Today’s Human Resources Function (Bradley W Hall,PHD)

Throughout history, virtually all breakthroughs required replacing a current model with a fundamentally different paradigm. Scientific examples include germ theory and the theory of relativity. Federal Express and Amazon.com are business examples of a paradigm shift, and W. Edwards Deming’s statistical process control is an example of a professional shift. In each case, these new paradigms emerged and completely challenged existing “truths.” The HR profession has yet to go through its paradigm change.

Think of today’s HR model as an engine with four elements:

(1) structure (i.e., who reports to whom, roles, and accountabilities),

(2) systems (i.e., performance measures, business reviews), 

(3) shared values (i.e., beliefs, values, culture), and 

(4) skills (i.e., talents, knowledge). 

Why Is Human Resource Management Important to all Managers? (Gary Dessler)

Perhaps it’s easier to answer this by listing some of the personnel mistakes you don’t want to make while managing. For example, you don’t want

● To have your employees not doing their best.

● To hire the wrong person for the job.

● To experience high turnover.

● To have your company in court due to your discriminatory actions.

● To have your company cited for unsafe practices.

● To let a lack of training undermine your department’s effectiveness.

● To commit any unfair labor practices.

IMPROVED PERFORMANCE Carefully studying this text can help you avoid mistakes like these. More important, it can help ensure that you get results—through people. Remember that you could do everything else right as a manager—lay brilliant plans, draw clear organization charts, set up modern assembly lines, and use sophisticated accounting controls—but still fail, for 

instance, by hiring the wrong people or by not motivating subordinates.

ADVICE FOR GLOBAL RECRUITERS

ADVICE FOR GLOBAL RECRUITERS

If you can’t find the talent you want in your own country, there are recruitment firms and Internet Websites that will enable you to look beyond your nation’s borders. Likewise, these same resources can help you people overseas operations with nationals rather than use expatriates to staff them. Whether you use an international headhunter like Korn/Ferry International Inc.

or a Website that specializes in overseas jobs like Overseas Jobs Express (www.overseasjobs.com) which lists entry level to senior executive posts, your description of the job will influence the response you get from talented employees to your job opening. Here is what Peter D. Weddle, publisher of Weddle’s, the newsletter about online recruitment, suggests that you talk about.

Challenging work

Stay away from a list of requirements and responsibilities. Instead, describe the opening from an applicant’s perspective. So talk about the opportunities that the job will offer for the holder to be involved in important and meaningful work. Discuss the corporate mission and the value of that mission and then describe how the job holder will contribute to achievement of the mission.

Personal development

Yes, you will provide opportunities for additional training but that is expected, particularly if the job is in the IT area. The candidate is looking for development beyond that; that is, professional development that comes from an opportunity to be mentored by leaders in the organization and to participate in key decisions that impact the success of the company. Still, do mention if the company will subsidize higher education degrees and support involvement in professional associations.

Advancement

Demonstrate that there are opportunities for upward mobility in your organization by posting examples on your own Website. This should catch the attention of foreign nationals willing to relocate to build their career. Let those hired to represent your firm abroad know, too, about specific examples of personal advancement within your company, ideally by others recruited abroad.

Collegial relationships

Let executive recruiters know about other superstars on your management team so they can mention them to prospective candidates. On your Website, play up these individuals. Says Weddle, ‘‘Include their picture and a description of their work, in their own words.’’ Update the site regularly with new profiles; you want prospective employees to see that your organization isn’t limited to one or two ‘‘names.’’

Support/resources

If you will be relocating a manager and family, you want to be sure that services are available to help them make the transition – physical and cultural. At the very least help them locate a home, even for the short term, and a local school for any children. Provide training in the language and career placement assistance for the spouse if that is an issue of interest. Depending on the position, mention should also be made about workplace resources like special computer systems, access to technical libraries or data, or information on new research that can make relocation seem worthwhile.

Compensation

‘‘Competitive salary’’ or ‘‘salary commensurate with skills and experience,’’ says Weddle, will mean little to someone coming from another country, particularly someone whom you truly need on your staff. Don’t try to pay less because you are recruiting from a developing country. It will take little time for a new hire to understand how he or she stands financially to peers. If the pay and benefits aren’t comparable to that of colleagues, you are likely to lose your new hire to another firm quickly. Better to talk about stock options and base plus incentive early in the recruitment process. Certainly include that information in any international Internet postings. As Weddle’s research has found, salary information must appear in the first five lines of a job posting or most candidates will read no further. What about staffing overseas subsidiaries with nationals? The same rule applies. Big distinctions found between expatriate and local national pay, benefits, and bonuses can encourage the brightest local nationals to learn as much as they can from you, then move on.

Source : Recruiting & Retaining People .Florence Stone. 2002

10 Techniques for Learning Names

In an active-training environment, the participants are as important as the trainer. When participants are called by their names, they feel important. There are a variety of ways to learn others’ names. Some (such as Name-Learning Assignment and Alphabetical Sign-In) are relatively straightforward; others (such as Name Bingo and Do You Know Your Neighbors?) make learning names into a game.

