It is also called personnel management. The function of human resource management is to deal with recruitment, selection, training and developing human resources. The human resource management or personnel management is a specified knowledge and that is concerned with management of human resource. It attracts and selects capable men, organises them so that they can work in a productive manner and give them necessary motivation to keep higher morale.
According to Edwin B Flippo,“ Human resource management is the planning, organizing, directing and controlling of development, compensation, integration, maintenance of human resource to the end that individual organisations and societal objectives are accomplished.
In the words of E.F.L Brech,“ Personnel management is that part of management process which is primarily concerned with human constituent in an organisation.
In the words of Dale Yoder,” Manpower management effectively describes the process of planning and directing the application, development and utilization of human resource employment.
H.R.M works on the list of assumptions such as:
1. It is moving towards strategic dimension and is major contributed to business policy.
2. It adopts developmental attitude.
3. It always works within pluralistic framework .
4. It’s goaL orientation and participation is important.
5. Coincidence of interest between stakeholders can be developed.
6. H.R.M assumes that human capital can be developed.
7. It creates open channel of communication to build trust and commitment.
1. People as Human Capital: Human resource function is the task to deal with human relationship within an organisation. It is the process of achieving the best individual in an organisation. People here are treated as an asset. People here have skills, abilities and experience which makes them successful.
2. Human Objective: Main objective of human resource management is to help employees to develop those potentials and capacities which enables to do a tough job so that they can be satisfied at their work. It needs willing corporation of people to attain desired goals
3. Staff Function: Human resource management supports the staff function of hiring, training evaluating, rewarding, counselling, promoting and firing of employees at all levels. The staff personnel manager is there to assist, advice, counsel and guide line managers.
4. Comprehensive Function: Personnel management covers all type of people at all levels such as worker, Supervisor, Clerical, managers at sector. Therefore it carries out comprehensive function.
5. Pervasive Management: Personnel management is pervasive responsibility which involves major subsystem in total management system. Every manager plans, staff organises, directing, controls the people and the people that required everywhere. It injects life in an organisation. Therefore, human resource management function is needed everywhere.
6. Innovative Role: A part of human resource manager services that of innovator. He performs up- to -date information and solves the problem by new methods. It brings innovation in an organisation.
Human resource planning is also called manpower planning. It is the process of forecasting an organisations demand and supply of right kind of people in right number for right place. It is a sub- system in total organisational planning. Human resource planning is also called employment planning.
According to Edwin Gester,” Manpower planning is a process including forecasting, developing, implementing and controlling by which a firm ensures it has right number of people at right kind of job at right time and right place and they are economically useful.
David Decenzo says,” Human resource planning is the process by which and Organisation ensures that it has right number and kind of people at right place at right time capable of effectively and efficiently completing those tasks that will help organisation achieve its overall objective.
Dale Beach says,” Human resource planning is the process of determining and assuring that organisation will have an adequate number of qualified persons available at proper time performing proper job which meets the need of an entire Enterprise and which provide satisfaction for the individual involved.
The major characteristics of human resource planning are as follows:
1. Optimum Utilization of Human Resources: The basic or primary purpose of human resource planning is to make optimum utilization of available resources. It aims at maximizing return on investment in human resource to achieve current strength of people and optimisation to human resources are to get for future requirement of company.
2. Primary Responsibility of Management: HRP is one of the primary responsibility of the management which ensures educated and capable supply of human resource and proper utilization of resources and attainment of organisation goal.
3. The Continuous Process: HRP is not static feature. It is an ongoing process. People in organisation changes. Changes in human resource is need of an organisation and work as per the requirement. It is a continuous process which requires continuous review and revision when necessary.
4. Integral Part: HRP is an integral part. It constitutes an indispensable part of the corporate and overall planning of company. It is a supportive plan for successful implementation of cooperative plan. The manpower planning for the appropriate and all the facts should be decided so that it meets organisation requirement. HRP helps to achieve all other organisational goal.
5. Quantitative and Qualitative Duality: HRP ensures that organisation possesses right person at right time and the right number of people are well qualified and capable to carry out desired activities efficiently.
6. Future Oriented: as we all know planning is future. So is human resource planning it ensures that Enterprises future needs are fulfilled as if forecast the manpower needs adequately.
7. Scans Manpower Environment: HRP studies team manpower environment which influences demand and supply of people required in the organisation It also includes study of optimum utilization of people.
8. System Approach To Manpower: System Approach to manpower as it considers all relevant aspect of manpower and demand and supply of human resource impacts compensation scheme the environment identifies the gap between command and supply and with the right strategy this gap is filled.
1. It facilitates productive bargaining.
2. it provides a basis for employee development programme.
3. It control cost of human resource.
4. it forecast future requirement for human resource to meet the future needs and maximized return on investment.
