How to Get Ahead in HR

Kay Maddox-Daines

• Publisher: London Publishing Partnership
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781913019471
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Negocios y empresa
• Subtopic: Gestión de recursos humanos

Have you ever thought about a career in HR? Or perhaps you are already working in HR and you are looking to progress? No matter your starting point, this book provides advice and guidance to help you achieve your goals. The HR profession is dynamic, and the opportunities to develop in the field have never been greater. Using a wide range of examples, skills-based exercises, quizzes and reflective activities, How to Get Ahead in HR prepares you to maximize your potential. Each chapter provides a variety of case study examples and action point lists. The book also introduces the field's main professional bodies and explains the available options for gaining professional qualifications.

Chapter 1

The evolution of HR

the notion of people management has been around for thousands of years. In prehistoric times tribal leaders were selected according to specified criteria such as wisdom and skill. The Romans were led by centurions who provided accountability through a hierarchical system. The development of leadership and management traces its roots to the military, where effective armies required leaders that could engage their troops through a shared vision of success and effective recruitment, selection and development. In early ancient times emperors reigned over communes and villages, collecting taxes and providing safety to citizens, which required effective leadership and the allocation of specific roles and responsibilities. As long ago as 2000 BCe the Chinese used employee screening techniques, and the ancient Greeks were also known for their apprenticeship systems. But these early examples of what we now term people management tended to be duties performed by supervisors and line managers rather than as part of a specialist role.

In this chapter we review the development of the people profession from the early 1900s to the present day. We explore how key developments have informed the roles that we see advertised. The profession as we now know it has evolved in relation to external events, including political, economic and social factors. For example, the world population has increased from 1.8 billion people in 1919 to 7.6 billion people in 2021. High-speed technology in the field of communication has completely changed the nature of education, commerce, banking, agriculture and health, and technological developments have accelerated globalization and the nature of business and competition.

the beginning of personnel management

In recognition of the harshness of industrial conditions and under the influence of both trade unions and Quakers, who campaigned for improvements in industrial practice, the role of welfare officer was created at the end of the nineteenth century. These roles were occupied by women and they predominantly focused on the protection of women and girls. As the roles became more established there was some tension between balancing the remit of moral protection officer with the need for higher output in production. The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development can trace its roots back to the Welfare Workers’ Association, established in 1913 with thirty-four members.1

World War I saw a major development in the direction of personnel management when women were recruited in large numbers to fill vacant roles as men left to fight. This meant reaching agreement with trade unions about the recruitment of unskilled women into craftsmen’s jobs. In the 1920s and 1930s specific new roles were created to manage employment matters, with a focus on handling absence, recruitment, dismissal and pay issues. Employer federations negotiated national pay rates with trade unions, although there were local variations.

World War II saw the development of new full-time roles in welfare and personnel work in all establishments that produced war materials. The government identified this role as vital to improving efficiency, and in 1943 there were around 5,300 people working with a personnel function. The main focus during the war years was on implementing rules in support of state-governed production, and as a result the emerging profession of personnel had its foundation in bureaucracy.

What is personnel?

Over time personnel grew to be much more than just a welfare role. Frameworks of policies and procedures were developed to manage the employment relationship between employer and employee. Successive UK governments actively encouraged the appointment of personnel officers (particularly in industries nationalized in the 1940s) to ensure smooth management of the employment relationship in unionized environments.

Formalized, standardized and integrated sets of policies and practices for effectively managing people in the workplace began to appear. This dedicated function brought coordinated approaches to recruitment, selection, induction, training, promotion and discipline as well as reporting and appeals mechanisms. The growth of discipline provided more efficient employer coordination and control of employees as organizations grew in size and complexity. Characterized by routine and administration, personnel roles are about supporting increasing production in pursuit of organizational goals.

There were three models of personnel.2 First, there was the clerk of works, a low-level role with general responsibility for personnel, focusing on administration and welfare. Second, there was the contracts manager, who was responsible for the implementation of well-established procedures and agreements with a close alignment to industrial relations. Third, there was the architect, who played a key role by establishing strategic policies to support corporate objectives and by designing personnel activities through a framework of delegating tasks to line managers in order to free up time for strategic activities.

The posibility of developing a strategic focus through an ­architect-type role in personnel was considered to be a significant challenge. The potential to support strategic activities depends on the extent to which personnel is involved in planning, which can be limited by both time and volume of work, as well as the readiness of senior management to recognize the function as a key contributor to business strategy. Time away from core personnel work can impact on efficiency and effectiveness, and this creates a negative impression of capability when things do not get done, reinforcing the prejudices of senior management about personnel being a non-core function.

