HUMAN RESOURCES MANAGEMENT

The successful management of human resources is one of the keys to the performance of an organization. And better management of human resources can be a major source of productivity improvement. Public relations documents often describe people as “the most important resource” a firm has.
Some managers feel that personnel management is primarily a “business” profession or activity. However, managers in both the private and public sectors depend on their human resources to be successful. Large corporations, banks, universities, advertising agencies, small retail stores, hospitals, manufacturing firms, and governmental agencies all must tap the talents of their people if these organizations are to accomplish their objectives. A production supervisor, hospital administrator, grocery store manager, or any managers in any organization-will succeed only if that manager can deal with people.
But the days when a “concern for people” was all that was necessary for success in personnel matters are long past. Responding to people’s needs, expectations, and legal rights in work organizations has become much more, demanding and complex. Laws and regulations at the international, federal, state, and local levels impose limitations on what managers can and cannot do in managing employees. Nondiscriminatory recruiting, selection, and promotion criteria must be identified and used. Sound, coordinated, and legal wage and salary systems must be designed and implemented so that employees feel fairly compensated for their efforts. Personnel policies that help rather than hinder the accomplishment of work must be designed. These areas and many other require a good understanding of the basics of “personnel” or “human resource” management. These terms are used interchangeably.
Personnel management has changed greatly in a relatively short period of time. In a 1970 survey, one respondent noted that personnel management had begun to move away from the image of “social, recreation, and fund drive leader.” A 1983 survey made the extent of change quite clear. More than 98 percent of the chief executive officers surveyed said they now consider personnel to be a top management function.
Another study asked personnel executives if their departments had changed in structure or authority in the preceding two or three years. About 60 percent said changes had occurred, with several respondents noting that the personnel director now reports directly to the president of the organization, rather than to a vice president. A later study for personnel departments in transition placed the figure at 74 percent. Some other trends in personnel management that will continue include:
- Assisting line management in long-range personnel planning
- Improving quality of work life
- More involvement in “social responsibility issues” such as anticipating and responding to government regulations and consumer pressures.
- Developing and implementing computer systems in personnel activities.
- Designing and changing the structure of organizations.
- Assisting operating managers with their communications.
These and other emerging trends will continue to raise the importance of personnel-related activities. One survey of top executives found that 65 percent of the non-personnel executives predicted that personnel executives will become more heavily involved in developing corporate strategy and policy in the years ahead.
It is clear that personnel practitioners do not have any formal training in modern personnel management. The same can be said for many operating managers with whom personnel managers must work. The number of personnel jobs has increased dramatically since 1950. (These figures include professionals as well as non-professionals, such as clerical employees). Yet the rate at which personnel professionals are being trained is much slower. This gap in training appears even larger when one realizes that all managers need personnel training to properly manage such activities as performance appraisal, discipline, and equal employment opportunity compliance. This paper provides with a basic understanding of the tools and concepts of personnel management. Whether or not you ever make personnel your career, information on the management of human resources will be important to you in the years ahead.
But who is a personnel manager? What exactly is personnel management? Which managers should do what jobs in managing people? Answers to these questions will help define personnel management.


VIEWS OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT
Not everyone agrees on what personnel management includes. One reason is that in different organizations personnel activities, for example, in one medium-sized bank all new non-management employees are hired by the personnel department. In another equally successful company, new employees are screened by the personnel department but actually selected by the supervisors for whom they will work. Which is “right”? The answer seems to be if it is working well for the company, it is right for that firm.
i. Who is a personnel manager?
ii. How do you handle individual employee differences?
iii. How do you learn personnel management?


WHO IS A PERSONNEL MANAGER?
On this issue, one perspective is that personnel management is limited to only one part of the organization, the personnel department. This department handles “people” problems. Another perspective contends that all managers are personnel managers, and that it is only through the effective management of human resources by all managers that work gets done.
Those who believe that the personnel department is best qualified to handle all personnel problems feel that there are advantages to having all personnel activities performed at once place. The personnel department “handles people”, in the same manner that the finance department handles the management of capital and cash, and many personnel departments can be very good at it.
Personnel is shown in the chart as a distinct unit, just as marketing, finance, and purchasing are separate specialized units. A major problem with this “functional” structure is that personnel management may become narrowly defined as only those areas with which a “personnel department” directly deals. For example, the personnel department might make wage surveys, but it might not work with middle-level managers on allocation of production bonuses, because that is “the production department’s job”. This split can result in activities that need to be done by a person with training in personnel going undone.
Those who share the perspective that personnel management is spread throughout the organization feel that all managers have some personnel responsibilities. Sales managers, manufacturing supervisors, corporate treasures, college deans, and retail store managers are all personnel managers because their jobs are closely tied to their employees’ effectiveness. However, it is unrealistic to expect an accounting department supervisor, for instance, to be extremely knowledgeable about such personnel activities as equal employment laws and insurance benefit plans.