5. It anticipates impact of technology on job and manpower.
6. It assess the surplus in shortage of manpower.
7. It formulate transfer and succession policies.
Human resource planning is a process through which the right candidate for the right job is ensured. For conducting any process, the foremost essential task is to develop the organisational objective to be achieved through conducting the said process.
Six steps in human resource planning are presented.
1. Analysing Organisational Objectives: The objective to be achieved in future in various fields such as production, marketing, finance, expansion and sales gives the idea about the work to be done in the organisation.
2. Inventory of Present Human Resources: From the updated human resource information storage system, the current number of employees, their capacity, performance and potential can be analysed. To fill the various job requirements, the internal sources (i.e., employees from within the organisation) and external sources (i.e., candidates from various placement agencies) can be estimated.
3. Forecasting Demand and Supply of Human Resource: The human resources required at different positions according to their job profile are to be estimated. The available internal and external sources to fulfill those requirements are also measured. There should be proper matching of job description and job specification of one particular work, and the profile of the person should be suitable to it.
4. Estimating Manpower Gaps: Comparison of human resource demand and human resource supply will provide with the surplus or deficit of human resource. Deficit represents the number of people to be employed, whereas surplus represents termination. Extensive use of proper training and development programme can be done to upgrade the skills of employees.
5. Formulating the Human Resource Action Plan: The human resource plan depends on whether there is deficit or surplus in the organisation. Accordingly, the plan may be finalized either for new recruitment, training, interdepartmental transfer in case of deficit of termination, or voluntary retirement schemes and redeployment in case of surplus.
6. Monitoring, Control and Feedback: It mainly involves implementation of the human resource action plan. Human resources are allocated according to the requirements, and inventories are updated over a period. The plan is monitored strictly to identify the deficiencies and remove it. Comparison between the human resource plan and its actual implementation is done to ensure the appropriate action and the availability of the required number of employees for various jobs.
The importance of human management or personnel management is as follows:
1. Achievement of Goals: Human resource is the denominator of the progress of organisation. Effective organisation means the human resource are using their skills and attaining goals. The success of organisation is the success of its people. Therefore, people are an important ingredients in an organisation.
2. Important Task of Management: According to saltonstill, ‘the important part of management is to handle its people. All the activities of an enterprise are initiated by persons who make up an institution. Out of all the task of manager the most important is to handle it human efforts as everything depends on how its managers manage their human resource. Managing people is the heart of being a manager.
3. Basis of Success: HRM is basis of an enterprise. It deals with every organisational part such as finance production marketing etc. It becomes important to fix and achieve the target volume but aspect of function is inherent in the process of management.
4. Deals with Human Beings: Job of HRM is the toughest job as they deal with human beings. In an organisation as every human has their own sentiments, emotions, culture and each individual has their own mindset it becomes difficult to deal with humans in an organisation. Keeping all the human beings as a team, motivating them to be better is a greater challenge. First on the management is controller of human factor and ensures optimum utilization of human resources.
5. Satisfaction from Work: Human resource management aims at getting effective result with people which helps in their satisfaction. Good personnel management helps individual utilize their capacities at their best and maximize their satisfaction in each and every part of work.
6. Nervous System of an Organisation: Human resource management is nervous system of an organisation. According to EFL Brech personnel management is not the brain, the controller nor only Just a limb, a member nor yet bloodstream, the energizing force but it is nervous system.
7. Two- Way Process: It is a two-way channel of formation reaching out to every part of body. It is a live channel not just a duct. The personal function lies embedded in the structure is inherit in dynamism of that structure and integral part of management.
8. Economy of Operation: HRM means to get best out of people. It helps to increase the effectiveness. The purpose of personnel function is to promote effectiveness of people to do their duties in a better way to get maximum benefits out of minimum input to have corporation in all the task and improve human relations.
Human resource manager plays variety of roles in accordance with changing needs and circumstances. They are as follows:
1. As a Counsellor a Specialist: HR manager advises different function required in various aspects of personnel function such as manpower planning, recruitment, selection, training, organising compensation etc. He provides new ideas, suggestions and informations. He advises top executive on certain policies and also help line managers.
2. As a changing Agent: Manager brings changes in organisation. He serves as an internal agent who takes an initiative to improve personal practices. He introduces and implements institutional changes and brings innovation.
3. As a Liason Man: He co-ordinates all the activities of various department and serve as a common link which connects each other. He acts as a linking pin between department and organisation.
4. As an Information Source: HR Manager provides information about labour laws, labour market routine, personnel matter and other related areas. He knows the legal rules and keeps personnel record to provide required information.
5. As a Controller: The human resource manager assists line manager and ensure its execution of personnel policies and programme. The personnel policies and procedures are approved by him and are controlled by him. He is an arm of the top management and serves the needs of all personal activities.
6. The welfare Role: The HR manager looks after safety, health, canteen and other welfare activities. He is treated as housekeeper and observes specific provision of industrial laws and work for Welfare of employees.
