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European Journal of Management and Marketing Studies ISSN: 2501 - 9988 ISSN-L: 2501 - 9988 Available on-line at: http://www.oapub.org/soc 10.5281/zenodo.208233 Volume 1│Issue 2│2016 DISCUSSING THE EFFECTIVE FACTORS ON MAINTENANCE OF HUMAN RESOURCES Bahare Shahriarii Department of Management, Payame Noor University (PNU), Iran Abstract: In this research, the author has elaborated on detection of effective factors on maintenance and retention of human resources. Since human resources are the most resources for obtaining competitive advantage, it is essential to pay attention to different dimensions of human resources management. One of these dimensions is retention of human resources. Factors such as providing correct and valid information at the time of recruitment, assigning tasks based on competence, existence of a clear career, having a suitable evaluation system and effective reward systems are effective in terms of retention and maintenance of human resources. Keywords: human resources management, maintenance and retention, human resources Introduction One of the most important tasks of every organization’s human resource management is retention or maintenance of human resources. In this regard, desertion rate is considered as a major index for evaluation of performance of HRM (human resource management). If its value was in a normal range, then management’s performance in terms of retention of personnel would be considered as desirable. However, there is also another side to this coin and that side is related to the reason why the personnel have decided to continue their career. Undoubtedly, the management of an organization is sensitive to the reason why the personnel have decided to stay in the organization. In case there was a desirable combination of reasons for the former, then the management board could continue its job at ease. On the other hand, human resources are considered as competitive advantages only when the organization Copyright © The Author(s). All Rights Reserved Published by Open Access Publishing Group ©2015. 99 Bahare Shahriari – DISCUSSING THE EFFECTIVE FACTORS ON MAINTENANCE OF HUMAN RESOURCES possesses elite human resources in order to be able to learn and to realize the acquired knowledge faster than competitors (Armstrong, 2003). Also in terms of debates related to lack of work force, probably the efforts have been oriented towards focusing on labor supply rather than labor demand. Therefore, in many organizations which have problems, one of the most economic strategies for overcoming lack of workforce is to maintain the existing elite work force (Armstrong, 2002). Since retention and maintenance measures are compliments for other processes related to HRM, even if the processes of recruitment, selection, assignment and optimization are performed well enough, without maintenance the results of management would not be significant (Dewas, 2009). One of the indexes of having advantage and superiority over other organizations is possession of committed and capable human resources (HR). Human resources with organizational attachment who are loyal and compatible with the objectives of the organization can be considered as major factors in terms of organizational efficiency (Hofmann, 2009). Factors such as providing valid information at the time of recruitment, assigning tasks based on competencies, existence of a clear career and having effective evaluation and reward systems are effective in terms of maintenance and retention of human resources. It must be taken into account that organizations have significant annual expenses for maintenance and retention of their personnel and this is while every organization can not only maintain its current personnel, but also absorb new ones through adoption of suitable approaches. In a previous study performed by Doaei and ”orjali Lou titled as discussing the relationship between perceived organizational support and organizational commitment and desertion intention . Their research was performed in and contained a research sample including 120 employees of a governmental organization. Consequently their results indicated that there is a positive relation between perceived organizational support and organizational commitment. In addition, a negative relation held between the former and desertion intention. In addition, their results showed that there exists a significant positive relation between perceived organizational support and all three dimensions of organizational commitment. In this regard, the lowest correlation was detected for perceived organizational support and continuous commitment. On the other hand, there exists a negative relation between entire three dimensions of organizational commitment and in this regard, highest negative correlation was detected for desertion intention. Mustafa Zadeh and “mman Zadeh performed a research titled as discussing effective factors on retention of personnel in and on a research sample including 5 9 individuals. They showed that three categories of factors titled as motivational factors, organization’s internal environment and organization’s external environment are the most important factor clusters on organizational sustainability. Their results indicated European Journal of Management and Marketing Studies - Volume 1 │ Issue 2 │ 2016 