Big Hat, No Cattle - Skinner

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6

Big hat,

no

cattle:

managing

h u m a n

resources

Wickham Skinner

After 60 years

of human resources

management,

where are all the comm itted, loyal and

dedicated employees^

When

faced with husiness pioblems, man-

agers natuTa lly make identifying the trouble theii piiotity.

Once that is done, at least half the job is over; finding

solutions is just a matter of time. Th is ha sn't been so ,

however,

with

the human resources problem: how to mo-

tivate employees. Sixty years

ago,

the Hawthorne

experi-

ments

revealed the issue, and ever since, managers, re-

searchers, and consultants have been searching for the

answer to the human resources problem..

Wh y aren 't employees as productive, loyal,

and dedicated to their companies as their managers know

they can bel The author of this article proposes four

rea-

sons why a ctuality ha s fallen so far below expectation in

personnel management, namely, that managers' expecta-

tions have been too high in the first place, that the con-

cepts staff piofessionals offer managers are frequently

contradictory, that the corporate role of personnel has al-

ways been problematic, and finally, that m anagers hold

assumptions concerning their employees thatundennine

efforts to motivate them.

Wickham Skinner is James

E.

Robison Fro-

fessor of Business Administration at the Ha rvard Business

School, where he teaches production and operations m an-

agement as well as the school's new course in human re-

sources managem ent. Thiti is his seventh article in HB R.

The last one was Managers with Imp act: Versatile and

Inconsistent (coauthored with W. Earl Sasser in the

November-December

1977

issue.

Illustrations by Richard A. Goldberg.

In the Dallas airport the other day

saw many tall, well-dressed, and impressive-lookin

men wearing large, immaculate Stetson cowbo

hats. As I walked hy one such hat-wearer, I notice

two middle-aged, sunburned men in faded bl

jeans standing nearby. They eyed the same fello

looked him up and down, and then one said quiet

to the other, Big hat, no cattle.

The same can be said of the massi

efforts to improve the management of people

U.S. industry . Since World War II, calling it h

man relations, personnel manag ement, lab

relations, and now manag ement of hum an r

sources, business has spent millions to make em

ployees produetive, loyal, and motivated.

First, academics, with minds opene

by the Hawthorne experiments, led the moveme

to effectively manage people. Now, eager consu

tants and zealous staff experts nurture it.

Fortu

writes of personnel directors as the new corpora

heroes. Library shelves overflow w ith people ma

agement books, and a hundred new ones appe

every year. Two hundred documented attempts a

going on to improve the quality of work life (QWL

and three nationally known institutions have cha

ters to improve productivity and QWL.

Since H awthorne, successive waves

people-problem solutions and programs ha

washed and tumbled industry. In some desperatio

managers have steadily invested in superviso

training, organizational behavior, interpersonal b

havior, T-groups, sensitivity training, employee a

titude surveys, job enrichment, flexible benefit

and expanded fringe benefits-bigger pensions, su



Managing human resources

10

sidized insurance, more holidays, shorter work days,

four-day weeks, and canned communications pack-

ages—and now companies are attempting to revive

the "work ethic" with human resources depart-

ments. Big programs, but where are the payoffs?

Not in productivity. Recent figures

show a decline in employee produc-

tivity for the United States.

Not in absence of strikes.

Not in widespread amicable labor re-

lations.

Not in the strategic position of many

U.S. industries in international com-

petition.

Not in the absence of government in-

tervention, such as OSHA and EEO

regulations.

Not in public confidence, support,

and credibility in our business system

or big corporations.

Not in the image of managers as a be-

nign, trusted group in our society.

Not in the absence of hostility or class

warfare.

Not in enthusiastic employee accep-

tance of new technology, machinery,

or equipment in factories, of stripped-

down offices, or of efficiency gains in

the ever-expanding service industries.

i hat, no cattle

Human resources management seems

to be mostly good intentions and whistling in the

dark or averting unionization. And the results of

the 1970s suggest that we may not even be holding

our own. The poor management of the work force

in this country is damaging the nation and our

standard of living. It is making us uncompetitive

with the Japanese and some other Asians, the West

Germans, the Swiss, and many others.

