Most businesses are in need of continuous improvement. management approaches the staff. The profitability and financial stability of a business largely depend on how effective the respective direction of management will be. At the moment, a variety of opportunities are open for top managers of Russia and developed countries regarding definitions of competent approaches to personnel management. Which ones are best suited for manufacturing businesses? Which are more universal and which are less?
Theory Z
If we consider the most popular modern concepts of personnel management, then we can pay attention to the so-called "theory Z". It was developed by a researcher from the University of California V. Ouchi. This concept of personnel management is based on the interpretation of Japanese experience in enterprise management.
Many experts attribute the corresponding interest to the fact that incredible economic success was achieved in Japan in the second half of the 20th century. A state that does not have significant resources could become one of the locomotives of the world economic system. Therefore, managers of even the most developed countries suggested that in many respects the corresponding success of Japan could be due to the implementation of effective personnel management principles.
At the same time, there is a point of view that those models that were used in the Land of the Rising Sun are largely due to the historical traditions of this state. In particular, the concept of personnel management under consideration, the Z theory, is based on a system of life-time hiring practiced in Japan and not very popular in the West. An employee, arriving at an enterprise, for example, immediately after graduation, gradually acquires the necessary professional knowledge, after which he no longer needs to transfer to another employer. One of the main criteria for calculating the salary of an employee is his experience.
The specificity of the concept of personnel management based on the Z theory is that a special social environment is created around the company employee: it is engaged in its “upbringing”, stimulates it to master new knowledge, and also provides a person with a stable salary. In exchange, the enterprise will expect full loyalty, dedication, high-quality and conscientious work from a person.
Such a concept of a personnel management system has an important advantage: if the company manages to create a similar atmosphere in which each employee will diligently fulfill their tasks, then there is no need for control and strict regulation of business processes. In turn, the employee will have a tangible space for freedom of action. He will be able to optimize his work in the best way - so as to achieve the most outstanding production indicators.
Human capital concept
Consider other notable HR concepts. Among them is the theory of human capital. She suggests that the company should "invest" in the employee so that he subsequently recouped the relevant costs. Such investments can be expressed both in raising the level of his salary and in ensuring that a person acquires new knowledge and skills - for example, during expensive training programs.In the contract between the employer and employees, certain conditions of “return on investment” could be prescribed - in the form of mining or other obligations.
However, this concept of personnel management of the organization, as it turned out, may not always be applicable. The fact is that it is difficult to imagine many positions at the enterprise in the form of an “investment project” and thereby calculate the necessary “investments”. As well as prescribing in the contract the conditions for the "return" of capital on the basis of clear, transparent criteria for the employee.
Of course, there are posts in relation to which a similar approach can be applied in the most effective way. This may be employees of production lines, receiving salaries mainly in piecework format. In turn, employees in positions where salaries are paid, in some cases, with difficulty can get an objective assessment of their labor productivity in the framework of the concept under consideration. Thus, the theory of human capital is best suited for industrial businesses. For “office” specializations, other concepts may be more optimal.
System models
The concepts of personnel management, which are based on the so-called system models, are very common. There are several noteworthy varieties.
So, the "four-dimensional model" of Beer and Spector, researchers from the Harvard Business School, is popular. The main idea here is to launch a special communication mechanism between managers and subordinates. Its main components: the orientation of the workforce, the organization of labor, as well as the salary compensation system.
Based on systemic approaches, a theory of organizational development is formed. Its specificity in considering the employee as a subject of the system. A feature of this concept of personnel management is the organization of continuous work related to improving the management of the organization as a whole, and not with a focus on optimizing activities in specific departments of the company. Work in this direction should be carried out by the management structures of the company continuously with the identification of problem areas and the adjustment of processes in the relevant areas.
Modern human resource management concepts include an approach such as systems empiricism. It is based on the study of the experience of the most successful organizations in a particular business segment.
Human Resource Management and Business Strategy
Researchers Gelbraith and Natanson have developed a theory according to which the concepts, principles and methods of personnel management in modern enterprises should be implemented in combination with approaches that are directly related to building a business strategy. The management of the company should implement 4 basic areas of activity that are related to work with personnel - selection, assessment, remuneration, as well as development in correlation with entrepreneurial approaches of management, which determine the priorities of the company in terms of business activities.
Human resources concept
Considering the basic concepts of personnel management, it will be useful to explore the specifics of one of the most common management approaches. It is a concept of human resources. Some researchers classify it as systemic. The main idea of this concept is to use labor as an integrated resource that allows us to solve a wide range of production problems and can replace many other sources - for example, financial ones.
Researchers associate the emergence of this concept (strategy) of personnel management with the growth of competition between enterprises in most business areas. Firms that have at their disposal the same number of specialists in the same positions and with similar labor compensation costs can show different results in terms of economic profitability simply becausethat in one organization the management of "human resources" is carried out more efficiently.
The key principles of the personnel management concept in question are as follows:
- identification and use of not only obvious, but also non-obvious potential capabilities, competencies and skills of employees;
- continuous improvement of management effectiveness;
- modeling of production processes aimed at improving labor efficiency;
- analysis of the reasonableness of the company's expenses on labor compensation;
The theory of human resources is constantly being improved and supplemented by the practical experience of various enterprises. The essence of the personnel management concept in question is most often understood by modern researchers as the conduct of work aimed at identifying the economic feasibility of financing certain business processes, based on the potential (knowledge, skills, competencies) of hired employees performing their tasks in company staff.
The concept under consideration assumes that each employee has a certain value for the company. As a rule, it is calculated by the revenue that arises with his participation. In this sense, the concept under consideration is often evaluated by researchers as more universal than the theory of human capital.
