Introduction -
In a company environment the Human Resources Management (HRM) function includes managing your approach to employee benefits and compensation, employee records and personnel policies. Usually small businesses (for-profit or non-profit) have to carry out these activities themselves because they can't yet afford part or full-time help. However, they should always ensure that employees have and are aware of personnel policies which conform to current regulations. These policies are often in the form of employee manuals, which all employees have. ( Macnara, 1999 ).
A key element of the positioning of the HSBC group is its emphasis on corporate social responsibility (CSR), which means addressing the expectations of all its customers, shareholders, employees and other stakeholders in managing its business responsibly and sensitively. In particular, it aims to deliver a world class brand through its human resources policies, which enable committed and engaged employees to deliver better customer service and contribute to a higher return for shareholders. It also prides itself on its policies on ethical finance, education initiatives, and efforts to protect the environment and its interface with the communities in which it does business.
Outcomes 1 -
The role and tasks of HRM executive of HSBC bank -
According to Milkovich et al, (2005), HRM is a model of personnel management that focuses on the individual rather than taking a collective approach. Responsibility for human resource management is often devolved to line management.
Every business is diverse, restaurants, oil companies, corner shops, fire brigades, banks are all business & they all need to have their human resource managed. As HRM is so important for every organisation it is also same important for world's 2nd largest bank HSBC. That's the reason why the person who is working on the HRM position has one of the major responsibilities for the bank positioning. The role and tasks of HRM executive of HSBC bank as follows -
The different approaches taken by the personnel management and human resource management are compared below:
Features
Personnel Management
Human Resource Management
Beliefs & assumptions
Contract
Careful definition of written contracts with fixed approaches.
Aim to go beyond contracts & flexible
Rules
Importance of devising clear rules/mutuality
`Can-do` outlook; impatience with rules
Managerial task vis-à-vis labour
Monitor activity labour
Nurture labour
Strategic aspects
Key relations
Labour management
Customer oriented
Speed of decision
Takes long time
Much faster
Line management
Management role
Believe in transactional leadership
Believe in transformational leadership.
Key managers
Personnel specialist
General/business/line managers
Communication
Indirect
Direct
Standardization
High(e.g. `parity an issue`)
Low(`e.g. parity not seen as relevant`)
Key leavers
Selection
Separate, marginal task
Integrated, Key Task
Pay
Job 0evaluation(fixed grade)
performance related
Job design
Division of labour
Teamwork
Training and development
Controlled access to courses
learning companies
(Source - Milkovich et al, 2005)
The role, tasks and activities of the human resource practitioner -
According to Desimone, (2002), HR Manager is one of the most important key to open a lock hanging on the door of success in an organization. If an HR Manager is efficient enough to handle and to take out best from his team members any organization and can achieve more from his target goals. Stated below are major responsibilities of HR Manager:-
To maintain and develop HR policies, to ensure the provision of a professional HR service to the organization, ensuring compliance and to contribute the development of corporate HR policies.
To ensure timely recruitment of required level / quality of Management staff, other business lines staff, including non-billable staff with appropriate global approvals, in order to meet business needs, focusing on Employee Retention and key Employee Identification initiatives.
Develop, refine and fine-tune effective methods or tools for selection / or provide external consultants to ensure the right people with the desired level of competence are brought into the organization or are promoted.
Prepare information and input for the salary budgets. Ensure compliance to the approved salary budget; give focus on pay for performance.
Ensure appropriate communication at all staff levels.
To maintain and develop leading edge HR systems and processes to address the effective management of people in relation to the following in order to maintain competitive advantage for performance Management, staff Induction, reward and recognition and so on.
Counseling and Guidance cell - provide support to Managers in case of
disciplinary issues.
Above points are amongst the most important responsibilities which has to be taken care by an HR. HRM is the one of the most important part for the company like HSBC, as a HR manager of HSBC have to be follow each of these responsibilities, so that he or she can do proper maintenance of the HSBC.
The role and responsibilities of line managers in human resource practices -
According to Sparrow, (2009), In the organisation, HR professionals' architect, facilitate, recommend an HR agenda, and coach line manager, but line managers have ultimate responsibility for approving and executing HR, as they have ultimate responsibility for approving and executing finance, marketing, and R&D. In HRM practice line managers responsibilities include:
Staff interview: Interviewing new staff for their own department on behalf of HR manager and by doing that they can make sure that the person got the skills to perform this particular role.