I do not wish to exaggerate the

gloomy aspects of this picture. A handful of large

(and certainly many medium-sized and smaller)

companies appear to have made their work forces

into competitive assets. And surely modest prog-

ress has occurred nearly everywhere. For the most

part, sweatshops are a thing of the past. Workplaces

are better lit and ventilated and are generally safe

than in the past. The atmosphere at work is les

coldly formal, and decision making more participa

tive. Managers are more aware of feelings and rela

tionships and make fewer overt demands of employ

ees. Fewer "bulls of the woods" charge ahout office

and factories. Personnel people are more profes

sional, more companies have clearly stated griev

ance procedures, and house publications regularly

explain how and why companies arc managing

themselves for their employees' benefit.

Some will argue that we've been

doing many of the right things and that it is so

cietal factors such as the "declining work ethic,

the "new breed," and the "new sociology" that are

eroding management's efforts. Regardless, in mos

companies the results of enlightened people man

agement are simply more comfort, more relaxa

tion, more freedom from pressure, more security

more benefits, and higher pay, not more produc

tivity and loyalty.

What's gone wrong? Why do so few

companies actually make use of the greatest com

petitive weapon of all—the powerful resources o

motivated, energized, cooperative, trusting people?

Few managers need much convincin

about the importance of people. All the manager

I've talked to say, "People are our greatest asset.

But they also report, "We don't know how to mo

tivate them." "People are getting harder to man

age." "Personnel departments don't give us th

leadership we need." "We're just hanging in ther

trying to cope."

What's been wrong?

Managers have had difficulty manag

ing human resources for four reasons:

1 Achieving who lehearted cooperation

energy, and commitment from large numbers o

employees is difficult, so managers are often unre

alistic in th eir hopes.̂

2 Concepts concerning the manage

ment of large numbers of people often convey con

tradictory messages to managers.

1.

The term

l rge

numbers is used

in this article to distinguish be-

tween the management issues con-

eerning interpersonal and small

group relationships and those re-

lating to laige gTOUps, departments

divisionTi, oi entire companies and

institutions. My focus is on the

latter, not on the former.



108

Harvard Business Review

September-October 19

3 Critical problems in the corporate

management of personnel, such as the place of hu-

man resources management (HRM) in corporate de-

cision making, the role of personnel

staff

and a

lack of sufficient human resources management

know-how at top management levels, remain large-

ly unresolved.

4 Some managem ent assumptions con-

cerning HRM undermine the efforts of many man-

agers,

no matter how w ell intentioned they may be.

Achieving employee

commitment

Capturing the loyalty of hundreds or

thousands of individuals in one business enterprise

so that they direct their energies toward the goals

of the company is enormously difficult. The goals

of the corporation are long-range and general in na-

ture-profit and growth. But employees usually fo-

cus on sbort time horizons to meet their needs in

wages, salaries, working conditions, fair treatment,

and promotion. Drawing a connection between

tbese sets of goals is not easy.

Effective relationships between indi-

viduals and companies rest on employees' trust that

the goals are connected. But developing trust often

requires overcoming years of bad experience and

many employees' belief that companies exploit peo-

ple.

Of every ioo employees, 5 or 10 will have been

disappointed or burned by some job-related experi-

ence,

which may have been beyond the company's

control. Their subsequent alienation can subvert

the efforts of managers and personnel officers to

build morale.

Given that working in a social, indus-

trial operation requires people to give up many free-

doms and that groups acting collectively play on

that loss of freedom to better their own short-term

interests, that the work force is uncom mitted should

be no surprise.

Seen this way, the fight for a moti-

vated work force is an uphill battle. It's rosy ideal-

ism to think that every employee is going to turn

on and perform w ith roo devotion to a company

and its objectives. Short-term economic interests

are in clear confiict. Employees see their share of

the pie as being cut smaller to serve up larger profits

to owners. Further, political factors such as Nader's

Raiders and the anti-big-business wing of the Demo-

cratic party exploit employees' distrust of business,

the corporation, and managers, whom employees

often see as being out for themselves and siding

with their corporate bosses against the employee.



