Role of the HR Department

Top management generally recognizes the contributions that the HR program can make to the organization and thus expects HR managers to assume a broader role in the overall organizational strategy. Thus HR managers must remember the bottom line if they are to fulfill their role. Investment in sophisticated HR practices contributes to greater financial performance and productivity and to reduced turnover.

In the process of managing human resources, increasing attention is being given to the personal needs of the employees. The HRM Department activities influence both the individ­ual and society.

Increasingly, employees and the public at large are demanding that employ­ers demonstrate greater social responsibility in managing their human resources. Complaints that some jobs are revitalizing the lives and injuring the health of employees are not uncommon. Charges of discrimination against women, minori­ties, the physically disabled, and the aged with respect to hiring, training, ad­vancement, and compensation are being leveled against some employers.

Issues such as comparable pay for comparable work, the rising costs of health benefits, day care for children of employees, and alternative work schedules are concerns that many employers must address.

All employers are finding that privacy and confidentiality of information about employees are serious matters and deserve the greatest protection that can be provided.

Where employees are organized into unions, employers can encounter costly collective bargaining proposals, strike threats, and charges of unfair labor prac­tices. Court litigation, demands for corrective action by governmental agencies, sizable damage awards in response to employee lawsuits, and attempts to erode the employment-at-will doctrine valued by employers are still other hazards that contemporary employers must try to avoid.