7. As an Educator: The human resource manager is interested in learning and achieving growth. He helps human being to grow and realise their full potential. He provides opportunity for his employees to learn and adapt new ideas. He reminds the management about their morals and ethics.
8. As an Intellectual: The human resource manager possesses skills to understand and communicate matters of humans. It provides full discussion for a problem, discuss the problem and deal with it in an intelligent manner he has ability to have an agreement and frame policies.
9. The Problem Solvers Role: He is a problem solver in all aspect in union management relations. He acts as a Firefighter and remove the disputes and conflicts between employers and work. He is a mediator to settle the dispute and make peace.
The human resource management has widely accepted principles and policies followed by all. They are as follows:
1. Principle of cooperation: The employer and employees are the co- partners in industry. They have a teamwork, good relations, no conflict between them and the principle of co-partnership should be accepted by them. There should be harmony of interest between the employees. They should know that theory of self-care and personnel management. It integrates not dispute between them and Co-orporation among them.
2. Principle of Communication: When you are dealing with a person you require to be a better communicator as communication means exchange of ideas, opinion, feelings, fact and attitude. Human resource manager cannot be effective without being good at communication when there is effective communication there is job satisfaction and people understand their job in a better manner.
3. Principle of Humanitarian Treatment: In an organisation everyone is valuable and they must be treated with respect and care because whatever we are able to perform is due to their skills and contribution. It means we cannot enable employees to work forcefully they only work when they are treated fairly which respect and they are motivated.
4. Principle of Individual Development: A man has unlimited potential to grow. His capacity should be extended beyond and skills should be uplifted. He should have some personal goals adding to his development. He should be given throughout training guidance and development opportunities so that he can be and happy.
5. Principle of Scientific Selection: This means that employee should be selected to proper medical test in screening, the scientific analysis of traits and abilities should be made. Their personalities to be judged, the various interest Outlook habits should be judged so that right person is placed to the right kind of job.
6. Principle of Motivation: It is the basic principle of Human resource management. It is more over a psychological concept where human should be made happy and their individual needs and perception should be satisfied so that they are self- motivated and work in a proper manner. The most important thing of an organisation is to let members work willingly and with enthusiasm.
7. Principle of Higher Morale: To maintain higher moral of an employees the basic duty of an human resource manager is good condition of physical and mental well-being of an individual Corporation and willingness to work with zeal and enthusiasm. If the morale of an employee would be low he will be frustrated, inefficient and do not take any initiative. The good wage, healthy environment proper working conditions and right treatment is important for keeping the morale of employees high.
8. Principle of Fair Reward: Fair and adequate reward is necessary for employees as it motivates and encourage them. Reward should be equitable wages. It must meet expectation of those who carry better results. Reward is a single motivator in the society as everyone Solely works for it. If wages and salary and not adequate other motivating factors will also not motivate employees. Satisfaction from money is the primary satisfaction and most important one.
Job analysis is a systematic process of collecting the information on nature of a job, qualities and qualifications required to a job, physical and mental capabilities to required to a job, duties and responsibilities, physical and mental effort required to perform a job, necessary skills required to perform a job, working conditions and environment for a job, in order to describe job description and job specification, for recruitment and selection of employee, improve job satisfaction, employee safety and to build up employee motivation etc. There are also some outside resources that provide useful information about job searching and resume writing, everyone can read essay writing service reviews to choose the best services to write an application essay or resume. Job analysis, contains a simple term called “analysis”, which means detailed study or examination of something (job) in order to understand more about it (job). Therefore, job analysis is to understand more about a specific job in order to optimise it. Job analysis is a systematic process of collecting complete information pertaining to a job. Job analysis is done by job analyst who is an officer have been trained for it. Job analysis is a procedure through which you determine the duties and responsibilities, nature of the jobs and finally to decide qualifications, skills and knowledge to be required for an employee to perform particular job. Job analysis helps to understand what tasks are important and how they are carried on. When we talked of job analysis there are two essential documents which are prepared underneath it they are job description and job specification
Job description is a systematic outline of information required in process of job analysis it is a summary of job content in which job title location duty responsibilities equipment to be used working condition are specified.
David Delenzo and Stephen Robbins says, “A job description is a written statement of what the job holder does, how it is done, why it is done, it accurately portray job content, environment and conditions of employment.”
According to Edwin flippo, “ A job description is an organised factual statement of the duties and responsibilities of a specific job in brief it should tell what is to be done how and why it is a standard of function which define appropriate and authorise content of the job.”
According to Werther and Keigh Davis, “A job description is a written statement that explains duties, working conditions and other aspect of a special job.
The job description has some content and format to follow. It is divided into several sub parts. Content of job description is as follows:
1. Job Identification: The job identification section of job description states job title, code, application date, author, job grade etc. It should be short defining the nature of the job. It can be both in number or letter. It should give the summary of the job. These job codes compare the job and identifies relation between different job. It is very important to mention the date in job description as it shows how old the description is. Supervisor’s name, a title is also listed in job identification.
