Introduction

10.2 Introduction
of all the factors of production. man is by far the most important. the importance of
human factor in any type of co-operative endeavor cannot be overemphasised. it is a
matter of common knowledge that every business organistation depends for its effective
functioning not so much on its material of fainancial resources. the product of any
manufacturing organisation by itself is not enough to win coustomers over, it is the
service support thats gives it the edge to steal a march over its competitors. the human
resources become even more important in the service industry whose value is delivered
through information, personal interaction or group work. this is the only resource which
can produce unlimited amounts through betters ideas. their is no apparent limit to what
people can accomplish when they are motivated to use their potential to create new and
other better ideas. no other resource can do this.
Characteristics of Human Resources
Following are some unique Characteristics of this resource which underscore the need
for a manager to be more than good at handaling men . he most recogonise their
importance as akey resource to be obtained cheaply, used sparingly and developed and
exploited as fully us possible.
(1) This resourcesc is animate, active and living. It is man alone who with his ability to
feel, think, conceive and grow shows satisfacation or dissatisfaction, resentment or
pleasure, resistance or acceptance for all type of managerial actions. All emotional
problems emanate from human factor only.
(2) This resource is most complex and unpredictable in its behaviour. Each individual
has his own distinct background. This makes each individual unique in his psychological
framework. No two individuals have exactly similar psychological frameworks. Hence,
they cannot be interchanged, much less standardised. This implies that all individuals in
an organisation cannot be treated alike. In employing and supervising people and in
endeavouring to reach their motivation, a manager must follow tailor-made approach
based on his understanding of the actions, attitudes, needs and urges of the worker
concerned. This is a very formidable and challenging task.
(3) Only this resource is the most scarce resource. Capital is no longer the most
important economic input for modern industrial corporation function. Capital has
become a commodity instead of a scarce resource. It is readily available for a price that
is commensurate with risk.
(4) Only this resource can help an organisation attain sustained competitive advantage
by facilitating the development of competencies that are firm-specific and difficult to
imitate.

(5) Only this resource appreciates in value with the passage of time. As time passes
people become experienced and skilled. It is not so with other resources which generally
depreciate as time goes on.
(6) Only this resource has the ability to unionise and instil fear of opposition in
management.
(7) Only this resource has several laws such as the Factories Act, Employees' Stats
Insurance Act, Workmen's Compensation Act etc. which direct management to treat it
with greater respect.
Definition of HRD
There is so far no commonly accepted definition of HRD Different authors have defined
the term differently and also given different accounts of activities which it should
encompass Lard Nadier of George Washington University (U.S.A. who is acclaimed as
the originator of the concept of HRD sometimes in the early seventies defines it as a
series of and activities touch as training, education and development) conducted within a
specified period of time, and designed to produce behavioural change. This definition
mmation behavioural change as the only outcome of HRD as if HRD does not promise
change in sa potation's performance. In a revised definition, therefore, Nadler defines
HRD an galand learning experiences in a definite time period to increase the possibility
of paving job performance and growth
1. Leonard Nadler, Developing Human Resources, Gulf Publishing, 1970.
2. Leonard Nadler, (ed.) The Handbook of HRD, John Wiley & Sons, NY. 1984
Patricia McLagan of the American Society for Training and Development defines HRD as
the integrated use of training and development, organisation development and career
development to improve individual, group and organisational effectiveness.
According to McLean and McLean' "Human Resource Development is any process or
activity that either initially or over the longer term has the potential to develop adults'
work- based knowledge, expertise, productivity, and satisfaction, whether for personal or
group/team gain, or for the benefit of an organisation, community, nation, or, ultimately
the
whole community."
Perhaps the best and the most comprehensive definition of HRD in the organisational

context has been given by Rao". He defines it as a process by which the employees of an
organisation are helped, in a continuous, planned way to; 1. sharpen their capabilities
required to perform various functions associated with their
present or expected future roles; 2. develop their general capabilities as individuals and
discover and exploit their inner
potentials for their own and for organisational development purposes; and 3. develop an
organisational culture in which supervisor-subordinate relationships, team work, and
collaboration among sub-units become strong and contribute to the professional well-
being, motivation and pride of the employees.
Subsequently Ran further simplifies this definition and suggests that HRD means:
Competence building.
Commitment building, and Culture building.
In this definition "Competence building" means building the competencies required to
execute the current business effectively and efficiently as well as the competencies
required to meet future (say next 3 years or above) business goals. The term
"Commitment building" means building motivation, satisfaction and a sense of pride and
involvement among people at all levels of the organisation viz., individual, dyad, team
and department. "Culture building" means building the desired patterns of behaviour in
all employees and setting up certain values attached to quality of product and services,
speed and quality of decision- making, discipline, integrity, punctuality, trustworthiness,
cost-consciousness etc. We must remember that these can be built and developed on a
continuous basis only in a certain type of culture. If the milieu is good, a number of
things can happen. Hence, creating a culture becomes important in any organisation.
HRD Methods
Any systematic or formal way of developing the competencies and motivation of indivi
duals in an organisation and building the organisation's culture can be called an HRD
3. John Walton, HRD: The Power of Definitions', in Oscar A. Alioga (ed) (2001),
Academy of Human
Resources Development, 2001 Conference Proceedings, Oklahoma, pp. 1080-1087. 4.
Gary N. McLean and Laird D. McLean, "If we can't define HRD in one country, how can we
define it in an International Contest in Oscar A. Alioga (ed.) (2001). A HRD Conference
Proceedings.
5. T. V. Rao, Integrated Human Resources Development Systems' in Leonard and J.
W. Pfeiffer, The 1985 Annual Developing Human Resources, University