Induction : A formal ceremony conducted by the line manager in which a person is inducted into an organisation which helps the person to get to know about the organisation's activities and his part of role in it.
Training: Helping the new recruit to make proficient with specialized instruction and practice towards performing his role properly.
Performance check: Checking the person's ability and skill to perform the role which determines whether he needs training or he can be promoted and so on.
Employee roster: Organise staff hours according to staff's eligibility of working to make sure there is always enough staff in the department.
Promotion selection: Through checking the performance of the colleagues, line manager can decide which person should be promoted according to his ability and skills.
Health and safety: Make sure the work area is safe and risk free and resolve all health and safety issues in the workplace.
Disciplinary investigation: When a disciplinary matter arises, the line manager come forward first to deal with it and having investigated all the facts the line manager decide whether to, drop the matter, arrange informal coaching or counselling or arrange for the matter to be dealt with under the disciplinary procedure.
The HR manager of the HSBC has lots of key role and responsibilities which I already explain in the top, As HSBC world second largest Bank and HRM is the one of the most important section for HSBC so all of these criteria are most important for maintaining the bank reputation. Staff interview is the main role for recruiting new staff, for example- HSBC opening a new bank in Bangladesh and they wish to recruit a cashier, on this case the HR manager have to be following what type of qualified staff they need for this position, then HR manager can arrange a interview for that. After that they have to follow the criteria which I already written in the top.
Outcomes 2 -
The need for human resource planning -
According to Aswathappa, (1997), HR Planning involves gathering of information, making objectives, and making decisions to enable the organization achieve its objectives. Surprisingly, this aspect of HR is one of the most neglected in the HR field.
According to the organization goal HR planning can be short or long term. Whole HR planning includes company objectives, demand for labour, how many labour required, what skills they need to have, where they are going to work, supply of labour and other HRP.
The programme does not assist the Organization only, but it will also facilitate the career planning of the employees and assist them to achieve the objectives as well. This augment motivation and the Organization would become a good place to work. HR Planning forms an important part of Management information system.
HR have an enormous task keeping pace with the all the changes and ensuring that the right people are available to the Organization at the right time. The changes in composition of workforce not only influence the appointment of staff, but also the methods of selection, training, compensation and motivation. It becomes very critical when Organizations merge, plants are relocated, and activities are scaled down due to financial problems.
Some other areas are also related with HRP such as:
Employee development and training
Staffing cost & cost centres
Abilities, experience & skill analysis
Ratio of work force occupancies
Local & national demographic trends
Dismissing
Stages involved in planning -
According to Turner, (2002), these are the following stages involved in HRP process -
HR demand forecasting: HR demand forecasting is the process of determining how many people will actually be needed in the organisation to succeed in achieving business objective.
Analysis of existing resources : This part of HRP dealing with a profile of the workforce which is based on certain characteristics which are relevant for planning purposes-supplemented, in some instances, by analysis of certain issues like absenteeism, overtime working etc.
Auditing HR resources: Auditing HR Resources is all about clarifying desired practices of HR work and roles within the organization (HR Department, Line Managers), to establish a baseline for future improvement, to evaluate current effectiveness, to improve performance levels to key customers within the organization.
HR supply forecasting: An analysis of the supply of workers-the numbers and the types of people expected to be available to meet demand.
HR plan : All the information that has came out from the first three steps should bring together and analyse to determine the action required fulfil the gap between the demand forecast and the supply forecast is made. Afterwards under several personnel policies the activities to be undertaken will be determined by those actions which have been discussed above.
Implementation and control: This is the final stage in the HRP model and this part focuses on the skills and the competencies needed as well as internal HR expertise to ensure that the management of the organisation is both competent and confident in the design and operation of the resourcing policies.
As a HR manager of HSBC must have to be proper planning for every steps before take. Who is working in which section, is the person working on the right place, is any staffs need motivation, staff rewarding system, all the rules and regulation of the company staff should know, if any of the staff need training, HR manager have to be send the staff for training. Each and every staff needs to notice importantly for motivation and promotion. So that it will be a perfect planning.
