Human Resource Management (HRM) can be defined in a variety of ways, but the central idea focuses on the process of hiring and developing employees so that they become more valuable to the organisation. The term “human resources” was first introduced in the 1960’s when the value of labour relations began to attract attention. In short, this department helps to develop a company’s strategy and handles the organization’s employee-centred activities. Additionally, HR plays a crucial role in the organisation’s success for the following reasons:
- It develops methods to reduce the costs associated with workplace management. This eliminates unnecessary spending which saves the organisation money in the long run.
- Determines whether employees are satisfied by designing employee surveys, overseeing focus groups and implementing an exit interview strategy to determine how the company can improve.
- Deals with conflict resolution in the workplace.
Functions of HR
While Human resource management performs many roles, the five main function of HRM is as follows:
Recruitment and selection
Recruitment is the process of captivating, screening, and selecting potential and qualified candidates based on objective criteria for a job. The goal of this process is to attract the qualified applicants and while discouraging unqualified individuals from applying for a position.
Before starting the process, the companies must execute proper staffing plans and should determine the number of employees they will need to employ. This all depends on the organisation’s annual budget, as well as its short-term and long-term goals. The recruitment and selection process are key to every business as it reduces the costs of mistakes such as hiring incompetent, unmotivated, and under qualified employees.
Employee orientation
Providing new employees with orientation is a critical factor in helping a new employee adjust himself with the employer and his new job. The employee orientation program should include the objectives and goals of the organisation as well as how the employee can help to achieve the long and short-term goals of the organisation.
The program should help the employee to become familiar with the assigned duties and the exact job description, role, and the relationship with other positions in the business.
Maintaining Good Working Condition
Human resource management is responsible for ensuring good working conditions for employees. One of the fundamental duties of the human resource department is to motivate workers while ensuring their health and safety in the workplace. This will lead to an increase in employee satisfaction.
Managing Employee Relations
Employees are the backbone of a business and maintaining a good employee relationship is crucial. Human resource management has the ability to influence employee behaviour and worker efficiency.
Management must prioritise employee relationships by organising social events and in turn become acquainted with employees on a personal and profession level.
Employee Training and Development
Lastly, training and development are the indispensable functions of human resource management. It is an attempt to improve the current or future performance of an employee by increasing the ability of an employee through educating and increasing one’s skills or knowledge.
Additionally, human resources are also responsible for conducting job analysis, planning personnel needs, managing wages and salaries, providing benefits and incentives, evaluating performance, resolving disputes, and communicating with all employees at all levels.
How ISO 30405 can improve recruitment
While every HR department already has set recruitment processes in place, in 2016 the International Organisation for Standardisation released the ISO 30400 series for human resources, which aims to help HR departments improve their performance as well as the performance of the organization in which they work.
One of the standards in this series is ISO 30405 which provides guidance on how to attract, source, assess and recruit people for a position. ISO 30405 can be used by anyone involved in recruiting staff, whether they be HR professionals or not.
Other standards in the ISO 30400 series include ISO
30408 which provides Guidelines on human governance and ISO
30409 which focuses on Workforce planning.
These standards were developed by ISO technical committee ISO/TC 260, Human resource management, whose secretariat is held by
ANSI, ISO’s member for the USA.
ISO 30405:2016 can be used by any organization regardless of its industry or size.