HR Report: Developing Individuals, Teams and Organisations (M&S)

This report examines the critical aspects of human resource (HR) development within an organization, focusing on the knowledge, skills, and behaviors required by HR professionals. It includes a personal skills audit and a professional development plan for an HR officer, highlighting the differences between organizational and individual learning, as well as training and development. The report emphasizes the need for continuous learning and professional development to sustain business performance, exploring how high-performance work practices (HPW) contribute to employee engagement and competitive advantage. Furthermore, it analyzes various performance management approaches, using Marks and Spencer (M&S) as an example to illustrate how these strategies support high performance, culture, and commitment. The report provides a comprehensive overview of HR development, offering insights into key concepts and practical applications within the context of a large retail organization.

DEVELOPING
INDIVIDUAL, TEAMS
AND ORGANISATIONS

TABLE OF CONTENT
INTRODUCTION......................................................................................................................3
LO1............................................................................................................................................3
P1 Knowledge, Skills And Behaviours (KSB) That Are Required By HR Professionals
Across The Department..........................................................................................................3
LO2............................................................................................................................................4
P2a) Completed personal skills audit for an employee: Jane Cambridge to identify training
and development needs considering the knowledge, skills and behaviours in task...............4
P2 b) Professional development plan for Jane Cambridge in her HR Officer role................5
P3 Differences between organisational and individual learning; training and development.5
P4 Need for continuous learning and how professional development will sustain the
business performance.............................................................................................................6
Section 2.....................................................................................................................................7
P5 Contribution of HPW in employee engagement and competitive advantage...................7
P6 Performance Management Approaches and their use.......................................................8
CONCLUSION........................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES.........................................................................................................................10

INTRODUCTION
This report will lay emphasis on appropriate knowledge, skills and behaviour that are
required by Human resource department of a large organization, personal skills audit to
identify training and development that are needed by an employee, professional development
plan for an employee in HR office, difference between organizational and individual learning
and difference between training and development, need for continuous learning and
professional development to drive sustainable business performance, understanding of how
HPW contributes to employee engagement and competitive advantage within a specific
organisational situation, different approaches to performance management using Marks and
Spencer as an example and showing how they support high performance and culture and
commitment. All these points will be explained with the help of Marks and Spencer as an
example. Marks and Spencer is UK’s one of the largest retailer business organization.
LO1
P1 Knowledge, Skills And Behaviours (KSB) That Are Required By HR
Professionals Across The Department
In today’s world human resource is evolving with much greater speed as technology and
business. Human resource knowledge requires knowledge, sets of skills and various behavioural traits.
 HR professionals need to have knowledge about the human resource information system they
are using.
 They also need to have knowledge about the project management software they are using.
 They also need to have basic knowledge about human resources.
Following are the skill sets required buy a HR professional.
 Human Resource Knowledge: In todays world candidates are more knowledgeable then
before. So, the HR professionals should be more knowledgeable and be prepared for all these
candidates with their own industry experience(Singh, 2018). Knowledge of HR professionals
in their area of expertise is really important and is needed.
 A commitment to ongoing learning of HR: In todays world business landscape is really
complex and is always in a state of progress. HR field is very dynamic and needs self-
motivation to understand and process it. To grow in the job, reception of new ideas is really
important doesn’t matter where they really come from. Professional who keep on learning are
well positioned throughout in the industry.
 Communication skills: The main function of an HR is to have communication between
employee and an employer. They can’t ne successful if they cannot communicate clearly. To
efficiently communicate any information both written and oral skills are required. The main
aspect of this communication is to resolve conflicts between employer and employee or
between two employees.
 Critical thinking skill: It is a very desired trait which is needed in an HR professional. They
are frequently required to balance situation which are very complex and think out of the box.
 An ethical approach for human resource: Nowadays every HR professional faces ethical
challenges for everything weather it is about employee’s personal information managing or
protecting organization’s reputation. Adopting a unilateral or steady ethics commitment will
help to safeguard the company or organization and also attract top talents.

