Human Resource Management Practices

This assignment delves into the critical aspects of Human Resource Management (HRM). It examines diverse HRM practices, including recruitment and selection, workforce planning, and the impact of factors like age awareness on employee decisions. The document analyzes how these practices contribute to organizational success and addresses challenges faced in contemporary HR management.

HUMAN RESOURCE
MANAGEMENT

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
1. Explaining purpose of the HR functions, their key role and responsibilities and role of HR
in acquisition of talent for meeting business objectives..............................................................1
2. Assessing workforce planning, recruitment and selection, performance management and
reward system of Mercedes-Benz...............................................................................................3
3. Various methods of HR practices...........................................................................................5
4. Approaches and effectiveness of employee relation and employee engagement with flexible
arrangements...............................................................................................................................6
5. Key aspects of employee legislation within organisation.......................................................6
6. Evaluation of employee relation and employee legislation to meet business objective.........7
7. Application of HRM practices in work-related context..........................................................8
8. Use of technological sources in improving recruitment and selection process....................11
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................13
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................14

INTRODUCTION
Human resource management can be defined as a strategic approach of managerial
activities fort the purpose of having effective management over the human resources of the
business organisation (Noe and et. al., 2017). Mercedes Benz is a global auto-mobile
manufacturing company that was founded in 1926. The company wants to bring technological
advancement in the business for making the organisation more effective in working. The given
study provides information about various practices used by the HR of Mercedes-Benz for
enabling the company to expand its business effectively. It shows various functions and purposes
of the HR and their role in acquisition of meeting the business objective. It also shows an
evaluation of effectiveness of some key elements of the HRM and an analysis of various factors
that affects the HRM decision making. Fuhrer, the study also provides a brief information about
various work related practices that can be used by HR.
TASK 1
1. Explaining purpose of the HR functions, their key role and responsibilities and role of HR in
acquisition of talent for meeting business objectives
Human resource management
Human resource management refers to a process of management in which they perform
their managerial activity for managing the human resources of the business (Cascio, 2015). This
function of management includes management of all the activities that is concerned with the
management of all the workforce of business organisation.
Functions of management
As Mercedes-Benz wants to adopt the latest technology in the business, its HR also need
to perform various functions as to help the company in successfully adoption of the latest
technology of the purpose of manufacturing auto-mobile. The key functions to be played by the
HR are as under:
 Recruiting: HR recruits the fresh talent into the business that have knowledge about the
latest technology adopted by the company. It helps managers in attracting maximum
talent for the company from all over the world.
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 Strategy for job satisfaction:Mercedes' HR managers also makes various plans and
strategies for providing job satisfaction to employees for the purpose of retaining them
with Mercedes for long time.
 Effective training:For the purpose of getting success in adoption of the latest
technology, they also provides effective training to the existing workforce for enabling
them to adopt the changes in the business.
Key Roles and responsibilities of HR of Mercedes-Benz
Due to the technological advancement purpose, the HR of Mercedes-Benz needs to play
numerous role within the business (DeCenzo, Robbins and Verhulst, 2016). Further, the
company has also provided various responsibilities to its HR so that it could attain a sustainable
success in the expansion. The key roles and responsibilities of the HR are as under:
 The key responsibility provided by the company to its HR is to recruit the best talent in
the business that are aware about all the latest technologies of the automobile industry.
 Further, they also play a role of motivator as to motivate its workforce to adopt the
technological changes made by the company.
 They also need to show the workers that how achievement of company's objectives can
help them in achieving their personal objectives. This role can help in fulfilling their
responsibility of convincing the workforce to adopt the changes.
Significance of HR in Mercedes-Benz in acquiring talent
For the purpose of achieving the objective of successfully adoption of the latest
technology, it is a significance of HR to recruit the right person at right position in the firm.
Following significant roles are played by HR:
 HR of Mercedes-Benz make strategies so that it could be able to attract the best talent
towards the company.
 They also develop their recruitment and selection procedure in such a way so that they
can efficiently identify the skill and knowledge of the candidate before offering the job
(Chelladurai and Kerwin, 2018).
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 HR also play a role as to develop the culture of business in such a way that its workforce
can easily adopt the changes made by it.
 For the purpose of meeting the objective of the Mercedes-Benz, HR organised the overall
functions of the business by effectively distributing various roles and responsibilities
among the workforce as per the skills and knowledge.
In this order, the HR played various functions, roles and responsibilities for the purpose
of helping the company in successfully adopting the latest technology within the business
organisation.
