HRM Report: Functions, Recruitment, and Practices at Merrill Lynch

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Human Resource Management (HRM) practices within Merrill Lynch, a financial services division of Bank of America. The report begins with an introduction to HRM, emphasizing its role in organizational growth and survival, and then outlines the core HRM functions, including recruitment and selection, training and development, compensation and benefits, and risk management. The report then delves into the recruitment and selection processes, comparing internal and external recruitment methods and their respective strengths and weaknesses, with a focus on the interview method for selection. Finally, the report examines the advantages of HRM practices for both employees and employers, focusing on learning and development, flexible working environments, employee performance management, and payment and reward systems, illustrating how these practices can enhance profit and productivity within an organization.

HUMAN RESOURCE
MANAGEMENT

INTRODUCTION
Human Resource Management refers to employee’s management in organization.
Companies make different policies and structure as well as motivating the employees so that
human resource can be managed effectively (Banfield, Kay and Royles 2018).
Merrill Lynch is a financial services' industry which is a division of Bank of America
and it was established on 6th January, 1914. The founder of this company was Charles E. Merrill
and it has its headquarter situated in New York, U.S. The company provides wealth as well as
investment services and it serves worldwide.
This report includes HRM functions and purpose in according to planning and resourcing in
an organization through various skills like training and developing the employees in order to
achieve the competitive advantage effectively in the organization. It also includes HRM practices
and its benefits for firm and employees. Application of recruitment will be described in the
current assignment.
TASK 1
P1 HRM functions and their purposes
HRM can be defined as essential part in contributing for long term growth and survival of
organization. HR department manages the recruiting and selecting of the best employees at
the appropriate place and also manages the remunerations as well as provides the best
facilities like transfer, placement, rewards, training and development to the employees in
order to attain the purpose of business effectively. HRM administration also assess the
problems or conflicts among employees and provide the best solutions in order to maintain
employee relations and also trains the current employees as well as new employees
regarding the policies, structure and skills. HRM motivates the employees by conducting
training programmes in order to develop their capabilities and apply to the workplace
which will result to employees retention for the long run in the organization (Berman and
et.al., 2019).
There are several functions of HRM applicable to the workforce which will help Merrill Lynch
Firm for proper planning and resourcing these are:-

 Recruitment and selection(workforce planning):- The first and foremost important
function of the HRM that will help the Merrill Lynch Firm to select the best applicant at
the right or appropriate place. It is the duty of the HR head to determine the needs of the
company and select the applicants according to the vacancies. HR manager chooses the
appropriate candidates as per the job to attain the administration objectives effectively.
 Training and development(HRD):- The another function that HRM should provide to
the current as well as to the new employees is by training and developing. In order to
motivate and to train the applicants of the Merrill Lynch Firm. HR department should
organise orientation and development programmes for training staffs regarding policies
culture and structure for performing the job at the same time set up the orientation
programme for the new applicants to get familiar with the existing employees. HR
manager should enhance employees for developing the ability and knowledge of
candidates to contribute to the administration.
 Compensation and benefits(rewards):- HR manager is liable to direct and attract the
new candidates by giving them the benefits like rewards, compensation and incentives.
In order to attract the new applicants of the Merrill Lych Firm the HR manager should
provide the best benefits like insurance benefits, incentives compensation in order to
motivate the new as well as existing employees towards the work.
 Risk management:- HR management and risk department of Merrill Lynch Firm should
manage the risk properly by assessing the risk that can be hazardous to company. HRM
should provide proper training to employees regarding the management of risk factors as
well as to protect the employees by providing extra health and safety facilities as per the
health ans safety act 1974(Bratton and Gold 2017).
P2. Recruitment and selection process strengths and weaknesses
Recruitment
It can be recognised as a process of attracting and finding the potential resources for the
purpose of filling up the vacant positions of an organisation is known as recruitment.
Recruitment is a process of determining the vacancies for the jobs and analysing the screening,
job requirements, short listing and selecting the right person for the right job. Recruitment
approaches are of two types:

Internal recruitment:
It is a process of recruiting the persons within the firm for filling the vacancies. This
method is quite easy and is being effective for Merrill Lynch as it is dealing with existing
employees and it is time and cost saving process of recruitment. Strength and weaknesses of
process:
STRENGTH WEAKNESS
 Merrill Lynch can save the expenses of
recruitment by recruiting the candidates
within the organisation(Wilton, 2016).
 Company's Employees are being
encouraged as they are being promoted
internally which encourages them to
work with more effectiveness.
 Policies and procedures of Merrill
Lynch are already known to employees
which reduces cost and time of training.
 Conflicts can be arise due to internal
recruitment among employees of
Merrill Lynch.
 Merrill Lynch have to select someone
in place of a person promoted.
 Merrill Lynch will limit the choice of
new ideas and fresh talents if internal
recruitment is being done. New ideas
helps in increasing the productivity of
Merrill Lynch.(Chelladurai and Kerwin
2018).
External recruitment:
It can be defined as a process of recruitment of proficient and well-qualified candidates
available outside the organisation to fill the vacancy of the organisation. The method used by

