Purpose and Function of Human Resource Management

This document discusses the purpose and function of Human Resource Management (HRM) in organizations. It explains the role of HRM in hiring, training, motivating, compensating, promoting, and firing employees. It also explores the strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to recruitment and selection. The document further highlights the benefits of using online job sites and provides interview questions for a team leader role. Additionally, it discusses the development opportunities available to employees and the practice of reward management. The effectiveness of HRM practices in terms of organizational profits and productivity is evaluated. The document concludes with the importance of employee relations and the impact of employment legislation on HRM decision making.

Human Resource
Management

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
A. Purpose and function of Human Resource Management........................................................1
B). Critical evaluation of Strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to recruitment and
selection.......................................................................................................................................2
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................4
A) Person specification for team leader role...............................................................................4
B) Creating advert........................................................................................................................7
C) Benefits of using online jobsite..............................................................................................7
D) Interview questions.................................................................................................................7
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................8
A) development opportunities available to employees................................................................8
b) Reward management practice.................................................................................................8
C) Evaluation of the effectiveness rewards and development opportunities in terms of
organisational profits and productivity........................................................................................9
TASK 4..........................................................................................................................................10
A). Importance of employee relations in respect to influencing HRM decision making..........10
b). Key elements of employment legislation and its impact on HRM decision making...........12
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................12
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................14

INTRODUCTION
Human resource management refers to the function and department of the organization
which is basically dealing with the people who are working for the achievement of the
organizational goals. It helps organization to hire and retain the employees in a such way so that
company can gain competitive advantage. In short, Human resource management refers to the
process of managing the employees in the organization. That management of employees involves
hiring, training, motivating, compensating, promoting and firing of the employees (Noe and
et.al., 2017). B&Q is the most popular leading home improvement and garden retailer. It was
established in the year 1969. Recently company has around 295 stores across the world and also
there are 27000 employees are working.
Present report will highlight the purpose and functions of human resource management,
strengths and weaknesses of the different recruitment & selection approaches, benefits of HRM
practices and effectiveness of the HRM practices in the context of the organization. It will
demonstrate the importance of employee relations, key elements of the employment legislation
& their impact on the decision making of the HRM and various application of HRM practices in
a work related context.
TASK 1
A. Purpose and function of Human Resource Management
Human resource management refers to the term that include training and development,
recruitment and selection, performance management and staffing in an organization. Workforce
planning and resourcing include assessment of current and future employees in the organization
and planning for bringing human capital in the organization as per the requirement. The main
purpose of HRM is to manage and coordinate all activities that is performed in the company. It
also helps in achieving objective of B&Q Firm (Jayasinghe, 2016). They are responsible for
satisfying needs and demands of employees so that they will be able to work properly. Another
purpose of HRM is to enhance communication between employees so that they will be able to
grow fastly in the company and that also lead to increase in its productivity. It is providing
training to employees for enhancement of skills and knowledge according to changes that
occurred in B&Q Firm. Performance of employees are measured by taking feedback for other
employees in the company that help in future growth.
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Functions of HRM
Planning:- This is the most important function that will be performed by HR manager in the
company. In this strategic planning is done for growth and bring more opportunities in business.
If proper planning is being done then it becomes easy to achieve objective of B&Q Firm.
Organizing:- It is another function that help in organizing all task that is performed in an
organization. Task is provided to each and every employee based on its qualification and skills
so that it will be able to complete it on time (Papa and et. al., 2018). A proper guideline is being
provided for completing a particular task that bring effectiveness and efficiency.
Recruitment:- It is the process of hiring a candidate for the company that will be able to meet
requirements of it. In this qualified candidate is selected by interviewer for achieving
organizational goals. In case of internal recruitment promotion method is used by B&Q Firm and
through advertising it is doing external recruitment.
Training and development:- In this training is provided to enhance skills and knowledge of an
employee that will be able to perform different task in the company. This help in understanding
different perspective of job role and responsibilities for the future.
