Bsbhrm602 Manage Human Resources Strategic Assessment Answer

1.2 Undertake additional environmental analysis to identify emerging practices and trends that may impact on human resource management in the organisation

1.3 Identify future labour needs, skill requirements and options for sourcing labour supply

1.4 Consider new technology and its impact on job roles and job design

1.5 Review recent and potential changes to industrial and legal requirements.

Answers:

1. What is human resource strategic planning? What may the objectives and targets of the plan relate to?

Human resource strategic planning is an extremely important aspect for a business and a key job for the human resource management. The Human resource strategic planning is the process through which the human resource department of an organisation understands the human resource needs of the organisation to achieve the future goals and objectives for an organisation. The human resource planning serves as the basic link with the overall strategic plan of the organisation. It is extremely important for an organisation to have efficient and skilled workers to meet their long term objectives and goals and that happens with effective workforce planning. The strategic planning that is done by the human resource management is to mainly focus on meeting the manpower needs of the organisation (Jackson, Schuler & Werner, 2011). The HR strategic plan helps to focus on workforce related objectives.

It could be said that the main objective of the HR plan is to understand the basic human resource needs of the organisation which would help to get suitable, efficient and skilled worker for the organisation. From the financial point of view the strategic plan helps the organisation to understand the cost involved in the overall process of getting suitable workforce for a project, hence it is important for predict the cost of recruitment and selection and even for the training process. Hence to conclude it could be said that the main objective that goes into HR planning is to prepare for recruitment and selection, training, pay and reward, career development planning of the candidates, performance appraisal system and management et cetera (Snell & Bohlander, 2010).

2. In order to identify emerging practices and trends, you may need to undertake environmental analysis. How can you do this? What is involved in the process?

In order to make the right kind of HR decisions it is extremely important for the HR to implement a strong environmental analysis which would help to understand the external environment of the organisation which would help the HR department to make decisions in terms of workforce effectively. It is important for the HR to implement environmental analysis to have proper association with the overall strategic plan of the organisation. The environmental analysis is extremely important to understand the emerging trends in HR like changing employment legislations, changing pattern of the workforce, labor market trends and economic trends in the market et cetera. To conduct an effective analysis of the external environment of an organisation the PESTEL Analysis is an extremely effective tool. The PESTEL stands for political, economic, social, technological and legal aspects.

Applying PESTEL will help the HR management to understand number of aspects related to these PESTEL factors. The PESTEL analysis is a systematic process of environmental analysis and could be done with the help of a team which is operating for the organisation and they will be responsible to gather suitable data from the external environment, identifying and applying suitable source of information, effective strategic options and analysing the findings of the study is extremely important steps which are involved in the study (Stone, 2013).

3. Give examples of the different options for sourcing labor supply

There are various options for sourcing labor supply. It is important for the HR management team to identify and use the best possible labor sourcing method. There is range of labor sourcing supply processes which could be implemented by the HR team of an organisation. The conventional approaches to labor sourcing are job classified, online recruitment, and web recruitments. On the other hand the organisation could avail different processes like hiring casual workers which is a cost effective method and companies don’t have to provide permanent positions to the candidates. Casual workers could be hired when there is a need and could be hired on a temporary basis. Hiring new graduates and trainees is another way of fulfilling HR needs of the organisation. They are enthusiastic and effective for the organisation.  Outsourcing is another cost effective way of sourcing labor supply (Mello, 2011). This means giving away the contract to hire people for the organisational operation to another company and is considered a cost effective method. Getting off shore workers from foreign countries are effective to reduce costs.

4. When considering the impact of new technology, what should you think about?

Technology is an extremely important aspect for an organisation and hence it is extremely important for the HR management to consider the impact of technology on the business especially on the workers and their job roles. When considering the impact of technology on the organisation the HR department should think how technology will work upon

• The work that employees are allotted
• The workforce strength that is required for a particular job
• The working strategy and procedure
• The important knowledge and skills needed for a particular job (Belcourt & McBey, 2010).

These aspects are extremely important as it will help the HR to understand a number of things like the change in the technology of machineries and the skills needed to handle them, the possible training which is important run the process. It is important to also consider the location of the job being done as digital technology or cloud based technology is extremely important to help employees to work from different regions. Hence overall it could be said that the above discussed aspects need to be taken into account while considering the impact of technology (Snell & Bohlander, 2010).

5. You should be aware of recent and potential changes to industrial and legal requirements. Give two examples of changes that you are aware of.