HOW DO YOU HANDLE INDIVIDUAL EMPLOYEE DIFFERENCES?
The second issue that helps define the role of personnel management relates to how individual differences are considered in an organization. One perspective assumes that management should use formal, standardized techniques for handling all people. These techniques will be effective because if everyone is treated in the same manner, the result will be “fair” treatment. Certainly, standard techniques, if they are well-designed, can be the basis for making some personnel decisions. But overuse of standard procedures emphasizes organizational uniformity, conformity, and predictable. It also assumes that people will be just as rational and predictable as the organization expects them to be. However, they obviously are not always that way.
Another view holds that individual human differences must be incorporated in the design and operation of personnel management activities. One can argue that employees’ individual qualifications and personalities have such a great impact on personnel decisions that formal personnel procedures always require exceptions. Carried to its logical extreme, this view would mean that the job of a personnel manager should be to maximize employee individuality and satisfaction.
However, organizations need a reasonable degree of standardization and uniformity. Clearly, what is appropriate for one organization and its employees may not be best suited to another. Adjusting to individual needs must be done, but this adjustment must be balanced with the overall needs of the organization.

A final question to help defined personnel concerns how one learns personnel management. One view is that personnel management is an applied field that should be learned by focusing on techniques for handling people. Another view argues that understanding basic human nature through training for personnel management.
Certainly, learning that personnel is only a series of techniques can lead to a loss of the “big picture” about why the techniques are followed. A manager must have an ability to predict the effects of new personnel policies and practices. This understanding is often based on a good underlying “theory” about human nature. Yet, personnel is an applied field and the research and theories from the bahvioural science only help when they are applied to the problems of people at work in real organizations.
In reality, successful personnel management contains elements of all the above viewpoints. The specific blend that occurs in a given organization depends on its strengths, weakness, history, and other variables. It is important to realize that contact with human resources activities in an organization cannot be limited solely to a personnel department. All managers are involved. Yet the personnel unit provides support in those areas in which other managers do not have expertise. Therefore, cooperation between the personnel unit and the other managers is very important for successful human resources management.
Cooperation between people who specialize in personnel management and other managers is critical to organizational success. This cooperation requires contact, or interface, between the two group. These points of contact occur within seven major activities, which will be out-lined later, that focus on the employees in an organization. These activities are ones that must be addressed by someone when an organization has employees. For example: who will do what jobs? How much will they be paid? Who is doing a good job? The idea is that personnel management involves shared responsibility for these activities.
The contact between the personnel unit and the operating managers is best based on who is most qualified to perform various parts of a personnel activity. For example, who is responsible for improving a poor safety record at a manufacturing plant? The personnel department has responsibility for safety because it compiles information on work-related injuries. But the production supervisors and managers share that responsibility because it is their control of the actual work situations that will change employee behaviour. However, in all organizations, some must change the “people-related” activities; they cannot be left to change. Clearly, personnel management is a concern of both the managers and the personnel unit in an organization.
The size of an organization is often a key consideration in determining who will do what. In a very small organization, such as a small retail store, no specialized personnel unit may exist. Instead, the owner-manager will hire the clerks, handle the payroll, train new employees, and perform any other needed personnel activities. However, a large retail chain will usually have a specialized personnel unit. The interface approach in this paper help to identify people-oriented activities that must be performed in all organizations. The responsibility for proper management of personnel activities, such as interviewing, training, or performance appraisal, is placed on both managers and personnel specialists.
Whether interviewing or appraisal of employee performance, a manager must consider both the situation and the people involved to determine the most appropriate approach to handling problems. For example, consider the appraisal of a clerk performance. The head of clerk and/or personnel director must choose the most appropriate appraisal method, given the situation and the nurse involved. This approach differs greatly from prescribing an appraisal technique for “any situation”, or from examining appraisal problems in the absence of having to solve them. It also requires cooperation between the head of clerk and personnel specialists, but the need result is a much more adaptable and effective personnel system.
The reconciliation of the various viewpoints discussed earlier emphasizes that personnel management is a set of activities that must be managed. All organizations with people in them must deal with specific personnel activities of work analysis, staffing, training and development, appraisal, compensation, maintenance, and union relations. Notice that the definition emphasizes the personnel activities, not who performs them.
The major activities that must be managed by the personnel unit and/or other managers are as follows:
- Work analysis
- Staffing the organization
- Training and development
- Appraisal of employees
- Compensation
- Maintenance of work environment
- Union relations