Managing buma n resources

109

People instinctively resent forces that

industrial estahlishment, the boss, the boss s

1960s and early 1970s are bearing fruit, and more

Given these obstacles to collabora-

is miraculous.

Conflicts in theory

Managers use many different organi-

zational techniques to achieve collaboration and

productivity. Researchers can take large credit for

the multitude of concepts and tools on hand. They

must also, however, accept responsibility for the

fact that their different disciplines often conflict

and work at cross-purposes.

For example, in most companies man-

agers employ four different disciplines to improve

employee performance and relations—human rela-

tions, labor relations, personnel administration, and

industrial engineering. Since human relations itself

includes at least three major schools, six fairly dis-

tinct sets of ideas and concepts can be at work in

the same organization at the same time:

1 Huma n relations Theories of group

behavior deal with social interaction and interper-

sonal relationships through such tools as theories

X and Y and sensitivity training. T he school s pre-

cept is that because group behavior is critical to col-

laboration and success, groups must bestow au-

thority and control upward.

The individual behavior school of

human relations focuses on individual psychology,

leadership, power, authority, responsibility, and the

subconscious. Its main concern is the individu al s

feelings and drives and how they affect the

workplace.

Organizational development goes fur-

ther and focuses on the need for people to reason

together about their common difficulties. Its central

belief is that employees can often manage them-

selves better than managers can.

2 Labor relations Labor laws, public

policy, the economics of wages and costs, demo-

graphics and manpower management, collective

bargaining, contract administration, and grievances

are under the purview of labor relations. It sees poli-

tics at the plant, corporation, union, state, and na-

tional levels together with labor laws as keys to any

situation. Its stance is usually adversarial and tough

—sticking to contract terms, denying exceptions,

avoiding precedents, and building a powerful posi-

tion for bargaining.

3 Personnel management Activities in

volved in managing large numbers of people in the

aggregate-namely, recruiting, selecting, training,

compensating, and developing them—are the prov-

ince of personnel. This discipline holds tbat if com-

panies perform those tasks well, they will acquire a

set of employees with appropriate motives, habits,

and behavior. Personnel holds that if managers are

consistent and apply policies that induce desired be-

havior, a good climate will result.

4 Industrial engineering This school

concentrates on designing jobs to fit technology and

human capabilities and controlling performance

with standards based on industrial engineering

studies. It holds that efficiency and productivity are

products of economic rewards and hard-nosed, dis-

ciplined supervision.

Each of these four schools focuses on

acquiring an effective, loyal, and committed group

of employees but in very different ways. My con-

cern is not that disagreement arises among these ex-

perts or that they have different approaches to the

same prohlem. I do not think that one school is

right and the others wrong, that one is better than

another, or that any should be ignored. On the con-

trary, they all offer ideas and tools that are often

very effective, though perhaps not when used at the

same time.

The problem is a little like having a

car that bas good wheels, a shiny body, an efficient

engine, excellent brakes, and a terrific hydraulic

system but that w on t go or that no on e in the fam-

ily wants to drive. Big hat, no cattle.

Each school of thought makes a con-

trihution, a vital contribution, like the wheels and

the engine, but the whole system sputters and

founders and doesn t produce enough involved, en-

ergetic, and loyal workers. Usually companies do

not know how to put these ingredients together in

one effective corporate system, for the four schools

each offer managers contradictory advice.

Two things appear to be missing from

the systems. One is a comprehensive unifying con-

cept. Another is a general manager who can effec-

tively mix and match these necessary ingredients

Unfortunately, such a person is a rare breed.





Corporate m anagem ent of

personnel

The third set of problems holding

back progress toward better people management has

to do with the structure of corporations, their size,

diversity, and allocation of authority.