2. Assessing workforce planning, recruitment and selection, performance management and
reward system of Mercedes-Benz
Mercedes-Benz is the top most company of UK in providing the best job satisfaction to
its employees. Currently, the company has over 3,50,000 employees worldwide. For managing
all these workforces, HR of the company need to perform various activities within the company
like:
Workforce planning
The workforce planning can be defined as a strategy of the managers in which they
develop a plan for satisfying the needs of workforce along with making the company cost
effective by having the best utilisation of the human resources of the company (What is
Workforce Planning?, 2018). For this purpose, the HR of Mercedes-Benz tries to recruit the right
person at right position. They have set standards of knowledge and skills for each person. It helps
them in having the best workforce planning in the business. In this regard, they adopts, effective
communication and personal leadership[p approaches of workforce planning.
Recruitment and selection
Recruitment and selection refers to a procedure in which the HR new employees in the
company. As the Mercedes-Benz wants to develop a technological advancement in the business,
they need to search the best talent from all over the world and also select the best recruitment and
selection procedure for each position (Recruitment and Selection: Hiring the Right Person,
2018). Selection of the best method helps them in selecting the most appropriate candidate for a
specific position. There are various methods of recruitment and selection method like:
Recruitment methods: there are generally two methods:
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 Internal recruitment: In this method, HR fills the vacant positions by recruiting the
existing employees over there through providing them promotions.
Pros Cons
It eliminates cost of recruitment and selection Company unable to recruit fresh talent.
It also fulfils a responsibility of providing
rewards.
It may attracts conflict among employees.
 External recruitment: In this method, managers of Mercedes-Benz recruits the new
employees in business through various external sources.
Pros Cons
It enables company to employ fresh talent in
company.
It enhances the cost of recruitment.
It helps in adopting the latest cultural trend in
business
It enhances the cost of providing training.
Selection method: Following are the various selection methods that can be used by Mercedes-
Benz in order to employ the best candidate:
 Group discussion: In this method, a group discussion is being conducted among various
recruited candidates. The candidate is selected on the basis of their knowledge and
confidence level.
Pros Cons
It enables managers in checking knowledge of
candidate.
This method may nit provide the best result for
making selection at each post.
It helps in determining the confidence of
candidate.
A knowledgable person may fail to present his
view due to lack of confidence
 Face to face interview: While using this method of selection, managers takes personal
interview of each recruited candidate (Timming, 2015).
Pros Cons
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It enables the business in selecting the best
candidate for the job.
It enhances the cost of company.
Managers can determine each skill of
candidate.
It is a lengthy procedure.
Development and training:
While performing this function, the HR conducts appropriate training and development
program for each worker of the company. As Mercedes-Benz wants to make a technological
advancement in the business, its HR provides personal training to each employee for updating
their knowledge as per the requirement of their job for adopting technological development in
the firm.
Performance management
Performance management is a function of the managers in which they develop a healthy
working environment within the company. They also make all the roles and responsibilities of
the person clear to each employee. In this regard, the performance management helps in
enhancing the efficiency of performance of overall business. Further, by clearly mentioning all
the goals, objectives of the company to its workforce along with their roles and responsibilities,
the managers enables the Mercedes-Benz in attaining its objectives effectively. For this
purpose \, HR of Mercedes-Benz adopts a approach as to setting goals for the employees for
making their performance plan.
Reward system
Involvement of reward system is the key function of HR of Mercedes-Benz. They
develop various strategies and plans for giving reward to the workers for their efficient
performance (Britten, Dowd and Worm, 2016). This system is important for providing self
motivation to the employees. Workers automatically starts working with their best efficiency in
order to attain the reward. For providing rewards, HR analyses the various activities and
performce of the employees and set their rewards accordingly.
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3. Various methods of HR practices
There are various HR practices that can be adopted by the HR of Mercedes-Benz for
managing their human resources. Some major methods of HR practices are as under:
Case study for HR practice methods
HR of Mercedes-Benz can adopt the Selective hiring method. In this method, they plan
their recruitment and selection process in such a way through which they select only limited
talent within the organisation
. With the help of this method, they enable to employ the best talent in the company. Although,
due to this practice, company may fail to attract maximum talent towards it.
Further, its managers can also adopt contingent compensation practice. It can be termed
as the best practice of HR. While using this practice, managers adopts a practice to pay
appropriate amount to the workers for their job. This method helps in providing a sort of mental
satisfaction to the employees.
