In a broader definition, the human resource (HR) is entitled to manage the employees of an organization. It has several roles including recruitment, facilitating proper training, employee welfare and safety, and legislation awareness. In this article, we take up several themes of HR management and then link them with the changed nature of the current workforce. It particularly focuses on the employee welfare and health issue in order to illustrate the changed nature of the work environment. Moreover, it traces the importance of “soft skills” for the employees, in general, and for the HR managers, in particular. Lastly, it argues that HR should be conceptualized as one of the major tools to achieve and sustain the strategic advantages for an organization operating in a competitive field.
The twentieth century has witnessed a major change in terms of occupational categories. Over the past century, the patterns of producing goods and services as well as the methods have changed significantly. In a study, by Wyatt & Hecker (2006), it has been shown that, over the second half of the last century, professional, technical, and kindred workers, as a category, rose from ninth largest to the largest occupational category. The authors hold that "Between 1910 and 2000, the employment of professional, technical, and kindred workers increased more than fourfold as a proportion of total employment, from 4.4 percent to 23.3 percent." Professional subgroups such as accountants, college teachers, and healthcare workers increased in number. Computer specialists have also increased steadily. In other words, it also shows that white-collar occupations and service workers, except private household, increased significantly over the last century. Therefore, we could say that it has brought a qualitative change within the total workforce. And this change, I think, leads us to re-think, re-asses, and re-formulate the role of HR managers in the present day situation.
In other words, the workforce that the HR managers of the present day are now dealing with is a special kind of workforce, one that largely comprised of professional, technical, and kindred workers. This, qualitatively different type of workforce, in turn, has resulted in the changed nature of the work itself. Indeed, these occupational groups, tasked with different kind of work than manual labor, are equipped with different kind of skills. Moreover, in this globalized age of market and finance, we see the emergence of a novel kind of work pattern as well which is discussed below. All these factors necessarily point to the fact that the HR managers of current days have to deal with different issues than that of the past century. Let us discuss this issue with a specific example.
In an article, Solomon (1993) discusses the changed role, and the importance of, HR manager with regard to a very particular problem, the shift-work. He stresses that we live in a time when the "natural, circadian rhythm" is gone, and it has been replaced with a non-stop work cycle of the whole twenty-four hours because, the author argues, the commerce and the communication have been globalized. The continuous flow of production, transportation, service is now possible because of the changes that had been introduced, during the last decade of the 20th century, in the design of machines and electronic devices. And this has posed a different challenge for the new HR managers.
The shift-work system does not come without its own set of problems. As the author says, "Human resources professionals must manage these 20 million night owls, and there's plenty to manage." An increasing amount of attention must be paid to the problem of fatigue, and health and safety. Family and social difficulties become all the more acute for these workers. Moreover, the supervisory system must adapt itself to this new working environment. It is evident here that the role of HR manager must address these changes as well (Solomon, 1993). The new HR managers need to focus on the family and lifestyle issues as well. We can no longer think of employees detached of their wider social relations, and confined within the institutional boundaries. Let me illustrate this point with the issue of child care. It could be a particularly troubling for the married couples working in the same company. Since the employees are the best asset for a company, HR managers must ensure that they stay without worries or health issues. New patterns of sociality, conditioned by the very logic of the changed nature of the work, must be taken seriously in order to ensure the vitality and productivity of the employees. And this explains pretty nicely the increasing demand HR in terms of knowledge production which correlates with the increased number of HR managers in the market.
Earlier we have talked about special kind of attributes or skills, which are now required from the employees, that Robles (2012) terms as "soft skills." The author differentiates them from the "technical expertise and knowledge." Without discounting the traditional emphasis on the hard or technical knowledge and skill, the present day situation has placed an enormous importance on the soft skills, which are interpersonal in quality. The author argues that the shift, from the industrial economy to the information economy, placed greater emphasis on "integrity, communication, and flexibility." This is study has focused on the employees in general. However, what I would like to indicate is that these qualities are especially valuable for the HR managers who must have the most engaging relationship with the rest of the employees as the previous arguments have made it evident. In my opinion, the soft skills are the indispensable part of the HR management.
In a broader term, as Delaney & Huselid (1996) argues, HR is important for the proper implementation of "operating and strategic objectives of firms." The authors conducted the study focusing on the impact of HR decisions on performance outcomes with clear and concise meaning for example "stock performance, productivity, profits, quality, and organizational survival." They argue that HR is crucial to the extent that it becomes an important tool to stay ahead of competing organizations. The traditional conceptualization of value creation through material resources such as fixed capital and goods is important, but it is not adequate to remain ahead of competing parties because, they argue, these strategies are not hard to imitate in a large-scale production environment. However, HR could be an important tool that has the potential to sustain the competitive advantage over the time.
As the discussion above implies that the nature of work environment has changed in relation to the broader changes in the pattern of occupational groups. These changes are correlative of the globalized nature of current day production, commerce, and service. One the one hand, the flow of production and service has been constant, and, on the other hand, the commerce and finance have been globalized. The impact of these changes is evident in the changing nature of work itself, and, therefore, it raises different issues regarding the management of the people, and their personal and social difficulties. The present day HR managers are then obliged to understand their special requirements in the 21st century because, as Delaney & Huselid argued, the HR is one of the most important tools for the deployment of organizational strategies and operating techniques in order to remain ahead of contemporaries.
WORKS CITED
Delaney, J. T., & Huselid, M. A. (1996). The impact of human resource management practices on perceptions of organizational performance. Academy of Management Journal, 39(4), 949–969. http://doi.org/10.2307/256718
Robles, M. M. (2012). Executive Perceptions of the Top 10 Soft Skills Needed in Today’s Workplace. Business Communication Quarterly, 75(4). JOUR.
Solomon, C. (1993, August). HR Is Solving Shift-work Problems. Workforece. Retrieved from http://www.workforce.com/1993/08/01/hr-is-solving-shift-work-problems/
Wyatt, I. D., & Hecker, D. E. (2006). Occupational changes during the 20th century. Monthly Labor Review, 129(3), 35–57. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=21675466&site=ehost-live
