In search of strategic HRM: Promises and pitfalls

Sri Lanka has entered an era of opportunities, leaving behind the bitter times of war and destruction. With the aspirations of becoming the next Asian miracle galore, the country needs a sustained effort, in line with a long term plan towards growth and development.

Being strategic is of utmost importance in this context. It essentially shows how “smart” you are in “playing the game”. The roots are from the Greek word stratēgikós, which means the art of the general.

Obviously, it has a military connotation. How a general order the troops to attack, or to withdraw or to surround the enemy, with the aim of winning the war in mind. A battle front and a business front have a lot in common, particularly with the sky-rocketing competition, globally as well as locally.

A game plan cannot be conceived or commissioned without people. In any organisation, we have physical, financial and information resources. All those three resources are not of any use if you do not have the most precious resource, its people. That is exactly, why people, to be precise the “right” people are the most precious asset to any forward-looking organisation.

How to acquire, retain, develop, and engage them have become increasingly challenging with the growing complexity associated with doing business in a globalised world. Hence, Human Resource Management (HRM) has become a critical factor for organisational success.



Human Resource Management (HRM)

What is HRM? There are hundreds of ways to describe it. I prefer how Garry Dessler puts it across in a rather simple manner: The policies and practices involved in carrying out the “people” or human resource aspect of a management position.

Interestingly, it does not talk about a particular department, section or a division, but it does talk about any management position. The good news coming from that is the fact that every manager has a “people” role to play.

Let’s take a simple example. You may be the best accountant in town. Yet, you cannot achieve results unless you master the art and science of getting the best out of your team. That is human resource management.



HRM: Past, present and future

HRM is constantly evolving. Having started as Personnel Management in the early fifties, it has come a long way in bridging the gap between organisational effectiveness and employee development. Table 1 contains the details.

As the table depicts, Strategic Human Resource Management (SHRM) is a significant landmark in the evolution of the management of human resources. When we compare PM, HRM and SHRM in line with their shift of focus in the typical organisational hierarchy, the scenario depicted in figure 1 can be seen.

As the figure depicts, SHRM deals with strategic level of an organisation. It contributes to the long term decisions of an organisation. Let’s look into more details about it.



Views on SHRM

SHRM is an approach that defines how an organisation’s goals will be achieved through people by means of HR strategies and integrated HR policies and practices.

Schuler and Jackson (1987) define SHRM as “explicitly linking HRM with strategic management processes of the organisation and to emphasise coordination and congruence among the various human resource management practices”.

According to Wright and others (1994), SHRM is “the pattern of planned human resource deployments and activities intended to enable a firm to achieve its goals”.

Truss and Gratton (1994) further elaborate SHRM as, “the linking of HRM with strategic goals and objectives in order to improve business performance and develop organisation culture to foster innovations and flexibility.”

In simplifying the above complex definitions, we can identify four elements affecting each other in the context of an organisation. Figure 2 contains such details. According to the figure, the interplay between external and internal factors impacts SHRM.

External facts could include industry, political, economical, social, geographical and cultural aspects that are beyond the control of the organisation. Internal factors are very much within the organisation such as people, leadership, organisational culture, etc. Such factors can collectively pose challenges for SHRM.

What is the status of SHRM in Sri Lanka? What specific issues do we face with regard to the practicing of SHRM? What could be the way forward? The next column of Humane Results will address these aspects in detail.

(Dr. Ajantha Dharmasiri is a Senior Faculty Member and a Management Consultant attached to the Postgraduate Institute of Management, University of Sri Jayewardenepura. He also serves as an adjunct faculty in International Human Resource Management at the Price College of Business, University of Oklahoma, USA. He has over two decades of both private and public sector working experience in diverse environments including Unilever and Nestlé. He has engaged in consultancies in more than 10 countries. He is a Commonwealth AMDISA Doctoral Fellow and Fulbright Postdoctoral Fellow. He holds a Ph.D. and an MBA from the Postgraduate Institute of Management, University of Sri Jayewardenepura and a B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Moratuwa. He is also a member of the Chartered Management Institute, UK.)