Abstract
With the emergence of technology in the business world, there have been many changes both by companies and employees too. Over the last few years, technology has taken over many activities that are carried out in organizations. The human resource department is the most affected one but greatly on a positive way.
Introduction
The human resource department has taken a different turn over the last few years with the emergence and use of technology. Many things and functions of the department are being done in the modern ways. These include recruitment and selection, hiring, training, and development among others. This project paper will focus on how the much technological advancement have had on the human resource departments in many organizations both positively and negatively Arman and Mishra (2010) .
Literature Review
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Transformation in recruitment and selection processes
Way before the internet and the use of social media was introduced; the only means of advertisements of job vacancies were through the posting of letters and word of mouth. That has however changed and made the work of human resource managers easier. Job seekers can easily access as well as connect with different companies on phones, emails social media and many other platforms Beer (1997). This has helped the human resource managers to have a variety of qualified applicants and therefore can easily choose the best among the many who have applied for the post. The use of technology has however affected the competence of the people employed in some organization as the human resource may fail to have a proper background checkup or too much reliance on the online information.
- Ease of
communication
This has been affected by the use of technological gadgets. The human resource can quickly communicate relevant information across all departments with so much ease. The method of text messages, emails, linked in and other communication apps have made this possible. Organizations that have offices in more than one country or different locations have benefited from this advancement.
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Training and development
Many organizations have adopted training and development for their employees. This is mainly done to acquit them with the new changes and keep them up to date with all the technological advances happening in the world of business. Technology has enabled learning in these workshops more effective, and employees can take these training online without having to travel to different places Walker (1982) . The use of gadgets like iPad, computers, and power point presentations has made it easier for the human resource department to conduct these training every once in a while. Web-based training can also be undertaken and are very beneficial as they cover a substantial number of people at the same time reducing cost and time. The use of technology in training has however been limited to those people who do not have the know-how of these gadgets and is therefore discriminative in some way.
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Data analysis
Analyzing employee performance in the organization has been made more effective. The hr departments can access personal data and assess their performance and other apparent standards. The department can gather enough useful information on their employees to get a perfect picture of all of their employees. However, too much information on a person may be viewed as an invasion of privacy. This could also put the HR department at risk of ending up with too much data that they cannot manage Shawn and Shrivastava (2003). This also leads to HR misreading data or making assumptions that would have been cleared by face-to-face conversations.
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Decision making
Technology has helped HR managers in making decisions quickly using the newly introduced IT tools that can analyze and summarize a significant amount of data and information with speed and get useful and relevant results. The general work of the HR managers has been made more accessible and more effective.
Analysis
The case study relating to the topic the impact of impact of technology in human resource management is that of Tata Sky, a satellite television provider operating as a joint venture in India and the UK. Due to its massive expansion policy, the company has been continuously faced with running and maintaining the HR department which has to control and monitor everything happening in the company. Over the years, they have been struggling to keep professionalism and enhance smooth running and smooth transitioning of the company with the drastic change in technology.
Tata Sky has used technology in many functions of the HRM departments which include; recruitment, training, and development of recruits and the existing ones, data storage among others. This has facilitated the functioning of the company and running the affairs of the companies especially with the many offices they had in the two countries.
Conclusion
To conclude, it should be identified that technology has had both positive and negative impacts on the human resource management. In this regard, the project paper highlighted on some of the major areas of HRM the use of technology has had direct impact on and their significances in those areas. These technological advancements have changed the face of human resource departments in any organizations and has helped them reach greater goals and strategies of effectiveness.
References
Akman, I. and Mishra, A. (2010), “Information Technology (IT) in the field of Human Resource
Management”, Public Personnel Management Volume 39 No. 3 Fall.
Beer, M. (1997), “The transformation of the human resource function: Resolving the Tension Between a Traditional Administrative and a New Strategic Role”, Human Resource Management, 36(1).
Shaw, B. and Shrivatsava, S. (2003), “Liberating HR through technology”, Human Resource
Management, John Wiley & Sons Ltd., 42 (3).
Walker, J. (1982). HRIS Development. Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York.
