Human Resource Policies & Strategies, SHRM, Objectives of SHRM,Strategic Management Process, Strategic Control, Types of Strategic Control, Operational Controls, Functional Strategy,Grand Strategies, Factors Affecting Strategic Human Resource Management

1. Prepared by Ms. Shery Asthana
Asst. Prof. (Greater Noida Institute of
Management)
Prepared by Ms. Shery Asthana
Asst. Prof. (Greater Noida Institute of
Management)

2. Human Resource Policies & Strategies
A policy can be defined as a formal official statement that every member of the organization
must follow. It can be related to any issue that links directly to the company’s mission or
goals.
a set of ideas or a plan of what to do in particular situations that has been agreed to
officially by a group of people, a business organization, a government.
A procedure can be defined as the process of how the policy must be strategized or
followed by the employees of the organization.
The human resource department designs or plans all the employment-related policies and
procedures for the welfare of the employees and their employment. These human resource
management policies provide guidelines regarding employment policies of the company.
The initial responsibility of any employee will be to get synced with the work culture of the
organization, in such a case HR policies help them give an idea about the do’s and don’ts
one must follow. Some of the top human resource policies are,
• Attendance
• Behaviour
• Requests
• Safety

3. Workplace Policies:
Usually, an employee handbook is a documented format which comprises all
the important policies of the organization. The policies mentioned should
also intend to communicate the company advantages and expectations of
their employees.
The company handbook for employees also considers various factors like
niche, size, industry and location of the company. Some other key policies
are,
• Employee conduct, attendance and punctuality
• Employment classifications
• Meal and break periods.
• Leave and time-off benefits
• Safety and health
• Timekeeping and pay
• Anti-harassment and non-discrimination

4. Let’s understand some terms which are used in SHRM:
i. Core competencies – A unique capability in the organization
that creates high value and differentiates organization from its
competitors.
ii. Mission Statement – It explains the purpose and reason for
existence, it is usually broad but does not go beyond couple of
sentences and it serves as a foundation for everything that
organization does.
iii. Strategy – It is the company’s plan for how it will balance its
internal strengths and weaknesses with external opportunities
and threats in order to maintain a competitive advantage.

5. The main objectives of SHRM are the following:
(a) Plan for manpower requirements for its business located in national and
international markets.
(b) Conduct scientific selection and appointment of employees for business
operation of right type and right in number.
(c) Train the employees on technology in use and working procedure for
developing their skills and knowledge.
(d) Place the employees at jobs according to their areas of specialization.
(e) Provide opportunities for the employees deserving on the scientific basis.
(f) Compensate employees according to their skills, experience and contributions.
(g) Maintain employees motivated, satisfied and cooperative in organisation.
(h) Improve industrial relations, industrial peace and harmony at workplace.
(i) Encourage employees for their cooperation, commitments and higher
performance at work.
(j) Contribute through manpower in improvement of organisational performance
and organisational effectiveness in business.
(k) Contribute in profitability, progress and image of the organisation.
(l) Stay competitive and effective in business for growth and excellence in global
market.

6. Strategic Management Process
Strategic management process has following four steps:
Environmental Scanning- Environmental scanning refers to a process of collecting,
scrutinizing and providing information for strategic purposes. It helps in analyzing the
internal and external factors influencing an organization. After executing the
environmental analysis process, management should evaluate it on a continuous
basis and strive to improve it.
Strategy Formulation- Strategy formulation is the process of deciding best course of
action for accomplishing organizational objectives and hence achieving organizational
purpose. After conducting environmental scanning, managers formulate corporate,
business and functional strategies.
Strategy Implementation- Strategy implementation implies making the strategy work
as intended or putting the organization’s chosen strategy into action. Strategy
implementation includes designing the organization’s structure, distributing
resources, developing decision making process, and managing human resources.
Strategy Evaluation- Strategy evaluation is the final step of strategy management
process. The key strategy evaluation activities are: appraising internal and external
factors that are the root of present strategies, measuring performance, and taking
remedial / corrective actions. Evaluation makes sure that the organizational strategy
as well as it’s implementation meets the organizational objectives.