The personal aspect of working with staff
So, we examined the basic concepts of personnel management. It will also be useful to study a number of approaches practiced by Russian managers without correlation to a particular theory, however, aimed at improving the efficiency of the enterprise’s employees.
Among the most common - the provision of personal communications with staff. Their essence lies in the study of the needs and interests of employees of the company, which may be due to both social factors and psychological characteristics of a particular employee. Using a personal approach, the manager, regardless of which one implements the concepts and methods of personnel management, will be able to find out, first of all, what is the employee’s motivation to solve production problems, due to which factors a person can be ready for more intensive labor investments for the benefit of the enterprise .
Studying the employee’s behavior peculiarities due to his personal characteristics, the manager will be able to correctly formulate tasks for a particular specialist, as well as identify non-obvious, and at the same time very useful employee competencies.
Human Resources Organizational Context
In addition to the personal approach, the leaders of the company, according to researchers, should take into account the organizational context of personnel management. In this case, factors should be taken into account that are formed not at the level of individual psychological characteristics of employees, but in the field of social communications with the participation of all company employees.
The corporate culture of the organization can act as a source of formation of relevant factors. It assumes that the company has stable behavioral norms, decision-making principles, value guidelines that largely determine how efficiently the company's employees will work.
The organizational context for working with personnel involves the study of a number of key corporate subsystems - regulatory, infrastructure, and business. They should be studied first of all by management. The concept of personnel management may well be selected based on the totality of the characteristics of the respective subsystems. For example, if it turns out that the current level of technology in the enterprise, objectively, does not allow to use all the opportunities (skills, knowledge, competencies) of employees,then the company may postpone the implementation of the concept of “human resources” until the infrastructure of the company is not necessary improved.
The importance of corporate culture in personnel management
We noted above that the prevailing corporate culture in a company can be of great importance when choosing one or another concept of personnel management. Let's consider this aspect in more detail.
So what is a corporate culture? It is, as we have defined above, a set of rules, norms, traditions and values adopted in the organization. The fact of their approval as generally accepted in some cases is rather difficult to fix. The corporate culture, according to many researchers, cannot be imposed as a policy. It should be formed in a natural way, with the accumulation of opinions, approaches, assessments related to business processes and the accompanying social communications in the enterprise.
A criterion for the formation of a corporate culture can be the fact that the bulk of initiatives related to improving approaches to the development of the economic and social component of company activities begins to go through the same channels. Each employee, therefore, knows who to contact in the company in order to convey this or that idea to management.
Another possible criterion is a decrease in the frequency and duration of the coordination and discussion procedures. Employees of the company are well aware of what can be done in the company, and that is extremely undesirable. What does this mean in terms of the effectiveness of personnel management?
A lot of things. First of all, the fact that employees begin to spend less working time on those communication procedures that are not directly related to their labor activities - such as coordination and discussion of projects. Corporate culture in most cases facilitates the integration of newcomers into the team of a company. They do not have to explain why those instructions should be followed this way and not otherwise: they just do everything that way, the company has adopted it.
Corporate culture allows you to accelerate the practical implementation of new approaches in management. For example, if the leaders of the company decided that a scientific concept of personnel management should be put into practice as soon as possible, then the established channels of corporate culture contribute to the rapid adaptation of relevant innovations among the company’s employees.
Promising concepts
So, we examined what approaches in personnel management are popular today. Some of them have been introduced into management practice for quite some time, but nevertheless they remain relevant. Of course, the further development of personnel management concepts both in Russia and in the world is very active. This process may involve the modernization of current approaches, as well as the development of completely new principles for the organization of management in the company.
Modern researchers identify a large number of factors that can affect the further development of the concepts in question. First of all, this is the practice of building entrepreneurial strategies, which will be formed in the near future. The fact is that the economies of many developed countries have developed a difficult situation. In Japan, real GDP has not been growing for almost 20 years. And therefore, effective, and therefore become popular methods of personnel management in the 70s, probably require some adaptation to the needs of modern businesses.
The management system at the enterprise should be built not only taking into account the specifics of local production, but also in correlation with external economic factors.The goals of the personnel management concept should be formed not only on the basis of profitability indicators of an individual company, but also taking into account the situation on the labor market as a whole, the situation in other, possibly competing organizations. What will be the theory of personnel management in the near future largely depends on the macroeconomic factor.
The relevance of new HR concepts for Russia
The Russian economy is traditionally regarded as transitional. Of course, now a few characteristics are given by a few experts regarding the Russian economic system: significant successes have been achieved in our country in terms of capitalist construction. But the crisis trends observed at the current stage of the development of the Russian economy are largely due, experts say, to an insufficiently realized potential in personnel management, which is carried out at Russian enterprises.
On the one hand, top managers of companies operating in the Russian Federation have full access to the most modern foreign knowledge bases and experience. Russian specialists can receive a similar resource both in the process of training in various educational programs, and in the course of international communications with foreign colleagues.
On the other hand, the specifics of business processes taking place in the Russian Federation is characterized by a number of features that may not always take into account the concepts of personnel management, which, for example, are accepted in Japan or the USA. It is noteworthy that many Russian managers, communicating with foreign partners, share their experience in solving problems in the field of management and receive the highest rating from colleagues.
Thus, the exchange of experience in terms of personnel management between the Russian Federation and Western countries can be not only one-sided and proceeding on the part of states that have a longer history of capitalist construction. Of course, current events in the political arena can significantly complicate the future prospects of communications between Russia and Western states in the business sphere. But even in this case, entrepreneurs and top managers from the Russian Federation may well develop competitive, relevant and adequately adapted to the specifics of the economy of the Russian Federation concepts. The question is in the practice of using them. The main thing, according to analysts, is that Russian managers are willing to consistently implement the relevant concepts, taking into account, as we noted above, not only factors specific to an individual enterprise, but also trends caused by processes on the national market and in international business .
