Human Resource Management Report: Strategic Planning and Analysis

This report provides a comprehensive overview of Human Resource Management (HRM), tracing its historical evolution from the early concepts of manpower to the strategic approaches employed today. It explores the contributions of key figures and significant milestones in HRM's development, highlighting the shift from traditional to strategic manpower planning. The report defines human resource planning, analyzes its impact on revolutionizing traditional manpower planning, and emphasizes its significance for organizations. It also includes a case study analysis to illustrate the benefits of strategic manpower planning on both employees and employers, ultimately showcasing how effective HRM practices contribute to building a strong and adaptable workforce. The report covers topics such as the craft system, scientific management, human relations, and human resource approaches.

Running head: HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT
Human Resource Management
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

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Executive Summary:
Human resource planning has always been identified as one the core essential function of any
organisation. However the very concept of Human Resource has a very interesting history of
evolution and its coming to practice. Thus this report will specifically highlight on this
evolving concept of Human Resource and how human resource planning today contributes
extensively in building up strong manpower base in any organization with help of certain
example from the real world of business.

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Table of Contents
Introduction:...................................................................................................................3
Discussion:.....................................................................................................................4
Defining Human Resource Planning:.........................................................................4
Historical milestones in Human Resource Management:..........................................5
Difference between traditional and strategic manpower planning:............................7
Impact of Human Resource planning on revolutionising traditional manpower
planning..................................................................................................................................8
Significance of Strategic manpower planning for organisations...............................9
Case Study Analysis:..................................................................................................9
Benefits of strategic manpower planning on employees:........................................11
Benefits of strategic manpower planning on employers and on the organisation:. .11
Conclusion:..................................................................................................................13
References:...................................................................................................................14

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Introduction:
The term “human resource” was first coined by John R.Commons, who was a
pioneering economist in his book, “The Distribution of Wealth”, published in the year 1893
(Kopczuk, 2015). Human resource generally defines the overall potentials, capabilities, skills
and abilities that the individuals of an organisation possess which are in turn continuously
sharpened, updated and tailor-made to suit the needs of the dynamic global business
environment. However researchers indicate that it was in 19th century, that the organisations
finally understood the necessity of building their human resource departments and address the
internal and external business factors in an appropriate and strategic manner (Noe,et al.
2015). It was gradually after 19th century that the business organisation understood the
importance of maintaining a sound human resource department which in turn required a
strategic planning by the organizational heads. Hence this report will specifically highlight on
how the human resource department evolved in this global business environment, how the
process became more strategic, the significance of Human Resource Planning and how it has
helped organisations to evolve and bring significant improvements in their traditional
manpower planning exercise. The report will also suggest the contribution of Human
Resource Planning towards assessing the overall human resource needs of any organisation.

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Discussion:
Defining Human Resource Planning:
According to research scholar E.W Vetter, in his research article has defined human
resource planning as “a process by which an organisation should move from its current
manpower position to its desired manpower position. Through planning, management strives
to have the right number and right kind of people at the right places at the right time, doing
things which result in both the organisation and the individual receiving maximum long-run
benefit.” (Bratton and Gold, 2017) where as Leon C.Megginson views human resource
planning as an integration approach directed towards panning personal functions of the
employees to help them perform better in an organisation and on the other hand equip the
organisation to better understand the needs of the employee as well as the goals of the
business entity (Rao, Narayana and Murty, 2014.). Another research scholar Dale S.Beach
has defined human resource planning as the process of determining and ensuring that the
organisations do have enough quality human resource to adequately meet the organisations
target as well as professional goals of the employees (Jeesha and Bunk). Critically analysing
all the above mentioned definition, the process of human resource planning can be
categorised as:
 The whole planning process must be objective and hold certain specific goals
 The planning process must be totally directed towards analysing the human
resource needs of its organisation
 Human resource planning aims to achieve the right balance between the
demand and supply of manpower (Rafiei, et al. 2016)

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 Human resource planning is a multi-dimensional activity which must take into
concern the organisational needs as well as personal needs of the employees
and create the right balance
Thus from the above presented discussion, it can be well understood why human
resource planning is referred as an indispensable part of human resource management. Next
comes manpower planning is also an integral component of human resource planning
process. To understand the impact of human resource planning on manpower planning of any
organisation, it is best to first understand the basic traditional model of manpower planning
and then analyse on how it has evolved with time.
Historical milestones in Human Resource Management:
The term human resource management specifically came in early 1980’s, (Brueller,
Carmeli and Markman, 2018) before that in the medieval era the production of goods and
services was primarily the job of skilled artisans and craftsmen who owned tools and
instruments, produced goods and made it sell in the market. There was no presence of an
employer- employee relation. However there were few effluent craftsmen who also employed
certain hired labour but the relationship was very informal rather person. In case of non-
compliance of orders or instructions these hired labours where often treated brutally with
physical tortures and the work environment was often rigid and toxic. Thus the organisations
back then followed the policy of persona administration rather than human resource
management. However the industrial revolution which had began in Western Europe and
USA in the year 1980’s (Analoui, 2018.) that specifically emphasized on the needs of
employing machinery and mechanical energy in the production process along with human
labour brought a revolution in the face of cottage industry setup. Thus with the gradual setup
of factory and its workers, the manpower started organising their own groups based on
common interest to strengthen their association and put forth their legitimate demand related