There have been number of changes in the industrial and legal requirements under which an organisation has to work now. As an HR employee it is important to learn these changes effectively which would help to implement them in the work and carry out the HR functions effectively in the organisation. Workplace bullying is one of the common legal aspect which has been revised to provide better and stronger protection to people subjected to bullying at the workplace. It is extremely important to note that workplace bullying is a legislation which has undergone change and this allows the organisation especially the HR to operate effectively.

On the other hand the Shared Parental leave is also another key legislation which has been recently included and made changes to provide both male and females equal opportunity to share their parental responsibilities. Hence it could be said that these key legislations changes are common and hence effectively known by the HR employees and this will help to improve the operation of the HR department in different organisations (Lengnick-Hall et al., 2009).

6. When consulting with relevant managers, what methods can be used? What should you inform them about?

To get the best possible result of the HR strategic planning it is extremely important to consult with the relevant managers. Consulting with the relevant managers is a key task for an HR manager and communicating with them largely depends on the size and the geographic reach of the company. For a bigger multinational company communicating with the managers might only happen remotely or through cloud based communication with a chosen sample management populace whereas in smaller organisations communicating with the managers is possible. There are various methods through which consultation with the relevant managers could take place.  The methods are:

• Meeting sessions where managers and HR team comes together to communicate about the basic human resource need.  This kind of meetings is mostly face to face and helps to understand the varying HR needs of the managers (Daley, 2012).
• Presentations are also effective as it helps to communicate the main aims and objectives of the HR plan.
• Questionnaire is another method of consulting with the managers that helps to get specific idea and finally
• Cloud based or teleconferences which are latest addition to the communication methods and help to consult with managers even in distant geographic locations.

The main focus of this consultation with managers lies in the fact that the HR department will have to inform them about what are movements that HRM is making in terms of recruiting workforce, what are the key information that they are looking for from the managers and how the HR is going to capitalise on the information received and by what time (Armstrong, 2011).

7. What are human resource philosophies and values?

The Human Resource philosophies are mainly focused on consolidating the strengths of the organisation and bring it together to focus on developing an excellent environment to work on. The HR philosophies not only focus on relying on the basic HR functions but it is focused on having an effective and suitable leadership style in the upper management which could be emulated by the mid level and lower level management to keep the intensity intact. Being open in the leadership style is one of the key aspects of HR philosophy as it helps to engage all the employees operating in the organisation and allows creating value from their activities. Through an open and participating leadership style the values are mainly determined by the upper management and are accordingly passed on down the order to establish an excellent work environment. Hence it is important to mention that the main focus of the HR is engagement of the people through suitable values created through effective participative leadership style (Chen & Huang, 2009).

8. What should the objectives and targets of your plan set out? What will this enable?

The objectives and targets of the HR plan relates to a number of activities which are carried out by the HRM of an organisation. These objectives and targets help the organisation to meet its workforce needs as well as the other relevant needs to achieve their long terms goals and objectives. The targets and objectives developed in the plan are mainly set to improve the equality and opportunity and diversity in the workforce, to improve the overall human resource information system, improving the overall training and development part of the organisation, having a strong communication to enhance the industrial relation system, better job analysis and design that will help to reach potential candidates. It is also the target of the HR to focus on performance management and recruitment and selection, understanding and fixing effective remuneration, professional development and retention targets (Ulrich, Brockbank & Johnson, 2009). Focusing on these targets and objectives helps the HR to allocate budgets effectively and also helps the HRM to emphasise and prioritise on certain tasks which helps to complete the job effectively. This also enables the HR to effectively interact with the employees operating in HR and measure the success of the job.

9. Give two examples of the different options for the provisions of human resource services

There are different options for the provision of human resources services. The two examples of provisions for human resource services are external provision by a consultant or a contractor and outsourcing. The external provision process is an extremely important method of providing HR services. It is extremely important to mention that external provision by contractors is cost effective method of human resource service provision and the external consultants and contractors could take a huge responsibility of doing range of HR activities effectively. This provides effective flexibility to the parent company and work on their key activities. On the other hand Outsourcing is a common option for companies especially small scale companies to improve their overall focus on HR functions through outsourcing. This is the process of contracting a particular job to another company effectively allowing the company to reduce their cost on HR functions and also complete their job effectively (Collings & Wood, 2009).

10. What may technology be used to support?

Technology is an important aspect for the HRM and there are number of tasks which are supported by technology. Technology is an integral part of business nowadays and in this scenario there are number of tasks which are smoothly done with the help of technology by the HRM. The common payroll administration is done with the help of technology, technology is largely involved with training and development, management of employee records effectively in computer system helps to improve performance management and interactions with the managers (DeCenzo, Robbins & Verhulst, 2010).