100 Bahare Shahriari – DISCUSSING THE EFFECTIVE FACTORS ON MAINTENANCE OF HUMAN RESOURCES that job satisfaction, external factors and internal factors have the highest respective effects on retention of personnel. On the other hand, the relation between job satisfaction and effects of external factors on employee retention is a reverse relation. In other words, there are many people who are not satisfied by their jobs but remain in their job as a result of external factors. This cannot be desirable for management of an organization. Jahangiri et al. 9 carried out a research titled as detection and prioritization of factors effective on retention of expert employees . The general purpose of this study was to detect and prioritize effective factors on maintenance and retention of expert personnel. Results of their study manifested that retention factors are respectively prioritized in seven elements including content and nature of the job; job satisfaction and security; management and leadership; clearness of objectives and expectations; collaboration atmosphere and work, salary and rewards. Ghorbani and Rezaei Rad performed a research titled as managerial role of police chiefs in terms of retention of police employees . The main objective of this study was to detect and present different managerial roles of police chiefs and manner of effectiveness of performance of these roles on retention and maintenance of police employees. The theoretical framework of the study was based on Mintzberg’s theory and included three main theories. Obtained results indicated that police chiefs require efficient and sufficient education regarding managerial roles and that they should pay attention to the role of decision making in retention of employees. In the following, you can study a summary of ideas of different authors about effective elements on retention of employees. Goldsmith: identification of competent employees, paying attention to competent employees, gratitude, providing the contexts for progression, optimization of reward systems, providing employees with cultural freedom and providing entrepreneurship opportunities. Lee: making opportunities for growth and development, making the jobs more challenging, making the jobs meaningful through career enrichment, presence of great characters in the organization, making teams, having a good boss and gratitude for those who work well. Hey study group: career progression, learning and development, making the jobs more challenging, meaningfulness of the job, formation of varieties and different work combinations, presence of popular characters, making teams, having good bosses, gratitude for good deeds, freedom and self-control, flexibility during work time, advantages and fair salaries. Kapli: suitable salaries, suitable job design, compatibility between the job and employee, persuasion of employees towards establishment of social relations, placement of employees in suitable geographical conditions, having suitable recruitment processes and alliance with competitors. European Journal of Management and Marketing Studies - Volume 1 │ Issue 2 │ 2016 101 Bahare Shahriari – DISCUSSING THE EFFECTIVE FACTORS ON MAINTENANCE OF HUMAN RESOURCES In a research performed by Deloi et al , titled as Human resources management in governmental section of Iran elaborated on HRM with respect to social contexts prevailing in Iran and have been discussed the weaknesses of human resources in Iran’s governmental section. Their results included Recruitment Rewarding Education and Development Performance Evaluation Large Number of Employees And Lack of Management 2. High Job Security 3. Recruitment Fluctuation 4. Selection Based on Behavior 5. Importance of Education 6. Having Abstract Criterions for Recruitment And Promotion 7. Low Sociability Mechanism 1. Constant Salary Systems 2. Payment of Rewards With no Specific Structure 3. Hierarchical Salaries 4. Importance of Education 5. Low Participation of Employees In Specification of Salaries 6. Numerous Subsidies 1. Inexpert Work Force 2. Balanced Educational Program 3. Education Regarding Quality of Life 4. Unplanned Educational Programs 5. Low Participation of Employees In Designing Educational Programs 1. Lack of Proportion Between Performance and Reward 2. Unstructured Evaluation 3. Abstract Evaluation 4. Evaluation Based On Behavior Rather Than Results 5. Low Participation 6. Top to Bottom Attitude 1. Statement of Problem Nowadays, HRM is considered as a major conflict for managers of every organization. In fact, elements such as complexity of organizations, technological changes and continuously changing global conditions amplify the need for paying attention to this subject. Two people may enter an organization at the same time and under similar situations. However, one of them may desert his or her job and the other may not. In the first case, the situation should be analyzed considering desertion issue and in the second case effective factors on the employee’s retention must be analyzed and studied. On this basis, retention of employees can be related to consideration for the process of maintenance of human resources by the management of organization. This process is a rational and intellectual choice which takes place during one’s employment in an organization (Bazaz Jazayeri, 2011). The point that should be taken into account