7. Developing HR strategy
A well-defined strategy clarifies the role of the HR team. It determines the
size, structure and cost of the resource required to deliver it and ensures that
all HR activity is aligned to business need.
What follows are eight key steps in the quest towards delivering a successful
HR strategy.
1. Aligning business Needs and HR needs
The business’ goals – that is its strategic imperatives – sit at the heart of any
HR strategy and in order to align business and HR needs one key question
must to be answered, “Can your organisation’s internal capability deliver its
business goals?”
This is where HR receives most criticism. The function is frequently accused
of failing to fully understand its business, goals and strategy for achieving
these goals, and its business model and how it delivers to its customers. For
those who already understand the demands of their business, it is easy to
identify where the business has strong core competencies and where the
business is weakest.

8. 2. Developing your HR strategy
Deeper knowledge and understanding of your business goals and business model
can identify potential threats and opportunities in the quantity and quality of
human resource required by your organisation. This in turn identifies the key
components of your HR strategy and the virtuous circle of providing whatever
your organisation needs for success.(SWOT Analysis)
3. Organisational performance
Organisational performance is the process by which business goals and objectives
are cascaded and managed across and down an organisation. It provides a link and
rationale for all other HR activity and, in addition, the greatest opportunity to
directly impact business success, enhancing HR’s reputation and contribution.
HR needs to create and install a robust performance management process that
sets out performance objectives for all levels of staff within a business. This is an
opportunity to develop line managers’ skills in being able to disseminate and set
stretch targets for their business.

9. 4. Organisational design and structure
Organisational design is the shape, size and structure of the organisation required to
meet customers’ needs. It reflects the management processes that drive the business
model and determines organisational agility and flexibility. These processes can be a
source of competitive advantage or sources of frustration, unnecessarily absorbing
time, cost and resources.
Decisions affecting the shape, size and cost of the organisation will be aligned with the
business strategy. It should be relatively easy to see whether an organisation invests
in marketing, sales or manufacturing, for instance, and whether the organisation is
maximising its work flow capability.
5. Strategic resourcing
Achieving clarity throughout the organisation’s structure is critical in order for
resourcing strategies to work well. If the organisation is transparent about its key roles
and accountabilities, this will define the skills and knowledge required to undertake
the work and determine strategic resourcing requirements.
Deciding on your resourcing strategy means identifying a number of critical
components. These range from the processes needed to determine resourcing needs,
the processes to attract the right people and the processes for assessing and selecting
the right people. HR has a strong traditional involvement in all of the above. In
addition, it is essential to ensure each stage of the resourcing activity is aligned and in
direct response to the strategic imperatives.

10. Strategic Human Resource Management
Strategic human resource management is the connection between a company’s
human resources and its strategies, objectives, and goals. The aim of strategic
human resource management is to:
• Advance flexibility innovation,
• Competitive advantage.
• Develop a fit for purpose organizational culture.
• Improve business performance.
The word “strategic” literally means something done as a part of a plan to
achieve a particular purpose or to gain an advantage.
Strategic management may be conceived as the process of:-
• identifying and formulating strategic goals,
• selecting strategies to achieve the goals,
• executing the strategic plan and,
• evaluating its effectiveness.
Strategic human resource management, thus, refers to adopting a specific plan in
regard to human resources, and revamping human resource policies and practices,
and developing employee competencies to cope with the special or challenging
situations.

11. 6. Organisation development
If strategic resourcing is about providing a pipeline for importing external
talent, then an organisation’s development strategy is the way in which the
HR team decides what changes and improvements need to be made to the
current workforce.
Usually these responses work at three levels – the individual, team and
organisation – and all are geared to achieve high levels of organisational
performance. It requires a close examination of the strategic imperatives and
clarity about the capabilities to execute it.
Development responses will aim to increase business skills, the application of
business skills (sometimes called competencies) and the behavioural
elements – all of which contribute to an organisation’s effective
performance.

12. 7. Compensation and benefits
Often called reward strategy, the purpose of compensation and benefits
systems is to align the performance of the organisation with the way it
rewards its people, providing the necessary incentives and motivation
required for an organisation to deliver its goals.
Its components are a combination of base pay, bonuses, profit sharing, share
options, and a range of appropriate benefits, usually based on market or
competitor norms and the organisation’s ability to pay. Typically, the
components of an organisation’s reward strategy will reflect the particular
performance culture of a business.
8. Organisation culture
Culture is usually described as the “way we do things round here” – the way
the organisation acts, reacts and interacts. The trend in the last 10 to 15
years has been to align organisational behaviour more strongly with
customers’ needs, creating customer-facing units and customer-sensitive
behaviours. This has been as a direct result of the increased competition
around product, quality, prices and packaging. In re-aligning an organisation’s
culture there can be real benefit and competitive advantage through
improved service.

