'The essence of strategic human resource management is in the development of staff to achieve competitive advantage in the marketplace'.

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Ailish O'Shea (Class B)        Human Resource Management        Assignment One         

BAMPM: 2003/2004        Critical Essay        November 10, 2003

‘The essence of strategic human resource management is in the development of staff to achieve competitive advantage in the marketplace’

To understand the importance of Human Resource Management (HRM) to the achievement of competitive advantage it is necessary to look at a range of conflicting opinions on various topics. This illustrates the scope of HRM and shows the key to a successful organization be the development of staff.

Given the rapid pace at which markets are expanding and changing, the successful firm will make the most of one of their most valuable resources – their employees. Amongst the aims of HRM are resource development, enhancing motivation and commitment and developing the employment relationship.

As identified by Storey (1989) there are two versions of HRM. ‘Hard’ HRM and ‘Soft’ HRM. The Hard version takes a business strategic approach. As opposed to soft which Storey (1989) observes as treating employees as a source of competitive advantage through a high level of commitment. It promotes unity of employee and management.

These contrasting opinions were first outlined in Douglas McGregor's The Human Side of Enterprise (1960.) His view of authoritarian management (Theory X, hard) and a human resource based view of on human relations ideas (Theory Y, soft) show the effect of management styles and motivation on productivity.  

F.W. Taylor developed the hard approach at the turn the 20th century. He placed great importance on task specifications and gave the role of thinking to managers expecting workers to tow the line. Although he advocated the financial reward of employees I feel this is a means to encourage compliance. It also ignores the importance of learning to job satisfaction and thus motivation.

This is an opinion supported by Herzberg et al (1957) who acknowledged that a lack of money might create discontent, however its presence does little for long term satisfaction. This belief is further illustrated by Maslow's hierarchy of needs, which states we have ascending levels of needs. To activate the next level needs (starting with physiological and working up to self-actualization) must be satisfied. Applying this to work systems places importance on job design. This is a key theme in HRM – that jobs should be designed to be challenging and interesting to gain commitment.

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Karen Legge (1989) recognizes the support to be greater for the hard approach to HRM. It assumes employees to be similar to any other resource that may be exploited for the benefit of the organization. She feels that soft HRM is irrelevant in the eyes of employees.

While I can agree that the soft approach may, in practice seem irrelevant to employees, I agree with its fundamental concept. Given that employees are a product of their complete environment (Kossen, …) excessive control by managers in a workplace creates an unhappy environment and in turn a dissatisfied workforce. The hard approach ...

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