HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

ASSIGNMENT-1
TOPIC: CHANGING ROLE OF HRM Submitted to:Mr. Renjith Krishnan Faculty HRM MBA DEPT. AIMIT Submitted by: Akhil krishnsn k.p (Batch-B), Abin Jose (Batch-A)

INTRODUCTION
Historical Role of HR
From a historical perspective, the role of HR has moved through three different phases. In the past, HR role was separate to the organizations business strategy. The main function of personnel department was to provide administrative support in relation to staffing issues.

PAST VIEW OF HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

BUSINESS OPERATIONS

HR SPECIALISTS In common view of HR that of providing a supportive role .Greater HR responsibility has been passed to line managers. It is the responsibility of the Hr department to provide support to the line managers and other customers within the organization as needed

CURRENT VIEW OF HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

The role of HR is assuming that of a strategic business partner. HR management needs to focus on big picture .Understand the business, it's strategies, and its goals and take the lead in ensuring that the organization has human resource capital required to succeed.HR will be the glue that holds the organization together and also the oil that lubricates the various parts f organization. HR must add value to the organization

 FUTURE VIEW OF HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

STRATERGIC BUSINESS DRIVEN BY HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

Critical Competencies of HR Professionals in the 21st Century

The new roles that HR professionals will need to undertake require that new competencies be devoloped. The Conference Board report identifies a number of critical competencies that HR professionals will need to possess in order to contribute to the organisations success. These competencies include the ability to facilitate and impliment change on a global scale; developing cross-cultural leadership skills; gaining a global business savvy; and being able to build teams across borders. HR professionals will need stronger cross-cultural orientations as well as language skills in order to communicate and develop a deeper understanding of the environment in which the organisations workforce operates. There is a need to globalise the core HR leadership group so that it is more aligned with business opportunities worldwide as well as with the cultural diversity of the organisation. HR professionals will need to be rotated among different offices and operations of the organisation in order to develop greater cultural sensitivity as well as an understanding of organisational operations. HR professionals will also need a greater knowledge regarding international business practices and labour laws. Interestingly, The Conference Board report indicates that many of the roles that HR professionals will need to fulfil in the future are presently not being performed well. Fewer than 20% of the executives surveyed rated HR professionals as performing extremely well in such areas as integrating global and local perspectives in its decision, supporting global

mobility and development experiences, building and supporting global networks of relationships, developing global leaders and global staffing. These findings demonstrate the work that HR professionals still need to accomplish in order to remain as significant contributors to their organisations success. HR Roles Within Organisations The three diagrams presented above describe the state of human resource management within organizations. HR departments still need to be concerned to handle payroll, benefit plans ,vacation and leave entitlements. HR professionals are also needed to provide support to line managers in filling job vacancies and dealing with particular HR issues that arise in the day today functioning of the organization . however , many of this specialist and supportive functions can be outsourced so that HR professionals can focus on the large , more strategic needs of the organization. In this way , the energies of HR department can be directed towards helpition succeed .

TOP MANAGEMENT
C O B E T R S E L E C T E M P L O Y E E A P P R A I S NON-HR APROFESSIONAL L R E L S

A M N VALUE DRIVERS I P I E STRATEGIC BUSINESS DRIVEN HRM N F I N I

N I S T INTEGRATIVE/GENERALIST G O A S T N

HR SUPPORTIVE ROLE
I O N O

HR SPECIALIST

FUNCTIONAL SPECIALISTS

CHANGING ROLE OF HR
1- Developing emplo y ees

and

retaining

the

best

Managing Talent

This is the topic at very near the top of the agenda in every region and every industry. It involves attracting, developing ,and retaining all individuals with high potential regardless of whether they are managers, specialists, or individual contributors across all levels of organization. Companies may soon find talent scarier than funding, as individuals gain more employment options. To tackle this challenge, companies should consistently and deliberately communicate their HR value proposition and marketing messages and identify new talent pools. In talent planning, they also need to take into account the future geographic footprint and future activities of the firm, and they should implement programs that will enable talent affiliation and development.