Merrill Lynch for recruitment is external recruitment. This method have several strengths and
weaknesses which are as follows:
STRENGTH WEAKNESS
 There is a large number of candidates
which helps the Merrill Lynch to find
appropriate candidate for the job.
 With the new people, fresh ideas are
being generated that are advantageous
to Merrill Lynch for implementation
and increasing productivity.
 Old employees can take advantage of
training and development session
which are conducted for new
employees which will help in
development of employees (Bratton
and Gold 2017).
 external recruitment is a time
consuming method which incurs huge
costs.
 Conflicts arises between existing and
new employees and existing employees
didn't get any chance of promotion.
 New employees face problem in
adapting the culture and environment of
the organisation .
Selection:
The process of selecting the best candidate for the available job is known as selection.
There are several methods of selection of employees that are psychometric testing, interview,
basic test, etc. Merrill Lynch uses interview method of selection.
Interview: A face to face communication between the questioner and interviewee which is
conducted for the purpose of identifying the skills and effectiveness of working of candidate for
hiring for the vacant job. Interview is the most popular selection method used by the companies.
Strength and weaknesses of the process:
STRENGTH WEAKNESS
 Merrill Lynch can identify whether the
(Harrison and Lock 2017)candidate is
 If a candidate is significant enough to
communicate orally but cannot practice

suitable for the appropriate job by
knowing skills and qualities of the
candidate.
 Merrill Lynch can identify whether the
candidate is able to adapt environment
and changes of the organisation.
 In a face to face interview it can be
identified that the candidate is taking
initiatives in addressing or ignoring the
questions which are being
asked(DeCenzo, Robbins and Verhulst
2016 ).
effectively in tasks, this can lead to
poor productivity.
 Interview is a process which consumes
more time and includes more expenses.
 Interview will be less effective process
if interviewer is not an expert in
identifying significant candidate for the
job.
TASK 2
P3. Advantages of HRM practices for employees and employer in Merrill Lynch
Basis Employee Employer

Learning development and
training practices
Learning is beneficial for
employees for the purpose of
development. Learning helps
the employees to grab
knowledge and understands
the policy and procedures of
organisation. Training helps in
improving working skills of
emp(Harrison and Lock
2017)loyees which help them
to achieve organisational goal.
With the help of training
employee can get working
cognition which assist the
employees to enhance their
career with personal
objectives. Training empowers
employee about his job and
work description which helps
him to work in an effective
and efficient manner that
creates positive environment
which helps in employee
development(Oke 2016).
Training and learning are
similarly beneficial for Merrill
Lynch as employees. When all
the employees are being
trained properly, that will help
in effective and efficient
working of employees which
will help Merrill Lynch in
good productivity and
profitability. Training and
development helps Merrill
Lynch in retention of
employees which reduces
employees turnover rate(Oke
2016) . As employees are
trained and develop which will
help Merrill Lynch as
employees will be loyal and
honest towards the company.
Flexible working
environment
Flexible working options is a
big advantage to employees as
flexible working time helps to
manage the time of employee
as per the requirement of
Merrill Lynch and employees
With flexible working option
engagement in the organisation
is being increased by the
employees and morale of
employees is being increased
by offering flexibility of

personal life. This helps to
motivate the employee by
rising his morale. Flexible
working timings help a
employee in working
efficiently in his comfortable
time by which there will be
less stress on the employee
which will increase the
effectiveness of workings of
the employees. Merrill Lynch
focuses on flexible working
environment.
working. Flexible working
options reduces unpunctuality
and absenteeism as employee
is able to adjust the working
time as per his comfortable
which will result in more
effective working of
employees resulting in increase
in productivity (Harrison and
Lock, 2017).
Employee performance
management and monitoring
Employee performance
management and monitoring
plays a important role in HRM
. This helps to measure
effectiveness and efficiency of
the employee by his
per(Harrison and Lock
2017)performance. This
improves the relationship
between employee and
employer with supervision of
employee and with assisting
and advising the employees
with the work (DeCenzo,
Robbins and Verhulst 2016 ).
With the help of this concept,
Merrill Lynch can determine
the strengths and weaknesses
of employees by observing
their work and performance.
Managers can train and
develop the employees where
they are lacking behind which
will help Merrill Lynch in
increasing its productivity.
Payment and reward
management
It encourages and motivates
employees to work effectively
Payment and reward
management gives a employee