Therefore, these functions helps in increasing productivity as well as efficiency of
employee in the company.
Hard and Soft HRM approaches
Hard approach of HRM is to treat employees as they are like machinery and company is
treating them like they are doing anything as machinery can does. Through this cost effective is
taken into consideration that help in making decision for the company.
Soft approach is that treatment of employees as they are resource for company and
providing competitive advantage to company.
B). Critical evaluation of Strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to recruitment and
selection
Recruitment is the process of hiring the best candidate that will be suitable for business in
the future. It helps in bringing competitive advantage for business that enhance different
perspective in the future. Selection means selecting the best employees
Different approaches to recruitment
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Internal Recruitment:- It is the process of picking right candidate that is suitable for the
position vacant in business. Promotion method is being used by the company for recruiting new
employees into the company.
Strength of Promotion
 This help in increasing morale and retention in B&Q Firm as in this candidate is selected
within company. If employees morale is good then it will be beneficial for company as its
productivity will increase and employees remain within company for longer duration.
 In this internal employee is recruited for particular post so operations are continued in
business and provide effectiveness in work it is familiar with work culture of the
company (Hitt, Xu and Carnes, 2016).
 It helps in reducing paperwork as there is no need to change documents of an existing
employee only necessary documents that can be updated.
 In this employee is already familiar with rules and regulation so it will become easy for
retaining in the company for longer term.
Weakness of promotion
 As employee is selected itself from company so there a barrier occur of getting new ideas
into business that will not lead to growth in business.
 In this there is lack of diversity as employees are not come from different backgrounds
that not bring more opportunities for the future.
 New ideas cannot come into business as old employee is there that do not have new ideas
so that will become barrier for the employee to work in the B&Q.
External Recruitment:- This is the process of hiring candidate outside from the company that is
qualified based on job position provided to them. Advertising method is used for recruiting
people in the company.
Strength of advertising
 It is providing chance to pool of applicants that can apply for the available job position in
the company and through this right candidate can be selected for certain position in
business.
 It provides an opportunity to freshers that help in gaining competitive advantage for the
company (Binder, 2016).
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 Fresh talent is selected that help in motivating other employees of B&Q and produce
productive result while bringing more opportunity in the future course of action.
Selection method
Interview method:- This process means interaction between people in which questions is being
asked from candidate by interviewer for selection of the best candidate for the B&Q.
Strength
 Relation is maintained between interviewer and interviewee that creates mutual
understanding between them.
 Information that is provided by candidate is real that will be helpful for the company.
 Less cost is incurred while conducting an interview.
Weakness
 It is not necessary that suitable candidate is being selected as written test is more
important than taking interview.
 It is time consuming as it depends on interviewer that what time it takes to ask questions
from interviewee.
From these approaches it can be evaluated that external approach is better than internal
approach as in external hiring there are more applicants that are available for job position and
company have chances to select the best candidate for B&Q Firm. This help in more growth and
opportunities for the future (Zhong, Wayne and Liden, 2016). As on one hand recruitment
enhance hiring the best candidate that help in meeting out objective of the company. In selection
method suitable person is being selected for refilling position in the company.
Strength of internal recruitment is it helps in increasing retention of employees as by
giving them compensation of doing effective work in the company. For example: In B&Q Firm
based on performance of employees incentives will be provided to them that help in completing
its work on time.
TASK 2
A) Person specification for team leader role
JOB SPECIFICATION – Job specification refers to the document which contains the roles and
responsibilities of the employee related to the particular job role. It also involves the
qualification of the employee which is demand-able by the company for the job role. It helps
candidate to understand the specific job role easily (Bratton and Gold, 2017).
4

JOB INTERVIEW – Job interview refers to the conversation between candidates and employer
representative related to the job. Its main purpose is to decide whether the candidates should
hire or not for the organisation (Wilton, 2016). There are various types of job interview such
as situational type interview and behavioral type interview etc.
