Summary of Chapters:

Chapter: 01

introduction to human resource management

Chapter 1 presents an overview of human resource management. The topic discusses the importance of managing human resources in an organization, roles of human resource department, human resource management functions, and the current issues and challenges. The topic also presents the compulsory legal framework that affects human resource management practices in Malaysia such as, the Employment Act 1955, the Industrial Relations Act 1967, and the Trade Unions Act 1959. In the event of uncertain economic situation, in addition to the shift from industrial community to informative community, the importance of human resource capital in an organization is becoming more distinct. Therefore, organizations need to update their human resource management strategy to ensure the effectiveness of their business. An effective human resource management is able to merge its diverse and different human resource to achieve the general target of the organization, at the same time tackle the challenges and issues of human resource management efficiently and effectively.

Overall, it is clear that the legal system does influence industrial relations formed between employers and employees. Industrial Relations Acts that have been discussed in this chapter should be able to give you a comprehensive picture on the importance of having a systematic and organized human resource management system. This can ensure a harmonious working relationship between employees and employers. In addition, this can help an organization reach competitive advantage in the local as well as the global market.

Chapter 2
HR Planning and Recruitment
Chapter 2 discusses the human resource planning process and activities involved in the recruitment. The topic explains how an organization tracks the movement of its employees into, within and outside of the organization. The topic also explains how an organization selects qualified candidates to join the organization.

In planning an organizations future, the top management and strategic planner must realize that strategic planning decisions will effect human resource planning, and vice versa. Human resource planning can be reactive and proactive towards an organizations human resource needs. Human resource planning is a systematic process involving forecasting process of human resource needs, implementation of human resource supply analysis, and balancing between existing supplies to the actual needs of human resource. In implementing recruitment functions, the management finds that internal recruitment gives a lot of advantages to the organization and also employees. Through internal recruitment, management is able to reimburse all expenditures invested in employees during employee training and development. For the employees, it is seen as an encouragement to further improve themselves in the company. However, internal recruitment can cause employee cloning. External recruitment has to be carried out when there are no internal candidates eligible to fill a vacancy. Recruiting employee outside of the organization can help an organization acquire new ideas. The recruitment sources used by an organization usually depends on the types of jobs and the labor market. The selection process is supposed to give reliable and valid information on an applicant. Among the methods used to get information on an applicant is through an interview. The interview method can be used together with application form, biographical information blanks, references, background check, cognitive test and job sample test.

A job test is more objective than an interview and is able to give a wider behavior sample. Each type of test has a specific purpose, such as the work knowledge and work sample tests which are designed to determine whether a person requires training or not. A variety of methods can be used in the interview process. An interview can be performed structurally or nonstructurally, as well as through one on one basis or with a panel. Finally, in the process of deciding whether a candidate will be offered a post, factors that are taken into account are what the candidate can do, and what he or she will be able to do.

Chapter 3
Evaluating Performance and Developing Employees
Chapter 3 explains the functions of performance appraisal and human resource development. In particular, the topic explains the essential steps in evaluating employee performance, the information sources accessible, the methods available, and the common errors made by appraisers. Basic theories and principles of learning and training, the roles and the process of training and development are also explained in the topic. Finally, the career development activities are introduced. The explanation focuses on the career development phases, the process of designing career development programmes, and the relationship between the choice of career and a persons personality which is based on Hollands personality model.

Performance evaluation is a critical activity in human resource management as it is important in increasing organizations competitiveness. In short, performance evaluation is a process to evaluate work performance at a particular duration, in order to determine that the level of achievement is based on the organizations strategic objectives. What is important here is that the developed performance evaluation system is able to motivate employees to improve their performance thus increasing organizations productivity. By this, an effective performance evaluation system is able to ensure that all parties, be it management or employees, are able to be benefited from it. At the same time this will help to strengthen the position of and ease human resource management. Furthermore, it helps to achieve objectives and organizational goals.

Training and development is a function of human resource that should be implemented so that an employee is equipped with the knowledge, skills and abilities required to help realize the objectives of the organization. Staff competition and ongoing changes demand an organization to react accordingly. Therefore, an organization needs employees who are capable, knowledgeable, and skillful and are able to give the organization a competitive edge. There are four phases in a training process that need to be addressed namely, the needs analysis, design, implementation and evaluation. Every step is closely inter-related, and the outcome of each step will form the input for the next step. Therefore, all phases in a training process should be given special attention. Career and jobs are two different concepts. Career can be

referred to all the jobs held by an individual throughout his working life. In an organization, the efforts carried out by the human resource manager to help an employee achieve his job objectives, is known as career development.

In the process of designing a career development programme, three main phases i.e the evaluation phase, the direction phase and the development phase, will be followed. The evaluation phase involves self-assessment activities and evaluation on the part of the organization. The direction phase involves defining the kind of career desired by the employee, and the steps to be taken so that the career objectives will become a reality. The development process on the other hand, involves activities for developing and improving the skills as preparation for getting job opportunities in future. Lastly, John L. Holland, a career counseling expert, believes that the achievement of every individual depends on his personality and his job environment. Therefore, each of us has at least one of these six personalities: realistic, investigative, sociable, conventional, enterprising and artistic.