As corporations grow in size and di-

versity, the difficulty of managing employee rela-

tions increases. With size come organizational lay-

ers that effectively remove top managers from the

large numbers of employees at the base of the pyra-

mid. By necessity, communication processes, which

are handled via mass media broadcasts, house or-

gans, speeches, and employee letters, become more

political and less personal.

When a company grows, the connec-

tion between the corporate well-being and the

needs of separate divisions and locations can break.

In principle, headquarters may be willing to let the

divisions deal with their local labor forces on their

own, but in letting the divisions take different

courses, the corporation may endanger its bargain-

ing position with the union. And even if the com-

pany is not unionized, the personnel office might

fear t hat one division s low-cost dem ands could

bring in a union, be shortsighted, or give the com-

pany a bad reputation as a place to work.

Also,

the Equal Employment Oppor-

tunity Act has vastly increased the need for head-

quarters to be in control, union or not. Yet each

division has different tasks and needs, different skills

and attitudes in its work force. Division A may need

a labor force tbat is especially cost effective, while

Division B, wh ere the strategy m ay call for rapid

product turnover, requires employees to be adaptive.

Given these potential conflicts, ex-

perimenting with new approaches becomes riskier

in large organizations than in small. Decisions be-

come more sensitive, have longer shadows, and,

understandably, executives may become more cau-

tious and may procrastinate or pass the buck when

they can.

These problems of size and diversity

plague many large corporations these days. Their

effects are perplexity and conflict at headquarters,

frustration and irritation at divisional and plant lo-

cations, and a mishmash of personnel policies and

practices that have no clear focus. Policies tbat

swing from the corporate to the divisional point of

view, with the responsibility resting in neither lo-

cation , are often ineffective.

ime is an enem y

Human resources management faces

a further fundamental problem that few companies




l U

have resolved. Acquiring and developing the right

talents for the business as it changes strategy, tech-

nology, and products requires more shrewd, wise,

long-range planning than any other corporate en-

deavor. Companies can usually replace or rebuild

technology, physical facilities, products, markets, or

business systems in 3 to 5 years. But how long does

it take to change the attitudes of 1,000 employees

with an average age, let s assum e, of 40 and with

10 years of seniority?

Clearly, management cannot dismiss

the work force and start over again. But it often

takes years to effect much genuine change, and one

bad decision or unfortunate sequence of events can

undo those years of slow progress.

In contrast to the nature of the

HRM task, which is a function that requires long-

term thinking, consistency, and staying power,

short-range pressures such as budgets and annual

plans force short-term reactions. Successful man-

agers seldom stay put long enough to see their HRM

investments pay off. Also, executive compensation

systems seldom reward a manager for five years

investment in HRM policies and activities.

The searcity of general managers who

are as capable, confident, and experienced in the

management of large numbers of people as they are

in production, marketing, finance, and control is a

further problem in many companies. Nonetheless,

despite their inexperience, executives who reach the

top must seleet and integrate the six different con-

cepts and disciplines of human relations, person-

nel administration, and industrial engineering.

They must also manage the conflicts among the

interests of the corporation as a whole, the differ-

ent divisions, and the separate plants and facilities.

Why do so many general managers

usually lack these skills? Several factors contribute

to the difficulty.

The first is that personnel work has

seldom been attractive to fast-moving, younger gen-

eral managers, who see the field as out of the main-

stream of the business. Also, they see personnel as

a staff function that is strictly advisory, that lacks

authority and power, and that deals with small-

scale, troublesome problems. A personnel job is sel-

dom an attractive position for a manager who wants

to run something independently. Because of per-

sonnel s conflict-ridden, pressured, contradicto ry

nature, the decisions personnel managers make are

touchy and eumbersome. Because tbey involve

many other managers, they are not only time-con-

suming but also often frustrating.

For these reasons, few outstanding

managers move into personnel, and those in it often

have problems getting out. The detail, the time re-

quired to gain expertise, the low status in the or-

ganization, and the lack of clear-cut authority can

swallow up and overwhelm all but the very best in

the field.

