Human Resources Book

Annual Editions: Human Resources 10/11

Preface

Correlation Guide

Topic Guide

Internet References

UNIT 1: Human Resource Management in PerspectiveUnit Overview

Part A. The Environment of Human Resource Management

1. Leveraging HR and Knowledge Management in a Challenging Economy, Society for Human Resource Management, HR Magazine, June 2009

In today’s challenging economy, organizations that optimize knowledge management—a key success factor—are leaders in their field. As a strategic business partner, HR plays an important role in fostering a workplace culture for organizational learning. From sustainability and education to workforce planning and global knowledge transfer, knowledge management is essential for competitive advantage.

2. When Generations Collide, Piper Fogg, The Chronicle of Higher Education, February 2007

There are now four generations in the workforce: Traditionalists; Baby Boomers; Generation X; and Generation Y. Getting them to work together can be a real challenge. This is especially true on university campuses.

Part B. Human Resources and Corporate Strategy

3. Stepping Up to the Table: The HR Professional’s Role in Corporate Strategy, Leigh Bailey, Supervision, September 2008

What is it that HR needs to do to get a seat at the corporate decision-making table? Here are five things that HR can do to answer that question.

4. Not the Usual Suspects, Jessica Marquez, Workforce Management, November 5, 2007

HR is becoming more demanding, and an understanding of the basic business model of the organization is a part of that demand. Unfortunately, few people in HR have that understanding. That is why 25% of the heads of the HR Department of the Fortune 1000 companies have tapped executives from other than HRM-firm performance divisions to head human resources.

5. Employers Prepare to Keep, Not Lose, Baby Boomers, Diane Cadrain, HR Trendbook, 2008

Baby boomers are preparing to retire, but wait, industry cannot afford to let them go because there are not enough people to replace them. Industry is attempting to make it more attractive for them to stay.

Part C. Americans with Disabilities Act

6. Make a Resolution: ADA Training, Victoria Zellers, HRMagazine, January 2009

Under the new ADAAA, organizations are going to have to train their personnel on exactly what constitutes a disability now that the definitions have been expanded.

7. On January 1, 2009, the ADA Amendments Act of 2008 Became Effective, Mondaq Business Briefing, January 16, 2009

What is included in the Americans with Disabilities Act Amendments Act of 2009 and what does it mean for employers? The answer is "a lot" as discussed here.

8. The Wonder of Work, Teri S. Arnold, USA Today Magazine, September 2007

If you are looking for a motivated workforce that is simply happy to have a job and contribute to an organization, look no further. Employees with disabilities will fill your bill.

Part D. Sexual Harassment

9. Women Harassing Men: Complaints about Women Bosses Preying on Men Have Doubled since 1990. What’s Going on out There?, Gretchen Voss, Marie Claire, June 2008

Sexual harassment is not about sex. It is about power. As women rise to more powerful positions in organizations, it is not surprising that there would be increased incidents of sexual harassment of men by women in the workplace.

Part E. The War on Terror

10. Fighting for Values, Tony Blair, Blueprint, vol. 2006, no. 2

The former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Tony Blair, explains why defeating Jihadism is so important to western civilization and why the struggle against Islamic extremism is not a clash between civilizations, but about civilization.

UNIT 2: Meeting Human Resource RequirementsUnit Overview

Part A. Job Requirements

11. White Collared, Julie Hanus, Utne Reader, March/April 2008

Something is happening in the workplace and it is not a joke. Workers are becoming disengaged from their jobs and their employers, and the attitude of "good enough" is starting to invade the workplace in many organizations. This does not bode well.

Part B. Human Resources Planning, Selection, and Recruitment

12. Managing in the New Millennium: Interpersonal Skills, Patricia M. Buhler, Supervision, 68 (11), November 2007

One of the essential keys to being a successful manager is hiring the right people to start with. This article presents ten keys for managers to make certain they get the right people in the right jobs.

13. How Your Diversity Reputation Attracts High-Potential Recruits, Yoji Cole, DiversityInc, July/August 2008

A company’s reputation for diversity can help to attract high-potential minority recruits to the organization. Making them feel welcome from the very beginning, from internships to selection to employment can help a firm recruit high-value minority candidates.