Associates, San Diego, California 6. HRD methods are also known as instruments,
techniques, sub-systems, mechanisms or interventions.
method. As such there can be many HRD methods available for organisations. However,
the
most frequently used methods are as follows:
1. Manpower planning 2. Performance Appraisal and Feedback
2. Training, Education and Development
3. Potential Appraisal and Promotion 5. Career Development and Career Planning
4. Compensation and Reward 7. O.D. techniques
5. Role Analysis and Role Development 9. Quality of Work Life and Employee
Welfare
6. Participative devices 11. Communication
7. Counselling
8. Grievance Redressal
9. Data Storage and Research
10. Industrial Relations.
Following is a brief description of these methods.
1. Manpower planning. Manpower planning is the sheet anchor of all HRD efforts. It
is concerned with the following
(1) Assessment of manpower needs, including forecasting such needs based on the
analysis of the policies of the company, trends of its development, plans for
diversification,
etc.
(i) Manpower audit, ie, examining whether manpower strength for various jobs is
inadequate or more than what should be employed. Both understaffing and overstaffing
may
be highly demotivating in the company.
Thus, manpower planning is linked with corporate plans and strategies on the and the
job analysis on the other. (See Chapter 2)
one hand
2 Performance appraisal and feedback. It is a very critical HRD mechanism under which
the performance of an employee is periodically appraised by the employee himself in
collaboration with his boss. In the light of the difficulties faced by the employee he

redefines his future goals. The mechanism emphasises the development of the
employees (by identifying their growth needs) rather than their evaluation. Open,
objective and participative appraisal and feedback develop better superior-subordinate
relations. During the appraisal interview the superior shares the concerns of the
subordinate and even guides him to achieve his targets. (See Chapter 7)
3. Training, education and development. These are 3 different HRD mechanisms
with different focus and purpose as shown in the following table:
Three broad areas in which training may be imparted are technical, behavioural and
conceptual. It is commonly believed that the rank and file workers need training in the
technical area only. Training in the other two areas is not very useful for them. But recent
experiences of many Indian companies, such as Petrofils (Baroda), have shown that
behavioural training to workers produces several useful results such as the following: a)
Improvement in workers' behaviour with their superior and peers
Gi) Development of we feeling instead of 'T'
t) Decrease in the habit of hiding one's own mistakes and highlighting others' mistakes.
tis) Increased interest in suggestion scheme. (e) Increased awareness of family needs
and more interest in family affairs. (See Chapter 9
4. Potential appraisal and promotion. It is another important HRD mechanism which
is concerned with identifying the potential of an employee for future development
and promotion in the company. This focuses on finding out periodically the extent
to which a given individual possesses the critical attributes required to handle
higher level responsibilities. Thus it is linked with job and role analysis. In HRD
promotion is not considered to be a reward. This is because it is not based on
performance but it is based on the potential of an employee. (See Chapter 8)
5. Career development and career planning. It may be useful to help new
employees become aware of the various phases of development in the company, and
plan with
senior employees their specific career path. Necessary help may also be given to
employees
with limited potential to cope with reality. In the HRD system, corporate growth plans are
not kept secret. They are made known to the employees to plan their career. (See
Chapter 8)

6. Compensation and reward. These are common positive reinforcers. They should
be clearly related to the performance and behaviour of employees. Failure to
reward employees properly or overrewarding undeserving employees reduces the
reinforcing effect of rewards. Under HRD while salary structure is based on job
analysis, salary increase is linked with performance. (See Chapter 12)
7. O.D. techniques. Many organisations make use of soveral O.D. techniques for the
development of their human resource. These include team-building,
organisational mirroring, T-group, etc. In team-building people learn how to work
in collaboration with each other. Under organisational mirroring, the host group
gets feedback from representatives from several other organisational groups
about how it is perceived and regarded. The intervention is designed to improve
the relationships between groups and increase the inter-group effectiveness. In T-
group participants learn to be more competent in inter-personal relationships.
They learn about themselves, how others react to their behaviour and about the
dynamics of group formation, group norms and group growth.
As organisation should be concerned as much about its health as about its growth, it
needs to diagnose its problems from time to time and take steps to cope with them. This
is usually done through Action Research which is the main stay of all OD efforts. The
most important object of all OD efforts is to build OCTAPACE culture in an
organisation. This is an acronym for openness, collaboration, trust authenticity,
proaction, autonomy, confrontation and experimentation. (See Chapter 20).
8. Role analysis and role development. This is an extremely important technique of
HRD Under it the job of an individual in the organisation is analysed and enriched
in terms
of his role and not in terms of his job. He, his immediate superior and subordinates t
together to discuss their expectations about the job from each other. They then arrive at
a ensenos about the individual's role and prepare his role description. It is always
ensured that a role is sufficiently challenging for the individual, provides him adequate
autonomy for taking initiative and is linked with other organisational roles to avoid a
feeling of isolation
Whereas rule analysis, role development and role description are usually related to
managerial jobs, job analysis, job enrichment and job description are related to workers
jobs Job analysis of a worker's job is done to know its critical attributes which ultimately
determine all those job qualities or attributes which a job-holder should possess. Job
descriptions describe these qualities. Job enrichment signifies efforts to make a job
more motivating. (See Chapter 4, 6 and 10)
9 Quality of work life. For ensuring a congenial atmosphere in an organisation for
implementation of HRD methods, only good wages are not enough. They also need to be
provided with good physical conditions and motivating work. The presence of these