2. Job Summary: It is a written narrative concise summary that tells about the job in few sentence. It tells what the job is, how it is to be done and why.
3. Job Duties and responsibilities: It is one of the main section of job description which explain in detail responsibilities to be performed by job holder, each main duty is described in terms of action expected. The responsibilities of job duties are also explain such as custody of money supervision etc.
4. Equipment Machine: Equipment machine, material to be used in job and name and its nature and complexity is also mentioned.
5. Working Conditions: The physical environment of job is described in terms of heat like noise smoke etc. nature of hazards and their possibility of occurrence is also stated.
6. Social Environment: The social environment and interpersonal interaction required in performance of job are described. Training and development facilities may also be stated.
7. Supervision Degree: Supervision degree or extent of supervision is also described in terms of the subordinates superiors with their job title.
8. Related to Other Job: The job immediately below and above it also mention in a vertical workflow reporting relationship between each kind of job.
1. Give short definite and suggestive information in job identification.
2. Give a clear concise understandable picture of whole job in job summary.
3. Describe sufficient details of duties and responsibility.
4. Quote the example of work performed.
5. Avoid statement of opinion.
6. Describe the important relationship.
7. Indicate necessary working condition hours and days.
8. Get the job description duly signed by a supervisor or departmental head.
9. Keep the job description up-to-date by incorporating necessary changes.
10. Use brief accurate and simple statement for employee.
The good job description should have various advantages such as:
1. It should serve as basis on which to develop job specification which are useful in Planning, recruitment, selection, training. Promotion etc.
2. It guides management better wage and salary administration by throwing light on wage differential.
3. In the areas like job grading, classification, adjustment of even understanding between the employer and employee, investigation of incident, studies of health it is very helpful. It helps to frame questions for interview performance appraisal and group discussion.
4. It serves in developing performance standards and job evaluation.
5. It help to orient new employees towards basic duties and responsibilities.
6. It identifies training needs of the incumbent
7. It helps to indicate nature and content of the job to the applicant and incumbent
Job specification is the document of job analysis which shows the qualities and abilities are required to do a particular kind of job. It is an overall written summary of employee or job holder requirement. It is a profile of human characteristics needed by the person to perform job. These requirements include experience, training, education, physical and mental characteristics. When job or position crosses National boundaries the language may become important addition.
According to Edwin flippo, “A job specification is statement of minimum acceptable human qualities necessary to perform a job properly.
According to David Delenzo and Stephen Robbins, “The job specification States minimum acceptable qualification that a candidate must possess to perform job successfully. Based on that information job specification identifies knowledge skills abilities needed to perform job effectively.”
The job specification is open document in job description. It may or may not be certificate document. Job specification contains following information.
1. Job Identification: Like job description this section includes job title, job code, job location, job grade and supervisor.
2. Personal Characteristics: This section includes education, job experience, family background, sex, communication skills etc. This is called skill section.
3. Physical Characteristics: This section includes height, weight, vision, chest, health, age personal appearance etc.
4. Mental Characteristics: This section includes memory, initiative, intelligent quotient, judgement, ability to concentrate, enthusiasm synthesis, decision making.
5. Social and Psychological Characteristics: This includes pleasing behaviour, emotional ability, group discussion, psychological characteristics. The two characteristics of these qualities are
a. Essential attributes possessed by job holder.
b. Desirable attitudes that job holder should possess.
1. It describe human skill or requirement necessary for successful performance of job.
2. It is an important tool used in selection process.
3. It is helpful in devising adequate training program for employees.
4. It helps in employee performance appraisal.
It is a systematic and orderly process of determining the worth of a job in relation to other jobs. The objective of this process is to determine the correct rate of pay. It is therefore not the same as job analysis. Rather it follows the job analysis process, which provides the basic data to be evaluated. In simple worlds, job evaluation is the rating of jobs in an organization. This is the process establishing the value or worth of jobs in a job hierarchy and compares the relative intrinsic value or worth of jobs within an organization. Some renounced definitions of job evaluation are described below.
Scott, Clothier and Priegel defines job evaluation as “The operation of evaluating a particular job in relation to other jobs either within or outside the organization”.
Dale Yoder described job evaluation as “A practice which seeks to provide a degree of objectivity in measuring the comparative value of jobs within an organization and among similar organizations”.
Edwin B.Flippo defines job evaluation as “A systematic and orderly process of determining the worth of a job in relation to other jobs”.
Sloane described job evaluation as “Any formalized system that attempts to determine the relative worth of different jobs in the organization so that jobs of greater value can be rewarded by greater pay”.
According to the International Labour Organization (ILO), “Job evaluation is an attempt to determine and compare the demands which the normal performance of a particular job makes on normal workers, without taking into account the individual abilities or performance of the workers concerned”.
The British Institute of Management defines “Job evaluation as the process of analysis and assessment of jobs to ascertain reliably their negative worth using the assessment as the basis for a balanced wages structure”.