PERSON SPECIFICATION – Person Specification refers to the document which describe the
details of qualification, skills and roles & responsibilities required by the company. These all
qualification, skills and roles & responsibilities must be posses by the candidates which will
be carry out the job role. It is considered to be the base for the recruitment process of the
organisation. It is considered to be similar of job specification but it is more specific and
descriptive in nature rather than job specification (DeCenzo, Robbins and Verhulst, 2016).
Job Specification of customer service team leader
Job Title customer service team leader
Reports to Customer service Head
Roles & Responsibilities  Provide training and development opportunities to the
employees
 Maintain a good relationship between employees and
employers
 Keeping records of consumer complains
 Resolving complains on immediate bases
 Lead team
Qualification MBA
MBA in Management / MA in Human Resource Management
Person Specification for customer service team leader
Title of the job Team leader
Date: 05/08/2019
Qualification required Essential Desirable Met
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Degree in B.com
MBA Yes
Yes
Need of Experience
2 years of experience in the
same field
Yes
Personal characteristics &
conduct
Technical Skills
Communication Skills
Teamwork Skills
communication Skills
Time Management Skills
Self-Motivational Skills
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Roles and Responsibilities
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Management of employees
Maintaining a good
relationship with customers
and another staffs of the
company
Enhance customer satisfaction
Minimizing customer
complains
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
B) Creating advert
Job customer service team leader
Experience 2 years in relevant field
Skills Communication, technical, leading and
management skill
Salary 25000-30000
Location London
C) Benefits of using online jobsite
B&Q can get benefit by giving advertisement on its online webpage. This is cost effective
method and always help business in making contact with maximum number of candidates. By
giving ads on online site firm can reach to mass audience and can hire the most deserving
applicant in business unit. B&Q needs a good person who is able to handle customer complains
hence there is need to make interaction with many people, but it is not always possible to review
skills of every person hence by giving advertisement on its webpage it can scrutinise the person
and can select the right person in business unit.
D) Interview questions
Question 1 – How team leader of customer service will help organization to gain competitive
advantage ?
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Question 2 – Why employment legislation are considered to be an important part of the team
leader ?
Question 3 – How will you solve the conflict which is arisen between employee and consumer?
Question 4 – If any employee is going to resign, what is your procedure in that case ?
Question 5 – What is the role of team leader in training and development of the employees ?
TASK 3
A) development opportunities available to employees
HRM practices is being conducted into business for enhancement of employees and bring
efficiency and effective in doing work in business.
Training and Development refers to the process of providing an opportunity to the
employees of the organisation to gain required skills, knowledge and capabilities in order to
carry out the job role within the given roles and responsibilities. Development help in identifying
areas where there is need of proper development in an employee. It help in promoting growth for
the future and innovating new ideas and concepts in B&Q Firm.
Through this practice there is increase in job satisfaction among employees. As it help in
developing skills and knowledge so that they can able to complete work effectively and
efficiently. It also helps in increasing motivation by providing them compensation of doing its
work. For employer also it will be beneficial for B&Q Firm as if employees are skilled then they
are doing more work and through this its productivity will increase. Effective learning helps
employee in more growth in business that lead to bring more opportunities towards it (Hornstein,
2015).
Employees can get promotions. They have opportunities to get more salaries and also to
get extra incentives. This may help them in fulfilling their family and personal needs in
significant manner. Employees can work at managerial post in the future if they show their
capabilities in the firm. This can improve their living standards to great extent (Srivastava and
Dhar, 2016)..
b) Reward management practice
Reward Management refers to the planning and implementation of strategies and policies
related to the reward which is given to the employees for the purpose of motivating them and
improvement in their performance in order to enhance the value of the organisation.