13. Strategic Control
● Strategic control is the process to control the formation and
execution of strategic plans,
● It is a specialised form of management control, handle
uncertainty and ambiguity at various points in the control
process.
● Strategic controls are intended to direct the company towards its
long term strategic direction.
● Focused on the achievement of future goals, rather than the
evaluation of past performance.
● SC tracks strategy implementation, detects problems or changes
in the strategy and makes necessary adjustments.
● SC is the critical evaluation of plans, activities and results thereby
providing information for the future action.

14. ● SC focuses on the dual questions of whether
○ the strategy is being implemented as planned
○ the results produced by the strategy are those intended.
● SC is concerned with tracking the strategy as it is being
implemented, detecting any problems areas or potential
problem areas, and making an necessary adjustments.
● SC focus on effectiveness of organisation.

15. Strategic Control Process

16. Types of Strategic Control
The four types of strategic control are premise control, implementation control,
special alert control and strategic surveillance. Each one provides a different
perspective and method of analysis to maximize the effectiveness of your business
strategy.
• Premise Control:-
Your business strategy is based on an assumed premise of how things will occur in the
future. Premise controls allow you to examine whether this assumption still holds true
once you actually put your ideas into action. Premises may be affected by
environmental factors such as inflation, interest rates and social changes or by
industry factors such as competitors, suppliers and barriers to entry. These controls
will help you recognize changes in the premise so you can adapt your strategy
accordingly.
• Implementation Control:-
Once you design a strategy for your business, you will need to implement it. As you
take the steps necessary to put your plan into action, use implementation controls to
ensure no adjustments to your strategy are necessary. Two basic types of
implementation controls are monitoring strategic thrusts and doing milestone
reviews. The former means you analyze the tactics you're using to gain market share.

17. • Special Alert Control:-
You will need mechanisms in place to assess the position of your
business in the case of sudden events, such as natural disasters,
product recalls or market spikes. Special alert controls allow you to
reconsider the relevancy of your strategy in light of these new
events. Prepare how you will handle these special alerts with
procedures to be followed, priorities to keep and tools to be used.
• Strategic Surveillance Controls:-
As a small-business owner, you need to protect your business from
external threats that may hinder the success of your strategy.
Strategic surveillance controls allow you to monitor multiple
sources for these threats. Continually safeguard your strategy by
following trade journals, attending conferences and keeping
awareness of industry trends to meet these risks as they arise.

18. Operational Controls

19. Importance of Operational Control:-
• Ensuring that the business runs smoothly.
• Ensuring client satisfaction.
• Ensuring timely and quality service delivery.
• Ensuring that stock is readily available to clients.
• Delivery of your services in a timely, effective and friendly
manner is absolutely crucial to the successful growth of your
brand. Without effective operational systems in place to assist
you in achieving complete customer satisfaction, your brand
runs the risk of developing a bad reputation.
Example of an operational control
When performance does not meet standards, managers enforce
corrective actions, which may include training, discipline,
motivation, or termination. ... For example, if salespeople are not
trained on time, sales revenue may fall.

20. Functional Strategy – Meaning of Functional Strategies
Functional Strategies are derived from business level strategy. Remember the
three generic strategy - low cost leadership, differentiation and focus
strategy.
For Example, take a firm pursuing low cost leadership. When the strategy is
implemented, all the functional areas have to be focused on low cost
structure.
Strategy are as follows:
1. Corporate Strategy – It is a strategy for the company and all of its
businesses as a whole.
2. Business Strategy – It is a strategy for each separate business the company
has diversified into.
3. Functional Strategy – Then there is a strategy for each specific functional
unit within a business. Each business usually has a production strategy, a
marketing strategy, a finance strategy, and so on.
4. Operating Strategy – And finally, this is a still narrower strategy for basic
operating units — plants, sales districts and regions, and departments within
functional areas.

