MNG00724 - Job Analysis: A Critical Function in HRM Strategy

This essay examines the critical role of job analysis within strategic human resource management (SHRM). It defines job analysis as a process for identifying job duties, responsibilities, and required qualifications. The essay discusses criticisms of job analysis, including its complexity, potential for bias, and resource intensiveness. It highlights the importance of job analysis in matching employees to suitable roles, setting performance standards, and facilitating human resource planning. The essay concludes that job analysis is foundational to core HRM functions and essential for aligning human resource practices with organizational goals. It emphasizes that despite perceived drawbacks like time consumption and resource demands, the benefits of a well-conducted job analysis significantly outweigh the costs, leading to higher performance and efficiency.

HUMAN RESOURCE
MANAGEMENT – 712121

Introduction
Human resource management
Human resource management is a subject that aims at establishing better relations between
employers and employees, in order to maximise efficiency and performance levels of the
employees. in achieving its objectives, human resource managers rely upon a number of core
and non-core functions, such as training and development, recruitment and selection, career
development, motivation, retention and attractions, etc.
In the past few decades, the focus of business organisations has shifted from human resource
management to strategic human resource management, which aims at aligning the human
resource management practices of a company with its goals and objectives. In this report, we
will discuss whether job analysis is actually an important function under human resource
management and whether business organisations should use it more or not. To achieve this
objective, we will discuss various merits and demerits of job analysis, which will
Job analysis
Job analysis is another function under human resource management where the managers of
an organisation use different sources and techniques for data collection in order to identify
the job duties and responsibilities for a given job position along with the importance of these
duties and responsibilities (Woods & Hinton, 2017). Along with the job duties and
responsibilities for a given position, a job analysis also lists out the qualifications that are
required to be fulfilled in order to work in a particular job position.
Criticism of job analysis
Job analysis, like any other process, is not entirely accurate nor does it fully serve the purpose
at times. Job analysis is a complicated process that requires a lot of accuracy and an
experienced person to give fruitful results. The concept of job analysis has been criticised a
number of times because of some of its disadvantages. These disadvantages are discussed
below:
First of all, job analysis involves a number of methods, tools, plans and a lot of human efforts
in order to gather the required information for listing out roles and responsibilities, which

increases the complexity of the process. Further, the involvement of job analysts and
judgement method introduces a scope for biasness, which can introduce variations in the job
analysis (Jennifer French and Kristine Smith Darany and Associates, 2002). Secondly, it has
been observed that most of the times, the idea of performing job analysis is not well
supported by the management of business organisations. Job analysis can require a lot of
resources and can also be very time consuming. Further, it requires a lot of organisation wide
communication to render fruitful results (SHRM, 2017). Thus, most organisations do not
offer ample support to the process and it results in a complete failure. Thirdly, job analysts
cannot rely upon single source of information for gathering data related to a job. To get
reliable and realistic data, analysts have to consult multiple sources as a single source can
render inaccurate results that can defeat the purpose of performing a job analysis
(Managementstudyguide, n.d.).
Importance of job analysis
To conclude whether job analysis is an important function under strategic human resource
management, it is crucial for us to gain a deeper insight into the advantages that it can have
for an employee as well as for an employer.
Firstly, job analysis helps business organisations in matching its talented employees with the
positions that are best suited to their knowledge and skills. In absence of job analysis, it is
likely for an organisation to waste the expertise of its employees because of unused employee
knowledge and expertise (Doucette, n.d.). Secondly, job analysis can help business
organisations in setting out achievable and practical performance standards. Listing the roles,
responsibilities, knowledge and skills for a job position allows human resource managers to
get a clearer picture of the performance standards that can be expected from an employee. On
the other hand, it also helps employers in clearly communicating the performance
expectations with the employees (SHMA, 2013). Thirdly, job analysis is one of the most
important step towards human resource planning. In absence of job analysis, it can become
difficult for business organisations to identify human resource demand and supply patterns,
which can result in staff shortage or surplus workforce at certain point of time (Rasel, 2015).
To sum it up, defining the job duties and responsibilities along with person requirements for a
particular job position not only helps an organisation in the recruitment process but also helps
it in identifying the training and development needs, deciding compensation and benefits for

different job positions, ensuring the right job-employee fit, performance and potential
appraisals, etc., which covers up everything that a human resource manager is supposed to
do. Thus, job analysis can be considered to be the basic foundation of most of the core human
resource management functions and has a crucial role to play in the strategic management of
a company’s human resources.
Conclusion
From the above information, it can be clearly stated that the first step in the management of
human resources should be to conduct a job analysis and outline all the roles and
responsibilities that an employee is supposed to perform while working in a particular job
position. Further, the basic objective of strategic human resource management is to design
human resource management functions in such a way that they can act as a catalyst towards
the achievement of an organisation’s strategic goals and missions, which can only be done if
the organisation has an efficient job analysis performed right in the beginning.
Job analysis can have multiple benefits for business organisations but it is still not being used
by some business organisations because of the absence of required knowledge, the skills to
conduct an analysis or because of the lack of support from the seniors. A number of
organisations are also of the view that conducting a job analysis can be a time consuming
process and a burden on their resources but the benefits of a well conducted job analysis can
far outweigh the resources used in the analysis process. Furthermore, a well conducted job
analysis for a job position eliminates the need to carry out analysis again and again.
Therefore, to achieve higher performance standards and efficiency as an organisation, it is
imperative for business organisations to conduct job analysis for all the job positions that are
there in their organisational hierarchy.

References
Doucette, C., n.d. What Happens If an Organization Doesn't Conduct a Job Analysis?.
[Online] Available at: http://smallbusiness.chron.com/happens-organization-doesnt-conduct-
job-analysis-15562.html[Accessed 15 April 2018].
Jennifer French and Kristine Smith Darany and Associates, 2002. Practical Issues in
Conducting Job Analysis Studies. [Online] Available at:
http://annex.ipacweb.org/library/conf/02/french.pdf[Accessed 15 April 2018].
Managementstudyguide, n.d. Problems with Job Analysis. [Online]
Available at: https://www.managementstudyguide.com/job-analysis-problems.htm
[Accessed 15 April 2018].
Rasel, 2015. 8 Major Advantages of Job Analysis. [Online] Available at:
http://bankofinfo.com/4-advantages-of-job-analysis/[Accessed 15 April 2018].
SHMA, 2013. Importance or uses or benefits of job analysis. [Online]
Available at: http://managementation.com/importance-or-uses-or-benefits-of-job-analysis/
[Accessed 15 April 2018].
SHRM, 2017. Performing Job Analysis. [Online] Available at:
https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/tools-and-samples/toolkits/pages/
performingjobanalysis.aspx[Accessed 15 April 2018]
Woods, S. A. & Hinton, D. P., 2017. What Do People Really Do at Work? Job Analysis and
Design. 11 March.