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It is being provided to employees for doing effective work in the company that help in
providing different perspective to employees. Reward is being given to those who are doing
effective work in the company for future course of action. There are different perspective that
will be taken into account for providing them rewards on doing good work in the company. For
employer, it is beneficial as employees are working effective and provide growth to company as
well as earning more profit through its work. If reward is provided to employees of B&Q Firm
they are doing effective work and give their best in completing work of the company. There are
various segments that play different role in getting rewards into business (Shuck and et. al.,
2016). By introducing new ideas into business that provide more growth and opportunities in
business. People can get incentives, extra pay for extra work and attractive pay scale in the firm
for their hard efforts. Staff members of B&Q company always get motivated by getting
recognition in front of all employees in business unit.
Company also provides flexible working arrangement as reward to its workers. Flexible
working means an option given by the organisation to the employees in order to maintain the
work – life balance properly so that employees can be satisfied with their both personal and
professional life and improve its job efficiencies.
For employees, it is beneficial as they can come and go at anytime and completing their
work on time. As they are having more control on time schedule so they come accordingly and
go back after completion. Stress of employees will be reduce as they are open to come and go
anytime. For employers, due to flexible timing employee retention will increase as employees
are satisfied with their working environment and hence help in improving productivity of
employees in the company. Therefore, flexibility is important practice that every company have
to apply in its business that provide more growth in the future
C) Evaluation of the effectiveness rewards and development opportunities in terms of
organisational profits and productivity
There are various HRM practices which is being adopted by the B&Q Firm. These
practices help firm to gain profit and productivity. The effectiveness of these HRM practices are
as follows -
Due to training and development opportunities provided by the organisation, employees
are getting benefits from these training and development programs as they are getting
opportunities to acquired the required skills, knowledge and capabilities which improve their
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work efficiency, and they are able to complete their tasks on time. Overall, company are able to
achieve their objectives which lead organisation to gain profitability and productivity (Cascio,
2015). For example — an employee who has qualification in finance subjects, must have the
knowledge about how to prepare financial statements on the Microsoft Excel. For that company
has to provide them training so that employee can use Excel in preparation of financial
statements & doesn't make any mistakes.
Due to flexible working option practice adopted by the firm, employees are able to
maintain a proper balance between their professional and personal life which lead them to be
happy and satisfied with their both life. This lead employees to able to focus on their work and
are able to manage the work properly, within time bound and without any errors. This lead
employees to achieve their target and improve the productivity. Overall organisation is able to
improve their employee satisfaction and work quality which result as improvement in
productivity, profitability and efficiency of the firm (Bratton and Gold, 2017). For example — a
female employee who have 2 children. In order to prepare them for school, she gets late for her
office. In case, if she has flexible working option, so she will be more happy to do her both
personal and professional work which make her satisfied with office as well as life..
Due to adoption of reward management practice by the firm, Company are able to
motivate their employees for the better performance. This lead employees to become responsible
for their performance and they are becoming focused for their work. This lead to improvement in
the employees' efficiency for their target which are achievable by them on time (DeCenzo,
Robbins and Verhulst, 2016). It lead to improvement in the organizational profit and productivity
as well as employees' productivity too (Noe and et.al., 2015). For example — if an employee is
able to achieve its sales targets, company will give commission, bonus etc. in the form of reward.
This will make that employees more happy, satisfied and motivated. It results in more
improvement in the performance.
TASK 4
A). Importance of employee relations in respect to influencing HRM decision making
Employee Relations
Employee Relations refers to the efforts which is made by the company and employers in
order to manage and maintain the good relationships between them and employees. It can be
measure in two terms — Good employee relations and Bad employee relations. The term
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employee relations is also known as Industrial Relations too (Sparrow, Brewster and Chung,
2016).