Improving Leadership Development

Leadership development is closely linked to talent management. Furthermore, the value added by management and managerial engagement contribute critically to outstanding business performance In today's Increasingly complex organizationsand leadership plays an essential role So generating both. Leaders convey the mission and sense of purpose of the organization. They serve as role models, are the primary developers of people, and engage the staff In highly visible ways. Corporations should invest considerable resources in defining specific leadership models, assessing their leaders, and designing development programs.

Many employees are looking for more than Just a pay check these days. Employers will need to understand this quest in order to attract and retain talent. Some workers have multiple employment options and can pick a job on the basis of flexible work hours and other nonfinancial features. Other workers are willing to work beyond retirement age provided that they can take longer vacations than their career-track colleagues. Many younger employees simply have new and non traditional expectations about work. Company responses to employees' needs may range from providing flexible work arrangements to addressing employees' growing desire to derive a sense of greater purpose from their work. Increasingly, companies will And it beneficial to offer "motivational management," under which some elements of compensation will consist of non-traditional and noneconomic features. Even when companies offer such initiatives today, however, employees often perceive that these options may hinder their careers and their standing within the company.

Managing Work-Life Balance .

2- Anticipating Change

Managing Demographics.

With the work force in developed economies graying, companies need to manage two risks: the loss of capacity and knowledge as employees retire and the loss of productivity as the work force ages. Companies can minimize their exposure to such demographic risk by certain systematic approach to analyzing the future supply of and demand for employees under different growth scenarios. This approach will allow companies to determine how many employees they are likely to need, which qualifications those employees should possess, and when the organizations will need them. At the same time, companies across all industries need to analyze and understand the effects of an aging work force and then take dedicated and focused actions to address or mitigate those effects. For example, companies can add or enhance career tracks, shift work schedules, or adjust health-management programs so that an aging work force can maintain the highest levels of productivity .

This topic is not, as executives sometimes contend, merely a "soft" issue; all change should be hard-wired into an organization in a tangible and measurable way. As the pace of change quickens, managing corporate and cultural change becomes a critical capability, especially for companies in the consumer goods and technology industries as well as the public sector. Yet change is the toughest challenge that companies face, especially complex, high-stakes, breakthrough change. Companies need to develop an integrated approach that addresses both operational and organizational changes, focuses on the behaviors of employees, and uses rigorous tracking and reporting to stay on schedule and on budget. The HR functiontogether with the change-management leadership teamhas a critical role to play .

Managing Change and Cultural Transformation

Managing Globalization.

All large companies face globalization, as they either move into new global markets or face competition from them. Rapidly developing economies like Brazil, China, India, and Russia, will be critical to the success or failure of many companies. One of the main HR challenges that these companies will face in managing globalization is making sure that the right people are in place in the right locations and that there is effective and efficient cross-country and cross-cultural collaboration.

3- Enabling the Organization

In a world driven by innovation and rapid change, becoming a learning organization from top to bottom provides a dear competitive advantage. Creating this advantage requires careful planning to ensure that the right people are being trained in the right ways. Few companies told us that they have found the ideal way to prepare their employees to cope with the complexities and accelerated speed in an increasingly global economy. This topic is particularly important since many national education systems are failing to arm potential employees with the skills that they will require to keep pace in the future. Corporate investments in learning and training activities are likely to increase significantly, and companies will need to monitor more systematically their return on these investments.

Becoming a Learning Organization

Transforming HR into a Strategic Partner.

While many HR executives told us that their companies arc proficient in this topic, they nonetheless recognized its future importance. Executives who work outside the HR department, meanwhile, cited a big need for HR to improve its ability to become a strategic partner. As we mentioned earlier, one of the keys for success will be ensuring that HR professionals have the operating experience and business acumen required to add value to the business itself. Another key to success will be the ability of the HR department to optimize its delivery model through both appropriate organization and governance and

the use of automation and shared services or outsourcing arrangements whenever relevant. Most of the topics presented in this report will require HR to assume the role of a strategic partner.

