The Changing Nature of Personnel Management
| Published date | 01 May 1985 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/eb055059 |
| Pages | 10-16 |
| Date | 01 May 1985 |
| Author | Derek Torrington,Lesley MacKay,Laura Hall |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour |
The Changing
Nature of
Personnel
Management
by Derek Torrington, Lesley MacKay
and Laura Hall
Department of Management Sciences,
UMIST
The information on which this article is based comes from
a major piece of research on the changing nature of per-
sonnel management, which is being conducted by the
authors at UMIST. The work is being funded by the
Leverhulme Trust in collaboration with the IPM. The first
phase of the research was the completion of extensive and
detailed questionnaires about personnel practice in 350
dif-
ferent establishments during the Spring and early Summer
of 1984. The data is still being analysed, but the second
stage in the research began at the end of 1984. This is a
series of interviews with questionnaire respondents.
Conclusions from the research will be published progressive-
ly between now and the middle of 1986.
Introduction
Like all aspects of management, personnel work has to
adapt to its changing context. The 1980s have seen
con-
siderable changes in the context of employment, but the
effects of these on personnel practice have been varied and
difficult to identify.
The overwhelming influence has been the change in the
labour market. Few commentators now look forward op-
timistically to "the end of the recession" as a time when
ours will again be a full-employment economy. For some
time,
the level of unemployment will remain higher than it
was for the 50 years before 1980. Employment supply will
generally exceed demand, though, at the same time, there
may be serious skill shortages. This has reduced the level
of recruitment and turnover for personnel officers to
han-
dle,
and few vacancies are difficult to
fill.
Closely associated with the change in the labour market has
been the change in trade union influence. This has been
particularly obvious at national level, but most managements
have become more assertive in their relations with local shop
stewards and there is a general difference here between the
public and private sectors of employment. The amount of
part-time working has increased, so producing the
phenomenon of the number of people in employment
ris-
ing at the same time as the number of people unemployed.
Employment legislation worries managers less than it did.
Some constraints have been removed by government and
the labour market changes make employees less inclined
to use the law to enforce their individual legal rights.
Widespread youth unemployment has brought the Youth
Training Scheme with its implications for vocational prepara-
tion.
There has also been a de facto reduction of the age
at which most people retire, as slimming the workforce has
been found easiest through early retirement and the job
release scheme. A less clear change in the context has been
the development of information technology, which brings
changes in the labour market but also provides a potential
change in the nature of personnel management work itself.
The effect of these changes has varied from industry to in-
dustry and from organisation to organisation, according to
their relative prosperity and overall styles of management.
Top Management Influence
The history of personnel management is largely one of seek-
ing power. Farnham[1] reviews the various analyses of the
personnel role and concludes:
. .
.
personnel specialists often feel that it is difficult to demon-
strate their department's vital contribution to the enterprise's
efficiency and success. In this, they are constantly trying to in-
crease the power and authority of the personnel department
within the organisational and managerial hierarchy (p.114).
Legge[2] echoes an earlier comment by Cherns, when she
states that one of the key factors governing the power of
the personnel manager is the degree to which those areas
of contextual uncertainty within the scope of his expertise
are defined by the organisation as being of crucial impor-
tance.
Another factor she identifies is the ability of the per-
sonnel manager "to establish credibility with those in-
dividuals he seeks to influence and from whom he seeks
support".
Table I.
(A. 13) Is there a director or someone at the highest level
of the organisation with specific responsibility for
personnel and/or employee relations?
Yes
No
Other replies
Number
293
54
3
%
83.7
15.4
0.9
(A. 15) What are his/her other responsibilities?
Production
Finance
Management services
Administration
No other responsibilities
Other replies
Number
13
27
84
94
104
78
%
3.7
7.7
24.0
26.8
29.7
22.2
(Some had more than one other
responsibility)
10 ER 7,5 • 1985
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