Fundamentals of

Human Resource
Management

Gary Dessler
 Managing Human
Resources Today
Chapter 1

Copyright © 2012 Pearson Education, Inc. Publishing as Prentice Hall

When you finish studying this chapter,
you should be able to:
1. Answer the question “What is human resource
management?”
2. Explain, why “knowing HR management concepts and
techniques is important to any supervisor or manager.”
3. Explain, with examples, what is meant by “the changing
environment of human resource management.”
4. Give examples of how the HR manager’s duties today are
different from 30 years ago.
5. List, with examples, the main implications of these trends for
human resource managers.

1-3
 What is Human Resource
Management?
• Organization • Manager
v Consists of people with v Someone who is
formally assigned roles responsible for
who work together to accomplishing the
achieve its goals organization’s goals, and
who does so by
managing the efforts of
the organization’s people

1-4
 The Management Process
Planning

Controlling Organizing

Leading Staffing

Copyright © 2012 Pearson Education, Inc. Publishing as Prentice Hall

 Human Resource Management
Processes
Acquisition

Fairness Training

Human
Resource
Management
Health and Safety (HRM) Appraisal

Labor Relations Compensation

Copyright © 2012 Pearson Education, Inc. Publishing as Prentice Hall

 What is Human Resource
Management?

vHuman resource
management
∟ The process of acquiring,
training, appraising, and
compensating employees,
and of attending to their
labor relations, health and
safety, and fairness
concerns

1-7
 Human Resource Management
Practices and Policies

v Conducting job analyses

v Planning labor needs and recruiting job
candidates
v Selecting job candidates
v Orienting and training new employees
v Managing wages and salaries

1-8
 Human Resource Management
Practices and Policies (cont.)
v Providing incentives and benefits
v Appraising performance
v Communicating
v Training employees and developing
managers
v Building employee commitment

1-9
 What a Manager Should Know

v Equal opportunity, ethics, and affirmative

action
v Employee health and safety and ethical
treatment
v Grievance and labor relations

1-10
 Why is HR Management Important to
All Managers?
Personnel mistakes you don’t want to make:
v Having employees who are not performing at peak
capacity
v Hiring the wrong person for the job
v Experiencing high turnover
v Finding that employees are not doing their best
v Having your company taken to court because of
your discriminatory actions

1-11
 Why is HR Management Important to
All Managers? (cont.)
Personnel mistakes you don’t want to make:
v Having your company cited under federal
occupational safety laws for unsafe practices
v Allowing a lack of training to undermine your
department’s effectiveness
v Committing any unfair labor practices

1-12
 Why Study this Book?

v To help ensure that you get results—through

people
v Many managers have been successful
because they had the knack for hiring the
right people for the right jobs and
motivating, appraising, and developing
them.

1-13
Line Versus Staff Authority

vAuthority
∟ The right to make
decisions
∟ The right to direct the
work of others
∟ The right to give orders

1-14
 Line versus Staff Authority

v Line managers
∟ Managers who are authorized to direct the work
of subordinates and are responsible for
accomplishing the organization’s tasks
v Line managers are associated with managing
functions (like sales or production) that the
company needs to exist.

1-15
 Line versus Staff Authority

v Staff managers
∟ Assist and advise line managers in accomplishing
these goals
v Staff managers generally run departments that
are advisory or supportive, like purchasing,
human resource management, and quality
control.

1-16
 Line Managers’ HR Responsibilities

1. Placing the right person in the right job

2. Starting new employees in the organization
3. Training employees for jobs that are new to
them
4. Improving the job performance of each
employee
5. Gaining creative cooperation and developing
smooth working relationships
1-17
Line Managers’ HR Responsibilities (cont.)

6. Interpreting the company’s policies and

procedures
7. Controlling labor costs
8. Developing the abilities of each employee
9. Creating and maintaining departmental
morale
10. Protecting employees’ health and physical
conditions
1-18
 Typical Job Duties

v Recruiters
v Equal employment opportunity (EEO)
representatives or affirmative action
coordinators
v Job analysts
v Compensation managers
v Training specialists
v Labor relations specialists

1-19
 Organization Chart

1-20
Copyright © 2012 Pearson Education, Inc. Publishing as Prentice Hall
 HR in Small Business

v Small firms (e.g., those with less than 100

employees) generally can’t afford a full-time
human resource manager.
v Their human resource management tends to
be ad hoc and informal.

1-21
 The New Human Resources
Organization
• Transactional HR group • Corporate HR group
v Focuses on using v Focuses on assisting top
centralized call centers management in “top-
and vendors to provide level” issues
specialized support in
day-to-day transactional
HR activities

1-22
 The New Human Resources
Organization (cont.)
• Embedded HR group • Centers of expertise
v Assigns HR generalists groups
to departments like v Provide specialized
sales and production assistance in areas such
to provide the as organizational change
assistance the
departments need

1-23
 Trends Influencing Human Resource
Management

v Globalization
∟ Firms’ tendency to
extend their sales,
ownership, and/or
manufacturing to new
markets abroad

1-24
 Trends Influencing Human Resource
Management
v Indebtedness (“leverage”) and deregulation
v Technological advances
v Nature of work
∟ Service jobs, human capital

1-25
 Trends Influencing Human Resource
Management
v Growing emphasis on “knowledge workers”
and human capital
v Human capital
∟ The knowledge, education, training, skills, and
expertise of a firm’s workers

1-26
 Trends Shaping Human
Resource Management: Figure 1.2

1-27
Copyright © 2012 Pearson Education, Inc. Publishing as Prentice Hall
 Economic Challenges and Trends

v All these trends are occurring within the

context of economic upheaval.
v Challenging times mean that employers will
have to be more frugal and creative in
managing their human resources.

1-28
 The Human Resource Manager Today

v Takes a holistic “talent

management” approach to
managing human resources
v Focuses more on big-picture
issues
v Finds new ways to provide
transactional services
v Builds high-performance work
systems
1-29
 Talent Management

v Talent management
∟ The end-to-end process of planning, recruiting,
developing, managing, and compensating
employees throughout the organization.

1-30
 High-Performance Work System

v High-performance work system

∟ An integrated set of human resource
management policies and practices that together
produce superior employee performance

1-31
 In-class group activity I

vInterview a manager who is managing a team

at least five staff of a real company, identify
the human resource management
functions/activities which they are
undertaking and give examples to illustrate.
vPrepare five minute presentation for the next
class.