HRS NEW ROLE

The five challenges described above have one overarching implication for business: the only

competitive weapon left is organization. Sooner or later, traditional forms of competitivenesscost, technology, distribution, manufacturing, and product features - can be copied. They have become table stakes. You must have them to be a player, but they do not guarantee you will be a winner. In the new economy, winning will spring from organizational capabilities such as speed, responsiveness, agility, learning capacity, and employee competence. Successful organizations will be those that arc able to quickly turn strategy into action; to manage processes intelligently and efficiently; to maximize employee contribution and commitment; and to create the conditions for seamless change. The need to develop those capabilities brings us back to the mandate for HR set forth at the beginning of this article. Let's take a closer look at each HR imperative in turn.

Becoming a Partner in Strategy Execution.

I'm not going to argue that HR should make strategy. Strategy is the responsibility of a companys executive team of which HR is member. To be full fledged strategic partners with senior management, however, HR executive should impel and guide serious discussion of how companies should be organised to carry out its strategy . It involves four steps .First HR should be held responsible for defining an organisational architecture. In other words it identify the underlying model of the companies way of doing business .several well established frame works can be used in this process . Ja Galbraith's star model, for example, identifies five essential organizational components: strategy, structure, rewards, processes, and people. The well- j known 7-S framework created by McKinsey % j Company distinguishes seven components in a company's architecture: strategy, structure, systems, staff, style, skills, and shared values .It's relatively unimportant which framework the HR staff uses to define the company's architecture, as long as it's robust. What matters more is that architecture be articulated explicitly. Without such clarity, managers can become myopic about how the company runs-and thus about what drives Strategy implementation and what stands in its way. They might think only of structure as the driving force behind actions and decisions, and neglect systems or skills. Or they might understand the company primarily in terms of its values and pay inadequate attention to the influence of systems on how work-that is, strategy execution-actually gets accomplished. Senior management should ask HR to play the role of an architect called into an alreadybuilding to draw up its plans. The architect .makes measurements; calculates dimensions; notes windows, doors, and staircases; and examines the plumbing and heating infrastructures. The re* suit it a comprehensive set of blueprints that contains all the building's ports and shows how they work together .Next, HR must be accountable for conducting an organizational audit. Blueprints can illuminate the places in a house that require immediate improvement organizational-architecture plans can be similarly useful. They are critical in helping managers identify which components-of the company must change in order to facilitate strategy execution. Again, hr's role is to shepherd the dialogue about the company's blueprints.

Consider a company in which HR defined the organization's architecture in terms of its Culture, competencies, rewards, governance, work processes, and leadership. The HR staff was able to use that model to guide management through a rigorous discussion of "fit"-did the company's culture fit its strategic goals, did its competencies, and so forth. When the answer was no, HHHR was able to guide a discussion of how to obtain or develop what was missing.The third role for HR as a strategic partner is to identify methods for renovating the parts of the organizational architecture that need it. In other words, HR managers should he assigned to take the lead in proposing, creating, and debating best practice in culture change programs, for example, or in appraisal and reward systems. Similarly, if strategy implementation requires, say, a team-based organizational structure, HR would be responsible for bringing state-of-the-art approaches for creating this structure to senior management's attention. Fourth and finally, HR must take stock of its own work and set clear priorities. At any given moment, the HR staff might have a dozen initiatives in its sights, such as pay-forperformance, global team work, and action-learning development experiences. But to be truly tied to business outcomes, HR needs to join forces with operating managers to systematically assess the impact and importance of each one of these initiatives. Which ones arc really aligned with strategy implementation? Which ones should receive attention immediately, and which can wait? Which ones, in short, are truly linked to business results? Because bcoming a strategic partner means an entirely new role for HR, it may have to acquire new skills and capabilities. Its staff may need more education in order to perform the kind of indepth analysis an organizational audit involves, for example. Ultimately, such new knowledge will allow HR to add value to the executive team with confidence. In time, the concept of HR as a strategic partner will make business sense.