Security practice is also a method that can be used by HR of Mercedes-Benz. In this
practice, managers frames a policy and plan through which they provide job security to each
worker. They provide them various insurance policies for themselves and their families. It helps
in providing mental satisfaction to employees. Although, mental satisfaction may not be enough
for enhancing the efficiency of workers.
In this regard, in can be analysed that there are numerous practices of HR that can be
adopted by HR of Mercedes-Benz. There are various pros and cons of each practice. Therefore,
the HR should choose the best practice for gaining the best result and help the company in
achieving its objective of attaining technological advancement.
4. Approaches and effectiveness of employee relation and employee engagement with flexible
arrangements
arrangements
Employee engagement refers to the involvement of employees in the organisation. It is an
important approach of human resource as it allow company to deliver outstanding performance
and to have an advantage of competition among other companies. Employee engagement
motivates the employees to an extent that employees achieve self satisfaction in achieving goals
of the company. They contribute their efforts and enthusiasm for the success of the organisation.
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On the other hand employee relation refers to the relationship that every employee share with its
employer and colleagues.
Approaches and effectiveness of employee engagement
Communication activities – This enable all the employees to know what is happening in the
company. It helps in building trust and loyalty and enables employee to be open to each other
about their views and suggestions. It helps in resolving mistakes.
Reward scheme- An important aspect to engage employees is that to give them rewards. When
employees get reward they get fully indulged in the work. This helps in eliminating
dissatisfaction among employees, to motivate the employees for good performance, and to avail
financial gain to the employees who performs well.
Team building activities - To have a feeling of belongingness and cooperation in the company
it is important to have team exercises to keep employee engaged in the company. It can be done
by creating small teams and groups within the company and build their bond by making them
play few games. This will help company to achieve goals in a way that will be beneficial for both
the company and the employees.
This approaches are effective in relation with flexible working arrangements as this
approaches adds value to the employees and their needs. Many employees work hard and reduce
cost of the organisation and its operations. This approaches of communication, team building and
reward scheme influence, employees to work harder and helps HR to make decisions effectively
without creating any chaos (Brewster, 2017). Through various communication mediums
employees can engage with each other and through communication approach excitement and
passion can be create among employees.
Approach and effectiveness of employee relation
Psychological approach – When employee and employer do not consider and realise
importance of each other it leads to dissatisfaction among employees, strikes, underutilisation of
resources etc. This approach says that employee relation must be managed by both the employer
and employee by talking and communicating well on important aspects of company.
Human relations approach- Each and every person is different and company must understand
that confusion and chaos between humans in the company must be eliminated. This approach
helps in understand the employees and their nature so that mutual relations can be established.
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These approaches are effective in the context to flexible work environments as it allow
human resource manager to deal with its employees and to create a special place in the minds of
employees. Both employer and employee respect each other and work towards organisational
goals. If the relationship is efficient in the company then flexible working arrangement scan be
adopted as everyone gets aware about their duty and there is less chance of confusion and
laziness among employees and it increases productivity.
In Mercedes Benz, the employees are provided with many benefits along with flexible conditions
of work where employees can easily manage their work life balance which the most important
aspect of anyone's life. With all the flexible working conditions Mercedes is able to reach where
it is today with all the technology advancements with the help of its employees who get all the
essential requirements to develop and grow. With the help and hard work of its employees doing
job and work sharing and doing shifts, Mercedes developed speed limit detection, new modified
safety system and LED headlights with high resolution. The flexible hours lead to increase in
productivity, motivation as well as morale of the employee.
5. Key aspects of employee legislation within organisation
Equality Act – The organisation must have equality among employees of the company.
The company cannot discriminate or can be bias between employees on the basis of their sex,
caste, race, age, disability, pregnancy, sexual preferences, marriage (Griffin, 2015). The
company must respect each and every employee and shall treat them equally. In Mercedes Benz,
equality is always been on top priority based on employees rights, status and opportunities
regardless of from where the person belongs. In 2017, Mercedes started a campaign on
Valentine's day on equality on various social media sites and committed itself to equality of
employees as well as people.
Employment rights Act- This act covers aspect of employee's pay, time off, internships
and training, suspension and retirement, contract of employees and company and also consists of
flexible working hours and maternity leaves for women employees. To safeguard the company
and to follow employees right act, Mercedes Benz has policies that deals with employees
termination and if any problem occurs then the contract it leads to slavery and forced labour
work. The company also ensure that no employee is getting mistreated in the company as well as
employees associated with the company (Brewster, 2017). It also provides employees with
flexible working hours and increase their productivity and decrease their work pressure.