11. What are the key ingredients of a strategic HR Plan?

A strategic plan contains different key and relevant HR components. It is extremely important for the HR managers and employees to understand the key ingredients that go on to make a strategic HR plan. The key ingredients which are involved in strategic plan are budget, objectives, timeframe and priorities set. The budget is focused on analysing the financial mechanism involved in the objectives of the plan. The plan also sets key priorities like recruitment and training, timeframe mainly indicate at what rate the work will be done to complete the job within stipulated time period (Jackson, Schuler & Jiang, 2014).

12. when developing a risk management plan, what should you ask yourself?

Risk management has to be there for an HR manager in whatever he or she does and hence it is extremely important to make sure risk management plan is prepared. While preparing risk management plan it is important to ask about what could possibly happen in an event organised by the HRM, the probability of success or failure in the job for instance probability of meeting the workforce needs or failing to do it. The impact of the job done whether positive or negative, and finally what are the key processes of reducing the negative impact of the job done (Boselie, 2010).

13.  In order to see that the plan is implemented, you will need to work with others. Who may these be?

In order to see the plan is properly implemented one will need to work with other like the HR executives, the line managers, upper management, employee unions and groups, consultants and contractors and suppliers. These people are extremely important people for the job and hence their collaboration is needed (Williams, 2009).

14.  Why should you monitor and review the plan? What questions will you need to answer in order to this?

Monitoring and reviewing the plan is extremely important as it helps to understand the key loopholes in the plan and what are the possible gaps that needs to be addressed by the HRM to get better results from the plan. It is extremely important for the HRM to address certain questions with the monitoring of the plan and hence the key questions that need to be answered are:

• Whether the actions been completed as per the plan or not
• If not, why?
• Whether the plan and the activities have adhered to the budget?
• What are key actions which have been identified?
• What are the barriers in fulfilling the plan?
• What is the consequence or outcome of the implementation of the plan?

15.  Give two examples of changes in circumstances that may result in your plan needing to be adapted

There may be different circumstances in which the HR plan needs to be adapted and for that it is extremely important for the HRM to understand the different situations under which change might have to be adapted. The change in the strategic direction of the organisation is one such scenario where the plan might have to be adapted due to the change in the objectives and aims of the organisation. Another scenario where HR plan needs to change if there is a sudden change in the legislation and industry requirements where the HR might need to adjust and adapt to scenario (Uysal, 2014).

16.  What does an evaluation of performance enable you to do?

Evaluation of the performance largely helps to improve the performance, identify the shortcomings and try to work on them to improve the performance of the HRM and also personal performance. Evaluation of performance helps to improve communication and interactions with the managers and improves employee engagement effectively (Mello, 2011).

References

Armstrong, M. (2011). Armstrong's handbook of strategic human resource management. Kogan Page Publishers.

Belcourt, M., & McBey, K. J. (2010). Strategic human resources planning. Nelson Education.

Boselie, P. (2010). Strategic human resource management: A balanced approach. Tata McGraw-Hill Education.

Chen, C. J., & Huang, J. W. (2009). Strategic human resource practices and innovation performance—The mediating role of knowledge management capacity. Journal of business research, 62(1), 104-114.

Collings, D. G., & Wood, G. (Eds.). (2009). Human resource management: A critical approach. Routledge.

Daley, D. M. (2012). Strategic human resource management. Public Personnel Management, 120-125.

DeCenzo, D. A., Robbins, S. P., & Verhulst, S. L. (2010). Fundamentals of human resource management. John Wiley.

Jackson, S. E., Schuler, R. S., & Jiang, K. (2014). An aspirational framework for strategic human resource management. The Academy of Management Annals, 8(1), 1-56.

Jackson, S., Schuler, R., & Werner, S. (2011). Managing human resources. Cengage Learning.

Lengnick-Hall, M. L., Lengnick-Hall, C. A., Andrade, L. S., & Drake, B. (2009). Strategic human resource management: The evolution of the field. Human resource management review, 19(2), 64-85.

Mello, J. A. (2011). Strategic management of human resources. South-Western/Cengage Learning.

Snell, S., & Bohlander, G. W. (2010). Principles of human resource management. South-Western Cengage Learning.

Stone, R. J. (2013). Managing human resources. John Wiley and Sons.

Ulrich, D., Brockbank, W., & Johnson, D. (2009). The role of strategy architect in the strategic HR organization. People and Strategy, 32(1), 24.

Uysal, G. (2014). Taylor, HRM, strategic HRM with jobs, employee performance, business performance relationship: HR governance through 100 years.

Williams, H. (2009). Job analysis and HR planning.