21. The activities and processes—such as human resource management, research and
development, finance, production, and marketing — constitute the strategic
functions of an organisation. Strategies designed to enact these strategic functions
are referred to as functional level strategies. A functional strategy is the short-term
game plan for a key functional area within a company.
https://www.marketing91.com/functional-level-strategy/
The reasons why functional strategies are needed can be enumerated as follows:
i. Aimed at making the strategies formulated at the top management level
practically feasible at the functional level.
ii. Provide flow of strategic decisions to the different parts of an organization.
iii. The basis for controlling activities in the different functional areas.
iv. The time spent by functional managers in decision-making is reduced as –
a. Plans lay down clearly what is to be done, and
b. Policies provide the discretionary framework within which decisions need to be
taken.
v. Help in bringing harmony and coordination as they remain an important part
integral part of major strategies.
vi. Similar situations occurring in different functional areas are handled in a
consistent manner by the functional managers.

22. Functional Strategy – 1o Important Features
1. The time span of a functional strategy, as compared to a business-level strategy, is short.
2. It focuses attention on what needs to be done now to make the grand strategy work.
3. It is more specific and action-oriented because it clearly outlines what should be done in each
functional area so as to achieve the corporate objectives.
4. Functional strategy pertains to the function, department, division of the enterprise.
5. It has to be in purseuanc of the overall corporate strategy.
6. It acts to achieve corporate and business unit objectives by maximizing resource productivity.
7. It is the game plan to manage a principal subordinate activity within a business.
8. Functional strategy is concerned with developing and nurturing a distinctive competence to
provide a company or business unit with a competitive advantage.
9. The orientation of the functional strategy is dictated by its parent business unit’s strategy.
10. Functional strategy is narrower in scope than business strategy. It contains relevant details of
the overall business game plan by setting out the actions, approaches and practices which are to
be employed in managing a particular function.

23. Grand Strategies
Definition: The Grand Strategies are the corporate level strategies
designed to identify the firm’s choice with respect to the direction it
follows to accomplish its set objectives. Simply, it involves the decision
of choosing the long term plans from the set of available alternatives.
The Grand Strategies are also called as Master Strategies or Corporate
Strategies.
There are four grand strategic alternatives that can be followed by the
organization to realize its long-term objectives:

24. The Stability Strategy is adopted when the organization attempts
to maintain its current position and focuses only on the
incremental improvement by merely changing one or more of its
business operations in the perspective of customer groups,
customer functions and technology alternatives, either individually
or collectively.
The Expansion Strategy is adopted by an organization when it
attempts to achieve a high growth as compared to its past
achievements. In other words, when a firm aims to grow
considerably by broadening the scope of one of its business
operations in the perspective of customer groups, customer
functions and technology alternatives, either individually or jointly,
then it follows the Expansion Strategy.

25. The Retrenchment Strategy is adopted when an organization
aims at reducing its one or more business operations with the
view to cut expenses and reach to a more stable financial
position.
when a firm decides to eliminate its activities through a
considerable reduction in its business operations, in the
perspective of customer groups, customer functions and
technology alternatives, either individually or collectively is
called as Retrenchment Strategy.
The Combination Strategy means making the use of other grand
strategies (stability, expansion or retrenchment) simultaneously.
Simply, the combination of any grand strategy used by an
organization in different businesses at the same time or in the
same business at different times with an aim to improve its
efficiency is called as a combination strategy.

26. Factors Affecting Strategic Human
Resource Management
Political, Economic, Social, Cultural, Regulatory and Technological are factors affect the
Strategic Human Resource Management.
Political Affect
(1) Lowering of Trade Restrictions – Introduction of globalization and liberalization in
many countries has removed restrictions on trade to a large extent.
(2) Tax Regimes Becoming more Liberal – Sectors that have significant contribution to
the GDP enjoy a considerable tax relaxation.
(3) Increase in Political Instability – There have been fluctuations in the political
leadership across the world. Say it be the case of countries like Afghanistan, Egypt,
Syria or part of Europe or be it the case of Andhra-Pradesh, where the Chief Minister
changed thrice in a span of 10-12 months, there has been fluctuations everywhere.
(4) People-power (Democratization) – Politics has become more people driven after the
introduction of democratic way of leading in many countries.
(5) Rise of Environmental Driven Policies – Considering the limited availability of
resources and increased amount of pollution, political parties have come up with
policies to have a check on the same. The concepts like carbon credits have come
came into the picture.

