Human Resource Management

Job Analysis

What is Job Analysis?

Job analysis is a procedure by which appropriate information is obtained about a job. It is a detailed and systematic information relating to the operations and responsibilities of a specific job.

A Job analysis determines the skills, knowledge, abilities, and responsibilities required for the workers to perform different tasks effectively which is a important part of human resource management.

Information Provided by Job Analysis

Job Identification:

Provide the information about title of the job including its code number.

Valuable characteristics of a job:

Location of the job, physical setting of the job, supervision, union jurisdiction, risks and inconvenience.

Materials and equipment a worker uses:

Metals, plastics, grains, yarns, milling machines, punch presses and micrometer etc.

Procedure to perform a job:

Nature of work like lifting, handling, cleaning, washing, feeding, removing, drilling, driving, setting-up, and many others.

Required personal attributes:

Experience, skills, training, apprenticeship, physical strength, mental capabilities, and social skills.

Job relationship:

Experience required, opportunities for advancement & development, pattern of promotion, essential co-operation, direction, or leadership for a job.

Sources of Information for Job Analysis

Information about a job may be identified through three principal sources.

  • From the employees who perform a job.
  • From other employees such as supervisors and foremen who observe the workers doing a job and thereby acquire knowledge about it.
  • From the outside observers specially appointed to watch and observe employees performing a job. Such outsider observers are called trade job analysts.

Job Analysis Purpose

Job analysis purpose
A comprehensive job analysis program is an essential ingredient of a sound personnel management.

Organization and manpower planning:

It is helpful in organization planning to define labor needs, co-ordinate the activities of the workforce, and divides duties and responsibilities.

Recruitment and selection:

It helps in determining characteristics of person required to perform a particular job. It points out the educational qualifications, level of experience, technical, physical, emotional, and personal skills required to carry out a job in a desired manner. The objective is to fit the right person in the right place.

Wages and salary administration:

By indicating the qualification required for a specific job and the risks and hazards involved in its performance, it helps in salary and wages administration. Job analysis plays a vital role in deciding the pay packages, extra perks, benefits, fixed, and variable incentives of employees.

Employee training and management development:

IT provides the necessary information to the management about the training and development programs. It helps it to determine the training content, subject matter, training tools, and equipment to be used to conduct training and method of training.

Performance Analysis:

It is done to check if the goals and objectives of a particular job are met or not. It helps in deciding the performance standard and evaluation criteria. On this basis, the overall performance of an employee is measured and he or she appraised accordingly.

Job designing and redesigning:

The main purpose of job analysis is to streamline the human effort and to get the best possible output. It helps in designing, redesigning, enriching, evaluating, and also cutting back & adding the extra responsibilities in a particular job. It is performed  to increase the employee satisfaction while enhancing the human output.

Health and safety:

It provides an opportunity for identifying hazardous conditions and unhealthy environmental factors, so that corrective measures may be taken to minimize and avoid the possibilities of accidents.

Job Analysis Process

Job analysis process

Identification of job analysis purpose:

Every process is futile until its purpose is not identified and defined. Hence, the first step in the process of job analysis is to determine its requirements and desired output.

The Person who will conduct job analysis:

Another most important step involved in this process is to decide about the fellow to conduct it. Some companies prefer getting it done by their HR department while some hire job analysis consultants.

How to conduct process:

The next step in the job this process is to decide how it is to be conducted. A planned approach about how to carry the whole process is required to investigate a specific job.

Strategic decision making:

Further step is to decide the limitation of employee involvement in the process, the scale of details to be collected, sources from where the data is to be collected, method of data collection, processing of information, and segregation of collected data.

Training of job analyst:

Next step in this process is to train the job analyst about conducting the process and use the selected methods for the collection and recording of job data.

Preparation of job analysis process:

Next step of this process is to Communicate it within the organization. Its a duty of HR managers that they should communicate the whole thing effectively so that employees offer their full support to the job analyst. This stage involves the preparation of documents, questionnaires, interviews, and feedback forms.

