Introduction
Human resource management (HRM) has to change as the business environment changes. It has to do this as a mixture of responding to changes in that environment and if predicting such changes and making proactive decisions about the nature of HRM. The future is unpredictable and it is hard to determine what it will bring. It is important to be flexible and to acquire as much knowledge as possible to help cope with these uncertainties. Human resource (HR) managers need to synthesize issues relating to their core personnel functions with the general economic and business issues, whilst remaining in touch with technological development. Successful HR managers and departments have a significant strategic impact on their organizations.
Of course, the core personnel functions relate to that most important of organizational resources ? the workforce. Handling core personnel functions of recruitment, selection, appointment, induction, training, development, etc. directly impacts on shareholder return and productivity. Successful companies invariably attract and retain productive employees.
Personnel issues in human resources
The first "personnel" role is that of hiring suitable employees. How easy this is depends on a number of factors, perhaps chief of which is the state of the local labor market. In the late 1990s, in the USA, the declining unemployment rate was a key factor. Competition for talent was high. Managers needed to hire quickly or risk losing a potential employee. In the current environment, this has changed. A company may receive a large number of re´sume´s. Of course, this gives different problems. Selection becomes a much more important issue, since there is a bigger pool to select from. It is important to have structures and processe ...