The key criticism of personnel is that there was only a weak relationship between the various recruiting and development activities and the overall organizational objectives. The reactive and sometimes ad hoc approach taken by personnel in relation to industrial relations issues reinforced this lack of alignment. The reluctance of senior managers to involve personnel in strategic decision making made planning difficult and added to the challenges of managing industrial relations effectively. Without access to key business information, the personnel department remained marginalized, with little opportunity to prove its worth to the organization.

Trade unions

Trade union representation was the key voice for workers up to the 1980s.3 At the peak of union power in 1979, a total of 13.3 million trade union members – equating to 54% of the working population – were represented by 300,000 workplace representatives or ‘shop stewards’. The expanding membership provided the unions with significant political influence and power. There was an upsurge in industrial action, meaning that public policy became preoccupied with managing the shop floor. The key concern was how to manage the power and influence of the unions while tackling the economic issues of the time, particularly unions’ restrictive practices (e.g. closed shops that restricted new jobs to union members, practices that restricted output, or practices that hindered management from implementing efficiencies). Trade union membership now accounts for just over a quarter (26%) of the workforce.

Since the Industrial Revolution workers have been withholding labour as a means of securing improved pay and conditions. More than 40 million working days were lost in a year in 1912 as a result of the national coal strike, which saw a million miners seeking a guarantee of a minimum wage. The government intervened and ended the strike by passing the Coal Mines (Minimum Wage) Act 1912, but strikes followed from shipbuilding and engineering workers, transport workers and heavy-industry workers, all of whom were seeking improvements in pay, conditions and working hours. The 1926 general strike saw 162 million working days being lost through the actions of 1.5 million workers striking in support of the coal miners (the Trades Dispute Act banned sympathy strikes in 1927). The UK miners’ strike in 1972 saw nearly 24 million working days lost and a three-day week introduced to save electricity. Widespread public sector strikes were enacted in 1979 in response to the government capping pay in an attempt to tackle inflation. This resulted in the Winter of Discontent, which saw another 29 million working days lost. Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government won a landslide victory in the same year as they promised to deliver legislation to restrict trade union power.4 The Thatcher years restored managers’ confidence by tackling militant trade unions in the automobile, mining and print industries. All were weakened during Thatcher’s tenure.

In the 1960s and 1970s the personnel function evolved, using theories from the social sciences about motivation and organizational behaviour to inform its direction. Selection testing became more widely used, and formalized management development was expanded to support the skills and knowledge development of leaders and aspiring leaders. During the 1970s, specialisms such as ‘reward’ and ‘resourcing’ started to appear as discrete roles.

A new challenge for personnel

In order for personnel to effectively negotiate and manage employer–employee relations, changes were required. Personnel required additional training if it was to be able to fulfil its potential. The function needed to upskill so that it was capable of formulating workplace policies and procedural frameworks to ensure alignment with corporate policy, e.g. employee planning, selection techniques, employee development techniques and performance management systems. It also needed to be able to provide advice, guidance and training on all people matters (employment law, equal opportunities, appraisals) to line managers. Without expertise, the people function was not going to be taken seriously by senior management teams.

In 1946 the Institute of Personnel Management (IPM) was formed from the previous welfare and labour management movement. In 1955 the IPM introduced restrictions on its membership, requiring members to pass an examination, with a formal programme of education introduced and run externally by colleges. The institute recognized the need for upskilling both its members and the profession as a whole. In 1994 the IPM merged with the Institute of Training and Development, gaining chartered status in 2000 and subsequently becoming what is now the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD). It was not until 2009 that a common set of profession competencies was launched in the form of the HR profession map.

At this point let us consider the evolution of management and leadership theory as it is closely aligned with the way in which the people management profession has developed. Here is a very brief overview.

Traditional management

Frederick Winslow Taylor is widely recognized as one of the first management consultants. With a background in mechanical engineering and general management he published The Principles of Scientific Management in 1911.5 Known as the father of scientific management, he examined how work processes could be optimized to improve the productivity of workers, and thereby their contribution to the effectiveness of their organization. He focused on recruitment and selection, job design and efficiency measures, and he highlighted that incumbents should be suited to the jobs they are doing. Taylor’s work emphasized the division of labour between managers and workers, which provided the seed for Max Weber’s bureaucratic organization structure.

Bureaucracy

Max Weber was a German sociologist and political economist. He argued that bureaucracy was the most efficient and rational model for the operation of a business. In 1922 he published Economy and Society, in which he described ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half title
• Title page
• Copyright page
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: The evolution of HR
• Chapter 2: Is HR right for you?
• Chapter 3: HR professional bodies
• Chapter 4: Getting qualified
• Chapter 5: HR for school leavers and graduates
• Chapter 6: HR for career changers
• Chapter 7: The job search
• Chapter 8: Interviews and selection tests
• Chapter 9: The future of HR
• Chapter 10: Continuing professional development and career progression
• Chapter 11: Further resources and support
• About the author