Hrm Wk 2 Team Reflection

Learning Team Paper

HRM/531

Learning Team Paper

Throughout this paper the author will evaluate four team members Jennifer Gautreaux, Marvel Traylor, Latrisha Coward, and James Richardson. Each member has expressed their own personal views with regard to what they thought human resource management was, and what they have learned it to be. The author will share their views and conclude with an overall analysis.

What is a human resource department? I once was lead to believe that human resource departments were designed to hire and fire employees, process payroll and maintain employee’s health benefits and 401k plans. Although these are all duties that the human resources departments carries out they are not limited to just these duties. Human resource managers must oversee and excite their organizations structured policies and procedures. Human resources play a vital role within a business.

Prior to the readings I believed, human resources was an easy position to hold. However I now find that it takes special people to fulfill the role of a human resource manager. There are five particular steps human resource managers must perform to succeed. These five steps consist of Staffing, Retention, Development, Adjustment and Managing Change.

According to Cascio (2010), Staffing compromises the activities of identifying work requirements within an organization, determining the number of people and skills mix necessary to do the work; and recruiting, selecting, and promoting qualified candidates. Retention compromises the activities of rewarding the employees for performing their jobs effectively, insuring harmonious working relations between employees and managers; and maintain a safe, healthy work environment. Development is a function whose objective is to preserve and enhance employee’s competence in their jobs through improving their knowledge, skills, abilities, and other characteristics; HR specialists use the term “competencies” to refer to these...