Objectives
of Human Resource Planning
 |
| Objectives of Human Resource Planning |
1. To ensure optimum utilization of human resources currently available in the organization.
2.
To assess or forecast the future skill requirement of
the organization.
3.
To provide control measures to ensure that necessary
resources are available as and when required.
4. A series of specified reasons are there that attach importance to manpower planning and forecasting exercises. They are elaborated below:
To link manpower planning with organizational planningTo determine recruitment levels.
To anticipate redundancies.
To determine optimum training levels.
To provide a basis for management development programs.
To cost the manpower.
To assist productivity bargaining.
To assess future accommodation requirements.
To study the cost of overheads and the value of service functions.
To decide whether certain activity needs to be subcontracted, etc.
HRP exists as a part of the planning process of business. This is
the activity that aims to coordinate the requirements for the availability of
the different types of employers. The major activities are forecasting,
(future requirements), inventorying (present strength), anticipating
(comparison of present and future requirements), and planning (necessary program
to meet the requirements).
The HR forecasts are responsible for estimating the number of
people and the jobs needed by an organization to achieve its objectives and
realize its plans most efficiently and effectively.
HR needs are computed by subtracting HR supplies or the number of employees available from expected HR demands or the number of people required
to produce a desired level of outcome. The objective of HR is to provide the right
personnel for the right work and optimum utilization of the existing human
resources.
The objectives of human resource planning may be summarized
as below:
•
Forecasting Human Resources Requirements: HRP is
essential to determine the future needs of HR in an organization. In the
absence of this plan, it is very difficult to provide the right kind of people
at the right time.
•
Effective Management of Change: Proper
planning is required to cope with changes in the different aspects which affect
the organization. These changes need continuation of allocation/ reallocation
and effective utilization of HR in an organization.
•
Realizing the Organizational Goals: To
meet the expansion and other organizational activities organizational HR
planning is essential.
•
Promoting Employees: HRP gives feedback in the form of employee data which can be used in decision-making
in promotional opportunities to be made available for the organization.
•
Effective Utilization of HR: The database will provide useful information in identifying surplus and deficiency
in human resources. The objective of HRP is to maintain and improve the
organizational capacity to reach its goals by developing appropriate strategies
that will result in the maximum contribution of HR.
Need for HRP in Organizations
Major reasons for the emphasis on HRP at the Macro level:
1) Employment-Unemployment Situation: Though in
general, the number of educated unemployed is on the rise, there is an acute
shortage of a variety of skills. This emphasizes the need for more
effective recruitment and employee retention.
2) Technological Change: The changes
in production technologies, marketing methods, and management techniques have
been extensive and rapid. Their effect has been profound on the job contents
and job contexts. These changes have caused problems relating to redundancies,
retention, and redeployment. All these suggest the need to plan manpower needs
intensively and systematically.
3) Demographic Change: The changing profile of the
workforce in terms of age, sex, literacy, technical inputs, and social
background has implications for HRP.
4) Skill Shortage: Unemployment does not mean
that the labor market is a buyer’s market. Organizations generally become more
complex and require a wide range of specialist skills that are rare and scarce.
A problem arises in an organization when employees with such specialized skills
leave.
5) Governmental Influences: Government
control and changes in legislation about affirmative action for
disadvantaged groups, working conditions and hours of work, restrictions on
women and child employment, causal and contract labor, etc. have stimulated
the organizations to become involved in systematic HRP.
6) Legislative Control: The
policies of “hire and fire” have gone. Now the legislation makes it difficult
to reduce the size of an organization quickly and cheaply. It is easy to
increase but difficult to shed the fat in terms of the numbers employed because
of recent changes in labor law relating to lay-offs and closures. Those
responsible for managing manpower must look far ahead and thus attempt to
foresee manpower problems.
7) Impact of the Pressure Group: Pressure
groups such as unions, politicians, and persons displaced from land by the location
of giant enterprises have been raising contradictory pressure on enterprise
management such as internal recruitment and promotion, preference for employees’
children, displaced person, sons of the soil, etc.
8) Systems Approach: The spread of system
thinking and the advent of the macro computer as part of the ongoing
revolution in information technology which emphasizes planning and newer ways of
handling voluminous personnel records.
9) Lead Time: The long lead time is necessary for
the selection process and training and deployment of the employee to handle new
knowledge and skills successfully.
