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Managing Human Capital

Managing Human Capital

Overview

Role in Managing Human Capital

Today’s Human Capital Management approach perceives employees as assets (human capital) whose current value can be measured with metrics and whose future value is also measurable and can be enhanced through investing in the development of employees.

At the same time, the HR department must show compassion for the various situations in which employees find themselves.

Small organizations often have team members performing multiple HR roles, such as benefits administration, recruitment, selection, payroll, and employee development/training. Normally, larger companies have at least one person in each of these areas. If a company’s HR team is too small for its number of employees, it is likely that employee dissatisfaction will rise because of delayed response times regarding resolution of issues. For example, an HR manager may not understand the timeliness needed for hiring replacement employees for various departments. If that happens, improvement in communications among departments is needed. If a new employee must wait for a busy HR staff member to update insurance records, filing deadlines could be missed.

Legal Compliance

All organizations, however, must follow employment laws and regulations related to discriminatory practices, retaliation for whistle blowing, or other serious issues.

This SLP assignment looks at an interesting contrast between company ideals and actual practices. For example, we are looking ahead to how employees should be viewed as assets. First, view the four potential futures identified by Deloitte for the worker-employer relationship:

  1. Work as fashion
  2. War between talent
  3. Work is work
  4. Purpose unleashed

Each video is less than 5 minutes long and is found in the following link:

Let’s compare this concept with an adverse management practice—utilizing children as workers. Think about companies that do business overseas, and more specifically ones who use child labor, such as the popular coffee company, Starbucks (Cousins, 2019).

SLP Assignment

For this SLP 1 assignment, consider what you have learned about the “Human Capital Management” approach to Human Resource Management and child labor practices that are reported to still be occurring in some U.S. companies overseas.

Using the Trident Online Library, research two US companies that have been found to use child labor. In your submission, discuss what the companies are doing to dispel the shadow over the companies because of this practice. Also discuss what role the HRM has to develop a culture where all employees, regardless of age or nationality, are valued and treated as assets.

In addition to the three background readings listed above, find at least one other high-quality source from the Trident Online Library to support your essay. (High quality sources are found in peer-reviewed journals and textbooks.)

Submit the 2- to 3-page SLP Assignment submission into the appropriate drop box by the Module 1 due date. The page count does not include the cover page or reference list page. The title at the top of page two should be the title you give your submission, not “Introduction” although the first paragraph of a paper is always an introduction. There is also a conclusion required at the end of this assignment that is a synopsis of your findings uncovered during the process of completing this assignment.

SLP Assignment Expectations

Your submission will be assessed on the criteria found in the grading rubric for this assignment:

  1. Meets assignment requirements
  2. Critical thinking
  3. Writing and assignment organization
  4. Use of sources and mechanics
  5. Timeliness of assignment

Module 1 – Background

A key ingredient to whether or not an organization views its employees as human capital to be nurtured and developed for greater productivity is the ability to analyze key metrics. There are organization-wide metrics that are often monitored on a routine basis. Some of the organization-wide metrics include, for example:

  • Net profit before taxes
  • Net profit on key product lines
  • Customer satisfaction (by customer group)

Company metrics are often viewed monthly or quarterly by the management of an organization with the use of balanced scorecards. Scorecards, for example, show unacceptable levels in red, while other metrics are green if they meet or exceed set goals.

Using employee satisfaction as an example, let’s look at how it might be measured. Since scorecards are often viewed only on a periodic basis, there could be a problem with employee satisfaction that goes undetected for weeks or months, before a problem is recognized. However, there will likely be signs that employee satisfaction has been impacted one way or another. For example, there may be changes in employee morale, tardiness, absenteeism, and/or other metrics measured by the company. So, while measuring key performance indicators is a great idea, managers must watch them frequently. Otherwise, by the time they learn that changes are needed, damage might have already been done.

Specific to HRM, then, what types of metrics are important; what are their uses?

HR metrics are numbers key managers of an organization are interested in monitoring frequently to learn the pulse of an organization. In addition to the highest organizational leaders, however, other managers watch the figures, too, including the leaders in an organization’s HR department. When a company seems to be turning over employees at a rapid rate, something is askew. When employees are consistently late to work or do not meet performance expectations, something needs more attention. Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are metrics that help reveal discrepancies that need further work.

Videos

View the four potential futures identified by Deloitte in the link above for the worker-employer relationship:

  1. Work as fashion
  2. War between talent
  3. Work is work
  4. Purpose unleashed

Each video is less than 5 minutes long.

Required Material

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