14. Six Ways to Strengthen Staffing, Adrienne Hedger, Workforce Management, January 15, 2007

Employers need to do a better job of finding the right employee in an environment of resume overload. This entails honing the search process, offering options to candidates, and being mindful of the organization’s real needs.

Part C. Human Resource Information Systems

15. Playing IT Big Brother: When Is Employee Monitoring Warranted?, Bruce Gain, Canadian Manager, Spring 2009

What is the appropriate use of monitoring when it comes to the personal use of IT equipment by employees? With few exceptions, employees have little in the way of rights when it comes to the personal use of corporate property, including computers. But many of them still use it and often for reasonable purposes. What is the appropriate policy?

UNIT 3: Creating a Productive Work EnvironmentUnit Overview

Part A. Motivating Employees

16. The ‘Brain Drain’: How to Get Talented Women to Stay, Jennifer Millman, DiversityInc, March 2008

Getting young, talented women to stay in an organization is a challenge. This article is the story of several female executives and some of the things they have done to be successful in their careers.

Part B. Facilitating Communication

17. Processes, Prospects, and Promises of Electronic Leadership, Michael J. Provitera and Esin Esendal, IGI Global, 2009

The availability of technology has given management the opportunity to lead employees in a more effective way, overcoming distance and time zones. Employing these new technologies from an HR perspective is discussed here.

UNIT 4: Developing Effective Human ResourcesUnit Overview

Part A. Training Employees

18. Your Co-Worker, Your Teacher: Collaborative Technology Speeds Peer-Peer Learning, Ed Frauenheim, Workforce Management, January 27, 2007

How do people really learn? In formal classes or on the Internet, or from their peers in informal settings on a need-to-know basis? Perhaps they learn in all these ways.

19. Have We Learned Anything about Leadership Development?, Robert J. Kramer, The Conference Board Review, May/June 2008

All aspects of society are crying for leaders, especially industry. Here is a look at some of the efforts on the part of industry to develop leaders and the problems associated with those efforts. It also looks at the disconnect between theory and practice and how that disconnect might be resolved.

Part B. Diversity in the Workplace

20. Firefighter Case Leaves ‘Gray Areas’, Thomas B. Scheffey, Connecticut Law Tribune, July 6, 2009

Ricci v. DeStefano is a case concerning white firefighters in New Haven, Connecticut, who, after they had passed an exam designed to determine eligibility for promotion were denied promotion because no African-American firefighters scored high enough on the exam to be considered for promotion. The city tossed out the results, claiming "disparate impact," and the white firefighters sued, going all the way to the United States Supreme Court.

21. Strategic Organizational Diversity: A Model?, Frederick Tesch and Frederick Maidment, The International Journal of Diversity in Organizations, Communities and Nations, vol. 8, no. 6, 2009

Contemporary organizations pursue diversity for many reasons—for example, economic, ethical, regulatory, legal, and social. Ideally, an organization’s human diversity matches its strategic goals. Little attention has been given, however, to a theoretical basis for diversity as an organizational goal. Modigliani’s theory of diversity in investments might provide a model for managing an organization’s human diversity and reducing its business risks.

Part C. Job Security

22. Laid Off!, Barry Yeoman, AARP, The Magazine, March/April 2009

Older workers are losing their jobs and it is more difficult for them to find new ones. Some are dealing with this better than others, but it is still a problem for many.

UNIT 5: Implementing Compensation, Benefits, and Workplace SafetyUnit Overview

Part A. Managing Employee Compensation

23. Employee or Contractor?: The Wrong Answer Could Cost You, Minda Zetlin, Inc. Magazine, September 2008

There are advantages to having contractors do work as opposed to regular employees. You do not have to provide benefits, or pay social security and other types of employment taxes. But if they are misclassified as consultants as judged by the IRS or various state agencies, it could cost you.

Part B. Incentive Compensation

24. Opening Keynote: Rethinking Pay for Performance, Debra Perry, Directors and Boards, Spring 2009

Boards of directors need to rethink how they incentivize their senior executives, especially in light of the recent downturn in the economy. They also need to consider how they develop talent in their own organizations rather than going out and paying top dollar for executives to run their businesses who know little about their business.