Collecting job data:

Next step in the process is to collect the data about the job including educational qualifications, skills, abilities of employees required to perform the job, working conditions, job activities, reporting hierarchy, employee behavior, duties, and responsibilities involved.

Documentation, verification, and review:

Proper documentation is done to verify the authenticity of the collected data and then review it. It is the last information that is used to describe a specific job.

Developing job description and job specification:

Now its time to segregate the collected data into useful information. Job description describes the roles, activities, duties, and responsibilities of the job while job specification is the statement of educational qualification, experience, personal traits and skills required to perform the job.

Job Analysis Methods

Observation Method

In this method, a job analyzer analyses an employee and the records of all his performed and unperformed tasks, fulfilled and unfulfilled responsibilities & duties, various methods & skills used by an employee to perform various duties, employee intellectual or emotional ability to overcome the challenges and risks.

However, it seems to be one of the easiest methods to analyze a specific job but the truth is that it is the most difficult one because different people think and interpret the findings in different ways as every person has its way of observing things.

Interview Method

In this method, employees are interviewed to gain the information about their working styles, problems faced by them during job, the use of particular skills and techniques while performing their job, insecurities, and fears about their careers.

This method helps the interviewer to know what exactly an employee thinks about his or her job and responsibilities involved in it.

Questionnaire Method

Another commonly used method is getting the questionnaire filled from employees, their superiors, and managers. However, this method also suffers from personal bias.

Appropriate care should be taken while framing questions for different category of employees. If it is not done effectively, then there will be a full wastage of time, money, and human resources.

Records Methods

The personnel department maintain the records of the facts regarding the job and the jobholders. The analysts collect the information from the records maintained by the personnel department.

The complete information about work and workers cannot be obtained by this technique because certain information such as supervisor-workers relationship, accessories used, and working conditions are not mentioned in that records.

Critical Incident Method

In  this method job holders are asked to describe the incidents concerning the job based on past experiences. The incidents so collected are analyzed and classified according to the job areas described.

These are some common methods used in job analysis. However, there are other specialized methods such as task inventory method, job element method, competency profiling method and technical conference method etc.

But while choosing a method, HR managers need to consider time, cost, and human efforts included in conducting the particular method.

Classification of Job Analysis

types of job analysis

Job Description

Job description is a basic job related data that is useful to advertise a specific job and attract a pool of talent.

It contains information about the job title, job location, job summary, nature of the job, objectives of the job, tasks and duties to be performed, working conditions, machines, tools, and equipment used by the prospective workers and hazards involved in it.

Purpose of Job Description
  • The main purpose of the job description is to collect job-related data to advertise for a particular job. It provide assistance to attract, target, recruit, and select the right person for the right job.
  • It is done to examine the kind of  requirement to be delivered in a particular job. It define the duty and responsibilities of the employees  if they are selected for that particular job opening.
  • It provide recruiting staff a clear idea that what kind of candidate is required by a particular department or division.
  • It also explain which person will report to whom.

Job Specification

A job specification may be defined as a inscribed detail about educational qualifications required for a job, level of experience, physical, technical,  emotional, communication skills required to perform a job, responsibilities involved in a job, etc.

It also includes general physical health, mental health, intelligence, leadership quality, adaptability, flexibility, values and ethics, etc.

Purpose of Job Specification
  • Described based on the job description, job specification helps candidates to analyze whether they are eligible to apply for a particular job vacancy or not.
  • It helps the recruiting team to examine that what type and level of qualifications we actually want, qualities, and set of characteristics present in the candidates to make them eligible for the job opening.
  • Job specification provide specified information about any job including job responsibilities, required technical and physical skills, conversational ability, etc.
  • It also helps in choosing the right candidate for a particular job.

Job Design

What is Job Design?

Job design is may be defined as an attempt to build a match between job requirements and human qualities & skills. Job design is a intentional and systematic approach to structure the technical and social aspects of work to improve technical efficiency and job satisfaction.

The main objective of job design is to connect the requirements of the individual and the requirements of the organization. The needs of employees include job satisfaction in terms of interest, challenges, and achievements.

