Table of Contents INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1 TASK 1...........................................................................................................................................1 Purpose and functions of HRM...................................................................................................1 Strengths and Weaknesses of different approaches of recruitment and selection.....................3 TASK 2............................................................................................................................................5 Benefits of HRM practices..........................................................................................................5 Effectiveness of HRM practices for organisation......................................................................6 Task 3..............................................................................................................................................7 Importance of employee relations and improve employee engagement.....................................7 Key element of employment legislation and the impact it has upon HRM decision making.....8 TASK 4.........................................................................................................................................9 Application of HRM practices in work – related context..........................................................9 CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................11 REFERENCES.............................................................................................................................13
INTRODUCTION Human resource management can be describe as the timely management and growth of employees working in an organisation. It is a vital function that aims at maximizing effectiveness and profitably of an organisation by making its employees more skilled and talented (human resource management (HRM).2019). The main activities included in HRM are recruiting, selecting, training, developing and managing the workforce of an organisation in best possible way to make them more productive (Analoui, 2018). Merrill Lynch was founded in 6 January, 1914 by Charles E. Merrill. It is basically an American investing and wealth management division acquired by Bank of America in 2008-9. It helps in meeting financial needs of emerging companies and also make investment in emerging companies. This report focuses on purpose and scope of HRM for providing organisation with talented and well skilled workforce. It also include strengths and weakness of different approaches of recruitment and selection. Benefits of HRM for both employer and employees are included in this report with its effectiveness in raising profits and productivity. Lastly, it includes the employment legislation and its impact on decision making and also reflects its application in work related context. TASK 1 Purpose and functions of HRM Humans are considered as most important and valuable assets on which the growth and profitability of an organisation depends. It provides most effective use of employees to achieve the targets and goals of an organisation on time (Purposes of the Human Resources Department. 2019). The main activities included in human resources management are recruiting and selecting most appropriate individuals, providing timely compensation and benefits, conducting proper training and learning programmes, establishing a good labour and employee relations and also helps in development of organisation (Analoui, 2017). HRM performs a large number of managerial, operative and procurement functions, some of the mostimportant functionsare as follows: Recruitment and selection :It is the process of attracting, analysing and selecting most qualified and potential individual best suited for a particular job. For effective recruitment, a proper staffing plan is prepared to analyse the requirement of new employees depending on the goals and objective of organisation.The main purposeof this functions is to ensure the balance 1
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between demand and supply of employee and also provide the most skilled and talented workforceforachievementoforganisationalgoal.MerrillLynchisusinganeffective recruitment and selection process to employ the people having suitable skills and qualification for an investment or banking sector. Orientations and good working conditions :Orientation is a process to help a new employee to get adjust with the working conditions of an organisation (Bailey and et. al., 2018). It includes providing complete description about the job and role of an employee in achievement of targets. HRM is also liable to provide a good and motivated atmosphere to its workforce. The purpose of this function is toprovide mental peace and satisfactionto employees to increase their efficiency. For better achievement of its goal, Merrill Lynch is providing a healthy atmosphere to its employees. Training and development :It is an important functions of HRM that focuses on increasing skills, changing attitude and providing more knowledge to employees through proper educationalprocess.Developmentisacontinuousprocessaimsatoverallpersonality development. The main purpose of providing training and development to employees is to make themmoreskilledandconfidentwhichincreasetheirefficiency.Thisalsoprovidea competitive advantage against other competitors (Banfield, Kay and Royles, 2018). Merrill Lynch is timely providing all relevant training regarding all new technology and working practices to make their employees more efficient and skilled. Scope of HRM The main aspects included in HRM are personal, welfare and industrial relations. Personal aspects includes recruitment and selection process, proper placement, promotion and training and all other areas related with remuneration and incentives. Working conditions and other amenities are a part of welfare policies. It is also included in the scope of HRM to maintain proper union management relations and to handle disputes (Baum, 2016). Approaches or Model of HRM Soft HRM :As per this approach, employees are treated as most important valuable asset and thus HRM focuses more on personal and individual needs of employee. They concentrate more on roles andrewards and provide positive motivation to employees. It provide better working environment thus increase efficiency. 2