Wendell French defines job evaluation as “A process of determining the relative worth of the various jobs within the organization, so that differential wages may be paid to jobs of different worth. The relative worth of a job means relative value produced. The variables which are assumed to be related to value produced are such factors as responsibility, skill, effort and working conditions”.
The objectives of job evaluation, to put in a more systematic manner are to:
1. Establish a standard procedure for determining the relative worth of each job in an organization;
2. Ensure equitable wage for a job and reasonable wage differentials between different jobs in a hierarchical organization;
3. Determine the rate of pay for each job which is fair and equitable with relation to other jobs in the plant, community or industry;
4. Eliminate wage inequalities;
5. Use as a basis for fixing incentives and different bonus plans;
6. Promote a fair and accurate consideration of all employees for advancement and transfer;
7. Provide information for work organization, employees‟ selection, placement, training.
8. Provide a benchmark for making career planning for the employees in the organization and;
9. Ensure that like wages are paid to all qualified employees for like work.
The job evaluation has certain principles. These principles are supposed to be kept in the mind of the job evaluators. These principles are not only directives of proper job evaluation but also provide clarity in the process of evaluation.
According to Kress, these principles are:
1. Rate the job and the jobber. Each element should be rated on the basis of what the job itself requires;
2. The elements selected for rating purposes should be easily explainable in terms and a few in numbers as will cover the necessary requisites for every job without any overlapping;
3. Elements should be clearly defined and properly selected.
4. Any job rating plan must be sold to foremen and employees. The success in selling it will depend on a clear-cut explanation and illustration of the plan;
5. Foreman should participate in the rating of jobs in their own departments;
6. Maxim mum co-operation can be obtained from employees when they themselves have an opportunity to discuss job ratings and;
7. Too many occupational wages should not be established. It would be unwise to adopt an occupational wage for each total of point values.
Job Evaluation is a technique to rank jobs in an organization on the basis of the duties and responsibilities assigned to the job. The job evaluation process results in a job being assigned to a pay grade. The pay grade is associated with a pay range that is defined by a minimum and a maximum pay rate. A model of job evaluation process with the following steps is presented below:
1. Job Description – The position supervisor assigns duties and writes the job description. If there is an incumbent employee, s/he reviews it, and they both sign it. Instructions and additional assistance are available from Human Resources, if needed. The job description is a snapshot of the job as it presently exists, reflecting the current duties and responsibilities of the job and/or the incumbent.
2. Approval – The vice president reviews job descriptions and, if s/he Concurs, approves the responsibilities, requirements, and departmental organization contained within a job description presented for new evaluation, and signs it. If the vice president does not concur with the contents of the description, it is returned to the supervisor for changes.
3. Review- Human Resources reviews the job description as submitted with the supervisor prior to evaluation by the Job Evaluation Committee (Step 4). Human Resources help ensure that there is consistency and equity in the job descriptions and titles by editing them for clarity and format. If the Human Resources Office makes changes, the job description is returned to the supervisor and vice president for signature prior to being presented to the Job Evaluation Committee (Step 4).
4. Evaluation – The Job Evaluation Committee (JEC) is a multi-member committee, the members of which are appointed by the Staff Salary Administration Committee (SSAC), representing employees throughout organization. JEC ensures equity among jobs through the use of established, consistent criteria for evaluation and prevents escalation of the job evaluation grades by validating changes in job content presented for review. Members of JEC receive in-depth training on job evaluation and utilize a consistently applied point system for the evaluations.
5. Confirmation – SSAC confirms all job evaluations and titles recommended by JEC. This committee is com-posed of the SLCC Vice Presidents, the human resources director, and other relevant co-opted experts. After confirmation of the evaluation job description, SSAC advises the supervisor of the results of the evaluation and the title. The supervisor then advises the employee of the results of the job evaluation.
Two methods of job evaluation are
1. Quantitavive method
2. Non- Quantitative method
Non-quantitative methods are ranking and job classification or grading method, while the most common quantitative methods are factor comparison and point rating. The starting point for all job evaluation methods is a current job description and job specifications.
The major types of non-quantitative job evaluation procedures are ranking and job classification.
1. Ranking Method of job evaluation – This is simplest form of job evaluation method. The method involves ranking each job relative to all other jobs, usually based on some overall factor like job difficulty‟. Each job as a whole is compared with other and this comparison of jobs goes on until all the jobs have been evaluated and ranked. All jobs are ranked in the order of their importance from the simplest to the hardest or from the highest the lowest. The main role of the evaluator is to determine which of the jobs is more important or worth more to the organization. The major types of non-quantitative job evaluation procedures are ranking and job classification.