factors may not help the success of HRD initiatives but their absence definitely produces
adverse effects Several Indian organisations are taking initiative in improving quality of
work life of their workers. Bharat Heavy Electricals (BHEL) is one such organisation
which took up job redesign as an O.D. intervention as early as 1975 In an HRD system
there is always a focus on employee welfare and quality of work life. (See Chaper 17)
10 Participative devices. Following are some important participative devices Bi-partite
meetings (between management and workers) (a) To arrive at settlements concerning
worker's wages and service conditions.
(b) To review the working of existing settlements and examine their impact on workplace
discipline, work ethics, customer service, etc Information sharing: To share information
about the business profitability, performance of the company, competition, marketing,
etc
Joint aureys: Management and union to undertake joint surveys on the state of morale,
motivation, grievances of workers, etc, and to jointly plan ways of dealing with these
problems.
Task forces To undertake study of problems like 'Absenteeism, Indiscipline, etc, and
suggest ways to solve the problem. Collaborative projects: To undertake jointly certain
projects, eg, a project on employee
welfare or workers' education
Quality circles. To involve workers at the grass root level for periodically discussing
work related problems. Quality circles are small groups of employees which are formed
voluntarily They work on the simple premise that the people who do a job every day
know more about it than any one else, particularly when quality or productivity is
involved. In the last few years, many companies, both in the private and public sector
(such as J.K. Jute, Bharat Electronics, BHEL, HMT, etc.) have recorded substantial gains
by implementing the suggestions given by quality circles in their organisations. (See
Chapter 17)
11 Communication. This process is fundamental to all aspects of life and is vital to the
function of integration Real communication takes place when the listener truly hears and
understands the position and intent of the speaker. This requires a type of listening
which is called "projective" While hearing the remarks of the speaker the listener must
project himself into the mind of the speaker in order to understand the speaker's
viewpoint (See
Chapter 14)
12. Counselling and Mentoring. It is an important HRD mechanism to provide timely

guidance to workers on problems relating to hand and heart. Many Indian companies
employ trained counsellors for this purpose. (See Chapter 13)
13. Grievance redressal. A grievance redressal procedure is vital to all organisations- big
or small. The mere fact that an employee has access to a judicial of justice is
satisfying even though he never has an occasion to use it. (See Chapter 16)
14 Data storage and Research. This also is a very important HRD mechanism. It is very
essential to preserve systematic information about every individual employee on various
topics such as the employee's personal characteristics, performance-potential,
promotions, salary, etc so that this may be used for counselling, career planning,
training, promotion, etc. Moreover, this information also serves as a base for research on
employee problems. Some times fresh data may be needed for identifying appropriate
interventions for improving the utilisation of human resources. This involves the
following four discrete yet interdependent steps
(1) Choosing the type of data to be collected. The HRD manager should first of all decide
the precise type of data which he needs. For example, if he wants to know about the
satisfaction level of his employees he may need their opinion on several factors such as
job content, compensation, appraisal system, career development opportunities,
leadership, working conditions, welfare, security, union-management, etc. Deciding how
to collect the data In the second step the techniques to be used for
collecting the data be decided. For example, it may be decided to administer a 5-point
questionnaire to a representative sample of employees.
(i) Deciding how to edit the data. In the third place it should be decided how will
inconsistent replies be dealt with. For example, if the questionnaire has 3 differently
worded questions on the appraisal system put at 3 different places and if a respondent
indicates high satisfaction with the system at one place and high dissatisfaction at other
places, his replies are obviously inconsistent and it may be decided not to take such
replies into account.
(e) Determining how the results of the survey will be fed back to the organisation. The
HRD manager may decide to hold workshops of each category of employees for
discussing the results and for identifying areas where action is needed.
15. Industrial relations. Industrial relations is a catalytic force which plays a vital role
in facilitating or inhibiting the impact of all other methods. Good industrial
relations based on mutual trust and goodwill make the execution of HRD
programmes easy. Poor industrial relations based on mutual distrust and fear
make execution difficult