Importance of Human resource planning(HRP)
HRP is the subsystem in the total organizational planning.
Organizational planning includes managerial activities that set the company’s
objective for the future and determine the appropriate means for achieving
those objectives. The importance of HRP is elaborated based on the key
roles that it is playing in the organization.
1. Future Personnel Needs: Human
resource planning is significant because it helps to determine the future
personnel needs of the organization. If an organization is facing the problem
of either surplus or deficiency in staff strength, then it is the result of the
absence of effective HR planning. All public sector enterprises find themselves
overstaffed now as they never had any planning for personnel requirements and
went on a recruitment spree till the late 1980s. The problem of excess staff has
become such a prominent problem that many private sector units are resorting to VRS's‘ voluntary retirement scheme’. The excess of labor problem would have been
there if the organization had a good HRP system. An effective HRP system will also
enable the organization to have good succession planning.
2. Part of Strategic Planning: HRP has become an integral part of
strategic planning. HRP provides inputs in the strategy
formulation process in terms of deciding whether the organization has got the
right kind of human resources to carry out the given strategy. HRP is also
necessary during the implementation stage in the form of deciding to make
resource allocation decisions related to organization structure, process, and
human resources. In some organizations, HRP plays a significant role as
strategic planning and HR issues are perceived as inherent in business
management.
3. Creating Highly Talented Personnel: Even
though India has a great pool of educated unemployed, it is the discretion of the HR manager that will enable the company to recruit the right person with the right
skills for the organization. Even the existing staff hope the job so frequently
that organization faces a frequent shortage of manpower. Manpower planning in the
form of skill development is required to help the organization in dealing with
this problem of skilled manpower shortage
4. International Strategies: An
international expansion strategy of an organization is facilitated to a great
extent by HR planning. The HR department’s ability to fill key jobs with
foreign nationals and reassignment of employees from within or across national
borders is a major challenge that is being faced by international business.
With the growing trend toward global operation, the need for HRP will as well be the need to integrate HRP more closely with the organization's strategic
plans. Without effective HRP and subsequent attention to employee recruitment,
selection, placement, development, and career planning, the growing competition
for foreign executives may lead to expensive and strategically descriptive
turnover among key decision-makers.
5. Foundation for Personnel Functions: HRP
provides essential information for designing and implementing personnel
functions, such as recruitment, selection, training, and development, personnel
movements like transfers, promotions, and layoffs.
6. Increasing Investments in Human Resources: Organizations
are making increasing investments in human resource development compelling the
increased need for HRP. Organizations are realizing
that human assets can increase in value more than physical assets. An employee who gradually develops his/ her skills and
abilities becomes a valuable asset to the organization. Organizations can make
investments in their personnel either through direct training or job assignment
and the rupee value of such a trained, flexible, motivated productive workforce
is difficult to determine. Top officials have started acknowledging that the quality of the workforce is responsible for both the short-term and long-term
performance of the organization.
7. Resistance to Change: Employees
are always reluctant whenever they hear about change and even about job
rotation. Organizations cannot shift one
employee from one department to another without any specific planning. Even for
carrying out job rotation (shifting one employee from one department to
another), there is a need to plan well ahead and match the skills required and
existing skills of the employees.
8. Uniting the Viewpoint of Line and Staff Managers: HRP helps
to unite the viewpoints of line and staff managers. Though HRP is initiated and
executed by the corporate staff, it requires the input and cooperation of all
managers within an organization. Each department manager knows about the issues
faced by his department more than anyone else. So communication between HR
staff and line managers is essential for the success of HR Planning and
development.
9. Succession Planning: Human
Resource Planning prepares people for future challenges. The ‘stars’ are picked
up, trained, assessed, and assisted continuously so that when the time comes such trained employees can quickly take the
responsibilities and position of their boss or seniors as and when the situation
arrives.
10. Other Benefits:
(a) HRP helps in judging the
effectiveness of manpower policies and programs of management.
(b) It
develops awareness of the effective utilization of human resources for the overall
development of an organization.
(c) It facilitates the selection and training of
employees with adequate knowledge, experience, and aptitudes to carry on
and achieve the organizational objectives
(d) HRP encourages the company to
review and modify its human resource policies and practices and to examine the
way of utilizing the human resources for better utilization.