Procedures used for structured recruiting of employees:
According to, Mackay, (1993) "The costs to an organization of recruitment can be high. But the costs of poor recruitment are dramatically higher. Recruitment-created disasters such as the wrong people for the job, lack of suitable candidates for interview, shortfall of labour and many other familiar problems have a direct impact on the organization. A formal policy document for recruitment can provide valuable guidance to prevent these disasters, but it must be up to date, especially in the light of current employment legislation.''
(Source - Mackay, 1993)
The interview as a selection technique and a range of alternative selection methods available -
According to Prasad et al, (2005) Selection can be conceptualized in terms of either choosing the fit candidates, or rejecting the unfit candidates, or combinations of both. So selection process assumes rightly that, there is more number of candidates then the number of candidates actually selected, where the candidates are made available through recruitment process.
When all the candidates' application has been received, the selection actually starts from this point. After the process of short listing, the final selection will be undertaken by following one or more of these methods:
Interviewing
Testing
Group assessment
The aim of the selection interview is to determine whether the candidate is interested in the job and competent to do it. A selection interview also explains the work of the organisation, the job and any features such as induction and probation. It uses to set expectations on both sides, including a realistic discussion of any potential difficulties (if appropriate) to enable the candidate to assess whether they want the job being offered.
The main advantage of face-t-face or direct interviews is that the researcher can adapt the questions as necessary, clarify doubt and ensure that the responses are properly understood, by repeating or rephrasing the questions. The researcher can also pick up nonverbal cues from the respondent. any discomfort, stress and problems that the respondent experiences can be detected through frowns, nervous taping and other body language, unconsciously exhibited by any person.
This would be impossible to detect in a telephone interview. So face-to-face helps the interviewee to get the desired results and help them the expression of the person to whom they are interviewing. By reading the facial expression of the respondent the interviewer can easily understand what the respondent want to tell them about anything.
The main disadvantages of face-to-face interviews are the geographically limitations they may impose on the surveys and the vast resources needed if such surveys need to be done nationally or internationally. It's not a good selection procedure in terms of halo effect and the horns effect. Halo effect means where the interviewer see the person in an exalted way because they have the same hobbies or interests, they go to same golf club or both of them used to go to a top school etc whereas the horns effect is totally opposite and both of this effects can result a bad judgement about a person during an interview.
HSBC is now opening a new branch in Bangladesh and they need a cashier for their new branch. For recruit a cashier interview is the best recruitment procedure for HSBC. An interview they can understand each and everything of their criteria for this job, which is not possible for other procedure in recruiting. For example- when a people interviewing by face to face the interviewer can easily say that is the person eligible for this work or not. So many things can follow by interview such as- eye contract, body language, style of communicating, style of answer the question, behaviour etc. A cashier of HSBC branch have to be 100% helpful for customer service because this person will serve the customer directly and the customer will judge the bank customer service primarily by this.
Outcomes 3 -
The main Factors of pay determination, (Cole, 2004) -
Long-term factors:
Regulations - including laws of national minimum wage, equal pay, pensions and other benefits, contract law, corporate governs - eg Stock exchange listing rules
Collecting bargaining or individuals pay-settings institutions or processes
Use of job evaluation
Organisation's strategic reward orientation- for example, policies in relation to pay market or regarding individual performance and pay
History and tradition in the organisation/sector
Short term factors:
Inflation and other general economic factors
Company performance/profit
Labour market trends-supply and demand for skills
Pay survey trends or comparability
Employees rewarding procedure:
According to Dickman et al, (2008) "You get more of the behaviour you reward. You don't get what you hope for, ask for, wish for or beg for. You get what you reward."
If organization fail to provide sufficient facilities & rewarded employee,
They will not get better performance from staff what they are supposed to get through whole job evaluation process.
Reward system consist of the following elements -
Financial reward- Compensation
Base salary
Pay incentives
Employee benefits
Non-financial rewards
Intrinsic Rewards - centres on the work itself
Praise, recognition, time off and other rewards given to the employee by peers or superiors.
The procedure is based upon the following principles:
All staff should be rewarded fairly according to their sustained contribution, including the application of new skills and of expertise developed over time in the job.