And organizational requirements and objectives refer to high productivity, technical efficiency, and quality of work. Nowadays educated and creative employees demand well-designed jobs. Therefore, increasing attempts are being made to redesign jobs to improve the quality of working life.

Conclusion

Job analysis and job design are the important parts of human resource management. Through this HR collects the information that which person is suitable for job and what are the requirements to be needed for the job.

Without job analysis human resource management can not come to know that what is the nature of the job and what are the requirements such as knowledge, skills, education, physical ability, mental stability, social background, etc. are needed for the job to achieve the organization objectives.

By Maaz Anwar, ago

Human Resource Management

Human Resource Management Introduction

What is Human Resource Management?

There are many definitions of what human resource management is or should be. But there is not even a single definition that actually can properly define what HRM exactly is.

In simple words we can say that HRM is the process of employing the people. And train them, compensating them, developing policies related to them. And developing strategies to retain them and to provide a better environment to work them effectively.

Human Resource Management Meaning

The human resource management refers to a process that consists of activities such as acquisition, development, motivation, and maintenance of human resources. HRM is also responsible for maintaining good human relations in the organization.

There is no best way and procedure to manage people. And it is very difficult task for a manager to predict how employees can be managed because managing people is not a straight forward task.

People are complex beings and have complex needs. In fact, effective personnel management very much depends on the best and effective conditions that an organization would provide to the people.

Human Resource Management Definitions by Authors

  • Scott, clothier, and Spriegel have defined HRM as that branch of management which is responsible on a staff basis for concentrating on those aspects of operations. Which are primarily concerned with the relationship of management to employees and employees to employees and with the development of the individual and the group.
  • Northcott, considers HRM as an extension of general management. And it promotes and stimulates every employee to make his fullest contribution to the business. HRM is not something that could be separated from the basic managerial function. It is a major component of the broader managerial function.
  • French Wendell, defines “HRM as the recruitment, selection, development, utilization, compensation and motivation of human resources by the organization.
  • According to Edwin B. Flippo, “HRM is the planning, organizing, directing, and controlling of the procurement, development, resources to the end that individual and social objectives are accomplished”.

Human Resource Management Activities

  1. Job analysis and job design.
  2. Recruitment and selection of the employees.
  3. Training and development of the employees.
  4. Performance management.
  5. Compensation and benefits.
  6. Safety and wellness related to employees.
  7. Employee motivation.
  8. Organization development.
  9. Labor relations.
  10. Managerial relations.

Human Resource Management Objectives

The objectives of Personnel Management in an organization is to obtain optimum individual development, sound working relationships between employer and employee and employee and employee.

  • To ensure effective utilization of human resources.
  • To establish and maintain a sound relationship among all the members of an organization.
  • To generate the maximum development of human resources within the organization by offering opportunities for advancement to employees through training and development programs.
  • To identify and satisfy the needs of individuals by offering them various monetary and non-monetary rewards.
  • To ensure the best development of the policies for the employees of the organization who are from a variety of backgrounds in the workforce.

Human resource management Process

There are many activities through which human resource management performs its process of operation which may be as;

  • Human resource planning, i.e., determining the number and types of personnel required to fill various positions in the organization.
  • Recruitment and selection of the personnel for the various post in the organization according to the job specification.
  • Training and development of the employees for their efficient performance and growth.
  • Performance management i.e., to provide an appraisal of performance to employees and taking proper steps such as transfer from one job to another.
  • Remuneration of employees. The employees should be given adequate wages and salaries to obtain a higher standard of living and also motivate them to perform well to achieve higher productivity.
  • Motivation of employees by providing financial incentives and bonuses.
  • Social security and welfare of employees.

Human Resource Management Importance

  • It helps management to prepare, adapt, and continue the evolution of personnel programs and policies.
  • It supplies skilled workers through a scientific selection process.
  • It ensures maximum benefit out of the expenditure on training and development programs held for the employees to improve their skills to get the organizational objective more efficiently.
  • It improve and modify the skills of workers according to the changing needs of organization and environment.
  • It motivates workers and upgrade them to make them enable to accomplish the organizational goals.
  • It contributes a lot to obtain the industrial solidarity and healthy employer employee relations within the organization.
  • It helps in maintaining the sound relationship among all the managers of different departments in the organization.