Part C. Executive Pay

25. U.S. Targets Excessive Pay for Top Executives; Compensation Czar to Oversee Firms at Heart of Crisis, David Cho, Zachary A. Goldfarb, and Tomoeh Murakami Tse, The Washington Post, June 11, 2009

Kenneth R. Feinberg is the new "Pay Czar" of the federal government who is in charge of determining the pay of the senior managements of the corporations that took the federal bailout money. These companies include Citicorp, Bank of America, AIG, and General Motors.

Part D. Health and Safety

26. This Time It’s Personal, Karen Coomer, The Safety and Health Practitioner, 25(6), June 2007

The environment where employees work can have a marked impact on how they feel, their morale, and their ability to complete their work. This article explores some of the psychological reasons for this phenomenon.

Part E. Benefits

27. Changing Course, Dave Keller, Best’s Review, March 2007

There are changes coming in health care and those changes are being driven by an industry that is finding the rising cost of health care to be too expensive to be sustainable. Something has to be done.

Part F. Retirement Programs

28. Retirements Top List of HR Concerns, Aliah D. Wright, HR Magazine, August 2008

Factors affecting the workforce that are a result of impending retirements are a major consideration for human resource professionals. The Baby Boomers are about to retire and as they do it will have a tremendous impact on the workforce.

UNIT 6: Fostering Employee/Management RelationshipsUnit Overview

Part A. Disciplinary Action

29. Setting Up a Disciplinary Procedure, Chartered Management Institute, March 2006

There are procedures for disciplining employees. Here is the checklist from the United Kingdom on how it is done there.

30. 5 Keys to Resolving Employee Conflict, Mark A. Hyde, Supervision, 6(4), April 2008

What are some of the types of employee conflicts and what are some of the best ways to deal with them or eliminate them all together? Here is some guidance for these perplexing problems.

31. Poor Performance & Due Process, T. L. Stanley, Supervision, 68 (1), January 2007

Dealing with individuals who perform below expectations is always difficult. It is important, however, to make certain that all employees be treated equitably and that they receive full consideration according to the rules of the company.

Part B. Temporary and Part-Time Employees

32. Managing Part-Time Employees, Mark Rowh, Office Solutions, April 2008

Part-time employees are becoming more important to organizations than ever before. As such, they need to be treated with the respect they are due because they are an increasingly important part of the organizations.

Part C. Ethics

33. Business Ethics: The Key Role of Corporate Governance, John D. Sullivan and Aleksandr Shkolnikov, The Corporate Board, January/February 2007

Global organizations such as the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), and the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), to name only a few, have issued guidelines and/or requirements on global ethics. Many corporations have complied, but the list is not complete.

34. Supporting Ethical Employees, Jean Thilmany, HR Magazine, September 2007

Ethics is an important aspect of any corporation and the corporation’s values, beliefs, and ethics need to be communicated and constantly reinforced. Here are some examples of how some companies are doing this.

UNIT 7: International Human Resource ManagementUnit Overview

Part A. Outsourcing and Offshoring

35. The Real Cost of Offshoring, Michael Mandel and Pete Engardio, BusinessWeek, June 18, 2007

Nobody knows what offshoring is really costing the United States, because the methods of accounting that are currently in place are not adequate for the task. The fact is that it is costing more than is being reported and as a result, the national income figures of growth, individual real income, and other measures are not accurate, and it is getting worse.

Part B. Managing International Human Resources

36. America’s Other Immigration Crisis, Vivek Wadhwa, The American, July/August 2008

There is a lot of talk about illegal immigration but there is another immigration crisis. This is the crisis facing American industry as it attempts to compete for global talent through the maze of the American immigration system. The United States is losing some of the world’s best talent, which is being trained in American universities, because the American immigration system will not let them stay.

37. China: Land of Opportunity and Challenge, Adrienne Fox, HR Magazine, September 2007

The human resource climate in China is very different from that in the United States. While there may be over 1 billion people in the country, there is a shortage of qualified people in the country for the jobs that are available.

38. Multiple Choice, Lori Chordas, Best’s Review, March 2009

A one-size-fits-all approach to benefits is not going to work for a company with employees in different countries. Each nation and the employees in that nation will have different requirements and expectations. While the home office can provide general guidelines, the benefits required for employees in each country will be somewhat unique.

39. Roots of Insecurity: Why American Workers and Others Are Losing Out, Horst Brand, Dissent Magazine, Winter 2007

Why do American workers feel so insecure? There are many reasons for this, which are explored here.

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