Historically, unions in our country have been playing the role of agitators and bargainers.
They generally oppose HRD initiatives because they fear that this will shift workers'
loyalty to management, reduce unions' bargaining power, encourage workers' greater
participation in unions leadership and destabilise workers' solidarity. Such fears can be
allayed only by building trust and by providing unions more opportunities in the planning
and implementation of HRD efforts In HRD unions are encouraged to make a thrust
towards the psychological and social wellbeing of workers. Some important areas in
which they are asked to participate are as follows:
1. Communication: Unions can pass on greater and more varied information to
workers about themselves and the organisation. At present they only
communicate on service conditions and related issues under this belief that
workers are not interested in receiving information on any other issues. This is
wrong.
2. Counselling: Unions can play a very positive role in providing counselling
services to employees. Cases of excessive drinking, smoking, drug addiction,
indebtedness, etc., not infrequent and need to be to by the unions. Defending a
workman during departmental enquiry for misconducts is not enough.
3. Education and training. Another important area in which unions can play
adevelopment role is education of workers. Unions can help them acquire new
humanrelations and work-related skills. The former would include akills of
collaboration, empathy,collective action, etc. The latter would include skills to do
new jobs and new projects.
4. Welfare: Unions can help management in developing innovative welfare schemes
for employees such as workers' co-operatives, workers' banks, nursery schools,
etc.
5. 5. Family and vocational guidance: Unions can help workers' families in several
ways. For example, they can provide guidance in respect of the education and
career of workers' children. They can provide conciliation services in settling
family quarrels. They can help in creating jobs for the wives of workers and so on.
6. Research: Unions can play a very significant role in generating data on
variousdimensions of workers' needs, aspirations, standard of living, etc. For this
purpose they canresearch projects either independently or in collaboration with
academic institutions.
7. The Baroda unit of ABB has a history of a long, peaceful and harmonious
industrialrelations The foundation of this harmony is the company's HRD policy
and experiments inparticipative forums, employee involvement, team work,
relationships built on mutual trustand respect, TQM implementation and
continuous education..
8. For ensuring the effectiveness of the above methods:
9. they should be properly designed keeping in view the organisation's needs;
10. they should be systematically linked to produce the holism effect; 3 they should
be periodically reviewed to examine whether they are producing the
11. desired effects; and

12. they should receive commitment from top otherwise they will become mere
rituals.
13. It should be noted that some of the above methods (such as performance
appraisal, potential appraisal, role analysis and role development are of very
limited advantage in the development of workers and are, therefore, used mostly
for developing managerial competencies only. Methods generally used for
developing the competencies of workers are grievance redressal, participation,
welfare, counselling, quality of work life, quality circles and training
HRD Outcomes
Following are the various outcomes which result from HRD methods via improvement in
the human processes which is one of the leading characteristics of HRD.
1. People in the organisation become more competent because on the one hand they
become better aware of the skills required for job performance and on the other
hand there is greater clarity of norms and standards
2. People understand their roles better because through increased communication
they become aware of the expectations which other members of their role set
have from them.
3. People become more committed to their jobs because now there is greater
objectivity in the administration of rewards. They come forward with better and
more creative ideas.
4. People develop greater trust and respect for each other. They become more open
and
5. authentic in their behaviour. Thus new values come to be generated.
6. There is greater collaboration and teamwork which produces synergy effect
7. . People find themselves better equipped with problem-solving capabilities. They
become
8. more prone to risk-taking and proactive in their orientation. There is greater
readiness on
9. their part to accept change.
10. . Lot of useful and objective data on employees are generated which facilitate
better human resource planning
11. The top management becomes more sensitive to employees' problems and human
12. processes due to increased openness in communication.
13. The net result of the above outcomes is that the organisation becomes more
effective. It achieves new heights in terms of productivity, cost, growth,
diversification, profits and publie image. However, one should not expect these
results in a short period. But if these results do not appear even after a reasonably
long period one should question the qualitative and quantitative adequacy of the
HRD processes and the related methods which are being used in that
organisation. It should also be remembered that excellent HRD outcomes at any
given point of time are also a consequence of many other factors such as top

management's commitment to HRD, availability of HRD professionals, adequate
HRD structure, a culture that can nurture and value the development of human
resources, a set of policies that can. develop culture and competencies and so on.
14. Over the years, researchers have collected a fair amount of empirical evidence
that
15. certain HRD practices can directly affect an organisation's performance. The
following table
16. summarises some of these findings:
Most of the evidence is in the form of case studies which do not scientifically prove a
clear linkage between HRD effort and organisation performance. Hence it is sometimes
said that HRD successes are nothing more than "Hawthorne effects"-that special
attention frequently causes people to increase their efforts.
Characteristics of HRD
Let us refer back to Rao's definition of HRD given on page 3. Important characteristics of
HRD which emerge from this definition are as under
1 HRD is a process. Just like the "throughput proces" in the input-output model of
production methods also transform all inputs (human beings) into desired outputs. How
do HRD methods achieve this ? Every method has two dimensions: Substantive or
structural and procedural. Substantive dimension is what is being done; procedural is
how it is done, including how people are relating to each other and what group dynamics
are taking place While the substantive for structural) dimension has its grounding in
classical organisation theory the procedural dimension reflects the human relations
movement
In most of the organisations, there is overemphasis on the substantive dimension of a
method, and its procedural dimension is overlooked. Whenever there is a problem in the
organisation its solution is sought in the rules and structures rather than in the
underlying group dynamics and human behaviour Thus, rules may be changed, structure
may be modified but peculiarities of human behaviour remain unfortunately untouched. It
is thought that there is no need to pay any attention to them. This is not so under HRD
which gives to the human process as much attention (if not more) as to the substantive
dimension.
One can find six human processes in operation in an organisation at six different levels.
HRD methods help in promoting or improving these processes as described below:
At the personal level there is the existential process. This process tells us how an
individual perceives his environment, how he interacts with others, how he achieves his
goals in life and so on. If this process is neglected it may adversely affect the integration
of the individual with organisation and his quality of work, Career planning, Performance