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Data protection Act – There are a lot of workers work in company and to keep their
personal information safe is the duty of the company. From their CV to bank details and their
residence address and phone number everything shall be secured. Mercedes use advance data
protection software to keep the data of its employees safe and secure with GDPR. The process of
keeping the data safe is complete transparent to everyone (Vanhala, 2016).
These acts must be followed by company in order to make decisions. The management must
keep in mind that all employees are equal and in order to provide equality the company must not
be bias to employees who are from different race. The management even though do not like
some employee yet it will have to provide him bonuses and incentives as per the rules if the
employee performs well. The opportunities must be distributed among the employee effectively.
There must be proper leave allotted to pregnant women even if their work is pending, it ,must be
shifted upon other employee who have less burden.
6. Evaluation of employee relation and employee legislation to meet business objective
Employee relation – All the members of the company must be in touch with each other
and communicate with each other efficiently to achieve organisational goal. Workers spent more
than half of their day in the office they work in and it is more like their second home. Therefore,
to have a good relation with each other is important to increase coordination and co-operation.
Rather than making issues and complicating things, employees shall focus on adjusting and
compromising (Punia, 2015). In Mercedes Benz, the employee relation is quite efficient that is
why they could achieve the level of technological advancements from increasing safety features
to updating technology in headlights of the car because employees communicate well with
coordination and cooperation.
Advantages Disadvantages
Employee relation lead to increase in
motivation, corporation and coordination. It
creates a same vision for all employees and the
y work to achieve business goal.
It leads to favouritism and many small groups
are formed in the company which lead to
biasses and inefficiency.
When employee relation is efficient in the company it leads to efficient communication in the
organisation, also it helps the company to take decisions related to new reforms, policies and
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procedures as the information flows in the organisation and everyone understands and adapt to
the dynamics of decision.
Employee legislation – The employer and employee relationship needs to be maintained
and in order to maintain and regulate them these legislations are formed (Hennekam, 2015). This
includes a lot of factors like hiring process, retirement of employee etc. In Mercedes the policies
are clearly defined on legislation basis where an employee has fixed working hours and the
process of hiring an employee and dismissing them is according to legislation for achieving its
goals.
Advantages Disadvantages
It assures clear and specific rules for both
employee and the company that decreases
confusion and provide security to both.
It creates boundation on both the sides which
lead to rigidity and decision making gets slow.
Employee legislation can affect decision making in the terms of dismissal and retirement of
employees, If an employee has committed some mistake or did misconduct the decision making
of management gets affected but still management has to work according to the legislation and
terms mentioned in the contract.
TASK 2
7. Application of HRM practices in work-related context
Application of HR practices
For the purpose of helping Mercedes-Benz in successfully adopting the technological
advancement, the HR has to recruit the fresh talent (Britten, Dowd and Worm, 2016). This
function can help the managers in making the company to achieve its set objectives effectively.
There are numerous methods of recruitment and selection method. Company needs to
analyse all the practices and select the best method for recruiting best talent in the company.
Job description
Job title: Human resource manager
Job location: Mercedes-Benz, UK
Job summary:
 The HR would need to create healthy working environment for each employee.
 HR would need to have skill of quick decision making power.
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Reporting to: The CEO of Mercedes-Benz
Working conditions:
 Healthy working culture.
 Each employee is provided security.
Job duties:
 To manage the human resources of company
 To develop policies and plans for workers.
 To handle queries of each employee with patience.
Hazards:
 The employee may have to suffer pressure of working.
 Employee may need to work excessive over the set working hours.
Person specifications
Basis Essential Desirable
Academic knowledge MBA in HR Any other qualification which have
enhanced the management skill of
candidate.
Skills  Effective communication
skills.
 Quick Decision making
power.
 Leadership skills
 Fluent in speaking various
languages.
 Skill to handle queries.
Experience 0-2 years 2-5 years
Extra qualification  Basic knowledge of
computers.
 Valid certificate of
management skills.
 Excellent knowledge of
Excel.
 Excellent communication
skills.
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“Resume”
Name: James Pharnandis
Aims: To manage a sustainable amount of workforce of the top companies.
Academic Qualification:
 Bachelor degree in management
 Masters in HR
Extra Skills:
 Having valid certificate of computer knowledge.
 Valid certificate of good communication skills.
Qualities:
 Leadership skills
 Decision making power.
Thanks,
Regards,
James Pharnandice
Date: 12/3/19
“Resume”
Name: Jim Frankiln
Aims and objectives: To attain a good position in the corporate world.