Questionable managem ent

premises

Finally, a few commonly held as-

sumptions, the validity of which is increasingly

doubtful, are at the root of the HRM problem.

W ith good managers RM

takes care of itself

If one believes that well-intentioned

managers naturally do well at HRM, the following

will also seem valid:

Responsible, generous, enlightened

top management will develop an ef

fective employee group because its

considerate and humane practices wil

inevitahly trickle down and permeate

the organization.

Management may share its preroga

tive to manage if it wishes, but philo

sophically employees have no righ

to manage.

People are fortunate to have jobs for

which someone else has invested the

capital.

People are adaptable to a wide variety

of tasks and conditions.

Someone will turn up able and will

ing to do any job if the pay is right.

These premises are no longer valid

Widespread dissatisfaction with jobs despite ade

quate pay has been documented. More workers now

see good jobs as rights. Employees demand mor

autonomy at w ork and question managem ent

right to administrate, and indeed its competence

and wisdom to manage, without participation.

Personnel

is

not very important

If the personnel department

housekeeping function, it follows th at:

IS

It makes available services and advic

that line managers can accept or re

ject since they have the responsibil

ity for line operations.



112



Persormel's job is to get good people

and keep everybody reasonably happy.

Managers responsible for line opera-

tions can accept or reject personnel's advice as a

st ff department. Relegating to housekeeping or

staff advice activities that directly impinge on a

corporation's most vital competitive resource no

longer makes sense.

Decisions affecting human resource

quality should not be dealt with in a secondary,

catch-up, tidy-up, reactive way. Doing so gives a

lower priority to personnel activities than to pro-

duction, sales, or finance; results in personnel man-

agement assignments being a sentence to obhvion;

fosters second-rate, sloppy personnel activities; and

removes accountability from personnel officers for

setting up reactive, short-term HRM policies.

ontrol is all

If control systems are really what

make an organization run well, it follows that:

By estabhshing careful and detailed

annual forecasts and budgets and

monitoring results by month, quarter,

and year to meet the plans adopted,

managers can effectively control and

operate companies.

This premise drives out long-range

thinking as well as the long lead times required to

build effective human resources. The quantifiables

remain, but the soft quality items such as train-

ing and development, appropriate compensation

structures, and communication activities are ex-

pendable.

Every problem h as a solution

The eternally optimistic macho belief

is that if reason is applied;

When managers put good minds to

work on a problem, it will yield

quickly.

When good managers who will be

held accountable are armed with good

solutions, substantial improvements

will result.

This premise accounts for many big

hats ;

managers have adopted programs to Bx

poor morale or low productivity instead of getting

at basic underlying causes. Short-term fixes or pro-

gram s do not work in hum an resources develop-

ment any better than they do in government.

Managers wishing superior human r

sources must get at fundamental rather than supe

ficial symptoms; they need to accept disappoin

ments and unexpected outcomes of solutions

complex problems, and they need the staying pow

er to work persistently at improving the quality o

human resources. These problems are massive an

stubborn. When disillusionm ent and frustration h

many managers react judgmentally, blamin

the union or the goverimient, the vanishin

work eth ic or the new breed, instead of the

own piecemeal, reactive approach to the manag

ment of people.

Since changing habits, skills, value

beliefs, and attitudes in

work force takes year

the lack of long-range planning in human resource

is frequently disastrous. So the ultimate irony

that the personnel function-which deals with th

most fundamental and central corporate compet

tive resource and that has the longest time horizo

of any function-is left with no long-range strateg

and allowed to react merely to transient pressure

and events.

Toward improving

human resource

performance

To develop human resources, co

porate management will have to make some funda

mental changes in its conventional wisdom.

Let me suggest five processes to in

clude in a new approach:

1 Managers need to tackle the mistake

premises head on and cast them out in favor of

new set like the foUowing-

n If managers con tinually fail to listen

communicate, explain, anticipate, and in every wa

nurture commitment and mutual understanding

employees will inevitably become alienated. In th

nature of people and organizations there is a relen

less gravitational shde toward alienation .

