Human Resources, Essay Example

Introduction

Human Resources (HR) today is a remarkably wide-ranging function, and one dramatically removed from traditional forms focusing only on paperwork, hiring processes, legalities, and addressing exceptional situations. It is now comprehended that HR is integral to the entirety of the organization, as the business or concern relies so enormously on how all employees both perceive and perform their jobs, and at all levels of rank. This translates to a modern and necessary addressing of behavior, personality, and the job performance itself. Most importantly, these key elements invariably interact in exponential ways, and the effective HR department must fully understand how employee personality, behavior, and performance each complements the others, if successful training and the satisfaction of all concerned are to be achieved.

Discussion

The inescapable reality facing HR is that the most carefully designed training program cannot be effective if the circumstances of the employees are not first identified. To that end, HR must focus on needs assessment, and specifically the twin core elements of person analysis and task analysis. The terms are broad, but critical. The skill levels, motivations, and essential personality of the employee are as important to successful training as is a thorough understanding of what the task, or job itself, requires (Noe, 2010, p. 103). Moreover, there are a variety of ways in which HR may assess personal character, with the “360-degree” appraisal is most advantageous. Here, the direct supervisor observes employee behavior on a consistent basis, as input from peers, customers, and subordinates adds to the information pool (Werner, De Simone, 2008, p. 124). With observation of behavior must come an awareness of personality, a process enhanced when the employee is encouraged to express feelings regarding their position.

The person analysis then clearly and potently affects task analysis; inadequate job performance from a motivated and skilled employee, for example, indicates issues with the task itself. HR is then enabled to better determine if the problem is a “bad fit” between employee and job, or tasks requiring modification themselves. This then underscores the inevitably exponential relationship between the elements. The behavior of the employee frustrated by undue difficulty in the work is a circumstance as interrelated as that of the employee’s personality as disagreeable because the tasks fail to engage their interest, or fall below their skill levels. This being the case, the strategy of both comprehending and employing processes of consistent analysis and learning is virtually essential for organizational success. The Nokia firm, for example, incorporates this ideology into their development processes, with an emphasis on continuous learning. This presents limitless opportunity, as the elements of employee personality, ambition, skill levels, and peer interaction combine in ways that advance each component (Noe, 2010, p. 61). More exactly, when HR seeks to ignore any one of these components, its efforts to address the situations must fail, so interdependent are personality, behavior, and performance.

Conclusion

With the modern appreciation of how crucial HR is for organizational achievement comes, inevitably, a far more expansive responsibility. To fulfill its true function and serve the interests of the business as only it can, HR must comprehend the inherently exponential nature of the presence of the employee within the organization, and how each element of the scenario affects the others. Personality, behavior, and performance do not exist in vacuums; they directly and indirectly influence one another, and effective training may occur only when attention is properly given to both each component, and to how and why the interactions occur.

References

Noe, R. A. (2010). Employee Training and Development, 5^th Ed. New York: McGraw Hill Irwin.

Werner, J. M., & De Simone, R. L. (2008). Human Resource Development. Belmont: Cengage Learning.