People Management Issues and Factors That Contribute to Challenges in People Management - Essay Example

People management Student’s Name: Instructor’s Name: Course Code: Date of Submission: Introduction People management is the process of guiding all human resource skills in an organization towards achieving the goals of the organization (Thomson 2002). People management has become a major concern in the modern business. There has been stiff competition in the modern business because the world has flattened. Due to this stiff competition, each organization is contemplating on how to improve its competitiveness for the market share. One of the strategies for improving the competitiveness of the firm is through people management (Harvard Business review 2008). When people are well managed they improve their productivity by offering their best skills in the production process. When people of the organization are well managed, they are motivated and in turn can pay back to the organization by being innovative and creative in their tasks which lead to effective utilization of resources and production of high quality products. In this regard, this report discusses the challenges managers face when managing people, the factors that contribute to these challenges managers face, the relevance of past theories of management in the modern management of people in organizations, how the human resource managers can overcome these challenges of managing people and finally the relevance of this research paper to the management of people. People management issues People management has become a constant issue in the management of people in the organizations today. This is because the managers face various challenges when they manage people in the organizations. Some of these challenges keep on changing thus giving human resource managers hard task in managing people. These challenges that have led the management of people a constant issue in organization include the challenge of human resource functions in an organization. Every organization aims at improving its performance in the market and this can only be achieved through good management of people. Therefore, as the human resource skills changes, the management also has to change the strategies for attracting and retaining the best skills in the organization which help the organization to improve its performance (Mullins 2005). As competition increases, the organization also has to improve its strategies of managing people to meet the competition and this has been a major challenge to managers across all organizations as they try to maintain the best skills in the organization. Another challenge that has made people management a constant issue is that there are shortages in the skilled labor (Legge 2005). Due to stiff competition in the market, skilled and expertise knowledge are being scrambled for by organizations. For instance, in the information technology sector, the information technology experts are few and each organization will be scrambling to get the skills so that it can gain the competitive advantage by using appropriate technology in its production’s process. This is a challenge to all human resource managers as they try to manage people. Further, another challenge in the people management is the frequent changing of labor laws (Armstrong 2003). These labor laws influence the management of people in every organization. The human resource managers find it hard to manage people according to the strategies of the organization. The changing labor laws for instance influences practices of the organization of recruiting employees, discipline of the employees, social amenities of the employees like safety, compensation and the structure of the human resource hierarchy. The labor laws require that each organization should observe and follow the labor laws for their employee which is prone to changes any time. This forces the human resource managers to change their strategies frequently to meet the demands of the labor laws. For instance in Australia, the Fair Work Act 2009, changed the strategies of many organizations including Bakers Delight in terms of remunerations. In addition, there is the challenge of inflexible practices of human resource management. In some organizations, the management strategies do not regard the changing perspectives of people management and therefore managers find it hard to incorporate the changes in the organizational structure. They are restricted to manage people according to the organizational guidelines which can be too rigid for flexible people management tasks. Another challenge is the rising level of conflicts among the employees of an organization (Bamberger 2000). The human resource managers are faced with constraints of dealing with the conflicts fairly. The human resource managers sometimes find it hard to deal with conflicts that arise among the employees of superior ranks than the human resource managers. Most managers act discriminatively to favor some parties in the conflict resolution which leads to poor cooperation of employees in the organization thus low performance and thus people management is a constant issue in organizations today. For instance, employees’ conflicts affected the performance of Bulla Dairy Foods and reduced the production as well as the quality it offered to customers. Factors that contribute to challenges in people management There are many factors that contribute to people management challenges. First, there is the factor of poor motivation of employees (Gratton 2000). Many organizations do not motivate their employees by giving rewards and appreciating their efforts. When the management does not motivate its employees, the reputation of the organization becomes bad and it will be hard to attract most qualified and expertise skills to the organization. Good reputation of the organization attracts and maintains the skills. This becomes a major problem in the people management because the human resource manager aims at attracting expert skills to the organization but the organization’s reputation does not attract interest of the skills personnel. For instance an organization which only profit oriented forgetting the employees’ welfare, human resource managers find it hard to manage the talents of the employees. Another factor that contributes to challenges in people management is the remuneration policies. Many organizations defy the obligations of paying standard salaries and wages to their employees according to labor laws (Adkins & Caldwell 2004). The employees are overworked with little pay. This aspect leads to lack of job satisfaction by employees and therefore their production becomes low. On the other hand, it becomes hard to maintain employees in the organization because of the incompetent salaries and wages. They keep searching for better paying jobs in other places and therefore the organization keeps on recruiting new employees. Leadership style also contributes to the challenges of managing people (Caldwell 2003). For instance, in an organization which practices inflexible management styles, managing of people becomes a challenge because the human resource managers control the employees according to the set strategy and not the changing circumstances. This lowers the morale of the employees and lowers their productivity and therefore the organization will not compete effectively for the market share. This dictatorship leadership style causes conflicts between the management and the employees and some skills will leave the organization to work in more competitive organizations. The behavior of employees further can contribute to challenges of managing people in an organization (Doyle 2002). Some employees are so violent and engage in vices like excessive drinking of alcohol during the time for work. Normally, it is hard to manage violent employees because they sometimes boycott their tasks which lead to poor productivity of the organization. Immoral behavior further leads to conflicts with other employees destroying the commitment to the development of good working relationship among employees by the human resource manager thus a challenge to managing people. For instance, in the food and beverage industry, high moral