• Managers can develop and tailor

work force to meet the particular performanc

needs of an organization.

n Because superior hu m an resourc

create the most central, basic, and powerful strategi

competitive advantage possible, human resource

management should receive top priority.

n Employees are stakeholders in th

enterprise. Their interest in the conditions of em

ployment and work are as real as those of stock




113

olders and managers. The problem is not whether

o keep them involved in the management of the

enterprise, but how .

D As a function, personnel has as much

a right and an obligation to monitor the quality and

rescribe the processes of personnel activity (selec-

ion, compensation, communication development,

t cetera) as accountants do to prescribe and moni-

or accounting policies and procedures. The top

chelon of leading companies in this respect, such

s Hewlett-Packard and Dana Corporation, gives

he personnel function broad license in any and all

RM activities.

2 Any company can begin to improve

he management of human resources simply by do-

ng the basics better. The most practical way to

ng, and communications procedures are in many

Worst of all is supervision—the oldest

nd most written about of management skills. The

les,

costs, and time pressures allow careless and

nhumane practices to characterize it.

Poor supervision is absolutely unnec-

ssary-yet millions of workers have to put up with

it. It hurts American manufacturing and service in-

ustries beyond

belief

The importance of good su-

ervision is so obvious th at its rarity is astounding .

The enorm ous improvements in HRM

at General Motors began when managers went back

o the basics of good supervision and communica-

tion. For instance, although QWL programs were

ehind the turnaround at Tarrytown, the funda-

mental changes were achieved by supervisors

simply treating people with care and respect.

3 Managers need to set a seven-year

time horizon for their human resources planning

and operation. I pick seven years simply to make

the point that it s not one, two, three, or even five.

Planning in personnel needs at least that amount of

time to survive several generations of top exec-

utives strategy shifts, economic recessions, division

and companywide crises, government policy

changes, legislative revolutions, and technological

advances. It takes at least seven years for managers

to install, live with, improve, and reap the benefits

of major change in personnel activities; to weed out

unproductive skills or attitudes,- and to hire a new

generation. And it takes that long for employees

to live through a period of history in a company

that forms a new foundation of trust.

Seen as a seven-year ongoing p roblem,

the ask of human resources management takes on

a whole new cast demanding staying power as well

as clear philosophy and strategy. For example, IBM s

philosophy that people are valuable to the com-

pany has penneated the organization from the be-

ginning. Similarly, at Hewlett-Packard the founders

enunciated a set of standards that placed people

first. To this day, these values persist with great

benefit to these companies.

4 Having a seven-year horizon requires

that managers develop a philosophy, some objec-

tives, and a strategy. Since human resources strate-

gic planning is as yet a largely unknown art and

since it may take researchers years to develop com-

petence, managers would do better to begin on their

own rather than wait for the perfect approach.

But how to begin? The combined ex-

periences of four major U.S. corporations that have

been working at HRM for a long time (Honeywell,

American Hospital Supply, Dana Corporation, and

Westinghouse) offer several lessons—

• A first step is to identify the impli i

tendencies of present personnel policies and prac-

tices in terms of the skills, attitudes, and behavior

they develop. Each corporate unit and division has

implicit objectives in its personnel activities—to de-

velop a work force that achieves low costs, to be

fiexible, or to acquire the skills for special projects

for instance. In most companies, such analysis will

show that the implicit goals of the various person-

nel policies and activities are contradictory. Fur-

ther, the uniformities in policy and practices across

divisions, departments, and functions are also fre-

quently dysfunctional in meeting the strategic

needs of those separate groups.

n A second useful step in hu m an re-

sources strategy planning is to identify by function,

department, and division the desired behavioral

characteristics of each employee group. These will

depend on the company s or d ivision s objectives

and plans for gaining competitive advantage. That

plan requires certain product, marketing, manufac-

turing, and financial strategies. These in turn will

each have specific human resources implications.

