The Human Resource Management (personnel) profession has evolved to encompass a wide range of activities that surround

Question:

The Human Resource Management (personnel) profession has evolved to encompass a wide range of activities that surround the management of people in organisations. Its relationship with the subject of organisational behaviour is similar to that between engineering and mathematics; the one is a necessary foundation for the practical activities which form the other. Most managers have to manage staff-related issues (along with budgets, operations etc.) and the HR function should be there in some form to provide the necessary professional expertise to do so effectively and ensure the organisation doesn’t find itself on the wrong end of an employment tribunal case. HRM is thus an important support activity, and as organisations grow so, in most cases, does the HR department.

Your tasks

1. Critically evaluate the extent to which an outsourced HR service might either support or undermine managers in carrying out the ‘people’ side of their work.

2. Review the position of an organisation like BT in relation to the model of HRM as a shared responsibility (Figure 13.1). To what extent does outsourcing disrupt this shared responsibility, and how?

3. The CIPD considers that HR professionals should become ‘strategic business partners’ rather than personnel administrators, and that outsourcing HR administration might be one route to achieving this aim. How do you think the trend towards creating centralised IT-based HR service centres might affect the nature of the HRM profession? Figure 13.1 The HRM function - a shared responsibility TOP MANAGEMENT Underlying philosophy and attitudes