standards are expected like the Boost Juice Bars which was initially affected by immoral behaviors of the employees and human resource managers found it hard to manage people. Theories of people management There are two previous theories which explain the concept of people management. The first theory is the X theory (Sahin 2012). With this theory it is assumed that people are normally not motivated and don’t like working without supervision. As a result, the human resource manager develops an authoritative style of leadership so that he or she will encourage people to work. With this theory, the organizations employees naturally do not like working and have to be directed. This theory further assumes that the people of the organization should be forced to work, threatened and controlled so that they can work towards the desired objectives of the organization. The employees need to be supervised at every level of production process and should be rewarded so that they can be encouraged to work hard towards achieving the aim and objectives of the organization. X theory of managing people assumes that authority should be centralized to managers and there is no delegation of authority. On the other hand, there is the Y theory of managing people (Sahin 2012). This theory of managing people assumes that people are naturally motivated and enjoy their work. It assumes that people in an organization do enjoy working with other people unlike the X theory where people do not enjoy working. In this theory, it assumes that people are well motivated and take tasks with less supervision. The employees consider work as their natural obligation and are innovative in finding solutions to problems. These theories of managing people to some extent are relevant in the modern management of people in organizations and that some features of these theories are outdated. For instance theory X the concept of controlling people is being adopted even up to date in the management of people. However, the concept of authoritative style of leadership should be reviewed because people should not be treated like objects and therefore they should participate in making decisions of the organization. Theory Y of people management is of no relevance in today’s management of people. This is because employees are not naturally motivated without enticements. Employees do not like working and therefore need to be supervised. If the employees are left to make their own decisions without direction of the manager then some decisions may not be viable and will not benefit the organization. In this regard, these previous theories of people management are outdated and should be adjusted to meet today’s changing demands in managing people. Overcoming the challenges of people management First, the human resource managers should take all the necessary steps to ensure that the employees are motivated (Schuler & Jackson 2001). When the employees are motivated, they can work in teamwork spirit with less supervision. This saves the headache with which the human resource managers face when controlling low motivated employees. Also when the employees are motivated, they can be retained in the organization hence the organization will be able to enjoy their expert skills. For instance, the employees should be rewarded through bonuses and other incentives to make them be satisfied with their work. Further, the human resource managers should develop clear hiring and recruitment procedures (Gould-Williams 2003). Through these standard procedures, the recruitment process will be able to attract required skills to the organization. For instance through job advertisement, a wide range of skills will be attracted and the best qualified applicant is selected unlike when the organization recruits employees from a limited range of skills which increases the chances of selecting unqualified candidates. The management should change the styles of leadership. The human resource functions should take into account the labor laws so that conflicts between the management and the employees are minimized. The management should provide provisions in the management policy to cater for the changing policies of employees in labor laws. For instance, an organization should change its leadership styles to involve employees in decision making. The salaries and remunerations should be competitive so that it will attract and retain the wide range of human skills in the market (Guest & Peccei 1994). When the employees are well paid, they will be satisfied with their work and could be motivated which will improve their productivity. Also through competitive salaries and wages, an organization can gain competitive advantage because it will attract expert knowledge from the labor market than the competitors whose salaries may not be competitive and in this regard the manager could have attracted and maintained required skills in the organization. Importance of this research information This research about people management is important to human resource managers in every organization. To start with this information will help the managers to understand the importance of managing people well. It will help the managers to know that when people are well managed, they will improve their productivity. By understanding this concept, the managers will be encouraged to manage people well in the organization. Secondly, it will help the human resource managers to understand the concepts through which they can motivate their employees (Oakland & Oakland 2001). This research paper has shown the various theories of people management and can be used by the managers to motivate the employee in the organization. For instance, the X theory states that employees should be enticed in order to improve their efficiency. In this regard, the human resource managers will be able to design a strategy for motivating the employees in the organization. They can either use the financial motivation incentives or the non financial motivators. This information further will be useful to human resource managers in organizations as it will help them to understand the concept of managing people well. This will improve the efficiency at which the employees are managed. It will help the managers to understand and treat employees as very important in the organization and tools for instance through provision of social services like housing in the process of motivating them. This information will help the human resource managers to design ways of attracting and maintaining expert skills within the organization. This can be achieved through offering competitive salaries and wages. These salaries will attract skills from the labor market and maintain them because the remunerations are competitive than other organizations in the same industry. Conclusion People management is a concept that is being practiced by many organizations in the modern businesses. Through effective and efficient people management, an organization can have competitive advantage. There are many challenges which face the human resource managers in managing people. First challenge is the concept of attracting and maintaining competitive skills in an organization (Patterson et al 1997). The changing labor laws and regulations also is a major challenge to managers in the modern management of people. Inflexible management practices, raising level of conflicts among the employees and the shortages of skilled labor are other challenges that face human resource managers in executing their duties. The factors that contribute to the challenges facing the human resource managers in managing people include lack of top management support, poor motivation strategies, leadership styles and immoral behaviors of the employees. These challenges can be overcome by offering sufficient and competitive remunerations, motivating employees and designing clear strategies for hiring and recruiting employees. This information is important to human resource managers because it will help them to understand how they can manage people well through motivation by designing training programs. References Adkins, B. & Caldwell, D 2004, "Firm or subgroup culture: Where does fitting in matter Most?" 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