27. Economic Factors
1. Globalization- Globalization refers to the increasing unification of the world’s
economic order through reduction of barriers to international trade as tariffs, export
fees, and import quotas. The goal is to increase material wealth, goods, and services
through an international division of labour by efficiencies catalyzed through
international relations, specialization and competition.
2. Monetary Policies- Monetary policy is the process by which the monetary
authority of a country controls the supply of money, often targeting a rate of
interest for the purpose of promoting economic growth and stability. The official
goals usually include relatively stable prices and low unemployment. Monetary
policies of various countries change significantly according to the prevailing
economic situation.
3. Explosion in Stock Markets- With the advent of free trade and globalisation
across the world, there has been a significant change in stock markets of various
countries. Due to availability of capital for companies due to portfolio investments
and Flls there is an explosion in stock markets.
4. Growth of Inflation in Developing Countries- Due to growth of employment in
developing countries and shift in focus of major MNCs there is a growth of inflation.
Apart from that various economic policies like free trade, globalization, etc. also
have an impact on inflation.

28. Social Factors:-
I. Social Relations – Social relations focus on the behaviours and
needs, those that primarily concern themselves with how people
organise and make meaning of their world and their relationships
within it.
II. Social Institutions – A social institution is a complex, integrated set
of social norms organized around the preservation of a basic societal
value. In shorthand, the five basic institutions are called the family,
government, economy, education and religion.
III. Social Behaviour – It is behaviour directed towards society, or
taking place between, members of the same species.
IV. Social Networking – It is the practice of expanding the number of
one’s business and/or social contacts by making connections through
individuals.

29. Cultural Factors :-
1. Mindset Change – People have become more broad minded and more acceptable in
nature and also more tolerant towards different cultures.
2. Woman Participation – The participation of women is being encouraged in
organizations. They are taking up important roles and their contribution is being
recognized.
3. Diversity in Terms of Work Force – The organizations are employing people from all
over the globe to ensure, they have the best talent onboard, rather than restricting
themselves to a particular location.
4. Orientation (Collective to Individualistic) – The workforce is now self-oriented more
than collective.
5. Multilingual Acceptance – Acceptance towards other languages has increased.
6. Emergence of Online Communities – Various online communities have emerged
primarily due to the social media revolution. Such communities are transnational and
virtual.
7. Emergence of Aspirational Culture – The Gen Y especially is an aspirational
generation. It aspires for better quality of life, better amenities, better technology &
gadgets, better standard of living, better jobs & career, financial freedom, better access
and no- nonsense culture.

30. Legal/Regulatory Factors:-
a. Flexible in Corporate Governance and Expansion – As a result of
globalization, businesses now have the opportunity to expand beyond their
national boundaries and adapt to the type of regulations followed in that
particular country.
b. Foresight of Legal Changes – For setting up any kind of business in other
nations, the business shall be much aware about the legal/ regulatory aspects.
c. Employment Terms (Talent Philosophy) – Employee rights vary from country
to country and it depends on the talent philosophy of the organization how
they treat their employees.
d. Implementation of Laws – Only understanding the laws is not important, the
degree to which they are implemented needs to be known.
e. Know Your Customer Rights – The businesses have to understand the rights
that customers enjoy in a particular nation. However globally there is a surge in
consumer rights and businesses must become cognizant of the same.
f. Transparency of Information – The kind of information that is required to be
exhibited in one country as a legal right may not be the same for any other country.

31. Technological Factors:-
1. Better services to line managers:-
Both HR and line managers primary interest is the success of the business. The human
resource’s main function is to support the workforce needs of the organization.
Strategic planning between HR and line managers is important for reviewing
projections concerning future business demands to determine whether to train
current employees, to prepare them for promotion or to recruit candidates.
2. Effective recruiting:-
Nowadays, organizations have realized that effective recruiting cannot be done
without the use of IT. Organizations now use job portals on the internet to search for
the best candidates for the position. The process has been made effective with the
use of the internet as many people come to know of the offer and hence increases the
probability of hiring efficient employees.
3. Career development and human capital management:-
The career planning tool is a learning and knowledge-based system that helps
successful businessman around the world to manage their personal development and
career paths along with those of their employees. Performance evaluation and career
progression can be a key motivating factor for the employees to work effectively and
efficiently.

32. 4. A new way to brand a company
Company branding is an important factor in attracting and retaining
employees. Thanks to IT, companies now have an option to build strong
online presence and reach numerous potential candidates with minimal
effort.
Thorough website branding and design, presence on major marketplaces and
online communication – all these factors promote direct interaction between
a candidate or employee and a company.