The following steps are involved in ranking jobs.
a. Obtain job information – The first step is job analysis. Job descriptions for each job are prepared and these are the basis on which the ranking s are made. The job ranking method usually ranks jobs according to the whole job‟ rather than a number of compensable factors.
b. Select raters and jobs to be rated – Ranking all the jobs, at a time, is usually not possible. The more usual procedure involves ranking jobs by department or in clusters‟ i.e. factory workers, clerical workers and so on. This eliminates the need for having to compare directly, say, factory jobs and clerical jobs.
c. Select Compensable factors – In the ranking method, it is common to use just one factor, for instance job difficulty, and to rank jobs on the basis of „the whole job‟. Regardless of the number of factors you choose, it is advisable to carefully explain the definition of the factor(s) to the evaluators so that they evaluate the jobs consistently.
2. Job Classification or Grading Method – This is a simple, widely used method. This method of job evaluation was made popular by the U.S. Civil Service Commission. In the ranking system there is no re-determined yardstick of values. In the job grading approach there is one such yardstick constituting of job classes or grades. Jobs are measured as whole jobs. Under this method job grades or classes are established by an authorised body or committee appointed for this purpose. A job grade is defined as a group of different jobs of similar difficulty or requiring similar skills to perform them. Job grades are determined on the basis of information derived from job analysis. The example of job grades may include, depending perform them. Job grades are determined on the basis of information derived from job analysis. The example of job grades may include, depending on the type of jobs the organization offers, skilled, unskilled, account clerk, clerk-cum typist, steno-typist, office superintendent, and laboratory assistant and so on.
The following five steps are generally involved in the process of job classification.
a. Prepare job description for basic information about the job
b. Prepare job grading description for identification of different levels of jobs. Each grade level must be distinct from the grade level adjacent to it. After establishing the grade level, each job is assigned to an appropriate grade level on the basis of the complexity of duties, non-supervisory responsibilities and supervisory responsibilities.
c. Select grades and key jobs about 10 to 20 jobs, which include all the major departments and functions and cover all the grades.
3. Quantitative Methods
Quantitative methods divide jobs into component parts and require absolute or relative value judgements about how much of a component part a particular job requires. The two most popular types of quantitative systems are the point rating and factor comparison methods.
a. Point Rating Method – This is most widely used system of job evaluation. The method evaluates the compensable factors of each job. It involves a more detailed, quantitative and analytical approach to the measurement of job work. Under this method jobs are broke down based on various identifiable factors such as skill, effort, training, knowledge, hazards, and responsibilities and so on. Thereafter, points are allocated to each of these factors. Weights are given to factors depending on their importance to perform the job. Points so allocated to various factors of a job are then summed. Then, the jobs with similar total of points are placed in similar pay grades. The sum of points gives an index of the relative significance of the jobs that are rated.
Factors Comparison Method – This is a combination of both rating and point rating methods. It means rates jobs by comparing them and makes analysis by breaking jobs into compensable factors. This system is usually used to evaluate white collar, professional and managerial positions. The mechanism for evaluating jobs under this method involves the flowing steps.
b. Determine the compensable factors – Analysts must first decide which factors are common and important in a broad range of jobs. The critical factors like responsibility, skill, mental efforts, physical effort and working conditions are most commonly used. Some organizations use different factors for managerial, professional, sales, and other types of jobs.
c. Determine key jobs – Key jobs are those that are commonly found throughout the organization and are common in the employer’s market. Common jobs re sleeted because it is easier to discover the market rate for them. Ideally, these benchmark jobs should be accepted by employee as key jobs and should encompass a wide variety of critical factors to be evaluated. Typically, 10-25 key jobs are selected by the committee.
According to the International Labour Organization, job evaluation offers the following advantages:
1. Job evaluation being a logical process and objective technique helps in developing a equitable and consistent wage and salary structure based on the relative worth of jobs in an organization.
2. By eliminating wage differentials within the organization, job evaluation helps in minimizing conflict between labour unions and management and, in turn, helps in promoting harmonious relations between them.
3. Job evaluation simplifies wage administration by establishing uniformity in wage rates.
4. It provides a logical basis for wage negotiations and collective bargaining.
5. In the case new jobs, job evaluation facilitates spotting them into the existing wage and salary structure.
6. In the modern times of mechanisation, performance depends much on the machines than on the worker himself/herself. In such cases, job evaluation provides the realistic basis for determination of wages.
7. The information generated by job evaluation may also be used for improvement of selection, transfer and promotion procedures on the basis of comparative job requirements.
8. Job evaluation rates the job, mot the workers. Organizations have large number of jobs with specialisations. It is job evaluation here again which helps in rating all these jobs and determining the wages and salary and also removing ambiguity in them.
In spite of many advantages, job evaluation suffers from the following drawbacks/limitations
1. Job evaluation is susceptible because of human error and subjective judgement. . While there is no standard list of factors to be considered for job evaluation, there are some factors that cannot be measured accurately.
2. There is a variation between wages fixated through job evaluation and market forces. Say Kerr and Fisher, the jobs which tend to rate high as compared with the market are those of junior, nurse and typist, while craft rates are relatively low. Weaker groups are better served by an evaluation plan then by the market, the former places the emphasis not on force .