The Changing Role of Strategic Human Resource Management in Principles of Management

Understand how HR is becoming a strategic partner. Understand the importance of an organizations human capital. List the key elements of SHRM. Explain the importance of focusing on outcomes. The role of HR is changing. Previously considered a support function, HR is now becoming a strategic partner in helping a company achieve its goals. A strategic approach to HR means going beyond the administrative tasks like payroll processing. Instead, managers need to think more broadly and deeply about how employees will contribute to the companys success.

HR as a Strategic Partner

Strategic human resource management (SHRM) strategic human resource

management (SHRM).An organizational level approach to human resources management with a concern for the effects of HRM practices on firm performance. is not just a function of the HR departmentCompetence: To what extent does our company have the required knowledge, skills, and abilities to implement its strategy? Consequence: To what extent does our company have the right measures, rewards, and incentives in place to align peoples efforts with the company strategy?

 Governance: To what extent does our company have the right structures,

communications systems and policies to create a high-performing organization?

Learning and Leadership: To what extent can our company respond to uncertainty

and learn and adapt to change quickly? all managers and executives need to be involved because the role of people is so vital to a companys competitive advantage. In addition, organizations that value their employees are more profitable than those that do not. Research shows that successful organizations have several things in common, such as providing employment security, engaging in selective hiring, using self-managed teams, being decentralized, paying well, training employees, reducing status differences, and sharing information. When organizations enable, develop, and motivate human capital, they improve accounting profits as well as shareholder value in the process. The most successful organizations manage HR as a strategic asset and measure HR performance in terms of its strategic impact. . The new principles of management, however, require a focus on outcomes and results, not just numbers and compliance.HR professionals track how employees are using the skills theyve learned to attain goals, not just how many hours theyve spent in training,. In short, the people strategy needs to be fully aligned with the companys business strategy and keep the focus on outcomes.

Becoming an Administrative Expert .

For decades, HR professionals have been tagged as administrators. In their new role as administrative experts, however, they will need to shed their traditional image of rule-making policy police, while still making sure that all the required routine work in companies is done well. In order to move from their old role as administrators into their new role, HR stuff will have to improve the efficiency of both their own function and the entire organization. Within the HR function are dozens of processes that can be done better, faster, and cheaper. Finding and fixing those processes is part of the work of the new HR. Some companies have already embraced these tasks, and the results are impressive. One company has created a fully automated and flexible benefits program that employees can manage with out paperwork; another has used technology to screen resumes and reduce the cycle time for hiring new candidates; and a third has created an electronic bulletin board that allows employees to communicate with senior executives. In all three cases, the quality of HR work improved and costs were lowered, generally by removing steps or leveraging technology. But decreased costs aren't the only benefit of HR's becoming the organization's administrative export. Improving efficiency will build HR's credibility, which, in turn, will open the door for It CEO becomes a partner in executing strategy. Consider file case of a CEO who held a very low opinion of the company's HR staff after they sent a letter to a fob candidate offering a salary figure with the decimal point in the wrong place.(The candidate called the CEO and joked that she didn't realize the job would make her a millionaire.) It was only after the HR staff proved they could streamline the organization's systems and procedures and deliver flawless administrative service that the CEO finally felt comfortable giving HR a seat at the strategy table.HR executives can also prove their value as administrative experts by rethinking how work is done throughout the organization. For example, they can design

and implement a system that allows departments to share administrative services. At Amoco, for instance, HR helped create a shared-service organization that encompassed 14 business units. HR can also create centers of expertise that gather, coordinate, and disseminate vital information about market trends, for instance, or organizational processes. Such groups can act as internal consultants, not only saving the company money but also improving its competitive situation.

Becoming an Employee Champion.