 Human resource Organizational skills: Human resource management is a jumbled act. So,
if a HR professional wants to remain ahead and complete things, they would like to do they
need to be more organized.
There are many behavioural traits that every HR professional need, such as:
 Curious: As the rate of change in business is changing rapidly, So a HR professional need to
adequately respond in time for smooth running of an organization. A HR professional should
act proactively, should have a curious mind set, should set a vision to move the organization
forward and think creatively keeping in mind about procedures and policies.
 Decisive thinker: HR professionals are often in a situation to take tough people decisions and
if they don’t do it in a efficient way, correctly and in a structured manner then their purpose
suffer. Being a decisive thinker is a key to good HR.
 Skilled influencer: Role of HR has shifted to role of a solution focused person and this
requirement is becoming more and more important. They need to be skilled influencer and
need to influence employees’ decisions in favour of the organization.
 Personally credible: To development, build and deliver professionalism combination of both
HR and commercial expertise is important which brings value to stakeholders, organization
and peers. Effectiveness in a HR comes from credibility, gaining respect and by showing
professionalism at its highest.
 Collaborative: Change, development, diversity and learning are all main factors for an HR
professional. These are achieved when collaboration of policy making and practise is
considered.
 Driven to deliver: Resourcefulness, demonstration and purpose to deliver excellent results to
an organization are the most important behavioural traits for an HR professional.
 Courage to challenge: When HR professional have courage in their behaviour and when they
are not afraid to challenge then that makes them sound credible and are at their height point.
 Role model:HR professionals should act with impartiality, integrity, independence, balancing
personal, legal, organizational matters, in short lead by an example or should behave like a
role model.
LO2
P2a) Completed personal skills audit for an employee: Jane Cambridgeto
identify training and development needs considering the knowledge, skills and
behaviours in task
It is basically a process to measure and record skills of a group or an individual. This process
is done in an organization to identify skills and knowledge required by an organization and knowledge
and skills that an organization already has.
This analysis conducted by Jane Cambridge has three key stages to analysis skill audit, they
are:
 Determine skill required: To determine what skills are required, organization need to
identify all the future and current skills required for the job(Haraldsdottir and et.al., 2018).
The end result of this is a skill matrix with related definitions. These definitions are then
allotted to different levels of job like basic, intermediate and complex.
 Audit actual skills: Main skill audit involves both self and skill audit. Results are then
collected into a reporting document that includes qualitative reports, statistical graphs and
recommendations.

 Determine development needs and plan for training or restructuring:Once all the
information is collected then an analysis of result is done and is used for development,
training and other HR interventions. All the recommendations are then discusses and then an
agreed action plan is implemented.
P2 b) Professional development plan for Jane Cambridge in her HR Officer role.
Skills Improvement
Areas
Action for
development
Timescale Evidence
Communicatio
n
Lack of
command in
other languages
Taking
communication
classes and
enhancing
interaction with
other employees
3 months Maintain
relationship
with other
employees and
customers
Professional
knowledge
In depth
knowledge of
all expertise
area
Use all the sources
to gain required
knowledge
3 months Providing
training to other
employees
Time
management
Failing in
achieving set
time frame
Prior scheduling,
planning, allocating
resources.
2 months Setting targets
and time bound
goals
Planning Execution of
ideas should be
proper
Need of clients
should be known
and follow-up
procedure should
be
known(Perry,2017).
2 months Planning
projects
efficiently
Decision
making
Lacking in
analysing and
making quick
decisions
Observing and
consulting with
higher authorities.
3 months Participating
and
contributing in
projectplanning
and discussions
P3 Differences between organisational and individual learning; training and
development
Organizational learning and individual learning
Organizational learning Individual learning
It is based on individual learning. When an
employee learns and develop weather by
training or individually organization learn.
Learning is self-directed. Individual can learn
itself also and at work by training etc also.
Organization learns through their
employees(Clark and Mayer., 2016).
It is learned through interaction, working,
searching, activities etc employee learn.
Both employees and organization learns and
benefits from it.
Not compulsory that all employees will learn
and benefit from it
Organization can learn without an individual but
not independent of all employees.
Individuals are independent of organization.
Provide ongoing development, learning to its Individuals may or may not develop skills