Managers need to uncover these implications and

clearly specify them.

• When managers juxtapose the hum an

resources implications of their plans with those im-

plicit in their personnel policies and activities, the

need for change will emerge. From this process they

can develop a human resources strategy that details

by division, department, or function the human

resources and specific policies and practices needed

in the basic areas of human resources management.

Then they can make long-term plans.



114


September-October 1

D Pioneers in hum an resources strategy

make such planning a central part of their annual

plans,

budgets, and long-range strategy. In other

companies, however, managers commonly let HRM

become a residual or an ou tcome of the plans rather

than a key input. At best, most divisional or com-

pany managers merely project from extrapolations

the number of various personnel categories they

will need in the future.

Experience in HRM strategic plan-

ning shows that the process nearly always raises a

fundamental problem: the divisions or departments

of the company have different competitive strategies

and often need different performance from their

people. Similarly, within a division or a location,

groups may need different personnel poUeies and

activities. But can a company, for example, pay peo-

ple differently in engineering than it can in purchas-

ing or accounting? The answer is yes, but only when

management discards the old uniformity rules and

designs personnel policies to achieve strategically

essential objectives.

5 Companies wishing to improve their

HRM need to establish a long-term program to de-

velop general managers with human resources man-

agement skills and experience. Considering the per-

sonnel department as a functional operation with

strong authority and responsibility for effective hu-

man resources management practices has helped

several companies to attract and keep good person-

nel managers.

By regarding the development of su-

perior human resources as an essential competitive

requirement that needs long-range, functional

strategic plans, top managers can attract many of

the best managers in the company to the HRM

function. Some companies that have moved out-

standing managers into personnel functions for two-

to four-year periods have, after five to seven years,

developed a top management group, a high propor-

tion of which has had in-dcpth experience in the

formulation and implementation of human re-

sources strategy.

A group of loyal, productive employ-

ees is an organization 's most effective competitive

weapon. But during the last decade variations

among persons available for employment appear to

have greatly increased. Subtle differences in job and

personal skills and in attitudes toward work and

employers have made selecting an outstanding set

of employees even more difficult. Mass education,

which makes schooling level as a selection criterion

less meaningful, has compounded the problem.

Leading companies in HRM have learned that

the old adage that people are people is wron g:

there are enormous differences between a good e

ployee and a superb one. A small fraction of co

panies have learned to insist stubbornly on hir

only the very best.

These increased problems in achie

ing a quality level set of employees have ma

this HRM strategy, when successfully carried o

a uniquely dynamic competitive weapon. But it

more important than ever to recruit and devel

a high-quality group of employees, for compan

with a head start are hard to catch. Their good pe

ple attract others like them, while conventional

ganizations have to accept what is left.

Human resources planning can

as a catalyst and an operating mechanism to

celerate the building of an effective work for

Where this is accomplished, people are energiz

and committed and become the most powerf

fundamental corporate competitive resource

all.

^

The most difficult

variable to control

In the whole production matrix, peo-

ple are probably the most frustrating

for managers since Ihey constitute

the most difficull variable to control

and predict. No matter how predict-

able society tries to make its mem-

bers through its various socializing

mechanisms, people continue to

give managers the most trouble.

Managers are always complaining

about those worke rs II only they

would do what we lell them or learn

to follow instructions, we would sur-

pass all our quotas , It is this obses-

sion with Ihe product and the

consequent neglect of human

needs that could fill case-history

books with stones of managem ent's

irisensitivity to workers. This insen-

sitivity IS oflen turne d aroun d an d

explained as a lack of worke r

moti-

vation.' Workers become strangers

to many m anagers and are seen

only as an exten sion of a piece of

machinery in which a capital invest-

ment has been made. This leads to

the engineering dream of eliminat-

ing the huma n element in

production.

From

Robert Schrank,

n Thousand Working ays

Cambridge, Massachusetts:

The MIT Press,

copyright © t 978 by the

Massachusetts Institute of

Technology,

p, t4t.

Reprinted with the

permission of the publishe r



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