3. When job evaluation is applied for the first time in an organization, it creates doubts in the minds of workers whose jobs are evaluated and trade unions that it may do away with collective bargaining for fixing wage rates.
4. Job evaluation methods being lacking in scientific basis are often looked upon as suspicious about the efficacy of methods of job evaluation.
5. Job evaluation is a time-consuming process requiring specialised technical personnel to undertake it and, thus, is likely to be costly also.
6. Job evaluation is not found suitable for establishing the relative worth of the managerial jobs which are skill-oriented. But, these skills cannot be measured in quantitative terms.
7. Given the changes in job contents and work conditions, frequent evaluation of jobs is essential. This is not always so easy and simple.
In the context of an industrial organization, performance appraisal is a systematic evaluation of personnel by supervisors or those familiar with their performance. In other words, performance appraisal is a systematic and objective way of judging the relative worth or ability of an employee in performing his/her task.
Many authors described and some of them were tried to define the concept of performance appraisal in their own way. According to Gary Dessler, performance appraisal is an evaluation of employee’s current or past performance relative to his/her performance standards. Further he mentioned that the appraisal process involves three steps;
1. Setting work standards,
2. Assessing the employee’s actual performance relative to these.
3. Providing feedback to the employee with the aim of motivating that person to eliminate performance deficiencies or to continue to perform above par.
McGregor discusses the formal performance appraisal plans in view of meeting three needs. Out of which one is relating to organization and other two for individual. The first one, organization level, is to provide systematic judgments to back up salary increases, transfers, demotions, or terminations. The other two, individual level, are relating to certain means which are meant for subordinate to tell subordinate how boss is doing, and suggesting needed changes in behaviour, attitudes, skills or job knowledge.
Performance appraisal may be defined as a structured formal interaction between a subordinate and supervisor, that usually takes the form of a periodic interview (annual or semi-annual), in which the work performance of the subordinate is examined and discussed, with a view to identifying weaknesses and strengths as well as opportunities for improvement and skills development. Appraising the performance is method of evaluating the behaviour of employees in the work spot, normally including both the quantitative and qualitative aspects of job performance. Performance refers to the degree of accomplishment of the tasks that make up an individual’s job. It includes how well an individual is fulfilling the job demands. In order to find out whether an employee is worthy of continued employment or not, and if so, whether he should receive a bounds, a pay rise or promotion, performance needs to be evaluated form time to time. It is by and large useful for not only for the different payments purpose but also to make aware of once strengths and
Performance appraisal serves the following management objectives:
1. Providing Basis for Promotion/Transfer/Termination – Identifying those subordinates who deserve promotion or required lateral shift or termination can be sued for career planning.
2. Enhancing Employees’ Effectiveness – Helping employee by identifying strengths and weaknesses and informing him as to what performance is expected from him, would go a long way in making him understand his role well, and he is likely to be more effective on the job.
3. Identifying Employees’ Training and Developmental Needs – Identifying training and development needs of employees is necessary to prepare them for meeting challenges in their current and future employment role. 4. Removing Work Alienation – Identifying and removing factors responsible for workers’ discontent would motivate them for better work performance. Performance appraisal helps in creating a positive and healthy climate in the organization.
5. Developing Interpersonal Relationship – Relation between superior-subordinate can be improved through realization that each is dependent on the other for better performance and success. By facilitating employees to do introspection, self-evaluation and goal setting, their behaviour can be modified. Better interpersonal relationship leads to team-building.
6. Removing Discontent – Identifying and removing factors responsible for workers‟ discontent would motive them for better work performance. Performance appraisal helps in creating a positive and healthy climate in the organization.
7. Removing worker alienation – Counselling employees corrects misreading which might result in work alienation. Performance appraisal helps in creating a positive and healthy climate in the organization.
The seven criteria for assessing performance are:
1. Quality – The degree to which the process or result of carrying out an activity approaches perfection.
2. Quantity – The amount produced, expressed in monetary terms, number of units, or number of completed activity cycles.
3. Timeliness – The degree to which an activity or a result produced.
4. Cost effectiveness – The degree to which the use of the organization’s resources – human, monetary, technological and material.
5. Need for supervision – The degree to which a job performer can carry out a job function without supervisory assistance.
6. Interpersonal impact – The degree to which a performer promotes feelings of self-esteem, goodwill and co-operation among co-worker and subordinates.
7. Training – Need for training for improving his skills knowledge. The above criteria relate to past performance and behaviour of an employee. There is also a need for assessing the potential of an employee for future performance, particularly when the employee is tipped for assuming greater responsibilities.
The performance appraisal process starts with employee planning and ends with an evaluation of employee progress. The performance appraisal process consists broadly two steps.
1. Complete the performance appraisal form.
2. Participate in a performance appraisal interview and discussion.
These two stages comprise the following levels in the appraising performance of the staff.
