Human Resource Management Essay: HRM in Australian Service Sector

Question

Task: This assessment requires you to write an academic essay on "Managing human resources in the context of global challenges" in service sector.

Answer

In this modern era, the concept of human resource management becomes an essential aspect for every business. Without an effective human resource management, not even a single organisation will be able to manage employee retain and recruitment process, enhance organisational effectiveness through proper employability and maintain an adequate workplace culture and ethics. Within this context, Castanheira& Story (2016, p. 989) have mentioned that human resource management is also important for an organisation to maintain its employee relationship within organisations. Without maintaining a positive employee relationship, organisations cannot successfully enhance organisational effectiveness in both regional and international marketplace. In the context of maintaining an appropriate employee relationship, human resource management focuses on two basic objects, such as resolving problems or conflicts among the employees and fulfilling the satisfaction level of the employees by offering several opportunities, for instance, appropriate training, managing cross-cultural relationship, health and safety measurements and remuneration or incentives.

The above-mentioned statement is also applicable for the Australian service sector. The service sector consists of different large organisations, in which four major organisations are “Health care and Social Assistance”, “Retail Trade”, “Construction” and “Professional, Scientific and Technical Services”. As of present research, around 1.5 million people are associated with health and social assistance followed by 1.3 million in retail trade and 1 million in construction organisations (Australian Government, 2020). Based on the large numbers of associated employees in different service providing organisations in Australia, it is to be mentioned that the importance of human resource management is excessive for the service sector of Australia.

The study aims to highlight some effective aspects of human resource management which is associated with the challenges in Australian service sector. First of all, the essay will be focusing on the workforce challenges in the service sector of Australia. After that, the study will be highlighting the importance of talent management and its relationship with human resource management (Podger, 2017, p. 112). Thirdly, the major focus of this study will be on the human resource management and its effectiveness on employee engagement for organisational effectiveness in Australian service sector. Finally, the study will be highlighting how human resource management is capable of managing staffs by offering appropriate training and leadership practices. In order to portrait each segment, several article, journals and books will be followed and to strengthen the evidences, a text book, named “Human Resource Management” written by Alan Nankervis and other writers will be followed in this study.

According to Lamont et al. (2017), it has become a great matter of concern that the health care organisations and its associated employees within the Australian health care are facing several challenges. The excessive workload and mere job positions of the employees within the health care become the major reason of early burnout. In this regard, Costello et al. (2019) have stated that more than 33% of employees, including nurses within the health care organisations are experiencing the symptoms of burnout. These symptoms not only a concern for the involved nurses, but also affects the entire workforce within the health care. With the flow of time these symptoms of burnout increases the volume of employee turnover in the Australian health care organisations. As of recent study, it has been followed that the present employee turnover rate in health care is more than 18.2% in Australia.

Another workforce issue that the Australian health care is facing nowadays is the increasing skills gap. According to Mcmillanet al. (2016), the skill gap or lack of skill of the employees is to be seen in almost every organisation, but in the scenario of a health care where the presence of appropriate employees can bring a difference between life and death, the presence of skill gap among the employee is undoubtedly an obstacle for the entire operation of the health care. As per some present research, it has been observed that if appropriate steps are not taken to retain or attract skilled employees, then the Australian health care will be facing a shortage of doctors by more than 100,000 by 2030.

In order to fulfil the shortage of skilled employees within the health care, the human resource management needs to take appropriate employee attraction and retention activities. Regarding this, Karpenko&Basenko(2017) have stated that by attracting and retaining skilled and top-notch quality workers within the health care, the human resource management will be able to overcome the workforce challenges and increase the efficiency of the overall health care. The similar approach has been mentioned by Nankervis et al. (2019) in their chapter 6. As of the scholars, talent attraction and retain of the skilled employees is a fundamental job that should be done carefully by the human resource management of the Australian health care organisations. By following such a policy of employee attract and retain, HRM will be able to cope with workforce challenges.

