Labor management has been practiced for thousands of years, and large-scale projects like China’s Great Wall or dikes in the Netherlands wouldn’t have been possible without labor process coordination. However, the significant changes that led us to human resources as we know it today began in England around 1760.
18th Century - “The Welfare Officers:” The Industrial Revolution of the 18th century shifted economics from agriculture to factories and required organizations to show absolute results for effort, relate them to costs, and sell them competitively. It also required a system to hire, pay wages, record employee work hours, and provide housing and health care. Worker oversight was managed by Welfare Officers or the Welfare Department.
19th Century - “Personnel Management:” Business and factory expansion led to a labor shortfall. Employees worked long hours under difficult conditions. To look for a solution, scientific ideas were applied to increase labor outputs, specifically the Scientific Management Theory advocated by Frederick Taylor related to Personnel Management.
20th Century - “Human Resource Management:” Elton Mayo’s Hawthorne Studiesdisproved Taylor’s Scientific Management approach to increasing productivity, and found that the primary drivers of motivation and productivity were not monetary factors. A host of new theories emerged based on this behavioral perspective and the term human resource management came into use.
21st Century - “Strategic Human Resource Management” and “Human Capital Management:” The increase in technology- and knowledge-based industries is intensifying global competition. At the same time, there’s a shortage of workers with appropriate skill sets. Consequently, many organizations have adopted strategic human resource management practices to make a long-term impact on corporate success, and refer to their human resources activities as human capital management.
Today’s Talent Management Trend
Today’s Talent Management Trend
The evolution of human resource management also led to a new sub-practice: talent management, a business strategy that anticipates required human capital. Talent management is about engaging highly specialized, highly skilled people to retain them for the long run by understanding future skills needs, assessing competencies, training and developing employees, and keeping them on board and motivated.
“Retention of talent is one of the greatest challenges an agency can face. Money is always nice, but only gets you so far,” says Remley. “Most people are looking for a more custom-designed package, so you need to be flexible in perks such as signing bonus, flexible or extra vacation, ability to work at home, and sabbaticals.”
The talent management process has four main stages:
“One of the most important levers is training. People look to acquire new skill sets, and having a company willing to invest in you by paying for training can be very enticing,” says Remley. “Talent stays if they feel involved, engaged, and have a clear understanding of what the company is doing and what it is aiming for. People need a reason to believe. They need to know the why of what they are doing. If this is not clear, there is little reason to stay put.
0 Comments