1. Establish Performance Standards or Goals – The appraisal process begins with the establishment of performance standards. The Officers must determine what outputs, accomplishments and skills will be evaluated. These standards should have evolved out of job analysis and job description. These performance standards should be clear and objectives are to be understood and measured.
2. Communicate Performance Expectations to Employees – Once the performance standards are established, these need to be communicated to the respective employees so that they come to know what expected of them. Past experience indicates that not communicating standards to the employees compounds the appraisal problems. Here, it must be noted that mere transference of information form the Medial Officer to the staff is not communication. It become communication only when the transference of information has taken place and has been received and understood by the staff. The feedback form the staff on the standards communicated.
3. Measure Actual Performance – This is the third step involved in the appraisal process. In this stage, the actual performance of the employees is measured on the basis of information available from various sources such as personal observation, statistical reports, oral reports, and written reports. The evaluator’s feeling should not influence the performance measurements of the staff. Measurement must be objective based on facts and findings. This is because what we measure is more critical and important to the evaluation process than bow we measure.
4. Compare Actual Performance with Standards – In this stage, the actual performance is compared with the predetermined standards. Such a comparison may reveal the deviation between standard performance and actual performance and will enable the evaluator to proceed to the fifth step on the process i.e. Review and discussion of the appraisal with the concerned staff.
5. Discuss and Review the Appraisal with the Staff – The fifth step in the appraisal process is to communicate to and discuss with the employees the results of the appraisal. This is one of the most challenging tasks the Officers face to present an accurate appraisal to the staff and then make them accept the appraisal in a constructive manner. A discussion on appraisal enables employees to know their strengths and weaknesses. This has, in turn, impact on their future performance. The impact may be positive or negative depending upon how the appraisal is presented and presented and discussed with the employees.
6. Initiate Corrective Action – The final step in the appraisal process is the initiation of corrective action when it is necessary. The areas needing improvement are identified and then, the measurers to correct or improve the performance are identified and initiated.
1. Rankings Method – It is the oldest and simplest method of performance appraisal, by which the man and his performance are considered as an entity by the rater. No attempt is made to fractionalize the ratee or his performance; the whole man is compared with the whole man. It involves raking all employees according to job performance and commitment to the organization. It is the oldest and simplest formal systematic method of performance appraisal in which one employee is compared with all others for the purpose of pacing them in a simple rank order of worth. The staff can be ranked from the highest to the lowest or from the best to the worst. The relative position of each man is tested in terms of his numerical rank. It may also be done by ranking a person on his job performance against that of another member of a competitive group by placing him as a number one or two or three in total group. The greatest limitation of this method is that in practice it is very difficult to compare a single individual with human beings having varying behaviour traits.
2. Paired Comparison Method – In this method, each employee is compared with other employees on one – on – one basis, usually based on one trait only. The rater is provided with a bunch of slips each containing a pair of names; the rater puts a tick mark against the employee whom he considers the better of the two. The number of times this employee is compared as better with others determines his or her final ranking.
3. Grading Method – In this method, certain categories of worth are established in advance and carefully defined. There can be three categories established from employees: outstanding, satisfactory, and unsatisfactory. There can be more than three grades. Employee performance is compared with grade definitions. The employee is, then, allocated to the grade that best describes his or her performance.
4. Graphic Ratings – It is a common method, which uses either a numerical scale (1-5) such as ‘poor’, ‘average’, ‘good’, ‘very good’, ‘superior’) or rate various attributes of employee performance. This method is popular because it is easy to construct; adaptable to a wide range of jobs and tasks, and easily understood construct; adaptable to a wide range of jobs and tasks, and easily understood by raters and employees.
5. Check-List Method – The basic purpose of utilizing check-list method is to ease the evaluation burden upon the rater. In this method, a series of statements, i.e. questions with their answer in „yes‟ or „no‟ are prepared by the concerned officials. The check-list is, then, presented to the rater to tick appropriate answers relevant to the appraisee. Each question carries a weight age in prepare the final scores for all appraisees based on all questions. The sample Check-list for appraising University teachers is presented in exhibit.
6. Critical Incidents –This method involves recording on-the-job behaviour over a period of time. The employee’s Officer keeps a ‘diary’ of examples of effective and ineffective job performance. Thus the behaviour of the employees in terms performance in different occasions are recorded and assessed and then used as background to overall assessment.
7. Forced Distribution Method –This method was evolved by Tiffen to eliminate the central tendency of rating most of the employees at a higher end of the scale. The method assumes that employees‟ performance level confirms to a normal statistical distribution i.e.10, 20, 30, 20, and 10 per cent. This is useful for rating a large number of employees‟ job performance and promotability. It tends to eliminate or reduce bias. It is also highly simple to understand and easy to apply in apprising, performance of employees in organizations. It suffers from the drawback that if all distribution grades improve similarly, no single grade would rise in a rating.