Management of talent is a mechanism in which corporations and organisations discover and cultivate skilled individuals who can have a beneficial influence on their organisations. This strategy becomes a key aspect within the context of human resource management, with talent management techniques being established in accordance with the specific requirements as well as structure of the organisation and industry (Cole, 2016). Nowadays, talent management has become one of the effective job roles of human resource management in Australian hospitality sector, as this service sector is increasing and developing day by day, and thus, the competitiveness in increasing within the Australian market overwhelmingly.

Regarding the scenario of talent management, Zehiret al. (2016) have mentioned that appropriate skilled employees and selection of adequate workforce is excessively required for the development of every type of organisation and sector. Such an approach is also applicable for Australian hospitality sector. According to the report of “United Nations World Tourism Organisations (UNWTO)”, there are more than 4.45 million hotels in Australia. This large numbers of hotels undoubtedly indicate the existing and potential competitiveness among the hospitality sector in Australian marketplace. Therefore, to achieve the competitive advantage and to leading position, the entire hospitality sector is looking for skilled and appropriate employees, so that organisational effectiveness can be increased. In this talent management process, the role of human resource management is significant.

According to (), the best way to attract adequate talent for the hospitality industry is to provide benefits to the workers by the HRM. The nature of jobs within the hospitality industry is not always desirable and thus, employee turnover is to be seen inside the hospitality sector. As per Davidson, Timo & Wang (2009), the hospitality sector of Australia has reported that in some cases, the employee turnover rate exceeds to 80%. Therefore, to attract skilled and talented employees within the hospitality sector, HRM should offer healthy wages and other benefits along with remuneration to the employees, so that the employee turnover rate can be minimized. The same approach of talent retention and development of the employability of the employees is mentioned by Nankervis et al. (2019), in their book “Human Resource Management’ in chapter 7. In this book, the scholars have mentioned that to retain talent within the Australian Hospitality sector, the skilled employees should be compensated. Working within hospitality sector creates work-related pressure on the employees and thus, HRM should provide them flexible timing.

Employee engagement is another chapter that creates several issues for the human resource management of major numbers of organisations. By implementing an effective employee engagement strategy, the leaders of the businesses are able to develop the entire organisational operations by improving the performance of the organisational workforce. Regarding the issues of employee engagement, Ismail et al. (2016) have stated that acquisition is one of the major factors that creates challenges in employee engagement strategies within an organisation. Due to acquisition, a feeling of fear and distrust sometimes occurs among the employees. Therefore, these fears and distrusts impact on both physical and psychological state of the employees, which lead to an inappropriate employability of the employees. Being situated in such a condition, employees concentrated on those factors more rather than their work and job role. Therefore, both organisational productivity and profitability are hampered.

Apart from acquisition issues, less employee engagement is another factor that creates challenges for the human resource management during employee engagement within organisations. Regarding this scenario, Fort et al. (2016) have stated thatlarge numbers of accidents take place mostly within the utility industry. Several preventive violations may cause vehicular accidents, health injuries, and damage to overall infrastructure or death of the employees. As per the report of 24th September 2020, 113 Australian employees killed within the workplace. On the other hand, in 2019, 183 Australian employees experienced some serious injuries inside the workplace followed by 144 fatal injuries in 2018 (Safe Work Australia, 2020).

In order to resolve these issues, Al Adresi&Darun (2017) have mentioned that organisational human resource management department should communicate with all the employees to engage all the employees with each other. In resolving employee engagement challenges, the role of organisational HRM is excessively important. In such a scenario, human resource managers should frequently communicate with the employees in order to acknowledge their current state of mind regarding their job role or any other organisational conflicts. In order to communicate with the employees in a proper manner, human resource managers can spend leisure time with employees and give opportunity to every employee to share their values with each other.

In order to resolve the employee engagement issues within organisations, Nankervis et al. (2019) have mentioned in chapter 10 in their book “Human Resource Management” about the work health safety. It is mentioned earlier that less employee engagement within an organisation can cause serious health damages and even death of the workers. Therefore, for effective employee engagement within organisations, human resource management team should provide adequate work health and safety to the workers. In such a manner, workplace-related risks can be minimised and also an effective employee engagement strategy should be implemented within organisation to increase the profit margin with the help of skilled employees.