employees. useful in future for them.
Training and development
Training Development
Employees get to learn, develop skills,
competency and knowledge according to job
requirement.
Educational process which helps employees to
grow overall.
It is a short-term process It is a long-term process
Trainings are mostly given for specified job
position(McCleskey, 2014).
Development mostly puts emphasis on a
successful professional carrier to be build.
Trainers are the source of motivation Individuals or employees are themselves source
of motivation.
Objects are well defined and specific and mostly
to improve performance of employees.
Objectives are broader and cover all skills and
different types of knowledge and are mostly for
employees to get prepared for the future.
It is basically a design initiated by the
organization or company and taught by experts
and tutors i.e. many numbers of individuals are
involved.
In development only, an individual is involved
and does all the work and learn.
Aim of training is particularly job oriented While aim of development is conceptual and for
general knowledge.
P4 Need for continuous learning and how professional development will sustain the
business performance.
Learning is a continuous process it takes place at every stage of life but it takes time
as well as patience. Through learning knowledge and skills are acquired instructions or by a
study which leads to the behavioural modifications and also increase in the experience. It is
very important that continuous learning take place within the organisation. It will help M&S
to remain competitive which is essential in the global competitive world(Nolan and Garavan.,
2016). More the employees of M&S learn more they will earn. Continuous learning will
spark new ideas and innovations which M&S can use in its business operations.
For an effective learning process M&S should implement learning theories which
includes four stages such as
1. Concrete experience: in this stage employees are given the new experience or even
introduced to past experience this stage will set the basics of learning.
2. Reflective Observation: in this stage of learning an employee will gain the new
experience what is its impact on the employee, its importance to the employee and what are
the inconsistencies what they experience and what they have understood(Deakin and et.al.,
).
3. Abstract Conceptualisation: in this stage a trainer make the assessment for the need of
any new ideas or modifications in the existing learning’s.
4. Active Experimentation: in this stage learner will apply his or her learnings to the real
world and sees what the results of their learnings.

All this stage of continuous learningwill benefit the employees of M&S increasing the
speed of employees, it will help them adapting the changes, it will improve their performance
in current job, it will develop the organisation culture etc. Continuous learning will expand
the skill sets of employees and will professionally face the changes which take place at any
stage of life.
Professional Development is the process of earning and maintaining the credentials of
professionalism like achieving the targets, taking the opportunities, hard work etc. There is a
need of professional development in M&S as it will help in the retention of employees which
will directly improving and sustaining the performance of the business(Waddell and et.al.,
2016. ). If the employees are professionally developed it will provide the opportunities for
other staff members to learn from them. Due to professional development employees are
able to achieve their targets easily which will improve their leads in future. During
professional development an employees become knowledgeable about its profession, about
technology, change in policies etc which helps in the increase in the performance of the
business.Professionally developed employees achieve the efficiency for the goal settings and
also provideguidance is achieving these goals and objective for the company. Professional
development will not only improve the performance of current job but will also prepare them
for the future jobs to be done.
Thus both learning and professional development is of great need to M&S it will not
only help in improving the current performance of the employees but will also prepare them
for the advancements. It will increase the experience of employees and develop them
accordingly. All these benefits will not only bring the competitive advantage from its
competitors but also will help in sustaining the business performance.
Section 2
P5 Contribution of HPW in employee engagement and competitive advantage
High performance working means a kind of working process which allows an
organisation and its employees in achieving high level of performance. HPW creates an
environment in the organisation where employees have the greater responsibilities and
greater involvements. In today’s competitive markets companies find it difficult to sustain its
business performance or to remain at the top in spite of providing the high value added
products and services. But with the help of HPW helps the companies to gain the competitive
advantage over its rivalries.Thus HPW plays an important role in M&S.
There are various elements of HPW that exists in M&S which has resulted in the
high performance culture of the organisation but of its key elements are describes
below:
a) Organisational Structure: M&S has a flat organisational structure, in this structure there
is a simple levels of management that exists between the administrative and the employees of
M&S. With the help of this structure M&S encourages it employees to part in its decision
making processes.

b) Organisational Goals: M&S main goal is to achieve the competitive advantage and hold
the competitive position within the market for this purpose they plan new strategies and
approaches like increasing the market share, high sales volume, improvement in its quality
standards and becoming the world’s leading retailer.
c) Information System: Information system is the centre for providing the real time
information in the present competitive word. Information system of M&S has helped in
strategic planning to gain the competitive advantage(Landsberg., 2015.). IS provides ways to
manage the inventory at its best. IS has maximizes the technological standards of M&S.
d) Reward Systems: the reward system that is followed by M&S is “Spotlighting”. In this a
bronze, silver and gold cards are given to the employee’s exceptional service. Which have
increased the employee’s performance and satisfaction level as well.
e) Training and Development: training and development is very important, through
training programmes employees can achieve skills and knowledge about a tasks which will
increase their performance within the organisation and through developmental programs it
makes the employees achieve the knowledge as well as over all development within the
organisation. Both of these programs will increase the overall performance of the
organisation.
HPW will have the great outcomes on the M&S like it will make the job interesting
for the employees, it will enhance the employees satisfaction, low absenteeism, it will
increase the sales, improves the productivity, increase in the knowledge of the employees, it
will result in the higher profits and will ultimately will improve the overall business
performance.
The conditions that will contribute HPW in the employee engagement and gaining the
competitive advantage in M&S is when the organisation is facing the high level of
competition in the market and it has to its improve its performance(Kools and Stoll., 2016). A
company sets its goals and objectives which are to be achieved in a particular period of times
it will result in the employee engagement as employees will get committed towards the task
in order to achieve the goal which are set by the company after achieving the goal it will help
the company in gaining the competitive advantage over others.
P6 Performance Management Approaches and their use.
Performance Management is a systematic process through which overall performance
of employees as well as the organisation is improved. It helps in bringing the successful
results to the organisation through improved employees performance through teams or as a
individual.
There are various approaches of performance management but M&S have moved
from the traditional approaches to the modern approaches of performance management. This
new approaches have encouraged the employees of M&S to work as a team in achieving the
goals , create and follow the plan for the growth and development.
These approaches of performance management which are used by M&S are:

a) Defined Goals: It is the first step of performance management i.e setting well defined
goals. This can be done by setting a individual goals or a corporate goals and aiding them
with a corporate strategy. On setting goals there should be collaboration between employees
and the manager. Major function of goal setting process is that there should be a “SMART”
frame for achieving goals(Ghobadi., 2015). For example , if a company has set a goal for
increasing the sale volume up to 20% in a month, company have to frames the strategies,
employees needed with special skills and experience, provide special training and high
motivation level etc, it will enhance the business performance and also will makes employees
get committed to achieve this goal.
b) Progress on Goals: Managers have to be aware about the progress for achieving these
goals. Manager needs to check whether there is a need of resources or coaching or any
guidance which decrease the chances of errors. For example if managers think employees are
performing low, he motivates them or acknowledges them rewards it will get employees
engaged to work committed.
c) Appraisals: This process includes providing the feedback and recognition to the
employees. Its most important part is to provide feedback. For example it provides the
feedback about the employees performance, what they learned, need for improvements etc it
will develop the loyalty to the company and also improves the performance culture within the
company.
d) Compensation: It is the best way to improve the performance of the employees and get
them committed to work. For example a successful strategy of compensation for employees
performance will align them towards the goals, continue to improve their performance and
make the committed and brings employees satisfaction.

CONCLUSION
It is concluded from the report that the human resource plays an important role in any
business and HR is evolving and improving its skills sets in order to face the competition. In this
report difference between the individual learning and organisation learning and their impact on the
organisation of M&S is discussed. This report also discusses about the need for training and
development of employees in the organisation. This report also highlights what is the need of
continuous learning and developments and how does it lead to the employee engagement and achieve
the competitive advantage. Report also highlights various approaches of performance management
and how the performance culture is improved and also how to make the employees committed to their
work.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals:
Singh, P.K., 2018. Knowledge strategy, sharing behaviours+ and performance: Reviewing a
knowledge-oriented approach. Management Research Review. 41(3). pp.395-411.
Haraldsdottir and et.al., 2018. Registration, access and use of personal knowledge in
organizations. International Journal of Information Management. 40. pp.8-16.
Perry, M., 2017. Personal Professional Development Plans. Canadian Journal of Medical
Laboratory Science. 79(1). p.8.
Clark, R.C. and Mayer, R.E., 2016. E-learning and the science of instruction: Proven
guidelines for consumers and designers of multimedia learning. John Wiley & Sons.
McCleskey, J.A., 2014. Situational, transformational, and transactional leadership and
leadership development. Journal of Business Studies Quarterly. 5(4). p.117.
Deakin Crick, R and et.al., 2015. Developing resilient agency in learning: The internal
structure of learning power. British Journal of Educational Studies, 63(2). pp.121-
160.
Waddell, D and et.al., 2016. Organisational change: Development and transformation.
Cengage AU.
Nolan, C. T. and Garavan, T. N., 2016. Human resource development in SMEs: a systematic
review of the literature. International Journal of Management Reviews, 18(1). pp.85-
107.
Landsberg, M., 2015. The Tao of coaching: Boost your effectiveness at work by inspiring and
developing those around you. Profile Books.
Kools, M. and Stoll, L., 2016. What makes a school a learning organisation?.
Ghobadi, S., 2015. What drives knowledge sharing in software development teams: A
literature review and classification framework. Information & Management, 52(1).
pp.82-97.