Case Scenario:
You are the human resources director for the National Lewis and Clark Corporation (NL&C). NL&C is a 2-year-old innovative-service organization that has grown from 5 employees to 250 employees, with most of that growth occurring in the past 6 months. You joined the organization 2 months ago, when the company president decided that the company had grown to the point of needing a human resources department. In your first couple of months with NL&C, you have noticed several areas in need of development or redesign.
The growth of the organization has been steady, and that is not expected to diminish any time soon. The top management expects you to somehow develop fast, reliable, cost-effective recruiting methods to meet the tremendous staffing needs that have been communicated to you.
All employees benefit from the company's progressive profit-sharing plan. However, a comparative salary survey has found its way to your desk, and you see that NL&C's salary and benefits for most positions are far below national averages. You wonder if this will in time have an effect on the quality of employees attracted to the company.
In your first weeks with the company, you have also received many informational requests from employees about their benefits--so many, in fact, that it takes up much of your productive time.
With a company that has grown as quickly as NL&C, there are employees who were promoted to management positions and given very little training. The quality of people management and customer service practice varies greatly from department to department. There are actually a couple of departments that clients and vendors seem to try to avoid interaction with, though the majority of departments seem to naturally excel in the way they treat both business and internal clients.
Something that the company president recently said makes you think that part of the reason you were hired has to do with the fact that a few terminated employees have filed lawsuits against NL&C in recent months. You also have been passed paperwork from these lawsuits involving claims of both wrongful termination and discrimination. Though the treatment of employees in the company seems good overall, there is little documentation on some of the recent terminations. Also, there are no measures in place that would make you fully confident that NL&C's defense would stand in court.
There are mixed feelings among management and employees about the addition of your position in the company. Some on the management team are not sure that what your position offers will assist the company's bottom line. Others, including the company president and line employees, hope that you will bring structure to everything that involves the company's employees. They are looking to you not only to ensure that each employee is treated fairly but also to see to it that each employee has the incentive and training needed to keep meeting the company's ambitious goals for growth, expansion, and profit.
Details: It is time to meet with senior management and explain what you do and why it is important to the success of the organization. You want to be thorough in your response, so you begin by asking yourself the following questions:
Q1. What do you believe are the most important roles of human resources in an organization?
Q2. What are specific examples from your research and your personal experience of how these roles helped employees and the organization?
Q3. Who does the HR department represent--the organization or its employees?
Q4. How has the role of human resources management changed over the past 25 years?
Q5. What is the future of the role of the HR manager in organizations?