1. Name-learning assignment. Ask participants to learn as many names as possible, either by going up to others and introducing themselves or by reading one another’s name tags. After several minutes, stop the group and ask the participants to cover up or discard name tags, name lists, and the like. Now challenge participants to look around and quiz themselves on the names of others in the class. If desired, repeat the learning and self-quizzing activity as many times as you like. Within ten minutes, it should be possible for participants to learn at least twenty names.

2. Name chain. Ask each participant in turn to share his or her name and the names of the people who have already introduced themselves. For example, the first person to introduce himself or herself need only say his or her name, but the second person is required to give the first person’s name as well as his or her own. As the chain becomes longer, there will be more names to remember; however, the names will by then have been repeated several times. You can make the name chain alliterative by inviting each person to use an adjective before his or her name that begins with the same letter, as in “creative Carol” or “lucky Lee.” The alliterative adjectives help others to remember the participants’ names and often add humor to the activity. Or invite participants to say their names and then accompany them with some physical movement. The movement then becomes a mnemonic aid.

3. Alphabetical sign-in. Pre-mark sheets of flip-chart paper with the letters of the alphabet. Tape the flip-chart paper to walls around the room. Direct participants to sign the sheet containing the first initial of their names and to find others with the same initial. Then instruct the participants to look over the other sheets and attempt to identify as many names and faces as possible.

4. Alphabetical lineup. Invite participants to arrange themselves in alphabetical order by their first names. This task forces participants to find out other names in the group. Or do a “nonverbal name lineup” as a way to review names after participants have introduced themselves in conventional fashion. Ask participants to line up in alphabetical order by their first names without talking to each other.

5. Name bingo. Ask participants to mill around the room and meet one another. As they exchange names, have them write each name anywhere on a blank bingo form you have made for them. Create a 3 x 3 format of squares if the group has fewer than ten people, a 4 x 4 format if the group has sixteen or fewer, and a 5 x 5 format if the group has twenty-five or fewer. Instruct participants to place an “O” on any box not used up after meeting each participant. Then place a copy of everyone’s name in a hat. As the hat is passed around the group, each participant picks a name out of the hat. Everyone places an “X” on the box on their form containing the name picked. Whenever any player obtains bingo (horizontally, vertically, or diagonally), he or she yells “Bingo!” Eventually, everyone will get bingo several times.

6. Name tag mix-up. Give each participant the name tag of someone else in the group and ask each person to find the owner of the name tag. Invite participants to circulate until every person receives his or her name tag.

7. Do you know your neighbors? Form a circle and place one participant in the middle. Ask that person to point to someone in the circle and challenge him or her with the question, “Do you know your neighbors?” If the person in the circle can successfully say the name of the people immediately to his or her right and left, the person in the middle stays there and challenges another person in the circle. When a participant fails the neighbor test, he or she replaces the person in the middle. As the game is played, frequently change the positions of the participants in the circle.

8. Personalized name tags. Provide materials so that each participant can develop a name tag that uses any of the following:

•  Interesting calligraphy
•  A personal logo
•  A zodiac sign
•  An object or animal that symbolizes some personal quality
•  A coat of arms
•  A collage of magazine cutouts that contain favorite expressions or objects

Ask participants to meet one another and to learn names.

9. Name toss. Have group members stand in a circle with one person holding an object that can be easily thrown and caught, such as a ball or a beanbag. The member holding the object says his or her name and tosses the object to another group member. The person catching the object gives his or her name and tosses the object to another group member. Continue the tossing until all participants have introduced themselves. When the final member has been introduced, ask that person to say the name of another group member and then toss the object to that person. The receiver then repeats the name of the person who tossed him or her the object and says the name of another group member before tossing the object to that person.

10. What’s in a name? Have participants introduce themselves and then share any of the following about their names:

•  What I like or dislike about my name
•  Who I was named after
•  A nickname that I like or dislike
•  The origin of my name

After these introductions, challenge participants to write down the names of all the members of the group.

Source : 101 Ways to Make Training Active. Mel Silberman.2005

10 Questions for Obtaining Participant Expectation

There are a variety of questions you can ask to find out the needs, expectations, and concerns of the participants so that you can gear instruction appropriately. You can obtain answers through open discussion, a go-around, response cards, fishbowls, polling, panels, games, and so on.

1. Why did you choose this class? Why did you come?

2. What questions about [subject matter of class] do you come with?

3. What advice, information, or skills do you want to get from this class?

4. What advice, information, or skills don’t you need or don’t you want?

5. What do you want to take away from this class? Name one thing.

6. What are your hopes for this class? What are your concerns?

7. Do the class objectives match your needs?

8. What knowledge or skills do you feel you “need” to have? What would be “nice” to have?

9. What are your expectations about this class?

10. What have you learned from previous classes on this topic?


Source : 101 Ways to Make Training Active. Mel Silberman.2005

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