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to child labour, or poor working conditions , or increase in pay and much more. These where
known as trade unions who helped each worker obtain their basic rights and ensure their
physical and mental wellbeing.
Gradually by 20th century it was observed that varied factory owners had begun
adopting a more humanistic and healthy approach towards maintaining their workforce and
helping the workers to achieve better. Better monetary compensations, safe working
environment, reduced work hours where certain core measures adopted by the employees to
sustain their employees (Newell and Scarbrough, 2017). However it was in 1920’s that
finally the management researchers did an in depth study on the human factors at work and
the core elements which are generally the responsible to affect their behaviour. Researchers
like Hugo Munsterberg in his book “Psychology and Industrial Efficiency”, has used multiple
qualitative research tools like interviewing, personal testing, attitude measurement and
learning to ascertain the core psychological believes and patterns of behaviour of the
workforce (Koppes, 2014.).
1924 was termed as the “Industrial Psychological Era”, where the core attention was
given on varied subjects like the : social factors operating in a workplace, study of workforce
groups and their influence on each other, the preferable style of leadership and its impact, and
the necessity of building a sound organisational communication structure (Schneider, et al.
2017). A group of researchers from the Harvard Business School in USA began their research
to gradually focus on the perspective that employers of every organisation must ensure to
meet the basic physical and mental wellbeing needs of all their employees in order to sustain
productivity and retain their workforce. Thus gradually as the employers started maintaining
their workforce it was observed that large number of workers started working together to
meet the desired production goals (Baum, Frese and Baron, 2014). Hence, their rose the need

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to maintain this complete workforce to ensure their wellbeing and productivity. This was
exactly when the need of building a human relations department was felt.
However with gradually increase in the size of production, the work force the
complexities relating to human resource management also escalate which finally made the
employers, the owners the recruiters understand the need of building a sound human resource
management team who would necessarily look into the pooling of human talents, maintaining
the workforce, training and developing them and most importantly keeping a right balance
between their demands and the organisational goals (Leon, 2014.).
Thus the evolution of Human Resource Management has witnessed four basic stages
which might be termed as: the craft system, followed by the scientific management system,
then the human relations approach and finally the human resource approach (Kramar, 2014).
The very final stage of HRM process suggest how the human resource or the manpower
system has become strategic to respond efficiently to the needs of the organisation as well as
how organizations have revolutionised in their outlook towards maintain the workforce and
ensuring proper training and development of the same.
Difference between traditional and strategic manpower planning:
The traditional manpower planning was not actively responsive to the needs and
wants of the employees who are regarded as the basic manpower. Moreover the manpower
planning was not backed by any contingency plan that is the business originations did not
have enough manpower security during any crisis. The strategies of man power planning
where not responsive to the needs of constant training and development of the individuals
which are very much required for the organisations to grow and sustain in the market
(Brewster, 2017). The traditional system of manpower management was basically built of the
simple principle of keeping the staffs and employee happy and satisfied, however there was

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no strategic implementation of human resource management principles which are specifically
meant for manpower development and aims at achieving maximum results and altogether
ensures optimum utilisation of resources (Bamberger, Biron and Meshoulam, 2014). To best
understand the difference between traditional manpower planning and contemporary strategic
human resource planning it is better to cite an example. For instance if company is under
extreme production pressure because of a sudden increase in demand of a certain product, the
company with a traditional manpower planning would not have an inbuilt manpower force to
sustain the labour demand and in the lieu of current situation either make the existing
manpower force to work overtime or hire labour from outside which might altogether
increase the production cost. However this is not the case with strategic manpower planning
which always has a plan B if plan A fails.
Impact of Human Resource planning on revolutionising traditional manpower planning
The introduction of strategic manpower planning which is again regarded as one of
the basic elements of human resource planning altogether broadened the scope and mission of
the human resource departments of organisations. Human resource planning has helped in
bringing an organized and systematic approach to the whole manpower planning process
which can be categorised as:
 Analysing the current manpower inventory of the business- this includes a
deeper understanding of the varied departments of the organisation, the
workload of each department, present manpower in each of the department
and amount of demand for manpower recruitment in each of the departments
 Assessing the future manpower forecast of the organisation- the techniques
which are commonly used the human resource planning department in
assessing the future manpower forecast trends range from workload analysis,
to workforce analysis (Fenech, Baguant and Ivanov, 2019)

