HR is a commonly used acronym for Human Resources which is also referred to as Human Resource Management or HRM.

HR services typically include:

• Recruitment & Selection
  • Recruitment is the process of identifying that the organisation needs to employ someone up to the point at which application forms for the post have arrived at the organisation.
  • Selection then consists of the processes involved in choosing from applicants a suitable candidate to fill a post
• Workforce Planning
  • Systematic identification and analysis of what an organisation is going to need in terms of the size, type, and quality of workforce to achieve its objectives. It determines what mix of experience, knowledge, and skills is required and sequences steps to get the right number of right people in the right place at the right time.
• Remuneration
  • Remuneration is the compensation that one receives in exchange for the work or services performed. Typically, this consists of monetary rewards, also referred to as wage or salary.
• Job Analysis
  • The management of a business need to determine what work needs to be done. Job analysis is a key part of this need.
  • Job analysis concentrates on what job holders are expected to do. It provides the basis for a job description, which in turn influences decisions taken on recruitment, training, performance appraisal and reward systems.
• Training and Development
  • Training is an educational process. People can learn new information, re-learn and reinforce existing knowledge and skills, and most importantly have time to think and consider what new options can help them improve their effectiveness at work
  • Organisational Development is a process that “strives to build the capacity to achieve and sustain a new desired state that benefits the organisation or community and the world around them.”
• Industrial Relations / Employee Relations / Employment Relations
  • Industrial relations are those between an employer and a collective workforce, almost exclusively held together by a recognised union, although this does not necessarily need to be the case.
  • Employee relations involves all matters involving the relationship between an employee or employees and the employer and is a far broarder term – which is why the phrase is most commonly used in HR departments.
  • So in short, employee relations could involve anything at all (absences, pay, disciplinaries), Industrial relations is specifically referring to unions
• Organisational Development / Change Management
  • Organisation development is the planned and systematic enabling of sustained performance in an organisation through the involvement of its people.
  • You’ll find here information on organisation design, organisation effectiveness and transformation, reorganisation, restructuring, organisation tools, techniques and diagnostics.
• HR Metrics
  • HR metrics are a vital way to quantify the cost and the impact of employee programs and HR processes and measure the success (or failure) of HR initiatives. They enable a company to track year-to-year trends and changes in these critical variables. It is how organisations measure the value of the time and money spent on HR activities in their organisations.

The history of human resource management (HRM)

The history of personnel management begins around the end of the 19th century, when welfare officers (sometimes called ‘welfare secretaries’) came into being. They were women and concerned only with the protection of women and girls. Their creation was a reaction to the harshness of industrial conditions, coupled with pressures arising from the extension of the franchise, the influence of trade unions and the labour movement, and the campaigning of enlightened employers, often Quakers, for what was called ‘industrial betterment’. As the role grew there was some tension between the aim of moral protection of women and children and the needs for higher output.

Today’s HR profession encompasses a number of specialist disciplines, including diversity, reward (including compensation, benefits, pensions), resourcing, employee relations, organisation development and design, and learning and development (the history of which is covered in detail in the next section of this factsheet).

See CIPD  for more historical information