Information Age, Human Resources Is Emerging Is

¶ … information age, human resources is emerging is a critical strategic function, contributing substantially to the execution of strategy. Technology companies, for example, seek to hire the most creative, intelligent people they can find, because that is what gives them the competitive edge in an industry characterized by rapid innovation cycles and short product life cycles. This paper will explore the transition of human resources from administrative function to a key component of strategic management. Wright and McMahan (2011) identify human capital as the link between practices and performance.

When companies set out their strategy and break that down into job descriptions, they still need to have the right people in the right roles to execute that strategy. They need human resources departments to define those roles, but also to ensure that the right people are attracted, retained and motivated -- all of which are tasks with which the modern human resources department is charged. Leemans and Duts (2013) also point out the importance of learning and development.

This is a critical point to make, because most organizations are not able to hire the best employees immediately. Instead, they need to create pathways by which employees grow into their roles, the result being that eventually the organization can have the talented employees it needs, even if they were not hired that way.

De Wit and Meyer (2010) describe this situation as the "new ecology of business," which sees the role of different elements of the organization evolving, and in this case the human resources department sees dramatic changes to its role. An administrative human resources department is a processor of paperwork, and its other tasks are only marginally more complex. Today, human resources must deal with far greater tasks.

This would have begun with Peter Drucker's management by objectives (MBO), which relied on having specific job descriptions and measures as a form of control. Once a job is understood, the human resources department can seek out the right fit for the position. Human resources management, therefore, is the backbone of the organization. This is especially true today where information, creativity and critical thinking are the main drivers of innovation and therefore success. Such talent is scattered around the world, and the market for it is competitive.

The means of finding and attracting this talent, nurturing and motivating it, and ensuring that there are clear job descriptions and success measures all falls to human resources professionals. There are still administrative, transactional tasks that the human resources department can perform. Employees still need benefits administration and paperwork for staff movements is still required. However, so many of the tasks of the human resources department now fall into the category of strategic, because so often they underpin the organization's ability to forge competitive advantage on the global scale.

Human resources departments are making critical decisions about outsourcing, and working with supply chain management teams to find solutions for acquiring human capital, information and for moving these things around the world. Overall, it is evident that the purely administrative staff function of.