and efficiently for incentives.
It gives employee satisfaction.
With the help of reward
management Merrill Lynch
can continuously encourage a
employee to work hard which
will improve the productivity
of Merrill Lynch.
satisfaction and retention. By
providing fair remunerations to
employees, the loyalty of
employees towards Merrill
Lynch will increase. Good
payment and rewards attracts
more number of candidates for
recruitment (Harrison and
Lock 2017).
P4. Role of HRM practices in increasing profit and productivity of an organization
Learning, training and development: It plays a major role in raising productivity of Merrill
Lynch. Merrill Lynch focuses on training and development of its employees. Proper training can
help the organization, employees will work with minimum mistakes which will lead to more
productivity in efficient cost directly resulting in increase in profits. Training leads to catch up
the weak points of employees and work on it, which make them work more efficient and
develops skills and knowledge of employees. Training helps in reducing the cost of production
and less consumption of time which helps Merrill Lynch to make more profits. Appropriate
training to employees will result in positive work environment of Merrill Lynch which will
increase the productivity and decrease the cost of production. Learning training with
development has helped system in increasing the effectiveness of employees. It has supported
them in keeping motivated and also helped them in achieving their objectives. This also helps in
achieving the business objectives. It will also help company in gaining more return on
investment.
Flexible working hour: Flexible working hours refers to the independent working environment
provided by the organisation to employees for giving them chance to work according to
suitability of their time. This shows the caring nature of Merrill Lynch towards employees as it is
a facility being provided to employees by Merrill Lynch. This concept leads to keep employees
motivated as this concept allow them to work according to their suitable time. This results in
reducing unpunctuality and increasing regularity at work that increases the productivity of

Merrill Lynch(Guest 2017). Flexible working hours in company will help in enhancing the
relationship between employers and employee. This has helped firm in enhancing their
productivity and operational efficiency. It has also helped in making the environment of
organization better and peaceful. This will also reduce employee turnover and will also create
employee belongingness.
Employee performance management with monitoring: Employee performance management
and monitoring is beneficial for an organisation in increasing productivity. Merrill Lynch's HRM
monitors the performance of its employees regularly, so that corrective actions could be take
place for better productivity. This makes employee work loyally and efficiently with the
organisation. This concepts help to determine the capacity and efficiency of work by observing
the employees in the Merrill Lynch. Training can be provided to the employees where they are
lacking in work, which will increase the effectiveness of work by employees. Organization can
ensure that the importance of employee contribution is being understand by them. (Oke 2016).
Payment and reward management: Payment and reward management is the most essential
thing to motivate employees. It is the best way to motivate and encourage employees so that they
work efficiently which will result in more productivity at low cost. The major objective of
reward management is to reward employees in a fair manner without implementing any bias, it
must be done in a equitable and consistent manner with the value to these employees of the
organization.
TASK 3
P5 ROLE OF EMPLOYEE RELATION IN DECISION MAKING
Relation of staff with management has very significant role in developing an effective
organisational work culture. Manager should understand the notions of the employees and the
ideas they want to share for building an strong employee management relationship in the
organisation. Merrill lynch has worked out on various strategies of employee relation
management to cope up with the factors influencing the HRM decision-making process. Figuring
out some of the strategies on Merrill Lynch has worked on :-
Negotiation

For building trust of the employees towards the firm and developing healthy relationship
with those working in the organisation Merrill Lynch has used the negotiation strategy as the
building block towards it. Two way communication has helped out Merrill Lynch in forming a
consistent and a familiar relation with the employees which influenced the employees to work
even better . In addition firm's reward policy also worked out in a positive way for the firm and
the employees. Firm is giving extra incentives for increasing their efficiency as a resultant
employees are working with full motivation and helping the firm in achieving its objectives. This
has created an efficient work culture in the organisation and has developed trust in the firm as the
employees are getting recognition as per their performance(Guest 2017).
Collective work culture
 Work Environment :Merrill Lynch is providing employees with effective and
flexible work environment for an easy going process. Work environment has a
significant role in the process of building a good employee relation as employees
are influenced by the work culture or the working environment in which the are
working. Company is giving effective focus towards this strategy so that the
employees have the direction and can develop interest in their work for the overall
growth of the organisation.
 Motivation : Motivation is one of the most effective tool through which any
organisation can boost up the efficiency of employees working in organisation.
Human resource team should get individual feedback of the working employees
to have the understanding of the exact issues faced by them, so that they are
resolved for developing the trust in the employees. Dissatisfaction from the work
would slow down the growth process. HRM should motivate the employees to
work at their aligning their motive with the firm's objective.
 Strength Identification : Merrill lynch is always working towards identifying the
key strength of the employees, so that employees can be allotted with the work
they are best at doing. A proper guidance in the specific field of the workers can
help the employees to excel in the field of their work(Harrison and Lock 2017).
 Effective Communication : Communication gap between the employees and the
management team can turn out to be very harmful for the organisation. Workforce
would not be getting the work and objectives correctly and that would again