Appraisal and Review, Feedback, Counseling, Job Enrichment. Objective Rewards, etc.,
improve this process.
(i) At the interpersonal level we have the empathic process. This process tells us
how much empathy ane individual has for the other person and how does he reach out to
the other person and establishes a relationship with him. Altruism, Conflict, Cooperation
and Competition are some important areas of study in this process. If this process is
neglected it may adversely affect the interpersonal effectiveness of individual in an
organisation. Training, Rotation, Communication etc., improve this
Process
) At the role level we have the coping process. Every individual is required to cope with
various pressures and stresses in relation to his role in the organisation. However, if the
individual's rele is clear and the individual is aware of the competencies required for his
role he can cope with these pressures effectively Role analysis goes a long way to
improve this process.
tel At the group level we have the building process. This process tells us various groups
form themselves as distinct entities in an organisation, how do they become cohesive
and strong and how can they effectively contribute to the goals of the organisation.
Several OD and team-building exercises improve this process.
how
(e) At the intergroup level we have the competitive and the collaborative
processes. Both can be either positive or negative. Competition is positive if it poses a
challenge to a group in terms of standard of performance and achievement. It is negative
if it prevents a group from achieving its goals. Similarly, collaboration is positive if it
aims at helping others in achieving a common goal. It is negative if it aims at escaping
hard work. This process can be very much improved by creating a climate of trust,
authenticity, openness etc and by clarifying norms and standards (e) At the
organisational level we have the growth process. This involves issues
relating to organisational culture, change and organisational effectiveness. HRD
examines its methods periodically to see whether they are promoting or hindering
the above-mentioned processes. The following diagram illustrates the input-throughput
(process)-output relationship in a training sub-system:
9. Empathy is the ability to put oneself in another's position
10. Role can be broadly defined as the behaivour commonly sxpected of an individual
by other members of his role set. (See Chapter 4).

2. BRD is a continuous and planned development effort. In any development effort
the end is never reached. HRD alen being a development effort always goes on
even when organisations have reached saturation in their growth. Their excellent
HRD profiles at any given point of time do not guarantee that they will continue to
remain so for all times to come. HRD is, therefore undertaken on a continuous
basis in a proactive, planned manner by allocating resources for the purpose, and
by creating an HRD philosophy that values human beings and promotes their
development.
3 HRD develops capabilities and competencies at four levels: individual, dyadic, group
and organisation. These capabilities and competencies include new knowledge,
attitudes, values and skills in 3 broad areas viz., technical (eg., designing a machine or
servicing a product), conceptual (eg, planning a strategy) and behavioural teg leading a
group, building a cohesive team or resolving a conflict) Development of these
competencies helps people in performing the existing tasks better or faster, or in
performing new tasks
At the individual level HRD makes people aware of the expectations of other persons
about their roles so that they are able to improve their skills and attitudes accordingly.
Holes of individuals are made more interesting by designing and redesigning jobs and by
job. enrichment programmes. At the dyadic level strong supervisor-subordinate
relationship is developed by developing in the two persons more trust, mutuality and
feedback. At the group level committees or task groups are made more effective by
developing team spirit and use of available resources within the team. Finally, at the
organisation level HRD develops "enabling culture" so called because it enables the
development of not only various competencies at different levels but also self-renewing
mechanism in the organisation which enables it to adjust to the changes in the
environment and to proact
4. The ultimate object of HRD is to contribute to the professional well-being.
motivation and pride of employees. Since an organisation can only be as effective
as its employees, an enlightened, motivated and job-satisfied body of employees
is the ultimate objective of HRD. Thus understood, HRD denotes the contribution
of the growth of the well- known human relations school of management which
began over eight decades ago on the basic premise that the fulfillment of an
organisation's immediate and future goals depends to a considerable extent on
the fulfillment of its people's goals.
HRD efforts motivate people to maximise their performance beyond the assigned roles.
HRD believes that it is not enough if people within an organisation simply carry out what
is assigned to them. They must also perform certain actions which though not assigned
by role prescriptions are very important to accomplish organisational goals. These
include: (i) doing acts of cooperation, eg., lending tools to fellow-worker, diagnosing a
defect in his machine, helping a fellow-worker who is behind on his quota and so on; (ii)
protecting an organisation against disaster, eg, saving life and property in the

