Preface

The strategic perspective on human resource management is not a novel concept; rather, it was in practice, since ancient times. Many epic wars like “Mahabharata” were fought on the concept of strategizing the manpower and facilitating the optimal utilization of these resources.

Human resource management is under immense pressure in the 21st century given the rapid changes in the political, technological, market, and demographic spheres. In such environments, building capability that ensures successful execution of a business’s strategy becomes more critical for leaders, managers, and HR professionals.

Strategic Human Resource Management provides new ways of thinking about how employees—an organisation’s talent—are attracted, developed and retained to drive employee engagement and business performance. In this reference, the Human Resource has evolved to become human capital and is considered as investments, which is expected to pay returns in the future.

The book discusses in detail the concepts from Strategic Human Resource Acquisition to the development and retention of these assets. The book also includes the concepts that are in the field of HR like workplace analytics, HR outsourcing, and high performing work systems.

Each chapter includes the interview of HR professionals and corroborating the importance of the concept. Besides that, the case studies are included to give the practical exposure to the concept. The interviews as well as case studies are in the Indian context, which makes it easier for the reader to connect. Every chapter provides links to other resources like videos, journal articles, tools for conducting the study, other casestudies, and so on, which would provide additional information on the topic. It also provides a research link for those who want to pursue further research on related topics for publication. Thus the book would serve as a handy resource for the Post Graduate, Doctoral, and postdoctoral researchers as well as corporate professionals.

The book is an effort to provide the rational approach to the prospective HR professionals to understand the optimal utilization of the HR processes by aligning it with the strategy of the organization and hence, develop the field of HRM. In order to prove the case of strategic HRM to the top management, the book tries to equip the reader with the ability to measure HR and thereby, provide an evidence of the importance of SHRM.

Chapter Overview

This book is intended both to be descriptive of Strategic Human Resource Management (SHRM) and its key constituent ideas and to be analytical of the approach and its ideas. It is intended that the reader is not only better informed about what SHRM is but better able to evaluate SHRM and to understand it. The understanding of strategic aspects of HRM is very vague in not only the management students but also the practitioners and hence, they devote most of their time to transactional activity. The book is an effort to provide the rational approach to the prospective HR professionals to understand the optimal utilization of the HR processes by aligning it with the strategy of the organization and hence, develop the field of HRM. In order to prove the case of strategic HRM to the top management, the book tries to equip the reader with the ability to measure HR and thereby, provide an evidence of the importance of SHRM.

The objective of the book is to fill the gap in existing texts and also to cover some contemporary topics like HR Metrics and HR branding. The concept of Human Asset Management is new; hence the project gives insight into the changing role of HR which is moving towards the strategic & business partner role.

Chapter 1 introduces the concept of strategic human resource management along with its evolution stages. Further, it discusses the changing role of HR professionals and hence the importance of SHRM. Different philosophies of SHRM are included to explain the understanding of SHRM.

Chapter 2 is an investment perspective of SHRM which discusses the case of employee as a competitive advantage and emphasize that employee is an asset. The money spent towards workforce is not ‘cost’ but ‘Investment’. The sources of employee values are discussed further in the chapter. This chapter also reflects upon the factors influencing investment perspective of the organization.

Chapter 3 sets the context for SHRM as the Human Resource Environment is discussed here. The impact of political, economic, social, technological, legal, and environmental context on the HR practices is elaborated in this chapter with an emphasis on the changing management trends, workforce demography, workforce utilization, and globalization.

Chapter 4 is an outline on formulating strategy and aligning HR strategy with the organizational strategy. This recognizes human resource as an important factor for strategy and hence the role of HR manager in strategy formulation has transformed the job of HR professionals.

Chapter 5 brings in the concept of workforce planning. It gives details of the forecasting techniques and the process of workforce planning. It further elaborates upon the contribution of workforce planning to SHRM.

Chapter 6 is a comprehensive chapter which includes broadly the major HR practices—acquisition, development, and evaluation from the perspective of implementation of the strategy. It elaborates upon all these HR functions from the perspective of aligning them with the strategy.

Chapter 7 is the discussion on high-performance work systems, which is an approach of HRM practices that consider that there are certain best HR practices, which can be used by all organizations to develop performance culture.

Chapter 8 is a quantification of HR through metrics & evaluation. It discusses different matrices which could be used to understand the impact of HR practices on organizational performance.

Chapter 9 discusses one of the important issues in HR that is, Outsourcing. It brings to light the transformation of HR practices due to increased outsourcing of HR function. The strategic decision making in identifying the functions to be outsourced is also discussed.

Chapter 10 touches upon a very important aspect of business that is, strategic alliances. The strategic alliances have become a way of business to grow. The role of HR is generally ignored in such processes but it is realized that it is of utmost importance.

Chapter 11 is on HR branding. The role of HR in developing and creating a positive brand of the employer is very crucial, especially to attract talent in the times of “War for talent”.

Supplement Materials: Supplement materials shall be available for download at www.pearsoned.co.in/ekta