Hard HRM :this approach provide little empowerment or delegation and focuses only on workforce requirement of business and give more importance to overall organisational goal and not on individuals priority. This approach is useful in crisis but lead to poor employee relation. Merrill Lynchis making use of soft approach to make better and healthy relation with employees to make them more efficient and positively motivated towards organisation and its goals. Strengths and Weaknesses of different approaches of recruitment and selection Recruitment and selection plays a vital role in deciding the quality of manpower on which the overall profitability and growth of organisation depends. Recruitment :It includes attracting qualified applicant to apply for the job. It provide a pool of qualified and skilled individuals from which best individuals are selected for the particular job. Recruitment can be of two types: Internal approach :It is an approach or process in which vacancies are filled through its exiting staff by the way of promotions, transfers and also by employee referrals or by converting temporary employees into permanent.Merrill Lynch can make use of this approach as it is less costly and increase loyalty of employees towards organisation but at the same time, it increase internal competition thus more chances of conflicts arise (Brewster, 2017). StrengthsWeaknesses Costeffectiveasreducesextracostof advertisement and orientationas employees arealreadyawareaboutworkingof organisation. It reduces scope of new idea and creates lack of diversity which can lead to miss out of new opportunities. Provides positive motivation to employees to work more effectively to get promotions in future. Maycreatesfeelingofjealousybetween employees which can lead to conflicts between workforce,hamperingtheperformanceof organisation. External approach :It is an approach of hiring new individuals for filling the job requirement.Differentapproachesformakingexternalrecruitmentarethroughmaking 3
advertisement,campusselection,interviews,jobfairs,etc.MerrillLynchisaglobal organisation thus, this approach is more suitable as this provide employees with new skills and more innovative ideas. StrengthsWeaknesses Provide a lager pool of individualsmake it easy to select most suitable person (Buckley and et. al., 2019). It is more costly as increase the cost in form of advertising and additional factors required for conducting recruitment process. Increase competitive power by providing fresh and innovative ideas through new employees. Not providing proper growth opportunity to existing employees thus reduce their moral. Merrill Lynch is making use of both internal and external recruitment to avail advantage of both as internal approach provides motivation and growth of exiting workforce and external helps in getting new innovative and more skilled employees as per the requirement. Selection:To select or choose the best candidate for that particular job, proper selection process is required.Merrill Lynch is a quite big investment firm and hence require best and most talentedemployees to ensure its future development. Therefore, it require to make use of best selection method. Some modes of selection that can be followed by this organisation are as follows: Interview:Itis an oral test designed by the HRM manger to predict skills and qualification of applicant. StrengthsWeaknesses Thequestionsofinterviewcanbeeasily modifiedtocheckthebestpossible qualification. Notprovideanywrittenprooforevidence therefore validation of selection process can be challenged. Also provide a check on communication skills and behaviour of an individual. Itcanbetimeconsumingifnumberof applicants are more. Assessment test:Thisbasically include a English , maths or general intelligence test to check the skills and qualification of applicants (Chelladurai and Kerwin, 2018). StrengthsWeaknesses 4
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It removes chances of biasses as applicant is selected on the basis of marks scored in test. If test conducted is a multiple choice or true falsekind,itcanencouragingguessingby applicant and anyone can get benefit of correct guesses. It is also cost effective as compared to other methods. Not possible to include all material aspects in examhencelimitthescopeofchecking qualification and skills. TASK 2 Benefits of HRM practices HRM practices are the different ways used by an manager to attract and retain employees and also helps in developing skills and competencies. This also provide competitive advantage to organisation as helps in reducing employees related issues and also reduce employees turnover. HRM practices aim at promoting team spirit, improves skills, and provide maximum level of job satisfaction to employees. HRM practices includes providing flexible working hours, proper training and development, incentives Based pay including various rewards, etc. This not only motivates employees for better performance but also helps employer by establishing good relationship and completion of work on time (Debrou, 2017) Being a global organisation it is quite necessary for Merrill Lynch to adopt proper HRM practices. They are making use of a number of HRM practices to improve the performance and skills of its employees. The different methods used to motivate employees includes proper training and development program to enhance their skills and talents. To provide their clients best services they are making use ofemployee performancemanagement and monitoring polices.It is a process of reviewing the strengths and weakness of the work or performance. This policy include timely check and control on performance of each employees to ensure the quality of work. This can be used to evaluate and analyse the current potential of employees, to identify the development or growth opportunities and to address the work that is not meeting the expectations. Some organisation also provide rewards, incentives and better recognition on the basis of performance (DeCenzo, Robbins and Verhulst, 2016). Benefits of this policy for both employer and employee can be understood from following table: 5
