In this lesson, we will explore the role a manager plays in human resource management, including hiring and staffing. We will also
look at the circumstances affecting employment decisions such as promotion, turnover, downsizing, job redesign and termination.
What Is Human Resources Management?
Definition of human resources management


Human resources management is the management of the planning and staffing
of intellectual and physical inputs, or people of different skill levels, needed for an
organization to meet its objectives. This means hiring the right people for each job
in the organization.
We will focus on various activities involved in hiring and staffing in an
organization, like:

Recruitment

Promotion
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Turnover

Downsizing
Job redesign
Termination
Recruitment
Recruitment is simply the process of attracting the right people to apply for jobs in an
organization. Attracting the right people to apply for jobs seems pretty straightforward.
A human resource manager can place a help-wanted ad in a local newspaper or on a job
board. But the ad must be sure to attract not only the right people with the right
qualifications - it must also attract enough people to select from.
There are several ways in which an organization can attract candidates for a job posting.
A human resource manager can use either external recruitment or internal recruitment.
Activities involved in hiring and staffing
External Recruiting
External recruitment involves recruiting candidates who are not part of the
organization. This can be done in several ways:
 Posting jobs in a local newspaper or job board
 Company website
 Employee referral
 Local unemployment offices
 College and university recruitment
 Employment agencies
 Temporary employment agencies
Job postings are a way to inform candidates that a job is available via print media. Job boards are websites where candidates can
look for employment online.
Job boards are a type of external recruiting
Employee referrals are recommendations made by employees on behalf of a friend
or acquaintance who is interested in a posted job. Local unemployment offices are
agencies where people who are unemployed visit to receive financial benefits and
job skills training and placement.
College and university recruitment involves recruiting students who are about to
graduate for employment in a specific field. Employment agencies are businesses
that recruit and interview candidates, then recommend the candidates to companies
offering jobs that match the candidates' qualifications and the employers' needs.
Temporary employment agencies are businesses that recruit and hire employees to
fulfill temporary positions at local companies for days, weeks or even months.
Internal Recruiting
Internal recruiting involves promoting existing employees into a new position within the organization. There are many benefits to
recruiting from within the organization:
 Employees strive to advance to higher positions
 Employees do not need orientation into the company
 Employees are familiar with policy and procedures
There are a few disadvantages to internal recruiting:
 The promotion creates a gap in staffing
 The company does not benefit from new ideas or new ways of doing things
Staffing Tasks For Managers
Now that we've learned where to recruit the right people for the job, let's take a look at how The Downtown Hotel management team
deals with the circumstances affecting decisions like promoting employees, turnover of staff, downsizing, redesigning jobs and
termination.
Promoting employees involves moving an existing employee to a new position, generally with more responsibility and higher pay.
Julie, human resource manager at The Downtown Hotel, abruptly lost their front desk supervisor. This left the front desk
unsupervised and in disarray. Guests were not being checked in properly, the lobby was messy and guest requests were not being
honored.
The decision to promote Katie, a front desk clerk, was the only option to get the front desk back in working order. Moving an
existing employee to the supervisory position rather than externally recruiting meant that availability would be immediate,
orientation was unnecessary and training would be minimal.
While the decision worked out well to fill the gap in supervision, it left a gap in another area of the operation. Since Katie knows
how to do both jobs, the company decided it wasn't necessary to fill the gap. However, asking Katie to perform both jobs caused
stress, which led Katie to quit her job. This resignation is known as turnover.
Turnover is a voluntary resignation from employment. Turnover of employees creates gaps in staffing, which has far-stretching
consequences for organizational goals.
When Julie asked Katie to do the work of two people, Julie was downsizing. Downsizing is the planned elimination of jobs in an
organization.
Companies often downsize to save money on salaries and benefits. Julie, the human
resource manager, thought downsizing the front desk would be a good idea. She
wanted to save money on staffing, so she decided to eliminate Katie's former position
as front desk clerk after she was promoted to supervisor. Unfortunately, downsizing
rarely yields good results.
A better idea would have been to redesign Katie's job to combine some of her former
responsibilities and some of her new responsibilities into a whole new job. This is
known as job redesign. Job redesign is a restructuring of the tasks involved in a job
to enhance the job, satisfaction and/or productivity.
Definition of downsizing
While redesigning a job sounds
easy, there are decisions that
must be made in advance of the redesign. Human resources managers must ask
the following questions:

Will productivity decrease as a result of the changes?

Will customer satisfaction decrease as a result of the changes?
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Will the changes increase employee morale?
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Will the changes enhance the employee's work experience?
After Katie quit, Julie decided to redesign her position. Unfortunately, Julie
bypassed this crucial analysis and designed a job that is impossible to
Definition of job redesign
accomplish by including both clerk and supervisory duties in the front desk
position. Let's see how that turned out.
Julie hired Max. Max had the experience and education, was out of work so he was available immediately and also knew a few
people who are employed at The Downtown Hotel. This sounded perfect to Julie, so Max began his new job!
Max was miserable within the first week. He could not keep up with the work. The redesign of the front desk tasks made the job
impossible to perform by one person in one day. Max found himself working early morning until late in the evening, taking work
home and even working in the car at red lights.
Max started making big mistakes, like giving new guests keys to occupied rooms, mixing up room service orders, and giving out
incorrect change. He was miserable. Worse yet, the hotel lost guests and money. Julie had to make a tough decision: She could
either re-train Max, terminate him or analyze the job. Max was terminated.
Termination is involuntary separation of employment. Max did not perform up to standards, and he had to be let go. Unfortunately,
this brings Julie, the human resources manager, right back to the drawing board: recruitment. But this time, Julie looked more
carefully at the design of the job to determine whether changes needed to be made.
Lesson Summary
In summary, human resources management is the management of the planning and staffing of intellectual and physical inputs, or
people of different skill levels, needed for an organization to meet its objectives. This means hiring the right people for each job in
the organization. It starts with recruitment.
Recruitment is simply the process of attracting the right people to apply for jobs in an organization. It can be done externally by
recruiting candidates who are not part of the organization or internally by promoting existing employees into new positions within
the organization.
Other important staffing decisions include promoting employees, analyzing turnover, downsizing staff, redesigning jobs and
terminating employees.
Promoting employees involves moving an existing employee to a new position, generally with more responsibility and higher
pay. Turnover is a voluntary resignation from employment. Downsizing is the planned elimination of jobs in an organization, often
motivated by saving money on salaries and benefits.Job redesign is a restructuring of the tasks involved in a job to enhance the job,
satisfaction and/or productivity. Termination is involuntary separation of employment.