Academic skills:
 Has acquired bachelor degree in accounts.
 MBA in HR
Extra skills
 Having knowledge about the latest computer software
 Having valid certificate of personality development course.
 Have acquired various valid certificates of management.
Interpersonal skills
 Good communication skills
 Leadership skills.
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 Patience.
 Convincing power
Thanks, regards,
Jim Frankiln
Date 13/3/2019
“Interview Questions”
Q.1 Tell me about yourself?
Q.2 What are your hobbies?
Q.3. How will you make strategies for providing job satisfaction to each employee?
Q.4 What policy will you prefer as to stay connected with each workforce?
“Job Offer letter”
Name of company: Mercedes-Benz
Name of employee: Jim Frankiln
Date: 18/3/19
Dear sir,
Congratulations. You have been selected as the HR manager of Mercedes-Benz. Yopu key
responsibilities will be to manage all the wokers and create a helathy workling environment in
the company. Following are you job details:
Job title: Human resource manager
Salary: 8,00,000 p.a.
Probation period: 2 months.
Working hours: 9 am to 6 pm
8. Use of technological sources in improving recruitment and selection process
In the technological advanced world, technology is providing help in performing the job
activities in more effective way. Just like other fields, use of the latest technology is also helping
the HR in improving their recruitment and selection methods. With the latest technology they
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can improve their method of attracting the best talent for a specific job. They can improve their
advertisement method for the purpose of making more people aware about the vacant position.
Further, by using various online sources, they can improve their selection process, they
can use video calls, telephonic source, etc. for taking interviews. It can also help the company in
becoming more cost effective.
By using various Digital platforms and social media platform, They can effectively
spread the news of need of the candidate in the company. They can also provide detailed
information about the vacant position on these social media sites.
In this regard, it can be analysed that various latest technological sources helps the HR in
improving there recruitment and selection procedure.
CONCLUSION
In this study, it was concluded that human resource management plays an important role
in a firm from updating technology to create innovations. It also showed the need of human
resource management in assessment of various process of management and without HRM
working of company is not possible. The report then showed the practices of HR and their
importance in Mercedes-Benz and what practices are implemented by the company itself for
better working environment. It then discussed how employee relation helped company to achieve
its objectives and also focused on factors of legislation and how Mercedes got affected by that.
At last it evaluated the pro and cons of employee relation and legislation in context to company
and at last criteria of Mercedes for employee selection.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Noe, R. A. and et. al., 2017. Human resource management: Gaining a competitive advantage.
New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Education.
Cascio, W. F., 2015. Managing human resources. McGraw-Hill.
DeCenzo, D. A., Robbins, S. P. and Verhulst, S. L., 2016. Fundamentals of Human Resource
Management, Binder Ready Version. John Wiley & Sons.
Chelladurai, P. and Kerwin, S., 2018. Human resource management in sport and recreation.
Human Kinetics.'
Britten, G. L., Dowd, M. and Worm, B., 2016. Changing recruitment capacity in global fish
stocks. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 113(1). pp.134-139.
Timming, A. R., 2015. Visible tattoos in the service sector: a new challenge to recruitment and
selection. Work, employment and society. 29(1). pp.60-78.
Vanhala, M. and Ritala, P., 2016. HRM practices, impersonal trust and organizational
innovativeness. Journal of Managerial Psychology. 31(1). pp.95-109.
Hennekam, S. and Herrbach, O., 2015. The influence of age-awareness versus general HRM
practices on the retirement decision of older workers. Personnel Review.44(1). pp.3-21.
Punia, M. and Sharma, B., 2015. A Comprehensive Review of Factors Influencing HRM
Practices in Manufacturing Industries. Journal of Management Engineering and
Information Technology (JMEIT). 2.
Griffin, J. J., Bryant, A. and Koerber, C. P., 2015. Corporate responsibility and employee
relations: from external pressure to action. Group & Organization Management. 40(3).
pp. 378-404.
Brewster, C., 2017. The integration of human resource management and corporate strategy.
In Policy and practice in European human resource management (pp. 22-35).
Routledge.
Online
What is Workforce Planning?. 2018. [Online] Available Through: <https://www.hrzone.com/hr-
glossary/what-is-workforce-planninghttps://www.hrzone.com/hr-glossary/what-is-
workforce-planning>
Recruitment and Selection: Hiring the Right Person .2018 [Online]. Available Through:
<https://www.shrm.org/academicinitiatives/universities/TeachingResources/
Documents/Recruitment%20and%20Selection%20IM.pdf>
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