Work today is more demanding than ever-employees are continually being asked to do more with less. And as companies withdraw the old employment contract, which was based on security and predictable promotions, and replace it with faint promises of trust, employees respond in kind. Their relationship with the organization becomes transactional. Theygive their time but not much more.That kind of curtailed contribution is a recipe for organizational failure. Companies cannot valued share ideas, work harder than the necessary minimum, and relate hotter to customers, to name just three benefits. In their new role, HR professionals must be held accountable for ensuring that employees are engaged-that they feel committed 'the organization and contribute fully, hi the pasty HR sought that commitment by attending to the social needs of employees-picnics, parties, United :Way campaigns, and so on. while those activities must be organized. In addition, the new HR should be the employees' voice, in management discussions; after employees opportunities for personal and professional growth; and provide resources that help employees meet the demands put on them. Orienting and training line management about, how to achieve high employee morale can be accomplished using several tools, such as workshops; written reports, and employee surveys. Such tools can help managers understand the sources of low morale within the organization - not-just specifically, but conceptually- 'For instance, HR might inform the linethat 82% of employees feel demoralized because of a recent downsizing. That's useful. But more than that HR should be responsible for educating line about the causes of 'flow employee morale. For instantce,it is generally agreed by organizational behavior experts that employee morale decreases when people believe the demands put upon them exceed the resources available to meet those demands. Morale also drops when goals are unclear, priorities are unfocused , or performance measurement is ambiguous. HR serves an important role in holding a mirror in front of senior executives. HR can play a critical role in recommending ways to ameliorate morale problem recommendations can be as simple as urging the hiring of additional support staff or as complex as suggesting that reengineering be considered for certain tasks. The new role for HR might also involve suggesting that more teams be used on some projects or that employees be given more control over their own work schedules.Along With educating operating managers about morale, HR staff must also be an advocate for employees-they must represent the employees to management and be their Voice in management discussions, employees should have confidence that when decisions are made that affect them . HRs involvement in the decision making process clearly represents employees' views and supports their rights. Such advocacy cannot be invisible",. Employees must know that HR is their voice before they will communicate their opinions to HR managers

Becoming a Change Agent.

To adapt a phrase, Change happens. And the pace of change today, because of globalization, technological innovation, and information access/ is both dizzying and dazzling. That said, the primary difference between winners and losers in business will be the ability to respond to the pace of change. Winners will be able to adapt, learn, and act quickly. Losers will spend time trying to control and master change.The new HR has as its fourth responsibility the job of building the organization's capacity to embrace and capitalize on change It will make sure that change initiatives that are focused on creating high-performing teams, reducing cycle time for innovation, or implementing new technology are defined, developed, and delivered in a timely way. The new HR can make sure that broad vision statements (such as, "We will ployees figure out what work they can stop, start, and keep doing to make the vision real..Change has a way of scaring people-scaring them into inaction. HR's role as a change agent is to replace resistance with resolve, planning with results, and fear of change with excitement about Its possibilities.

TECHNOLOGY AND HR

Technology has changed the way HR conducts its business. It not only automates recurring processes but also decreases cycle time and increases productivity / efficiency in day-to-day transactions. To blend business needs with technology, HR professionals rely on information technology (IT) to reduce cost and to increase the contribution HR makes to the bottom-line. It helps them to track, view and respond and to make critical decisions. The biggest challenge before HR managers today is to effectively integrate technology, trends and business requirements. Human Resource Information System (HRIS) gives information about all the employees. SAP and ERP is implemented in most of the organizations.

EMPLOYER BRANDING

HR managers now use marketing concepts to develop the company as an Employer of choice. When IBM started to feature their employees in advertisements, they were amazed at the power they had as a recruitment tool. The advertisements featured employees and their CVs- what they do, the customer they work with and actual contact information for those individuals. Using employees in advertisements says more about the organization. It is a prime example of putting `people are our greatest asset` claim into practice. It shifts the focus from our product to our people. An employer brand describes how people feel about a company, based on whatever information they have, company activities, the workplace environment. Employer Brand appeals to existing and potential employees.

HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT IN MERGERS AND ACQUISITIONS

Mergers and Acquisitions is an essential element of corporate strategy to grow in the competitive business environment. Large organisations acquire upstream or downstream or similar firms or buy new companies in totally different business areas (conglomerate mergers). Research indicates that people issues occur at mergers and acquisitions. People issues in the integration phase relate to human capital related integration issues like leadership, integration of organization cultures, organization design and structure, systems

and processes and retention of key talent. A failure to address these issues in a merger or acquisition impacts the new organization negatively. The problems are given below.

Loss of employee Loyalty

A common consequence of many mergers or acquisitions is a loss of loyalty from employees who view themselves as Losers in the merger process. This loss of loyalty leads to high turnover rates.

Dilemma of Work force Reduction

One of the key dilemmas in any merger or acquisition is how to retain the most talented employees. Corporates often find that the very employees they most want to retain are the first to leave. This is particularly true of the acquired firm.

Lowered Employee Morale

Mergers and acquisitions can also cause a significant drop in employee morale.

Reduced Productivity

Probably, the most common long-term consequence is the productivity problems that evolve from the blending of new systems and standards. Organizations that ignore people concerns face complexities that can kill the deal even though the deal might pass all financial, marketing and operational aspects. So, an HR manager has a very complex role in the case of mergers and acquisitions.

MANAGING DIVERSIY

This is yet another field where HR department has to focus more. As a result of globalization, in almost all organizations, we can see people from different cultures, having different languages working together. Managing these diverse people from different backgrounds is a complex task for an HR Manager. The role of HR Manager here is to use this diversity for the better functioning of the organization, or how it can be made beneficial for the growth of the organization. Diversity, if managed properly is an added advantage. He should be able to make them satisfied in working in an environment of diversified cultures.

CAPABILITY DEVELOPERS

HR professionals need to frame what they do in terms of the capabilities they must create within the organisation. It will no longer be sufficient for HR professionals to hire, train, and reward employees. Rather , these activities need to be seen as contributing to the organisations success. Individual competence and efforts may be less important than the teamwork capability shared among all the employees. HR professionals will need to identify the capabilities that currently exist, what capabilities are required for the organisations future success, and how these capabilities can be acquired and aligned with the organisations business strategies.

HR professionals also need to study and understand the human capital available outside of their organisation that may be needed for projects or other short term assignments. As more professionals are hired for short term assignments and as companies increasingly turn to telecommuters and other off-site workers, HR professionals will need to understand the most important variables and capabilities required for such independent work arrangements.

MANAGERS OF INTELLECTUAL CAPITAL

Organisations will increasingly be competing for the best talent available on a worldwide basis. Successful firms will be those that are most adept at attracting, developing and retaining individuals with the skills, perspective and experience sufficient to drive a global business. HR professionals will need to lead the way in managing the intellectual capital that the organisation requires. Not only will the HR professionals need to be aware of the local labour market, but will need to maintain contacts and develop strategies to identify intellectual capital on a global scale. They will need to be able to have the right people in the right place at the right time in order for the organisation to quickly adjust and adapt to changing markets and demands.

Talent Management
Competition for talent is about attracting, developing, and retaining the most capable employees. Talent management means anticipating the need for human capital and setting a plan to meet it. As anticipating the need for human capital and setting a plan to meet it. It goes hand in hand with succession planning, a process whereby an organization ensures that employees are recruited and developed to fill each key role within the company., the process whereby an organization ensures that employees are recruited and developed to fill each key role within the company. It is expensive to develop all talent internally; training people takes a long time and requires accurate predictions about which skill will be needed. Such predictions are increasingly difficult to make in our uncertain world. Therefore, rather than developing everyone internally, companies can hire from the outside when they need to tap specific skills. In manufacturing, this principle is known as make or buy. In HR, the solution is to make and buy; that is, to train some people and to hire others from the external marketplace. Another principle from manufacturing that works well in talent management is to run smaller batch sizes. That is, rather than sending employees to three-year-long training programs, send them to shorter programs more frequently. With this approach, managers dont have to make the training decision so far in advance. They can wait to decide exactly which skills employees will learn closer to the time the skill is needed, thus ensuring that employees are trained on the skills theyll actually use.