Environmental forces that affect an organization as an external boundary surrounding the organization. These forces include legal, societal, and interrogational factors. The development of an organization as a system, open to environmental factors, and the relationship of the personnel unit to the total organization.
Interrogational forces of leadership, motivation, and group behaviour are organizational processes of special interest to personnel focusing on human behaviour. These forces are behavioural processes rather than specific personnel activities.


WORK ANALYSIS
Work analysis focuses on a job as a unit of work. The specialization of narrow jobs versus the humanization of broader jobs is one consideration in job design.
A good working relationship between an employee and a job does not just happen. It requires analysis of the job to be done and proper design of the work the employee does. Job design that considers people’s behavioural desires is becoming increasingly important. Comprehensive analysis of jobs also has implications for equitable pay systems. Why does a word processing specialist earn more pay than a keypunch operator? The answer has to be that one job requires more knowledge, skills, and abilities than other. But without good job analysis it is difficult to justify the difference.


STAFFING THE ORGANIZATION
Staffing emphasizes the recruitment and selection of the human resources for an organization. Human resources planning and recruiting precede the actual selection of people for positions in organizations. Choosing the right person for the job involves the use of such data sources as application blanks, interviews, tests, background investigations, and physical examinations.
Human resource planning, affirmative action, equal employment opportunity, and structured interviewing are terms that were seldom used. Yet, these modern procedures reflect that no single area has changed as much in personnel as staffing. Much of the change is for the better because it has forced a more professional approach to matching people and jobs, and has cut a major costs to both the organization and the individual associated with a mismatch.


TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT
Training and development includes the orientation of new employees, the training of employees to perform their jobs, and the retraining of employees as their job requirements change. Encouraging the development and growth of more effective employees is another facet.
Assessment of training needs, training evaluation, career planning, and management development have been growing in importance. However, training costs-like anything else-are increasing, and management has a right to know whether or not it is receiving at least a naira worth of benefit for every naira spent in training. Further, as jobs requiring special training become more common in organizations of all kinds, specialized types of training and development will continue to grow.


APPRAISAL OF EMPLOYEES
Performance appraisal focuses on how well, employees are doing their jobs. Appraisals are useful in making wage and salary decisions, in specifying areas in which additional training and development of employees is needed, and in making placement decisions. Knowledge of the approaches to appraisal and the types of appraisal methods is essential in implementing an appraisal system. The behaviuoral and legal consequences of appraisal are also a primary concern.
Performance appraisal is poorly done by managers in many organizations. Yet, as the cost of keeping unsatisfactory employee continues to grow, performance appraisal will become even more critical. The cost associated with unrecognized excellence and potential is at least as great. Further, proper appraisals are often needed as evidence in equal employment and termination situations that end up in court. Well-designed, properly implemented appraisal systems, perhaps more than any of other activities, require the cooperative efforts of the personnel unit and operating managers in an organization. The importance of performance appraisal can be summed up in one very simple question: If employees do not know how they are doing, how can they improve?


COMPENSATION
Compensation deals with rewarding people through pay, incentives and benefits for performing within the organization work. The behavioural side of compensation and the meaning of equity and reward to the employee are underlying considerations. Building on job analysis, the job education activity determines the relative worth of each job. Also, special types of compensation fall within this interface.
Pay is of great importance to employees. Although they obviously need pay to purchase life’s necessities, the motivating (or demotivating) effect of pay is also a major factor. Meanwhile, compensation administration is becoming increasingly complex, legislation has greatly changed benefits plans, and changes in white-collar jobs will make the tie between productivity and compensation even more complex. New approaches and new ideas about compensation and benefits are vital if strides in productivity are to be made.