EmployerEmployee Helps in identifying and recognising skills of employees that can be used in a better way for meeting the targets. Regularinformationandcommunicationis provided to employees on the basis of their performance,whichhelpsinimproving performance. Ifemployeesworkisnotmeetingthe expectationspropermonitoringprovides appropriate time to give feedback and to make relevant correction. Employeegetsufficienttimetomake correction and relevant changes in its work on the basis of feedback to meet the expectations Helps in identifying new opportunities on the basis of employees performance. On the basis of performance appraisal timely rewards and incentives are given to employees. Provideindicationfortrainingand developmentofemployeesiftheyare continuously lacking in their performance. Timelyperformancemanagementpolices provides a internal motivation to employees to performitsworkefficientlytomeetthe expectations. Thisalsoprovideabaseforemployerto introduce or develop new skills and talent in employees (Harrison and Lock, 2017.) Providesmoreopportunitiesforpersonal growthanddevelopmentthroughtimely appraisal and promotion on the basis of work. Thus HRM policies are beneficial for both employer and employee as it provides a good working environment and peace in minds of both. It enhance the performance of employee and helps in maintaining good relationship which leads to easy flow of working and achievement of targets. Effectiveness of HRM practices for organisation HRM practices plays a vital role in raising overall performance of organisation and achieving the targets of increasing productivity and profitably. It helps in retention of talented and skilled employees by satisfying their needs and providing regular motivation. A positive workingenvironmenthelpsinenhancingproductivitythatwillultimatelyprovidebetter customerrelationshipandthusincreasesprofitabilityandchancesforfuturegrowth. 6
Effectivenessof HRM practices toincreasetheoverallperformanceand productivityof organisation can be understood through following points. Performance management and monitoring :performance management and monitoring is an important HRM practice to effectively manage the talent inside an organisation. Timely performance management helps in developing and retaining the most talented and superior employees. For this purpose use of different rewards and benefits are made to maintain the effective and quality of employees (Huemann, Keegan and Turner, 2018).Proper HRM practises and timely performance management leads to employee retention and hence save the cost of time and money required to groom a new individual. For future growth of every organisation it is necessary to retain and maintain its best and most potential employees for longer period so that theirskillsandtalentcanbeusedforbetterment.Henceperformancemanagementand monitoring is providing good quality workforce through developing more talents and skills and also retaining these talents with proper rewards and incentives. Thus helps in future growth and increase in productivity and profitability. The different HRM polices adopted byMerrill Lynch is providing it more competitive advantages by retaining its most talented and superior employees. The policy of performance management and monitoring helps in identifying good and bad performs of an employee. The employees not able to show the required skills or perform efficiently, training can be provided to them and use of different incentives can be made to make them work properly or even threat of firing can be used to improve their performance. On the other hand employees giving good performs can be encouraged through proper rewards and recognition. In both the situation HRM polices are motivating an employees to work in best possible way and also developing an talented and skilled employee through proper training and motivation. All these activities finally lead to increase in productivity and growth of organisation and hence helps in earning more profits in future. Task 3 Importance of employee relations and improve employee engagement Growth and success of organisation depends on how passionate their employees are towardstheirjob.Itisresponsibilityofemployertoimproveemployeeengagementin workplace. This can be done through fulfilling valid needs of employees and creating a 7
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trustworthy workplace environment. Employee engagement basically shows the relationship between an organisation and employees (BMorgeson., Brannick. and Levine, 2019). It define the nature and attitude of an employee about their work and how they feel about organisation. This is having a great impact on overall reputation and public image of organisation. Better employment engagement means good emotional commitment between employee and employer, thus makes an employee more dedicated, and enthusiastic towards organisation. For providing better employment engagement,Merrill Lynch is using policy of “Asking for feedback from employees”.It is best way to increase an employee involvement in success of organisation by providing a channel to employees to give their feedback and suggestion for betterment of organisation. Single way communication from employer can create conflicts on the other hand, two way communication can establish better interpersonal relations. This makes employees feel that their opinion matters and they are also having an important role in the progress of organisation. This also increase the scope for more new and innovative ideas through providing proper initiative facility to employees. This also helps in creating and encouraging creativityandcollaborationbetweenemployeesandorganisation.Properchannelsof communication helps in clearly defining the goals and targets of organisation. Thus, employees can clarify their confusion regarding their role and responsibility (Moutinho and Vargas- Sanchez, 2018). Hence, to ensure the success of organisation, it is necessary to give respect and importance to employees views and thus these also have influence on decision making of organisation. Key element of employment legislation and the impact it has upon HRM decision making Purpose of Employment legislation is to render proper relationship guideline between employee and employer in any organisation. In case of any disputes in working environment related to bothering of any members or any other issue, there are certain laws and regulations for protection from such treatment. The legislation has constituted certain provisions in form of different laws and acts for protection of basic right of both employer and employees. Some of the most influential one's are described below: Contract of employment Act 1963:Its like ordinary contract law but, including statutory rights and norms consisting everything an employee agrees with before accepting job offer. Its mentioned in norms that employer shall explain all details to candidate before hiring. 8
