job satisfaction of employees, and combating turnover and absenteeism), and developing HR policies, aimed at creating special working conditions for each employee, who is of interest for the company.
References
Burger, J.M., 2008.Personality. Belmont: Cengage Learning
Dransfield, R., 2000. Human resource management. Oxford: Heinemann International Publishers
Haslinda, A., 2009. Evolving terms of human resource management and development. The Journal of International Social Research, 2(9), p.180-186
Kearns, P.,2005. Human capital management. Reed Business Information, Sutton, Surrey
Mayo, A., 2001.The Human Value of the Enterprise: Valuing People As Assets Monitoring, Measuring, Managing, Boston: Nicholas Brealey Publishing
Pastorino, E. E., M. Doyle-portillo, S., 2008. What Is Psychology? Essentials. Belmont: Cengage Learning
Weatherlie, L.,2003. Human capital – the elusive asset. Measuring and managing human capital: a strategic imperative for HR. Alexandria: The Society for HRM
Wood, A., 1999. Kant’s ethical thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