MAINTENANCE
The emphasis in maintenance activities is somewhat different from that in other personnel activities. Maintenance functions emphasize consistency, stability, continuity, and an acceptable work environment. The physical and mental health and safety of employees are key parts of this interface.
The Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 (OSHA) has forced management attention to the health and safety areas. The effects of various substances in the work environment on employees are just being discovered. Creation of a safe and healthy work environment is an evolving process for most organizations. Largely because of OSHA, but also because of increasing management awareness of its social responsibilities to the public and its employees, personnel health and safety will continue to grow in importance.
Maintenance also includes personnel coordination and personnel records and research. In addition to developing and implementing policies, managers must communicate with employees and keep abreast of the personnel activities in their organizations.


UNION RELATIONS
Union-related activities are very important because they affect both an employer’s bottom line and personnel activities. An understanding of unions requires an overview of the development of the organized labour movement in the country, the current state of unions, and the international dimension of unions.
The prime contact a union and employer occurs at two levels. One is at the formal organization level and occurs when union becomes the agent representing the employees of an organization. Once an organization is unionize, a contract must be negotiated through union-organization discussion and collective bargaining – a process in which behavioural considerations play a vital role. At another level, a continuing union-organization relationship focuses on settling disputes and grievances that arise during the duration of a labour agreement. Because effective union relations may play a significant role in the management of human resources, a discussion of unions is vital.
For some organizations labour unions will increase in importance in the years ahead. In other organizations and industries, a rethinking and reformulation of existing union-management relationship may be necessary for the industries to grow and remain viable. The steel industry is an example of an industry in which this reexamination appears to be occurring. At the same time, in white-collar and pink-collar areas unions are becoming more of a force to be dealt with.


CASE STUDY
As Usman Kareem, the newly promoted personnel officer, examined the evidence before him, he was at a loss as to how to present his report. He was under pressure from both Hassan Usman (Personnel Manager) and Aliyu Musa (Deputy Managing Director) to exonerate Miss. Fatima Ibrahim (Catering Supervisor) from blame on charges of assault leveled against her by Mrs. Aisha Mohammed (Manager, Designs). The branch senior staff association on the other hand are ready to call out its members on strike if “nothing is done to check this wicked lady’s excesses.


BACKGROUND
Interior Decorators (Nigeria) Limited, IDN for short, is a public limited liability company based in Kano. It has mainly been a trading company marketing paints, drapes and a variety of other decorating items. When its fortunes started to dwindle in the late 70’s as a result of more stringent foreign exchange controls, it decided to add on consulting services for government, organizations and individuals. There are plans to set up a paints factory when the current economic depression eases. With a total work-force of 560 employees (down from 720 in December 1982), its turnover for the year ended 31st March, 1981 was N5.87 million (down from N9.20 million for the last year).
The company was founded in 1960 by Asian nationals. It was a private company which operated without written rules and regulations for the first ten years of its existence. Most of its Nigerian managers were promoted from lower clerical and technical ranks. For example, both the present Deputy managing director and personnel manager joined the company as clerical officers in the early 1960’s. The company went public following its takeover by Nigerians in 1972 as a result of the Indigenization Act of that year. The expatriate management was retained especially as the company was doing brisk business at the time. However, following two years of serious trading losses (1977-78), the last expatriate managing director was relieved of his post. The Board directors then brought in the current M.D Yakubu Isa, who has until his appointment, commissioner for Trade and Industries in one of the Northern States. Mrs. Isa holds a Bachelor’s degree in Chemistry from Ahmadu bello University and a Master’s degree in management from an American University.
On assumption of duty in April, 1979, he took a management audit of IDN and was appalled by the calibre of staff he had to work with. While not intending to rock the boat too violently too soon, he felt the need to inject young University graduates into the company, especially with the company’s plans to move into consulting and manufacturing.
As part of his reorganization, he obtained the board’s approval to retire some expatriate staff especially for positions which could be filled by Nigerians. He also introduced a policy to stop promotions to management positions from junior and supervisory levels without proof of continuing education. To allay the fears of the old hands, he appointed Aliyu Musa as his deputy managing director and placed him in charge of senior staff matters. Hassan Usman confirmed as personnel manager and charged with junior staff maters. Mrs. Aisah Mohammed, who holds a degree in Fine Arts from Ahmadu Bello University, was appointed to fill the new position of manager (designs). She was to report directly to the M.D although she was administratively under the Deputy M.D before the current economic difficulties,IDN was beginning to pick up, moving from a net loss of N1.6million in 1978 a net profit of N2.18 million in 1981.


