To What Extent Can HRM Be Described as Strategic Essay

To What Extent Can HRM Be Described as Strategic - Essay Example This paper will focus on the extent to which the human resource management can be considered as strategic. Strategic human resource management (SHRM) The purpose of the HR strategies is to guide the human resource management development and implementation programs. The programs dedicate towards the means of communicating to all concerned the intentions of the organization about the management of the human resources. The Human Resource strategies provide a dynamic vision but they also determine to which direction the actions are required to be executed and realized. The strategic human resource management develops a stream of dynamic decisions which help in the formation of a pattern developed by the organization for the management of the human resource and also identification of specific areas which needs to be developed. The strategies will basically focus on the do’s and dont’s of the organization to maintain the organizational health stability (Armstrong, 124). In st rategic human resource management, the functioning system appears in a systematic cycle following a sequenced chronological order. These can be classified into five different dimensions: a) mission and goals, b) environmental analysis ,c) strategic formulation , d) strategy implementation and lastly d) strategy evaluation (Bratton, 40). Validation of strategic human resource management There are limitations to the strategic human resource management. They do not always take into account the circumstances that are unique to a company's structure which may require alteration to regular procedures. The strategic human resource may not be always cost effective in nature since it focuses more towards a centralization-based approach and ignore the factors such as implementation and operating costs (Armstrong, 385). The strategic human resource management may not find its optimal feasibility in smaller companies that do not provide hardcore corporate environment. It can be also said that t he concept of strategic human resource management are based on beliefs about the rationality of the approaches used to develop strategy. The process also seems to underestimate the significance of politics, power, and culture. The implications of the power and politics perspective of the HRM are manifold. It is a fact that anyone who has worked with the organizations in the development of the HR practices such as selection and appraisal systems has inferred that it is political rather than technical or strategic consideration which determines the development of the final product (Armstrong, 278). Focus on organizational processes such as power and influence, institutionalization, conflict and contest for controls needs to be given special emphasis in order to under how the strategic decisions will be successful (Klimosk and Zaccaro). The prevalent conceptualizations of SHRM are depended on the conventional rational perspective to administrative decision-making, acts of linear planni ng and choice and action. Managerial fallacy Critical organizational theorists have criticized these assumptions stating that the strategic decisions are not necessarily based on the output of rational calculation. The theorists argue that the image of the manager as a reflective planner and strategist is based on a