Keeping Star Employees

As a manager, therefore, you need to give your employees reasons to stay with your company. One way to do that is to spend time talking with employees about their career goals. Listen to their likes and dislikes so that you can help them use the skills they like using or develop new ones they wish to acquire

What Employees Want

Employees want to grow and develop, stretching their capabilities. They want projects that engage their heads as well as their hearts, and they want to connect with the people and things that will help them achieve their professional goals. Here are two ways to provide this to your employees: First, connect people with mentors and help them build their networks. Research suggests that successful managers dedicate 70% more time to networking activities and 10% more time to communication than their less successful counterparts. What makes networks special? Through networks, people energize one another, learn, create, and find new opportunities for growth. Second, help connect people with a sense of purpose. Focusing on the need for purpose is especially important for younger workers, who rank meaningful work and challenging experiences at the top of their job search lists.

Diversity Management
Another key to successful SHRM in todays business environment is embracing diversity.. Today, diversity goes far beyond this limited definition; diversity management involves actively appreciating and using the differing perspectives and ideas that individuals bring to the workplace. Diversity is an invaluable contributor to innovation and problem-solving success. As James Surowiecki shows in The Wisdom of Crowds, the more diverse the group in terms of expertise, gender, age, and background, the more ability the group has to avoid the problems of group think..Diversity helps company teams to come up with more creative and effective solutions. Teams whose members have complementary skills are often more successful because members can see one anothers blind spots. Members will be more inclined to make different kinds of mistakes, which means that theyll be able to catch and correct those mistakes. Except in a few instances, most companies offer largely undifferentiated products and services; airlines fly the same planes and serve the same food, financial service businesses offer similar advice and investment options, and retail stores offer the same merchandise. The list goes on. Because of the undifferentiated nature of their businesses, such firms as, Disney, Fidelity, Southwest Airlines, to name a few, have made branding a core element in their business strategy. In many respects, their brand strategy is their business strategy, and vice versa. A brand, simply put, is a promise to customers that a specific level of value, quality, and service will be received. Think of a brand as a covenant between a business and its customers. The promise is usually communicated through mass media advertising. Here are some current examples. FedEx Dont worry, theres FedEx MasterCard There are some things money cant buy Xerox Break Out Bose Better Sound Through Research GE Imagination at Work

Get Involved With the Brand

When a brand promise is not kept, customers flee and go elsewhere. A classic example is the fate that befell Eastern Airlines when it promised to Earn its Wings Everyday through superior customer service while at the same time losing bags, canceling flights and serving lousy food. As a result, the bonds of trust between customers and the airline were irrevocably broken. The net effect was passengers boycotted Eastern in droves and it eventually went out of business killing the brand for eternity. What went wrong? Eastern Airlines failed to align the behavior of their employees with the brand promise. They failed to understand that the lines of copy in an ad do not deliver a brand promise, nor by an airplane or piece of machinery - its delivered by people. Herein lies the opportunity for Human Resources to get through the fence and into the game, by helping ensure that all of the large and small actions that people take every day, throughout the organization, fall in line with the brand strategy.

Conclusion
Human resources management is becoming increasingly important in organizations because todays knowledge economy requires employees to contribute ideas and be engaged in executing the companys strategy. HR is thus becoming a strategic partner by identifying the skills that employees need and then providing employees with the training and structures needed to develop and deploy those competencies. All the elements of HRselection, placement, job design, and compensationneed to be aligned with the companys strategy so that the right employees are hired for the right jobs and rewarded properly for their contributions to furthering the companys goals.