MISS. FATIMA IBRAHIM
As part of the incentive package to attract young and talented university graduates to join IDN, Yakubu Isa decided early in 1980 to set up a senior staff canteen. Before then, the canteen services had been contracted to Miss. Ftima Ibrahim, an attractive lady in her early thirties. Some people say she was divorced or widowed while others say she had never been married.
With the opening of the senior staff canteen, IDN appointed her as the catering supervisor on fulltime basis. She was responsible to the personnel manager, Hasan Usman, who was in turn responsible to the deputy M.D Aliyu Musa.
Right from the beginning, many of the senior staff members complained about the quality of her services. They alleged that the food was poor and expensive, the catering supervisor and her staff were disrespectful to customers and that much of the food was sold to junior staff members. But, rather than to make a formal protest to management, most of the aggrieved members decided to stay away from the canteen. Asked why so, some of them alleged that the relationship between Miss. Ibrahim and the personnel manager (and the deputy M.D, to some extent) was much more than official. It was romoured that one or two unnamed managers who had tried in the past to report the matter had been frustrated out of the company by the deputy M.D. Meanwhile, Miss. Ibrahim’s record had remained very clean. She had been never been queried and her performances rating had been than normal.


MRS. AISHA MOHAMMED
Mrs. Mohammed joined IDN soon after her National Youth Service in September, 1981. A young mother of three children and wife of a medical doctor in Kano, her competence and dedication to duty had come to be recognized and respected by IDN employees, both senior and junior staff. In fact, Yakubu Isa (M.D) had been so satisfied with her work that he had promised to do everything to motivate her to stay with IDN. Mrs. Mohammed was known to be a very sensitive lady who could easily be upset when people take for granted her respect for them.

THE QUERY
Mrs. Mohammed’s protest letter to the deputy M.D copied to the M.D, was disturbing. She alleged that she had gone to the canteen in the company of Miss. Mariama Iya (Accountant), Isiaka Lawal (Sales Manager) and Chike Okoye (NYSC Member) to have lunch as usual. For merely drawing Miss. Ibrahim’s attention to the poor quality of her food, she “exploded” and rained insults on her (Mrs. Mohammed) “boasting that nothing can be done to me” and daring Mrs. Mohammed to “report the matter to the highest quarters if you like”. In concluding her protest letter, Mrs. Mohammed wrote:. “The purpose of my letter is not to report Miss. Ibrahim but to test whether indeed an employee can be above discipline in this company”.
The M.D was concerned-he had heard of Miss. Ibrahim’s unacceptable behaviour” from the grapevine and he had always wondered why nothing had been done about it by the personnel manager. The food bills from the senior staff canteen had risen steeply at a time that its patronage and dropped significantly. The M.D therefore, felt that this was an opportunity to deal with Miss. Ibrahim “once and for all”. On his copy of Mohammed’s protest letter, the M.D minutes to Aliyu Musa as follows:
D.M.D investigate this promptly and let the me know the true situation”
The deputy M.D in turn minuted on it to Hassan Usman as follows:
P.M for your information and necessary action.
As soon as the personnel manager received the petition, he instructed Usman Kareem, the personnel officer, to go and investigate the matter with the verbal warning, don’t write down anything without clearing it with me”.


INVESTIGATION
Usman Kareem wrote a query to Miss. Ibrahim “to explain in writing, not later than 4:00pm, tomorrow, why strict disciplinary action should not be taken against you for assaulting a senior staff member, Mrs. A. Mohammed Kareem then interviewed the three persons mentioned by Mrs. Mohammed in her petition; all of them confirmed her allegations. He also interviewed the catering aides mentioned in Miss. Ibrahim’s reply and all of them denied any clash between their boss and Mrs. Mohammed. However, he observed that even one of them who was not on duty on the day of the incident also wrote to defend her boss. From informal contacts with eye witnesses who declined to write down their views, it was clear that Miss. Ibrahim had wronged Mrs. Mohammed. Most of the male senior staff members expected action against Miss. Ibrahim especially as she could not claim in this case that “the manager made love advances to me”. As Kareem was pondering over these issues, he sighted a copy of the letter to the M.D by the branch senior staff association informing him that their members had decided to boycott the canteen unit. Miss. Ibrahim was removed and threatening to cal out its members on strike if action was not taken in the next 48 hours.

Questions
1. What are the key industrial relations and personnel management issues raised in this case?
2. Examine critically the investigation carried out by the personnel officer. How would you have done it?
3. How best do you think the issues raised in question 1 can be resolved.