The Role of the New HR Director for an Organisation

Question: Discuss about the role of the new HR Director for an organisation. Answer: Introduction: The Human Resource department of an organization has always been known to play an important role, as it helps in the organizational success, by recruiting the employees, and looking after their benefits and ensuring healthy relation among the employees. However, in the recent era, as Chang has asserted in his book The Passion Plan at Work, the HR plays a more vital role in the strategic planning of the organization. The HR Director of the emerging organization, Hunter Mason Company, must not only focus on the recruitment of employees, but must also adopt innovative strategies to help the employees develop their career and contribute more efficiently to the development of the organization. For this reason, the HR needs to chalk out a strategic plan to ensure that his task is not just limited to the duty of providing well-being to the employees, but is also to connect the immediate goal of the organization with the performance of the employees (Deshler et al. 2016). Company Vision and Mission: A strategic HR believes in concentrating more on the immediate needs and goals of the organization. For this reason, he needs to carry on regular interactions through formal discussions and meetings, with the executives to understand the most important and urgent concerns of the organization. The organization is an acclaimed real estate company which aims at becoming the most successful company in the market (Sharp et al. 2013). Hence, it ensures that the employees of the organizations are quite technologically updated as well as professionally skilled to make sure that they are able to respond to the needs of the clients in a faster and more prompt way. At present, majority of the consumers are technologically savvy and are busy in their workplaces, hence they like to keep themselves updated about the purchase or sale of land, buildings etc through their cellophanes. Since, the organization is a very reputed one, it usually serves upscale consumers, who are mostly occupied in their busy lifestyles, and so the organization aims at offering updated information to the consumers about the recent offers through the official website of the organization. The organization also believes in striking effectively persuasive communication with the clients, so that the employees can jot down the specific details regarding what a client is looking for, while buying a property. Hence, the HR also needs to frame a strategy that will enable the existent employees of the organization acquire a training on soft skills and personality development. The real estate industry has undergone drastic change through technological advancement in the recent years, and hence the company has to invest sufficiently for improving the interpersonal communication skills of the employees, as well as the decision-making and affective skills (McDonald 2015). Further, the HR should discuss and keep a note of the targets of the organization for the current year, and then formulate a plan chalking out the actions and the responsibilities to be vested on the employees. Based on the plan, the HR should announce rewards, as and when the targets are being achieved by the respective employees. Further, at the end of the year the HR must make an annual report on the performance of the employees, and should remain absolutely fair and unbiased in doing the same. On submission of the report, it should be reviewed and evaluated by the higher authority, and then it is the duty of the HR to know where are the loopholes in the performance of the employees, in the given period, and should communicate the problems to the respective employees (Robinson et al. 2013). Key Strategic HR Issues: The major issue that the HR of the organization will be confronted with, is that human resource, unlike the other resources of the organization, is not considered as asset, but is shown on the side of the expense. Hence, the HR needs to plan a strategy which will help the organization to extract the best out of the human capital to serve the organization and help in the development of the firm through the skills and capabilities available among the employees. Next, the HR of the Hunter Mason company, must also understand the requirement of the organization, and in accordance with that, must be able to draft the required policies and practices, which are needed to develop the human capital. However, the company is a growing and an emerging one, and hence it does not have a huge financial strength to invest on its employees. Due to low financial strength, the HR of the company has to adopt some cost-effective method of training the employees (Uysal et al. 2014). Another major problem, the HR is confronted with, is the dissatisfaction of the employees. Through discussion with the employees, it was found out that they are not content with the employment benefits and the salary scale that is being offered to them. There has been continual demand among the employees to hike the salary, as the employee salary scale has remained more or less unchanged from the beginning. Further, the HR of the organization has received various complaints from its skillful employees, that despite having worked well they were not being rewarded sufficiently. There have also been several instances of the employees demanding reduction of the working hours. Hence, the major issue that the HR of the company is facing at present, is to adopt a successful strategy that will help him to merge the desired benefits of the employees with the goals and targets of the organizations. The employees are the actual assets of the organization, and hence the organization must find out ways to retain the p otential ones and also to provide them incentives to improve the quality of their service. The company also needs to identify the weak performers, and should adopt sufficient measures to track and understand Further, since the organization has some financial constraints, the HR has to research well about the cost effective methods that can be used to train and develop the skills of the employees (Ulrich et al. 2013). 