The equal opportunity procedure procedures should be carried out with due regard to any diversity issues which may have affected either the original situation or the current process.
A summary of appraisal could be used in support of an application for reward. It is recognised that the introduction of a new appraisal scheme will require Heads of sales/ managers and staff to be fully trained in its use.
Assessment of objectives / performance standards achieved should be clearly related to Departmental/ Section objectives, recognise achievements and reward competencies and activities likely to contribute to future success of the school.
Objectives / performance standards must be applied fairly and consistently.
Judgements should be demonstrably based on objective evidence and, where appropriate, recognise initiative, leadership and/or contribution to teamwork.
Arrangements for access to contribution points should be fully communicated to staff in a way that makes clear how it operates and the part that they and their managers play in it.
HR manager is the main person who has to be look on the rewarding procedures. For example organisations like HSBC is now second position in world bank ranking is this possible for hard working of their staff, and they doing this because of profer rewarding procedure. When a people working hard they want the feedback for that, if the HSBC can give them proper reward for that they will do more hard work for HSBC.
Motivation theory and its link with employee reward system -
According to steers et al, (1979) Motivation is that which energises, directs and sustains behaviour. For the Human Resources department, HR motivation is a key goal and consideration when working with employees. Motivation, of course, in this sense, refers to giving employees good reasons to perform well and stick to their tasks within the organization.
There are a number of different motivation theories as to what motivates workers. However, i would like to explain Path-goal theory. The theory that a leader's behaviour is contingent to the satisfaction, motivation and performance of subordinates.
Path-goal theory
The Path-Goal Theory of Leadership was developed to describe the way that leaders encourage and support their followers in achieving the goals they have been set by making the path that they should take clear and easy.
In particular, leaders:
Clarify the path so subordinates know which way to go.
Remove roadblocks that are stopping them going there.
Increasing the rewards along the route.
The path-goal theory is complex. Its complexity is reflected in its component: four types of leadership, two classes of situational (contingency) factors, three different outcomes, and two propositions. The term path refers to the workers' activities or courses of action to achieve a goal. This theory also state that leaders will motivate workers to increase their work performance under two conditions: (1) the leaders' behaviour directly links the satisfaction of workers needs to the achievement of work goals and (2) the leaders behaviour matches the type of task and the workers personalities and abilities. To simplify, leaders can increase worker motivation by directly linking goals and rewards and by helping workers achieve the goals and, thereby the rewards.
Monitoring Performance:
According to Paauwe (2004), When the training program is implemented, organization should continue to monitor employee performance to ensure performance level stay within organizations high standard. However, there are two general ways to monitor employee performance:
Informal performance monitoring: This type of monitoring is done by a day-to-day basis and includes action on the manager's part such as observing employee at work, employees' inter-personnel skills and checking in with customers. It is important to let employees know when they are performing well and when they need to improve. When criticizing an employee's performance, it should be respectful. Some ways of making constructive criticism are :
Criticize the action, not the person
Don't focus on the trivial
Be clear about explaining what the employee is doing incorrectly and correct way should be explained.
Don't get angry because anger will only provoke fear and cause a loss of motivation in employees.
Formal performance monitoring: Formal performance monitoring goes beyond the daily observing of employee behavior. This monitoring focus on particular aspects. For this aspects, organization need to
Set standards which have to be specific, clearly defined and also be achievable so employees don't become frustrated.
Measuring performance which should be fair and communicated to all employees that these measurements will affect.
Feedback should be given on employees performances otherwise other two actions above would be useless cause people cannot change inappropriate or unwanted behavior if no one tells them to. Feedback should be collected from clients or customers. Employees who are meeting or exceeding the standards also need to be praised and recognized for their efforts.
A key element of the positioning of the HSBC group is its emphasis on corporate social responsibility (csr), which means addressing the expectations of all its customers, shareholders, employees and other stakeholders in managing its business responsibly and sensitively. In particular, it aims to deliver a world class brand through its human resource policies, which enable committed and engaged employees to deliver better customer service and contribute to a higher return for shareholders. To motivate their employee they can use the path-goal theory of leadership to encourage their employee.
