The industrial revolution of the 18th century has transformed the way organizations perceive human laborers. Man has become a means to achieve a worldly target, just like non-living machinery. People judge the actual value of human nature based on the profits it generates. A corporate mentality dominates most of our routine interactions. It also shapes our perception and the way we deal with society. Therefore, we can still see the 18th-century harsh approach to human labor present in a modern workplace. Here are four sub disciplines of HR and their importance.
Increasing performance stress, narrow deadlines, cost optimization pressures, and many other workplace factors have made it unbearable for employees. The corporate environment has become increasingly harsh and, for a long time, neglected the fundamental rights of employees. The Industrial Revolution started in 1760. However, it has taken around two centuries that organizations recognized the importance of the human workforce. We can trace prominent human resource management practices back to the mid-20th century in the US. Proper HRM inclusion in the organization started to occur after the UK published academic literature on workforce management.
Fortunately, almost every leading organization in the current business landscape contains an HR department. They have finally realized that humans are the most crucial element for the success of any organization. It is of utmost importance to dedicate ample organizational resources to keep the workforce satisfied and motivated. Organizations must meet their needs on priority. Therefore, they bifurcate their HR department into different disciplines to cater to various employees’ needs. Let’s have a look at those HR sub-disciplines:
Table of Contents
1. COMPENSATION AND BENEFIT
The most significant element while accepting an offer letter is the salary. You might have got a very charismatic manager who keeps you engaged and encouraged. It might provide you necessary intrinsic motivation. However, monetary compensation and employee benefits constitute a considerable chunk of your overall work satisfaction. The right balance between an employee’s position and the offered perks acts as a fruitful drive for employee performance.
The compensation division is the most specialized sub-discipline of HR. It encompasses extensive financial acumen along with good accounting skills. Ranging from salary, stock options, pension plans to flextime, maternity leaves, and even free lunches — you name it, they do it.
The compensation and benefits package entails a wide array of perks for employees. 31.4% of the total employment cost is only because of the fringe benefits to employees. Compensation and reward consulting firms can provide strategic benefit packages that will encourage employees to achieve more and perform really well in their expertise.
The dynamic range of this sub-discipline has made it among the most preferred choice of HR professionals. It has become the most prominent HR specialization in enrolling in an MBA degree online and across all leading business schools globally. Its managers enjoy a crucial position in the HR department and are usually next to become the department heads. Moreover, the complexity of this HR function demands proper scholarly training at higher levels. Which also contributes to its dominance among HR educational circles.
2. TALENT ACQUISITION
Attracting and retaining the right talent out of the potential candidate pool serves a fundamental purpose for organizational success. The talent acquisition division is responsible for recruiting, selecting, and hiring the right person for the job. This department provides a seamless supply of quality employees for an organization. The talent acquisition department ensures that timely recruitment drives and employee onboarding fill any vacant position in an organization.
Along with its rising importance, critiques have targeted this department too. The hiring process starts with relevant business divisions testing the required technical knowledge of the candidate. Then reviews question the need for an entirely separate department for onboarding, the talent acquisition department. Do they inquire about what does a recruiting coordinator do? Their rationale is when the business division can test technical aptitude, they can also fulfill the remaining requirements and finally onboard the candidate. However, these critiques miss out on an essential ingredient of organizational behavior.
The primary purpose of talent acquisition is to assess the candidate for soft skills. In a survey conducted by Deloitte, 92% of respondents rated soft skills as a defining priority for an effective employee. Moreover, recent hiring protocols have become very complex. They require proper specialization like any other functional domain of a business. Therefore, the existence of an appropriate acquisition of talent discipline is inevitable for an organization’s success.
3. TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT
What if I tell you that you can radically enhance the performance of your employees? That too without spending millions on technology or automation. Believe it or not, the key to unlocking your workforce’s true potential is training and development. One of the essential functions of HRM is undoubtedly training and development. Training is about teaching the employees necessary technical and other job-related skills. It follows a systematic educational program to impart awareness about the required organizational KSAs (Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities).
Globally, one of the leading causes of high turnover is lack of proper training and noticeable development in employees. Development is the most influential anchor for employees to keep them loyal to an organization. Researches have shown that 40% of employees leave jobs within the first year of employment because they do not get ample training and development.
4. EMPLOYEE RELATIONS
Human nature is very unpredictable. It can soon indulge in a conflict in response to an intriguing external factor. Especially in the contemporary corporate environment that has aggressive competition, maintaining employee relations is of paramount importance. As per a survey conducted by HP, employees interact for 56% of their total time with their’ work family’ rather than their own real families. Therefore, the usual tendency of humans to indulge in conflicts plays a role in workplaces, which necessitates a specialized division.
ER comprises different employer-employee relationship dimensions. It oversees contractual compliance as well as emotional and physical factors of the workplace. A surprising 48% of employees report behavioral complaints at work. The HR department invests 42% of its total time in resolving these issues. ER deals with bullying, harassment, and other routine relationship maintenance roles like tracking employee satisfaction. The importance of a satisfying human resource augments the significance of this sub-discipline.
FINAL WORDS
The HR department has contributed significant progress for the Fortune 500 companies that have moved up the list over the last decade. Organizations like Walmart, Amazon, Apple, and Berkshire Hathaway have transformed their traditional personnel management into modern-day human resource management practices. It has provided them with an edge to surpass their competition and uplift their employee performance. Different sub-disciplines of HR have become an unavoidable requirement for the proper functioning of the overall organization. Suppose you want your business to succeed and sustain in current markets with cut-throat competition. In that case, you must acknowledge the importance of HR. You must ensure the proper functional existence of HR and its key sub-disciplines in your organization.