organisation; (iii) contributing ideas for organisational improvement; (iv) self-education,
i.e., continually increasing competencies and continually raising demands on oneself; (v)
helping to create a favourable climate for the organisation in the community which
surrounds it. These actions also contribute to the pride of employees.
Is HRD a Profession ?
Mc Farland gives the following characteristics of a profession 1 Existence of an
organised and systematic body of knowledge.
2 Farmalized methods of acquiring training and experience 3. Existence of an association
with professionalisation as its goal.
4 Existence of an ethical code to regulate the behaviour of the members. 5. Charging of
fees based on service but with due regard for the priority of service
the desire for monetary reward.
Although, of late, quite a large number of books on HRD have been written by Indian
authors, there are only few which are based on fundamental research and theory. Some
books give unly generalined accounts of HRD implementations in certain industries at
specific periods of time. Some others do not clearly distinguish between HRD's
development role and its emphasis on process from personnel management's support
role and its emphasis on routine. Thus, our corpus of knowledge besides being small is
also unsystematic and unclear HRD has not yet gained clear cut independent identity
separate from personnel management's traditional role. So far as the formal methods of
imparting training and teaching are concerned, HRD is now taught by several universities
but there is no prescribed standard for this purpose. We have MBA with HRD, MSW with
HRD, PGD in HRD and so on. Some of those are degrees, some are diplomas and some
are certificates and are completed during varying time periods. What makes the situation
worse is the fact that there are no well-defined pre-requisites for offering these courses.
This has adversely affected the quality
and credibility of HRD learning
India has two professional bodies which deal with HRD issues
(a) National HRD Network, and
(b) Academy of HRD
The National HRD Network which was formed in 1985 disseminates HRD knowledge and
skills among HRD practitioners by holding meetings and workshops and publishing
monthly HRD Newsletter The Academy of HRD was started in 1990 by the National HRD
Network to promote education, research and training in HRD. It is located in Ahmedabad.

It conducts its own diploma and doctoral level programmes and publishes research
monographs. Its main mission is to professionalise HRD in all fields in India. Membership
of both these bodies is open to all on payment of fee and is not restricted to
professionals only. Thus, on the one hand, it has failed to bind HRD professionals by a
sense of identity, on the other, encouraged a number of organisations to appoint people
without professional training as HRD managers. Today, almost all managers dealing with
personnel training call themselves HRD managers. Unlike this, the Academy of Human
Resource Development USA, has introduced in 1999 a Code of Ethics called the
Standards of Ethics which establish desired standards of behaviour and bring in an
increased sense of professionalism to those doing research and practice. (See Box).
There exists no organisation in India to codify standards of HRD practice or to regulate
the entry of HRD practitioners into the profession nor is there any ethical code of
conduct (like that of physician's Hippocratic oath) to enjoin giving precedence to
propriety of service
and altruistic values over pursuit of material gain From what has been said above it
becomes amply clear that HRD in India has not yet acquired the status of a profession
perhaps because of its recent origin. Compared to other professions such as medicine
and law (which have a history of thousands of years) HRD is hardly 50 years old. The first
HRD department in India was created by Larsen & Toubro in 1975. It is a new concept
which is still to be fully understood and accepted both within professional practice and
enquiry.
We may thus conclude that HRD in India can at best be called an occupation. Difference
between
the Traditional Personnel Management Function and HRD
1. While the traditional personnel management function is a routine, maintenance-
oriented support function whose major attention is on ensuring discipline,
administering perks, welfare etc. HRD is a continuous always going on,
development-oriented function whose major attention is on improving human
competencies via improvement in human processes
2. While the traditional personnel management function uses 'training' as its
principal mechanism to develop human competencies, HRD uses a variety of
other mechanisms such as performance appraisal, potential appraisal, feedback
and counselling, career planning etc. and also attempts to find out new ways of
developing human competencies. It constantly
3. reviews and rejuvenates its mechanisms in order to ensure that they generate the
desired human processIC
4. While the traditional personnel management function is seen as an independent
function with independent sub-functions, HRD is viewed as a sub-system of a
large system, eir the Human Resource Management (HRM) and is supposed to be
made up of mutually dependent parts. This means that the design of HRD cannot

