BU51018 - HRMS - Essay Titles (2017-18).doc

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1. Economic Studies
BU51018 : Human Resource Management Strategies
Session 2017-18
Students must submit an electronic version of their essay via the Turnitin option in
my Dundee. Detailed instructions are given in the module outline given to students
at the start of the module.
Students should note that their essay MUST be either space-and-a-half or double-
spaced. The essay should no longer than 2,500 words. Any essay submitted late,
without a bibliography or over the word limit will have marks deducted.
Extensions cannot be granted.
Essay Titles (answer ONE)
Q1 : “Human Resource Management (HRM) is a strategic approach to managing
employment relations which emphasises that leveraging people’s capabilities is
critical to achieving sustainable competitive advantage, this being achieved
through a distinctive set of integrated employment policies, programmes and
practices.” Discuss.
Q2 : In the context of HRM what is meant by employee flexibility?
Q3 : A firm seeking to fill a vacancy has already recruited a suitable pool of
applicants. What characteristics should its selection process possess to ensure that
the most suitable applicant is offered the job?
The deadline for the essay is 12.30, Monday 13
th
November 2017.
Paul Seaman.
UNIVERSITY OF DUNDEE  Dundee DD1 4HN t [phone] f [phone]
e [email protected]
School of Business

2. Flexibility is very critical in Human resource management because it can help firms to
gain competitive advantage. Flexibility HRM is defined as the opportunities
organizations provide to employees to make choices regarding when and how they work
(Hill et al., 2008). In line with the research on HRM, There are differences in the
employee perceptions of availability of flexibility HRM and the use of flexibility HRM
(Allen et al., 2013; Casper & Harris, 2008).
Employees may be aware that they have access to flexibility HRM, while on the other
hand, they may actually use or take advantage of these practices. Moreover, we also
distinguish between two types of flexibility: Irregular flexibility HRM and regular
flexibility HRM. Irregular flexibility is defined as those practices aimed at facilitating the
workers’ needs to irregularly reduce workload over a certain period of time by practices
such as unpaid leave from work to pursue something else, such as volunteer work or
career breaks. Irregular flexibility is similar to accommodative practices identified in
previous research such that it allows employees additional exceptional leave or exemption
from working overtime (Bal, Kooij, & De Jong, 2013; Kooij et al., 2013). Irregular
flexibility also implies a minimal adjustment by organizations without fundamentally
changing the way of working (Lee, MacDermid, & Buck, 2000). Regular flexibility
concerns the freedom employees have in choosing their work schedules, starting and
quitting times, and flexibility in job sharing on a more daily basis (Hill et al., 2008).
Through distinguishing between these two types of practices, we expand understanding of
how different types of flexibility relates to outcomes (Allen et al., 2013).
Flexibility HRM is expected to be positively related to employee engagement.
Signalling theory explains why availability of HRM matters (Casper & Harris, 2008;
Rynes, Bretz, & Gerhart, 1991). This theory proposes that individuals use cues or signals
when they do not have perfect information. As employees have incomplete information
about the organization’s intentions, they use signals from the organization to draw
conclusions about an organization’s intentions and actions. As such, when employees
perceive to have access to flexibility HRM, this functions as a signal of the organization’s
intentions towards them (Takeuchi, Chen, & Lepak, 2009). Even when employees do not
currently use these practices, availability indicates that they can use these practices in the
future when they need them. Theory of work adjustment (Baltes, Briggs, Huff, Wright, &
Neuman, 1999) postulates that when employees have access to flexibility in their work,
they obtain a higher correspondence between the job demands and their private lives. In
this way, employees can decide themselves over how to allocate time, energy, and
attention in their work, which enables them more control and autonomy in their work,
which leads to more work engagement (Crawford, LePine, & Rich, 2010). Hence,
flexibility HRM is associated with higher work engagement, and thus, availability of
flexibility HRM is positively related to employee engagement.
Effects of use of flexibility HRM can be explained by Conservation of Resources Theory
(COR; Hobfoll, 1989). According to COR theory, individuals are motivated to protect and
Acquire new resources (Halbesleben, Neveu, Paustian-Underdahl, & Westman, 2014).
People who have many resources are more likely to invest and gain additional resources,
Creating a positive spiral of resource gain (Hobfoll, 1989). When people have the
Opportunity to use flexibility, they gain more resources to achieve work-related goals and
have more control over their work (Halbesleben et al., 2014). Use of flexibility and
applying change in a working environment provides the necessary resources to counteract
potential stress occurring in a work place. Taking the time to learn how people like to
work, and modifying your work style to accommodate those, makes a world of difference.
UNIVERSITY OF DUNDEE  Dundee DD1 4HN t [phone] f [phone]
e [email protected]

3. Some employees are auditory learners and prefer discussions while others are very visual
and need PowerPoint. Some managers are hands-off as long as you get your work done
while others are hands on and want a daily report. You will find some colleagues respond
better when you speak to them face-to-face while others prefer email communication.
Work obligations and private obligations, and thus, these resources provide employees
Functional Flexibility –
Functional Flexibility is a concept in companies where employees can work in different
functions or can be deployed purposely to various functions with different roles and
responsibilities. This can be accomplished by making the employees multi-skilled so that
they can perform various types of tasks whenever required. There are no fixed or same set
of tasks which employees have to perform regularly. Training, outsourcing and
management is very important for an organizational adaptability (mbasckool.com, 2016).
Functional flexibility is very common in the present world of work. Functional flexibility
can create organizational prosperity especially when the workers has the mindset to
participate in functional flexibility.
Numerical flexibility –
Numerical flexibility is y using ‘non – standard ‘contracts of employment to match labor
supply to products and service. It is achieved through overtime, part-time work, variable
working hours, fixed time contracts or lay-off.
Financial Flexibility –
It is the variable payment schemes are adequately designed, and can have a direct impact
on the motivation of the employees and their individual or group productivity. These
policies can provide an increased control over pay costs by allowing pay levels and
structures to fluctuate according to the firms need. Thus, pay strategy can follow business
strategy rather than being dictated by external forms of regulation (White, 1996).
Wages Flexibility
A key element of labour market flexibility is the flexibility of wages to adjust
to bring about equilibrium between demand and supply. There are several
type of wage flexibility, including relative wage flexibility - which relates to the
adjustment of wage rates between sectors of an economy, or between
regions - and real wage flexibility - the flexibility of real wages (nominal wages
adjusted for inflation) to adjust to economic shocks (economic online.co.uk.
2016)
UNIVERSITY OF DUNDEE  Dundee DD1 4HN t [phone] f [phone]
e [email protected]

4. http://www.mbaskool.com/business-concepts/human-resources-hr-terms/16682-
functional-flexibility.html
https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007%2FBF02295375.pdf
http://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1153&context=cahrswp
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joop.12082/pdf
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joop.12082/pdf
http://www.economicsonline.co.uk/Global_economics/
Labour_market_flexibility.html
UNIVERSITY OF DUNDEE  Dundee DD1 4HN t [phone] f [phone]
e [email protected]