Outcomes 4 -
Evaluation of exit procedure -
According to Gabarro, (1991), every company needs to have an organisational exit policy for whatever the reason an employee leaves the company. It is important whether employees leave on their own, because they are resigning or retiring, or if they are asked to leave because they are being terminated, downsized, or laid off. It is the way that can handle the situation of an employee's exit from the organisation sends a strong message to those who remain in the organisation.
So exit procedures have to be free, fair & acceptable by employee & employer both. So an specific exit procedures models shown on behalf of Tibet travel & Indi travel which can be used by both as best practises.
Exit procedure
Voluntary exits
Involuntary exits
Resignation
Retirement
Layoffs
Terminations
Redundancy
(Sources - Gabarro, 1991)
The Exit process orders are as follows:
Resignation from employee side or notice from employer side
Notice period: employee or employer both should give enough time to each other before any steps.
Conducting Exit Interview where employee is asked some questions such as what his primary reason for leaving is or what was the most and the least satisfying about the job and so on.
Provide Exp letter as well as relieving order or letter
Full & final settlement and No dues Certificate
Selection criteria for redundancies:
Redundancy is a reason for dismissal and is not itself dismissal. In particular it is not unfair dismissal although a dismissal by reason of redundancy may be unfair dismissal if the facts warrant it.
1. If a group of employees are selected for redundancy the employer must show what type of work they do and why the demand for that work has decreased or stopped completely.
2. If the amount of work has decreased so that only some of the employees within a group are selected, the employer must show how they picked those unlucky ones.
3. The employer must show in detail the selection procedure and criteria. This can range from "last in first out" to a scoring system, with the employer giving points for certain job skills.
4. The selection criteria should not be based upon an individual's view of each employee, (for example, what the personnel manager thinks).
5. Once the criteria have been agreed it should be kept to.
HSBC can use these selection criteria for redundancies. If the selection criteria are based upon Race, Disability, Age or Sex the affected employee can claim under Unfair Dismissal or the relevant discrimination law.
Conclusion -
In conclusion i can easily say that, the HRM activities of the HSBC are very strong otherwise they can't be able reach the world second largest banking position. They going to open a new branch in my country Bangladesh, which is a developing country and is there, have lots of opportunity to build a new business. HSBC has very strong reputation which will help the HSBC to develop their business very quickly. HSBC still have strong HRM activities if they can upgrade more for their employees to motivation and rewarding so they will work more hard. Another thing they can do which is as they are opening a new branch in Bangladesh so it is very important to understand the local environment. For example, what types of people will be their customer and how they have to be serve them. As a HRM of HSBC have to be more careful about the customer service, because the peoples who will be the customers in HSBC Bangladesh branch they are most of them will be large company and executives who's first priority would be the best customer service. That's all i like suggest about the HRM activities in HSBC.
References -
Aswathappa, K, (1997), Human Resource and Personnel Management, 4th edition, Mcgraw hill publication, London
Cole, G, A., (2004), Personnel and human resource management, 5th edition, Thomson learning, United Kingdom
Dickmann, M., Brewster, C. & Sparrow, P., (2008), International Human Resource Management: A European Perspective, Mcgraw hill publication, London
Desimone, R, L., Werner, J, M & Harris, D, M., (2002), Human resource development, 3rd edition, Harcourt College Publishers, New York
Gabarro, J, J., (1991), Managing people and organizations, Mcgraw hill publication, London
Macnara, C. (1999), Assessing organizational performance in higher education 9th edition, University of Michigan, United States of America
Milkovich, G, T., Boudreau, J, W & Milkovich, C., (2005), Human Resource Management, 7th edition, Pearson Education, London
Mackay, L. (1993), The Changing Nature of Personnel Management, 9th edition, pearson education Ltd, England
Prasad, P. & Pringle, J, K., (2005), Handbook of workplace diversity, 6th edition, Sage Publication Ltd, London
Paauwe, J., (2004), HRM and performance: achieving long-term viability, oxford university press, England
Steers, R, M and Porter, L, W., (1979), Motivation and work behaviour, 5th edition, McGraw-Hill publication, London
Sparrow, P, (2009), Handbook of international human resource management: integrating people, John wiley & sons LTD, London
Turner, P., (2002), HR forecasting and planning, Cromwell press, Great Britain