12 Month HR Plan: There is a set of key objectives towards which the organization is working and these factors should be well considered before chalking out the 12 month HR plan. This plan will help the organization achieve the desired goals within a given time, by providing incentives to the employees, as well as by arranging personality training and development programs for the employees (Sparrow et al. 2013). Name of the course or the program Description of the objectives Career Development Program It has been observed that many employees of the organization, are lacking in the written as well as the verbal communication skills. It is very important to update the employees with the innovative change in business, and hence on completion of a minimum of 2 years in the company, an employee will undergo a career development course. This course may involve, brushing up the employees communication skills, or refining his soft skills, and even providing him basic training on the relevant computer courses and software applications (Noe et al. 2014). Software Training It has been observed that the organization has many employees of different ages, and some middle aged employees are not much acquainted with the application of basic computer programs. Therefore, the company has to arrange computer-training programs, so that it can help the employees in the acquisition of basic computer handling skills, such as learning the applications of the Microsoft office, or designing an attractive pamphlet for advertisement purpose. Further, the employees with knowledge of basic computer skills will also be required to learn to open up a webpage, design the website and to post pictures and summarized information on the official business page of the organization (Basili et al. 2013). Introduction of a new promotion criterion The senior executives of the company will first chalk out a target plan, that will be chiefly focused on the present financial year, and the management authority of the company will hold a meeting with the employees stating to them that the achievement of the immediate goals will only assist them in getting promotional benefits (Altmann et al. 2012). Incentives The company also consists of a variety of efficient and talented employees, and it is important for the company to retain them, for the better development, in future. Therefore, the company is going to keep a track on the top ten performers for each month, and these performers will be rewarded accordingly. The company should keep on providing increment on salary, higher amount of bonus, extra casual leaves to the competent performers to encourage them in future. The company should also arrange for programs and annual functions that will recognize the talent of the employees, by giving awards, such as the Employee of the Year award (Barambi et al. 2012). Implementation of Healthy work Culture The company will also organize different interesting programs and participatory game shows once in a two months, to help in developing the personal relation among the employees. The organization will arrange seminars that will help in strengthening the unity and a sense of belonging of the employees, so that each one of them, can unify their skills and talent to provide the best possible result for the organization (Madsen et al. 2013). Introducing the idea of an inclusive and diverse workplace Australia is a multicultural country, and it consists of people belonging to various ethnic groups and cultural backgrounds. So, while employing the employees, the company will try to hire people from various backgrounds, and even the aboriginal people, if well-qualified, should be hired in the organization. A diverse workplace reflects a healthy attitude that the company possesses and will help in integrating diverse skills of people belonging to various regions of the nation (Barak et al 2013). Arrangement of a Skill Audit The HR will also organize a skill audit, which will help the company to identify and recognize the skills and talent of the individual employees and this can help the company to reward the deserving candidates, through financial means as well as through recognition. The skill audit will also be beneficial as it will help the company understand the skill gaps, if any, and to find out the ways as to how to fill up the skill gaps, either through fresh recruitment procedure or through introduction of a training program specially for the semi-skilled workers (Rao et al. 2014). Collection and management of information of the employees personal details The HR is responsible not only for collecting the necessary information from the employees, but also for storing them in a very organized manner, so that they can be accessed easily for reference in future. Hence, the HR of the company will henceforth store the information of the employees in the computer, and will keep a back up copy of the information, in case the data gets deleted or misplaced (Carroll et al. 2014). Conclusion: The success of any Real Estate firm largely depends on five factors, which are- good communication skills (both interpersonal as well as intrapersonal skills), market research skills, relationship building skills, patience and analytical skills. The HR of Hunter Mason has to ensure that these skills are present in the candidates who are being recruited, and at the same time, if they are wanting in these skills, he must implement these skills in the employees. The responsibility lies on the shoulder of the HR to look after the well-being of the employees, and to link the employee well-being with the overall well-being of the organization (Srimannarayana et al. 2015). Recommendation: It is advisable that Hunter Mason adopts the 12 year strategic plan, as this plan will help the company in including several changes to the existent process, in terms of deployment of employees, training the skills of the existent employees, offering recognition and other benefits, and also helping the employees in advancing their careers. However, the HR of Hunter Mason must also consider the financial expenditure that is to be incurred, and must ensure that the strategy is planned in accordance with the financial condition of the company. Reference List: Altmann, S., Falk, A. and Wibral, M., 2012. Promotions and incentives: The case of multistage elimination tournaments.Journal of Labor Economics,30(1), pp.149-174. Barak, M.E.M., 2013.Managing diversity: Toward a globally inclusive workplace. Sage Publications. Barmby, T., Eberth, B. and Ma, A., 2012. 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