The human resource managament in the postmodern era

STUDENT I.D. No: 100021420

SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT

MN4213 HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT Assignment 2

Submission date: 12 noon on Friday 10 December 2010

HRM – Assignment 2
The human resource management has gone through a process of evolution marked by human intervention, as all of the aspects that compose an organization. There was a time when the important matter was to make a profit,while the workers were left in the background, which can be a brief summary of the managerial methods of Frederick Taylor, Henry Ford and the Scientific Management. Luckily for the workers, there started to emerge different ways of management, according to which they were now beginning to be considered important parts of the company, important assets, rather than just pawns. In addition to theeconomic development of the company, the development of the workers also gains importance in these times in a broad sense, their training and their education becomes more significant (Sarriés 1997a, p. 307). I refer to what was called post-modernism, which is considered to be a new period in which the dominant management techniques and theories of the past give way to different method and ideas. In thefield of human resource management, this can be characterized by features such as changes in flexibility, empowerment or quality (Net Industries and its Licensors 2010). In what follows, I am going to make an attempt to analyse some of the post-modernist aspects that are directly linked with the human resource management. Before considering all the details, it should be pointed out that someaspects of both taylorism & fordism and postmodernism, which are quite different from each others. Taylor pursued the efficiency; it is needless to say that nowadays every organization pursues the same objective - efficiency, but it is not with the firmness and the extremism with which Taylor wanted to work. By way of explanation, suffice it to indicate briefly the differences between taylorism andmanagement techniques today: Taylor thought that the efficiency, the growth of the productivity, could be achieved with a group of workers sufficiently qualified and capable of working all together (Anon., ca. 2010a), and that it was the whole group that contributed to the organization with the results expected. Conversely, nowadays it is increasingly common that every possible worker, everycandidate for a job, be almost minutely examined in order to get and hire the most skilled individuals for a job. In this regard, Ford contributed to the improvement of the human resource management in some way, promoting the acquisition of advanced qualifications among workers for certain jobs, but it is the army-like labour discipline that does not fit into the techniques of nowadays imposed by him.Another fact that can help to differentiate both taylorism and fordism from managerial techniques of today is that formerly it was regular to hire and fire workers due to market demand at any given time, that is to say, it was usual to dismiss a worker when this individual meant an unnecessary spending for the company, and having to hire a new worker (or the similar one) due to changing marketconditions at a given time was usual as well. This plot just explained does not fit into the managerial techniques of the postmodernism, where the workers are an essential asset for the company and are almost as important as the money. While in earlier times workers were hired on condition that they had a set of skills and capabilities considered enough to fulfill their jobs, in the postmodernist timenew procedures for company’s management and workers as well began to arise. Besides, workers began to be considered not just an expendable element, but also an important asset, a knowledge asset which determines whether the company is going to achieve its aims and goals. Furthermore, the postmodernist organizations began to develop

different methods for identifying the workers who would help...