Chapter 4 - Workforce Focus
Chapter 4 - Workforce Focus
Core Values
“For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a
future and a hope.” - Jeremiah 29:11
Introduction
Organizations are learning that to satisfy customers, they must first satisfy the workforce. Workforce
refers to everyone who is actively involved in accomplishing the work of an organization. This
encompasses paid employees as well as volunteers and contract employees, and includes team leaders,
supervisors, and managers at all levels.
Many companies refer to their employees as “associates” or “partners” to signify the importance that
people have in driving business performance.
The workforce is an important component of a basic quality system. ISO 9000:2000 includes several
workforce-focused requirements. The standards require that “Personnel performing work affecting
product quality shall be competent on the basis of appropriate education, skills, training and experience”.
They further require that organizations determine the level of competence, evaluate the effectiveness of
training or other action taken, ensure that employees are aware of how their work contributes to quality
objectives and maintain appropriate records of education, training and experience.
The standard also addresses the work environment from the standard point of providing buildings,
workspace, utilities, equipment, and supporting services needed to achieve conformance to product
requirements, as well as determining and managing the work environment, including safety, ergonomics,
and environmental factors.
Workforce Management
Workforce management (which has also been widely known as human resource management, or HRM)
consists of those activities designed to provide for and coordinate the people of an organization.
Determining the organization’s workforce needs;
assisting in the design of work systems;
Recruiting, selecting, training and developing, counseling, motivating, and rewarding employees;
Acting as a liaison with unions and government organizations; and handling other matters of
employee well-being.
Strategic Human Resource Management
Concerned with the contributions HR strategies make to organizational effectiveness, and how these
contributions are accomplished. It involves designing and implementing a set of internally consistent
policies and practices to ensure that an organization’s human capital (employees’ collective knowledge,
skills, and abilities) contributes to overall business objectives.
Research shows that strategic human resource management practices are positively associated with
organizational performance indicators such as share price, profits, net sales per employee, gross rate of
return on assets, employee retention, employee attitudes, and customer retention rates.
Kay Kendall and Glenn Bodison propose five “Conditions of Collaboration” that characterized a culture of
high performance: respect, aligned values, shared purpose, communication and trust.
Respect – means believing in the inherent worth of another person. Respect also is taking into
consideration the views and desires of others. When you respect another person, you consider
what is important to him or her when you are planning and making decisions.
Values – are the guiding principles and behaviors that embody how organization and its people
are expected to operate. Values reflect and reinforce an organization’s culture. Aligned values
create a congruency between what the organization stands for and the personal beliefs of the
individual.
Purpose – is the fundamental reason an organizations exists. It inspire an organization and guides
its setting values.
Communication – is often cited as one of the most important factors related to employee
motivation. Communication that flows freely in all directions promotes collaborations.
Trust – that management trusts the workforce and vice-versa I vital. A survey by Annandale,
Virginia-based Mastery Works Inc. concluded that employees leave their organization because of
trust, observing that “Lack of trust was an issue with almost every person who had left an
organization.”
These attributes are usually evident in companies that are recognized as outstanding places to work.
Workforce Engagement
Refers to the extent of workforce commitment, both emotional and intellectual, to accomplishing the
work, mission, and vision of the organization. Engaged workers
Find personal meaning and motivation in their work,
Have a strong emotional bond to their organization, are actively involved in and committed to
their work,
Feel that their jobs are important, know that their opinions and ideas have value, and
Often go beyond their immediate job responsibilities for the good of the organization.
Advantages of Workforce Engagement
Replaces the adversarial mentality with trust and cooperation
Develops the skills and leadership capability of individuals, creating a sense of mission and
fostering trust
Increases employee morale and commitment to the organization
Fosters creativity and innovation, the source of competitive advantage
Helps people understand quality principles and instills these principles into the corporate culture
Allows employees to solve problems at the source immediately
Improves quality and productivity
Every organizations has a unique culture. What drives employee engagement will differ among different
organizations. Thus, every organization should conduct its own research to determine the drivers of
engagement.