Importance of Employee Relations in B&Q Firm
There are various reasons behind the importance of employee relations in the context of
the organisation. There are various strategies through which company is improving and
maintaining the relationship between employees and employers of the firm. These strategies are
such as Employee Involvement Strategy, Open Communication Strategy, Employee
Entertainment Strategy and Effective Communication Strategy. The importance of employee
relations in the context of B&Q Firm are as follows -
There are various issues arise in the organisation which must be solve immediately. But
an employee or employer cannot handle that issues alone. Thus, employee relations plays an
important role in solving issues and problems in the organisation at the faster rate. In this
situation, effective communication strategy and open communication strategy can be adopted.
Employee relations plays an important role in building good working environment as due
to good relationship between both of them, they do communicate with each other effectively,
they do wok properly and coordinately. Along with that tough tasks become easy. This lead them
to complete their target (Brewster and et.al., 2016). In this situation, employee involvement
strategy, open communication strategy and employee entertainment strategy can be adopted.
Impact of Employee Relations on HRM decision making of B&Q Firm
There are various employee relations strategies which affect the decision making of
Company's HRM. These strategies are as follows -
Employee involvement strategy – In this strategy, Employer of the organisation has to involve
their employees in meetings, decision making process and planning process. It will lead
employees to feel that they are an important part of the organisation. It will improve the
relationship between employees and employers (Human resource management (HRM), 2019).
Adoption of this strategy will make the decision making process fast.
Communication Strategy – In this strategy, Employer and employees will talk and interact with
each other informal manner which will improve their understanding. This will make them
comfortable with each other, which is beneficial for the good employee relationship. Adoption of
this strategy will affect the delegation of work in which decision making process is involved
(Stewart and Brown, 2019).
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b). Key elements of employment legislation and its impact on HRM decision making
Employment Legislation and its related Elements
Employment legislation refers to the process of enacting laws and acts in the context of
employers and employees working under the organisation. There are various elements which is
related to the employment legislation (Reiche and et.al., 2016). These elements are such as –
Equality Act, Health and Safety Act and Data Protection Act etc.
Impact of Elements of Employment Legislation on HRM decision making of B&Q Firm
Equality Act 2010 — According to this act, any staffs of the company can't do discriminate
between any of its employees at any aspects of the business whether it is related to the hiring or
promoting or paying salary or firing of the employees in the organization. Firm and Employee of
HR department can't do discriminate between their employees on the basis of such characteristics
which are as follows — Age, Disability, Gender, Race, Religion, Pregnancy, Marriage, Sex and
Sex Orientation etc. They have to give their employees equal opportunities who are working at
the same post in the company (Wilton, 2016).
Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 – According to this act, Employers and company has
to taken care of their employees and working environment in the organization. Along with that,
they are required to provide their employees training regarding the safety tools & techniques and
their way of usage. They (company and employees of human resource department) are
responsible for providing personal protective equipment (PPE) to their employees and workers in
order to reduce the risks which can hamper the health of the employees (Noe and et.al., 2017).
Data Protection Act 2018 – According to this act, Company and HR Employees both have to
make sure that their client's financial and personal details are safe and secure. They have to
ensure the safety of their system so that security of data can be maintaining. There system should
be regularly maintained and up-gradate. Also, Company has to take decisions regarding the
training of employees in order to make them understand the security of data and how to secure
them in their system without any kinds of errors (Cascio, 2015).
CONCLUSION
From the above study, it has been summarized that Human resource management is one
of the most important part of the firm. It helps organization to gain talented and required man
power which is beneficial for the company to gain competitive advantage. Due to various
functions of human resource department, Company are able to fulfil the proper human resource
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procedure. There are various approaches through which company is able to hire and select the
required employees for their firm. Along with these approaches, company adopts various
practices which is very helpful in the context of the organization in terms of profitability and
productivity as it improve the employees' efficiencies and productivity too. Employment
legislation plays an important part in the organization's HRM as it is enacted to protect the
employees and give them rights against misconduct by the employers and company. Also,
legislation plays an important role in policy making which is as essential aspect of the enterprise.
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REFERENCES
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Management, Binder Ready Version. John Wiley & Sons.
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management is now a necessity. International Journal of Project Management.33(2).
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