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 Strategic development of progressive employment programmes- once the
human resource planning (HRP) department is ensured about the present
manpower strength and the future forecast, HRP cell is involved in designing
varied gainful employment programs and placement plans to boost the whole
recruitment process.
 Designing strategic manpower training programmes- once the manpower
is defined then begins the plan of strategically implementing expansion and
diversification plans for training the present workforce is the most equipped
manner (Cohen, 2015)
Significance of Strategic manpower planning for organisations:
The process of manpower panning stands pivotal for any organisation because
without manpower or man force an organisation cannot exist to function. Hence the overall
managerial function of any organisation which comprises of organising, planning, directing
and controlling rests upon the manpower planning process (Voegtlin and Greenwood, 2016.).
Human resource planning ensures effective management of each individual in an organisation
which altogether helps in marinating a sound staffing function and easy management of large
scale manpower for big business houses. Thus it is also bound to impact positively on the
overall productivity level of the manpower which ensures proper strategic training of the
workforce along with performance appraisals and varied other effort acknowledgements on
the part of the organisation (Jackson, Schuler and Jiang, 2014). This altogether ensures a
better employer employee relation, a positive work environment which in turn acts as the
biggest strength for maintaining a smooth, hassle free and progressive workforce structure

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Case Study Analysis:
To best understand the impact of Human Resource planning in revolutionising the manpower
management in organisations it is important to consider the working dynamics of big
corporate entities like Amazon, Microsoft and Google. There had been much news regarding
how Amazon is often rigid and ruthless towards its underperforming employees with its
much criticised “Rank and Yank system” (Kantor and Streitfeld, 2015). This has gradually
proved fatal for the company in terms of its employee retention an employee satisfaction
levels, which indeed has created a division among the raking force with an unhealthy tooth-
and-claw competition and made the employee turnover rate climb vigorously. Now to address
this situation the human resource planning team has given way to a more strategic way of
developing its underperforming manpower by designing a retaining program named “Pivot”
(Moriez, 2016). This programme is more of a performance improvement plan rather than a
mere punishable technique for the underperformers. This is exactly how human resource
planning plays a very significant role in revolutionising the traditional manpower planning
and maintenance exercise. Apart from this performance improvement initiative Amazon has
also been quite active in panning varied employee benefits and employee retention schemes
like medical health benefit plan for the employees and their families, a range of full paid
maternity and parental leave , huge employee discounts for varied products which are sold on
Amazon and most importantly their career choice programmes which are no doubt an
amazing opportunity for their manpower to strengthen their skills, engage in varied career
development programmes. The employees receive heavy discount of these innovative courses
and 95% of the tuition fees is borne by the company (Sparrow, Brewster and Chung, 2016.).
The next example can be the corporate giant Google. The human resource panning team of
this corporate entity is well known for its sound forecast of information to keep a strict check
on the overall surplus or shortage of employees and strike the right balance between the

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demand and supply of its efficient employees. The human resource planning team of Google
uses varied strategic manpower management techniques where the surplus and shortage of
employees in the production process is generally met by developing web-based software
products like Chromecast or the Google Fibre Internet (Kianto, Sáenz and Aramburu, 2017)
and cable television service. Such a smart and strategic approach has no doubt can be sighted
as a strong example of how Google has revolutionised its manpower panning through
strategic use of human resource planning techniques. Another corporate firm which has set
high standards in terms of its human resource planning and manpower management is
Microsoft. At Microsoft, Human Resource transformation generally means having a larger
impact of each of its employees through simple efforts like automating travel letters, to use of
LUIS-based bots (Tung, 2016.) which altogether would imbibe the essence of building
modern human resource planning experience in the work culture
Benefits of strategic manpower planning on employees:
The strategic manpower panning process has no doubted aided the employees or the
professionals who are seeking for a new job or a job change. The employees are better
involved in the decision making process of the firm and are more equipped with the
necessary skills and training which are provided by these global firms. The professionals who
are beginners in the world of employment are also better aware of the available opportunities
in any organisation and most importantly what the organisation is looking for. It has added a
level of transparency in the whole recruitment, selection and training process where the
aspirants can understand what are their career objective, what are the goals of the
organisations they are applying for and how much does their ability and career plan match
with the existing opportunity and organisational goals of the company they are applying for
(Sandhya and Kumar, 2014). Hence it can be easily understood that the whole process of