Another major issue that is faced by the human resource management is the challenges of managing employees in global challenging environment. For each and every business, management of staffs is excessively required as the employees and their employability is considered as the backbone of the overall organisational operations (Castanheira& Story, 2016). If the management of the organisations failed to maintain proper staff management, then the organisations will be affecting in diversified ways, such as slow growth of the organisation, lack of productivity, which will lead to a poor profit margin and employee turnover. Without managing staffs within organisations, not even a single business can achieve competitive advantage in the marketplace.

Considering the essentiality of staff management, Davis, Frolova& Callahan (2016) have conducted that staffing or maintaining the entire organisational workforce is an essential operation, which ensures the organisational efficiency and performance level of several management-related operations. The process of staffing or managing employees within workplaces consists of several operations, for instance, deployment and recruitment of appropriate staffs or employees in diversified positions around the organisations. The entire process of staffing or managing staffs is performed by the skilled or trained human resource management team within organisations, and in order to recruit the best employees in the organisations, human resource management team monitors each and every candidate and their expertise area, so that the organisation can develop its business with the help of skilled employees and their knowledge in a specific area.

However, some challenges are faced by the human resource management team during staffing or managing staffs. In such a scenario, Sabiuet al. (2019) have mentioned that lack of clearness in organisational goals and mission may hamper the common goals of the employees and thus, they lost their aims. Such a staff management issue is seen because of lack of communication between the management and the employees. Moreover, poor communication and clarity between the administrative body and the employees slows down the decision-making approach and for that the overall organisational performance goes through a critical situation. Based on the issue of managing staffs in global challenging environment, Nankervis et al. (2019) have mentioned several strategies in chapter 5, which will be helpful for the human resource management of the organisations to mitigate the managing staffs’ problem in global challenging environment. A clear communication is one of them, which will help to share the decisions and vision of the organisations among the employees. By maintaining such an effective staffing strategy, all the employees will work together and organisational operations can be developed by acquiring the best decisions of the employees.

Finally, some effective recommendations are required to be mentioned, which will be helpful for managing human resources in the context of global challenges. First of all, human resource managers need to understand that only recruitment and retention of skilled employees is not enough in this competitive marketplace (Karpenko&Basenko, 2017). In order to manage global challenges, human resource management need to focus on technical professions apart from field workers. The modern era of business overwhelmingly depends on technology and innovation and thus, for developing business of an organisation, technical skilled employees should be kept ahead in the organisation and provide them health and safety, remuneration, work-life balance and flexible working hours. These employee management and retention strategies are considered as the best possible ways in Australian service sector to develop the entire sector globally by recruiting and retaining the best skilled employees.

Secondly, training and education always might not be the best manner to increase the organisational productivity and profitability level. Human resource managers should always focus on the employability of each employee and should provide adequate training according to their condition and skills. However, theoutcome may not be always satisfactory for the organisation or for the human resource management department. Therefore, to resolve such skill gap and global challenges, appropriate monitoring and supervising is required from the end of human resource management department. Along with training and skill development programmes, every employee should be provided equal opportunity and priority. In this manner, a proper employee engagement is possible within the organisations, which will be similarly effective for the development of organisational operations.

In conclusion, it is to be mentioned that the Australian service sector is currently in a leading position in the country’s economy, which contribute 67% of Gross Domestic product (GDP) and gives 78% employability to the regional people. On the other hand, the service sector of Australia is also developing day by day in the global marketplace. Therefore, the service sector is currently under excessive pressure from the global competitiveness. In such a scenario, all the organisations those are associated under the service sector, such health care organisations, hospitality sector and other organisations are needed to be operated by skilled and trained employees, so that the organisations acquires the ability to achieve competitive advantage. However, such a large number of employees should be controlled and managed by effective human resource management. During managing employees, human resource management faces several challenges, which can be resolved by implementing the recommended strategies. ?

References
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