Human Resource Management Functions

There are many human resource management role and human resource management responsibilities towards the organization. Some of the human resource management functions are;

Human resource management functions

Managerial Functions

The managerial function includes activities like planning, organizing, coordinating, directing, and controlling the employees. However, they are performed by all types of  managers including human resource managers.

Planning

Planning is a fundamental function of  HRM. It involves the decision taken in advance about the future work of the organization.

In this process some decision are taken about the work, such as what are the works we have to perform, the right time and right place to perform, the process how to perform that works, and who will perform that wok.

In planning, a manager research some course of action to achieve the desired objectives of the organization in future and make the planning accordingly.

A plan is a predetermined course of action to accomplish the set objectives, it specifies what and how operative personnel functions are to be performed to achieve the desired objective of the organization in the future.

Organizing

Organizing calls for grouping of personnel activities, assignments of different activities to different individuals. It is used in the sense of an enterprise or a business unit.

In an operational sense, organizing may be considered as consisting of division of work among people and coordination of their activities towards some objectives.

Directing

It is the managerial function consisting of all those activities which are concerned directly with guiding, influencing, and supervising the subordinates in their job.

Some elements of the directing function of  HRM are;

(a) Supervising the work of subordinates to ensure that their performance conforms to the plan.

(b) Maintaining discipline and rewarding effective performance.

(c) Issuing orders and instructions.

(d) Motivating the subordinate to direct their behavior in a desired pattern.

Co-ordination

It is concerned with harmonious and unified action directed towards common objectives. Communication with each other is very important and effective for the organization.

It ensures that all the employees perform their work more efficiently with the optimum utilization of resources and with happy working environment in the organization.

Controlling

It is a function of management which measures and corrects the performance of subordinates to make sure that the organizational objectives and plans made to achieve them are accomplished.

Control thus consists in knowing the extent to which actions conform with plans adopted and instructions issued so that errors and deviations are reported and appropriate corrective action taken.

Operative Functions

Operative functions of human resource management

Procurement

Procurement is the process of recruiting the expected number of employees with the desired qualification and experience which is required for an organization to achieve its objectives.

In fact, it is mainly concerned with hiring the right people, in the right place, at the right time. It is concerned with the obtaining of the proper kind and number of personnel necessary to accomplish necessary organizational goals.

Development

Development is a process of activities performed such as training, seminars, skill development program, group discussion, and education etc in order to increase the efficiency and skills of the workers.

Therefore through development, the skills and efficiency of the employees are improved and these results in the better job performance which is necessary for the organization.

Development function will be influenced by numerous factors like the induction of new machines, promotions, and transfers.

Compensation

This function can be defined as the adequate and equitable remuneration of personnel for their contributions to the organisation objectives. Compensation remains one of the basic functions of personnel management.

A proper wage system takes into consideration several factors subjects like job evaluation, wage policies, wage system, and wage incentive schemes.

Integration

It can be defined as an attempt to effect a reasonable reconciliation of individual and organizational interests. So, functions of procurement, development and compensation must be followed by integration. The function of integration relates to the problem of communication, informal organization, and trade unions.

Maintenance

Maintenance refers to sustaining and improving the conditions that have been established. This would thus include the above functions. However, it must be pointed out that it would be necessary to take care of the physical and mental well being of the employees.

To fulfill this objective, it is important that research must continue to every direction so that the function of maintenance is performed effectively. Maintaining aims at maintaining good working conditions for the employees. It includes the preparation and implementation of health schemes, safety systems etc.

Conclusion

Therefore, the role of HRM is very important in an organization. Personnel management is the key to the whole organization and it is related to all various activities of the management occurred in all the departments such as marketing, production, and finance, etc.

And, Human resource management concept involves a system to be followed in a business firm to recruit, select, hire, train, develop, and optimum utilization of human assets. Therefore, proper coordination of human efforts, effective utilization of human and other material resources is necessary.

By Maaz Anwar, ago