Thus, it becomes the responsibility of HRM department of Merrill lynch to explain all terms of agreement before appointing an employee. This is make it easy for both employer and employee to work properly as per the agreement. Health and safety Act 1974:It is most extrusive act which sets ground rules for working habitat of organisations. Specific sectors like construction or chemical industry are more bound to such acts since, working environments there consist higher rate of risk. This law gives local authorities, power to introspect and hand over required changes to which company is obligated to follow. Hence Merrill lynch need to maintain a safe and healthy work environment. This also help in increasing the work efficiency of employee. Discrimination (Equality act 2010):It protects members of all organisation from getting discriminated either direct or indirect because of appearance, religion, disability, age and many more. The key provision is to protect employees from unfair treatment and practises. Merrill lynch has adopted strict laws and regulation to prevent all types of description and hence itsHRMis providing bestworking environment to motivateitsemployees(ReesGand Smith,2017). The team of human resource management at Merrill lynch firm is quite shaken up and overloadedafter Brexit conspiracy. According to this, UK is leaving European union. The Brexit downfall has made it difficult to maintain adequate requirements ofemployeesas the employees from Europe and other migrates are not allowed to work in UK as freely as they are doing before this conspiracy. Hence, it becoming a little difficult for HRM department to mange the proper supply and demand of employees. But continuous efforts are made by Merrill Lynch to overcome this situation. The impact of this is that HRM is now taking more care before employing an individual and also focusing on birth place or citizenship of applicants. TASK 4 Application of HRM practices in work – related context HRM practices includes different activities performed in an organisation to manage people like hiring and firing process, training and development and also includes salary and other benefits administration. It is the responsibility of HRM department to select the most appropriate individual for the organisation. This can be done throughadopting a proper and systematic process for recruitment and selection of an employee. More importance is put on this process as 9
itisthefirststepthroughwhichanewemployeeentersanorganisation(Renzand Herman,2016). So, keeping check on recruitment and selection can ensure the quality of manpower to a great extent. This can be done through providing a proper job description and using interview process for final selection of employee providing a deeper look in skills and talent of an individuals. Job specification document :Itis a written document providing a detailed description of qualification, skills, knowledge and experience required in an individuals to apply for the job. This job specification can be advertise through print media or any other media to reach the suitable candidate. Job description helps in eliminating under qualified applicants by providing a base for comparison of minimum qualification. Thus helps in reducing the cost of organisation needed to conduct further process on these under qualified applicants (Renz and Herman,2016). For easily understanding the application of HRM practices in a work -related context a job specification document with expected interview questions is provided here. A specimen of job specification document and interview questions are provided for a HR Business Manager. Job Specification Job Details Designation : HR Business manager Firm : Merrill lynch Age limit : 25-35 years Nationality : UK Job Profile:Dealing with Managerial activities Description of Role and responsibilities : Responsible for recruitment or hiring process. Providing proper training to employees timely performance monitoring Establishing proper co ordination in all departments Maintaining good working conditions Providing proper motivation 10
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Developing team spirit in employees Ensuring timely achievement of organisational goal Experience: at least 1+ year in management sector for supervising workforce Education and knowledge : MBA in human resource management Ability to maintain proper working environment Effective and impressive communication skills Knowledge of recruitment and selection process Ability to manage the workforce properly Leadership skills to motivate the manpower Expected questions for interview : Q1) Tell me about yourself ? Q2) what strategy will you adopt for getting best results from your workforce ? Q3) What can be the qualifications and skills that a HR manger must have ? Q4) According to you which is the most important responsibility of a HR manager? Q5) what do you know about recruitment and selection process ? This proper job specification and interview process will help in getting the most qualified individual meeting all the requirements of that particular job. This ensures quality of manpower and employ most talented and skilled employee who will definitely contribute in a positive way for development of organisation. CONCLUSION From the above assignment, it can be summarised that various functions of HRM are there and it is very essential that every function should be well implemented at workplace so company can manage the actions and decision of its workforce. Different approaches of recruitment and selection are there that could be use by company to hire talented individual to perform a specific job role at workplace. There are different HRM policies like performance managementand monitoringeffectiveuse ofwhichleadstoincreaseinproductivityof 11
employees. It is very essential for manager to empower employees as this help in retain them for long time period and also increase the productivity of enterprise. Effective implementation of HRM practices offer various benefits to both employers and employees working at company and also ensure effective completion of business activities. 12