be considered in isolation. It must take into account ita linkages and Interfaces
with two other parts of HRM giz personnel management and industrial relations.
5. While the traditional personnel management function is regarded as mainly a
reactive function responding to the demands of the organisation as and when
they arise, HRD is regarded as a proactive function. The function of HRD is not
merely to cope with the immediate needs of the organisation but to anticipate
them and to act on them in advance in a continous and planned way.
6. While the traditional personnel management function is supposed to be the
exclusive responsibility of the personnel department, HRD is considered as the
joint responsibility of the line managers and HRD personnel. In fact, HRD believes
that functions like industrial relations, reward and punishment performance
appraisal, promotion etc. should increasingly become the responsibility of the line
people.
7. While the traditional personal management function takes a very narrow views of
its scope and aims at developing and administrating people only, HRD takes a
much wider views of its scope and aims at developing the total organisation. The
emphasis in the traditional personnel function is on increasing people's
efficiency, the emphasis in HRD is on building the right type of culture in the
organisation-a culture that can continuously identify, bring to surface, nurture and
use the capabilities of people.
8. While the traditional personnel management function considera salary, economic
rewards, job simplification and job specialisation as important motivators; HRD
emphasises the importance of higher needs in motivating individuals, It considers
informal organisation, autonomous work groups, role enrichment, job challenge
and creativity as the main motivating forces: Also, while the traditional personnel
management function (with human relations orientation) considers improved
satisfaction and morale as the cause of improved performance, HRD considers
the other way round. It considers improved performance as
9. cause and improved satisfaction and morale as its results. See chapter 10.
10. While in the traditional personnel management function employees constitute an
11. element of cost, in HRD they are considered as intellectual capital. HRD therefore
focuses on its proper utilisation, retention and multiplication.
Need for HRD
1. HRD is needed to develop competencies. No organisation can survive, let alone
make a mark, if its employees are not competent in terms of knowledge, skills and
attitudes. Competent employees are as much the necessity of a non-profit
organisation as of a profit- making organisation. Both types of organisations need
competent employees for the success of their internal and external operations. A
profit organisation interested in growing, diversifying or improving its working
(such as cost reduction, reduction in delays, increased customer satisfaction,
improved quality, market image, etc.) must first think of developing its employees'
competencies. Similarly, a non-profit organisation, say a university or a hospital

interested in improving its work culture, must first think of orienting its
employees' attitudes.
2. HRD is needed to mitigate some of the evil consequences of industrialisation. It is
common knowledge that the factory system has dehumanised and deskilled
various jobs. By enriching workers' roles HRD satisfies their needs of
advancement, growth, self-respect, recognition, creativity and autonomy. Under
career development plans workers are more or less assured about their future.
Other HRD mechanisms such as counselling, monitoring, quality of work life, etc.
enable workers to lead an integrated life which is mostly partitioned by the factory
system into two lives: the organisational life and the personal life.
3. HRD is needed to bring about system-wide changes. Whereas traditional human
resource development methods (such as training, job-rotation, etc.) have their
relevance and usefulness, they are by themselves inadequate to bring about the
kind of system-wide change which is visualised in the concept of HRD. In
traditional methods often top management personnel have the attitude that all is
well with themselves, and it is only the lower level which needs to be trained and
developed. Such attitude makes these programmes ineffective because by keping
the interdependent and interacting higher levels out, these levels continue to
remain plagued by forces of mistrust, jealousy and authoritarianism HRD
programmes bring about a system-wide change. They graduallyenrich the entire
socio-technical system
4. HRD is needed to develop a proper development climate in the organisation that
can continuously identify, bring to surface, nurture and use the capabilities of
people-a climate that can make people more open, independent, authentic,
creative and collaborative in their behaviour. No other traditional method can do
this. The existing climate of most of the traditional organisations generally works
against employee development because in this climate (al executives generally
remain unaware of human problems of their subordinates who
5. suppress their emotions and disguise their feelings.
6. decision-making becomes less effective because there is decrease in
experimentation and risk-taking with new ideas, and (el there is increase in
conformity, mistrust, and dependence, specially on those who are in power
Need for HRD in the Indian context
With liberalisation of the Indian economy many changes are taking place in the corporate
sector Many public sector enterprises are being sold to private hands, there is increase
in work load, ban on new recruitment, retrenchment of labour, imposition of voluntary
retirement schemes and so on. There is pressure on the Indian industry to perform-
produce quality goods and provide quality services. With increased competition there is
need to become cost-effective and upgrade work methods, work norms, technical and
managerial and motivation to face up to new challenges. will have to play a very crucial
role if the following changes which are sweeping through our industry are to prove