Motivation
Motivation - an individual’s response to a felt need. Saul W. Gellerman defined motivation as “the art of
creating conditions that allow every one of us, warts and all, to get his work done at his own peak level of
efficiency”
Classification of Motivation Theories
Content Theories (Maslow; MacGregor; Herzberg)
Process Theories (Vroom; Porter & Lawler)
Environmentally-based Theories (Skinner; Adams; Bandura, Snyder, & Williams)
Designing High-Performance Work Systems
Work and Job Design
Empowerment
Teamwork
Work Environment
Workforce Learning and Development
Compensation and Recognition
Performance Management
Hackman-Oldham Model
The model proposes that five core characteristics of job design (task significance, task identity, skill variety,
autonomy, and feedback from the job) influence three critical psychological states (experienced
meaningfulness, experienced responsibility, and knowledge of results), which in turn, drive work
outcomes (employee motivation, growth satisfaction, overall job satisfaction, and work effectiveness).
Empowerment
Giving people authority to make decisions based on what they feel is right, to have control over their
work, to take risks and learn from mistakes, and to promote change.
“A sincere belief and trust in people.”
Empowered employees must have the wisdom to know what to do and when to do it, the motivation to
do it, and the right tools to accomplish the task. These requirements may mean significant changes in
work system, specially, the following:
Provide education, resources, and encouragement
Remove restrictive policies/procedures
Foster an atmosphere of trust
Share information freely
Make work valuable
Train managers in “hands-off” leadership
Train employees in allowed latitude
Teamwork
Perhaps one of the most significant organizational changes that has resulted form total quality is
teamwork. A singe person rarely has enough knowledge or experience to understand all aspects of the
most important work processes; thus, team approaches are essential for achieving quality and
performance excellence.
Team is a small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose,
set of performance goals, and approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable.
Many types of teams exist in different companies and industries. Among the most common are the
following:
Management teams – teams consisting mainly of managers from various functions, such as sales
and production that coordinate work among teams.
Natural work teams – teams organized to perform the entire job, rather that specialized,
assembly line-type work.
Self managed teams – specially empowered work teams defined as “a highly trained group of
employees, from 6 to 18, on average, fully responsible for turning out well-defined segment of
finished work also known as self-directed work teams.
Virtual teams – teams in which members communicate by computer, take turns as leaders, and
jump in and out as necessary. These types of teams use a combination of cloud computing, e-mail,
video conferencing, and shared computer screen technologies to get their job done.
Quality circles – team of worker and supervisors that meet regularly to address work-related
problems involving quality and productivity.
Problem solving teams – teams whose members gather to solve a specific problem and the
disband.
Project teams – teams with a specific mission to develop something new or to accomplish a
complex task.
Workplace Environment
Because employees are key stakeholders of any organization, their health, safety, and overall being are
important factors in the work environment. Health and safety have always been priorities in most
companies, but working conditions now extend beyond basic issues of keeping the work area safe and
clean.
Summary
Workforce focus:
Refers to everyone who is actively involved in accomplishing the work of an organization.
Encompasses paid employees as well as volunteers and contract employees, and includes team
leaders, supervisors, and managers at all levels.
Any companies refer to their employees as “associates” or “partners” to signify the importance
that people have in driving business performance.
Workforce satisfaction is strongly related to customer satisfaction and, ultimately, to business
performance.
Review Questions!
Define workforce management. What are the activities included under workforce
management? What are the objectives of an effective workforce management system?
What advantages does employee engagement offer to an organization over traditional
management practices?
List some of the advantages offered by teamwork.
Why is it important to assess workforce engagement and satisfaction? How do organizations
measure workforce effectiveness?
How has the hiring criteria changed in the recent years? List some of the innovative
approaches being used by organizations to recruit employees.