Chapter 4
Compensation and Incentives
Topic 4 describes the vital organizations tools to motivate and sustain the Employees performance. The discussion focuses on the importance of providing compensation, benefits and incentives to the employees, the types of compensation, benefits and incentives, the advantages of incentive programmers, and the characteristics of an effective benefits and incentive plan. Compensation administration is a critical activity in managing human resource and has to be more focused on giving consistent rewards to encourage employee behavior consolidation. This will then increase employee performance and employee loyalty so that they will remain in the company for a long time. Therefore, the compensation administration strategy has to be flexible to ensure a rapid response towards change and compensation administration trends in the labor market. Basically, the purpose of compensation administration is to gain high returns from the investment made by the organization for its employees, in the form of salary. The rewards offered have to ensure organization as well as employees benefited from it. An effective compensation administration system impact is when employees practice a work culture that emphasizes on contribution compared to payment acceptance for being present in the workplace.

Incentive plan and benefits management nowadays are extremely challenging, complex and requires thorough planning to ensure the effectiveness of both types of rewards. A human resource manager especially needs to ensure that both incentives and benefits are designed and implemented well in order to achieve both rewards original goals.

Chapter 5
Workplace Well-Being
Topic 5 discusses the important components of workplace well-being: (i) good relationships between employers and employees, and (ii) safe and healthy work environments. The discussion focuses on the employees and employers rights, and issues related to employees work discipline. Apart from that, the topic elaborates the issues of misconducts that occurred outside of the organization and the techniques used to solve the issues. Disciplinary and trade unions matters, alternative conflict resolution procedures, and the procedure for termination of contract due to misconduct are also discussed in the topic. The topic ends with the discussion on occupational safety and health.

It is the responsibility of all employees to know their rights in order for them to know certain things that should not be done by the management and organization that they are working with. In Malaysia, the employees rights are presented in various codes such as the Employment Act 1955, Occupational Safety and Health Act 1994 and etc. However, the employer does also have the right in electing workers, promoting and to discipline them, as well as has the right to terminate form their respective post. .

Other than the rights of employees and managers, discipline is also another important issue in an organization. Unfortunately, it is not the most favorite aspect that is being focused by the employers even though is crucial to motivate employees to follow the existing performance pace. We have discussed the aspects of industrial relations and trade unions. Thus, we should have understood what is industrial relationship and trade unions, why employees should join trade union and the roles. Finally, the safety and health problems in workplace are everybodys problems. Therefore, everyone has to be responsible to ensure that the workplace is safe and free from any illness. The various aspects of safety and health such as the Occupational Safety and Health Act 1994, recognizing a few safety and health towards danger and issues related to it have been discussed in this topic. It is hoped that the discussions can open up our mind regarding the importance of working in safe workplace without any risks to threaten our health.

Chapter 6
JOB EVALUATION
Job evaluation is the process of determining the appropriate Career Group and Role to which a position is assigned. The job evaluation process has four steps:

1. Selecting the Occupational Family: The first step is to determine the appropriate Occupational Family by reviewing the vocational characteristics (the nature and type of work performed) outlined in the Employee Work Profile.

2. Comparing and Selecting the Career Group: The second step is to compare the Concept of Work capsule that describes the array of work performed in the various Career Group Descriptions to the Employee Work Profile in order to determine the appropriate Career Group.

3. Comparing and Selecting a Role within a Career Group: The third step is to evaluate and compare the Work Description (position objective; purpose of position; knowledge, skills, abilities and competencies; education, experience, certification and licensure; core responsibilities and special assignments) outlined in the Employee Work Profile to the various Role Descriptions and the factor matrices to determine the appropriate Role.

4. Comparing to other positions within a Role to ensure consistency: The final step is to confirm the assignment of the position to the Role by checking to make sure that it is consistent with other positions assigned to the same Role.

ALTERNATIVE JOB EVALUATION MODELS The Compensation Management System allows agencies to develop a variety of other job and employee-based evaluation alternatives within the context of the broader job structure (Career Groups and Roles) that may more effectively meet their organizational needs and assist in providing criteria for movement within a Role and pay band. Examples of job evaluation alternatives may include skill or competency based systems or rank structures. All alternative evaluation methods must be reviewed and approved by DHRM prior to implementation (see Appendices F and G, CompetencyBased and Skill-Based Systems).

Chapter 7
PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT
The Commonwealths Performance Management Program is an Integral part of the Compensation Management System. Therefore, this Component shares the same overall goals, which are as follows: To attract qualified employees. To retain qualified employees. To motivate employees by rewarding sustained performance. To support management in the realization of organization objectives. The Performance Management Program has been designed to encourage career development to enhance the Commonwealths workforce and to financially reward employees performance. The Commonwealths annual performance cycle is October 25th to October 24th of the following year with the applicable pay out of performance increases effective November 25th. Employee performance will be a key determinant in how pay will be administered not only in the Performance Management Program but also with the Commonwealths Pay Practices. The Commonwealths performance management philosophy is to reward employees for their work contributions in a fair and equitable manner. The performance management philosophy was developed based on the following underlying principles:

To identify individual and/or team objectives and measures linked to the agencys mission and strategic objectives. To promote employee and career development through creating an environment of learning and quality improvement through training, coaching, counseling and mentoring. To provide open and honest periodic evaluations of employees performance. To administer financial rewards based on distinctions in performance with the highest level of award directed to Extraordinary Contributor and a lesser amount directed to Contributor.