1 Restructuring of organisations and redefining of skill boundaries. Many Indian
companies are restructuring their organisation structures by thinning their management
ranks and expanding their spans of control. Seven layers in the pyramid and seven direct
subordinates for each boss which used to be the historic norm for many large
companies is becoming a thing of the past. Now the thrust is to flatten layers, expand
spans and transform the organisational pyramid from tall and narrow to short and wide.
Further, the traditional functional departmentalisations cast around manufacturing and
marketing are giving place to departments focused on broad classes of products or
services. These new departments reduce hierarchy, stress better work, reward creativity
and increase receptivity to the customer. The skill sets required of those heading these
departments differ from the skill sets required of those heading the traditional functional
units. Unlike the 'specialist heads of functional departments these heads are required to
be generalists who have working familiarity with engineering, manufacturing and
marketing.
2 Emphasis on core competency. With the licensing era coming to an end in India
companies now no longer need to preemptively secure licenses in diverse and unrelated
area to outwit their competitors. There is now a perceptible shift in favour of developing
core competency. Many companies which realise that they are not adding value in all
functional areas are increasingly outsourcing all but the most critical functions.
3. Focus on quality. In the past in a protected environment with a lot of demand even for
sub-standard products, customer and quality were never considered important and the
entire focus was on quantity of output. Management believed in only 'carrot and stick
approach towards employees and never thought in terms of developing the quality of its
output. Then, for sometime, due to the success stories of Japanese companies, there
was a shift in management's focus and craving for ISO 9000 accreditation started. Now
there is a wave in favour of Total Quality Management which calls for a change in the
mindset of individuals. This can come only through massive HRD efforts.
4. Technological changes. Recent spurt in computerisation and technological
upgradation is, on the one hand, streamlining process and paper work and increasing
quality, service and speed and, on the other hand, changing the way companies do
business, E-commerce is rapidly becoming the organisational challenge of the new
millennium. With the advancement in tele-communications, employees can now work in
their homes and gain due to savings in rents, transportation, etc. Companies can also
save on office space and overhead expenses. These changes may make Indian workers
redundant at some places. The redundant workers everywhere need to be rehabilitated
through training. The change has to be brought about with a human face. At this point,
the HRD manager has a critical role to play.
5. Work force empowerment. For the corporate democracy to become a reality many
companies are now vesting their employees with greater authority, expanding their job
titles and increasing their accountability. In a country where the 'benevolent autocrat' has
been the overwhelmingly preferred style real empowerment of the work force is going to

pose a big challenge for the HRD manager. He must develop workers' capabilities to
participate meaningfully in the matters concerning them.
6. More attention to special categories of workers. With the special cateogries of workers
such as physically handicapped, women, religious minority, backward and others
forming the ever-increasing proportion of organisations' total work force every year, they
are becoming more diverse in terms of gender, race, age, and ethnicity. This is forcing
management to adapt its human resource practices to reflect these changes. Family-
friendly measures like flexi time and tele work are likely to assume greater significance.
Flexi time permits workers to start, finish and take meal breaks according to their own
liking within a flexible time band subject to a core time when every one has to be in
attendance. This measure can help women workers to balance their job demands with
their family demands. Similarly, tele work can be of great help to the physically
handicapped.
7. Compensation linked to shareholder value. Top management compensation in U.S.
firms is becoming increasingly tied to shareholder value through expanded use of share
options. A study of more than one hundred German companies" found a strong link
between investing in employees and stock market performance. Companies which place
workers at the core of their strength produce higher long-term returns to shareholders
than their industry peers. in India may follow these examples and link executive
compensation to the production of greater investor wealth.
8. Greater employee retention and commitment. Employee retention has been a the
forefront of resource strategies in recent times. Worldwide, organisations seeking
competitive advantage by leveraging human capital, have had to learn to hold on to the
be talents in the business. With the looming prospect of the labour market tightening
further Indian organisations will be hard pressed to find enduring remedies to
dysfunctional employee turnover. They will also have to sustain conditions that induce
long-term employee and membership behaviour. In a study of 7,500 large companies in
13 countries conducted by the Walker Information and CSM Worldwide Network-an
Indianopolis-based organisation, it has been found that although in respect of "employee
focus" (defined as the extent to which an organisation attends to the needs and wants of
its employees) India ranks very high (third), but in respect of "employee commitment"
(defined as the extent to which employees are behaviourally interested in and attached to
the organisation) it ranks surprisingly very low (ninth). Long-term HRD interventions
using behavioural understanding are, therefore, required to establish new work ethics
and to build greater employee commitment.
9. Team development and inter-team collaboration. At present employees in Indian
organisations, are normally a divided lot with differences rooted in intra- and inter-
union conflicts, regions, castes, departments and shifts. Given the fact that the
output of one section is dependent on the output or support of the other section
such differences produce an adverse impact on every organisation's efficiency in

terms of quantity, quality, cost and delivery. HRD has a critical role to play in
building cohesive teams and creating linkages among them.
10. Building new organisation culture. Our organisations need to continuously renew
and rejuvenate themselves to face global competition. This needs inculcation of
certain valuesin all employees. These values known by the acronym OCTAPACE
are openness, confrontation, trust, authenticity, proactivity, autonomy,
collaboration and experimentation Organisations can build OCTAPACE culture
only through HRD. Not only this, in the wake of globalisation it is evident that
Indian organisations need to give careful attention to cultural preparation of their
expatriate employees. They have to develop eventually a cadre of transcultural
employees who can operate effectively in several cultures. Transnational
organisations, that is organisations which have ownership, operations, markets
and managers not dominated by any single nation, seek such employees. HRD
alone can make our employees transcultural.
11. Better response to external forces. Organisations are not closed systems. They have
to continuously interact with a number of stake-holders (such as government, trade
unions, shareholders, consumers and trade bodies, environmentalists and others) who
form an part of their external environment. Organisations, therefore, need to develop
necessary skills to be able to deal with all these entities more effectively.
12. More research in HRD. Continuous research is needed to discover new HRD methods
and interventions to develop competencies of individuals and teams. This is possible nly
when there are HRD-oriented organisations to pool and share their experiences in
diverse areas. The National HRD Network and many other professional bodies find it
difficult to mobilise researches in our country.

Introduction

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Introduction