is that not all types and manners of retention of human resources are suitable. This is because a person or employee cannot be beneficial for an organization under every circumstance. This is mostly because performance of a weak person not only raises costs, but also diminishes the spirits of coworkers as well. In other words, existence of such employees may result in extreme conflicts or even chaos (Morehead and Griffin, 2012). European Journal of Management and Marketing Studies - Volume 1 │ Issue 2 │ 2016 102 Bahare Shahriari – DISCUSSING THE EFFECTIVE FACTORS ON MAINTENANCE OF HUMAN RESOURCES One of the most important factors of superiority of an organization over another is its human resources. These people tend to maintain values and their participation in organization as well. They also act beyond their written tasks and are considered as major factors in terms of organizational effectiveness. Having such human resources leads to improvement of performance, reduction of absence rates and desertion as well (Mobley, 2011). The issue of desertion intention is nowadays considered by many managers and researchers. On this basis, organizations should adopt strategies which are helpful in terms of early detection of intention for desertion before acting it. This issue has negative effects on motivation of the employee and also has negative effects on other employees as well. Their absence forces other employees to take their duties and this means more expenses and time (Arizi, 2009). After recruitment and education, the management of an organization is left with yet another more difficult task which is retention and maintenance of the recruited work force. For this purpose, expert of the field of management have mentioned three HRM planning processes including recruitment, education and retention. Among these, the highest importance has been given to retention process. If an organization was able to successfully accomplish recruitment and education phases but failed in retention process, then it most probably will be unsuccessful in terms of realization of its goals. In other words if the entire recruitment, education and other personnel related measures are done perfectly but retention is failed, then outcomes of management would not be significant. This is why managers and organizations try to recruit and maintain expert and elite work forces. On this basis, the system of HRM can be considered as a tripod with its legs being the aforementioned processes of recruitment, education and retention. In fact, the HRM system will only be effective when all these dimensions are in a proportionately suitable status. Basically, an organization which has successfully accomplished recruitment and education phases can only be successful when it is able to prevent its employees from desertion and persuade them towards sustaining their career (Bolleri and Sharon, 2001). Strategies for retention of competence work force As Smith says, organization managers can no longer pay for fluctuations of human resource market and it is time to pay attention to humane assets of organizations as attention is paid to financial assets. The following strategies are proposed by Smith: 1. Detection of employees who need to be sustained 2. Competent employees must know that you tend to sustain them 3. Gratitude 4. Providing progression opportunity 5. Reviewing reward systems European Journal of Management and Marketing Studies - Volume 1 │ Issue 2 │ 2016 103 Bahare Shahriari – DISCUSSING THE EFFECTIVE FACTORS ON MAINTENANCE OF HUMAN RESOURCES 6. Cultural tolerance Major factors for retention of employees In terms of retention of employees, our most essential goal must be to sustain and maintain those employees who are valuable to the organization according to the following two criterions: 1. Performance 2. The ability to replace These manifest an individual’s overall efficiency which is evaluated through evaluations based on performance and objective indexes such as amount of production, amount of sale or number of services provided by the individual. In normal conditions, organizations prefer to lose employees with weak performance and sustain those employees who possess a better performance. The ability to replace is dominantly due to environmental features and is related to the organization’s ability in terms of refilling a post with a person with required experience and expertise. In this regard, posts which are hard to be refilled are usually of two types: 1. Posts in which having special knowledge regarding certain aspects of the organization is both essential and hard to obtain 2. Posts that require a set of special abilities and skills which are relatively rare in labor market The following provides definitions for the keywords of this research and elaborates on effective elements on maintenance and retention. a. Human resources: it is the most important asset of an organization and successful and efficient management of them is the key to the success of organization. Making a correct and efficient use of human resources for obtaining predetermined goals and objectives of an organization is termed as human resource management (HRM). Functions of human resources include planning for human resources, job analysis, recruitment, selection, education and development, performance management, rewarding and discipline. The concept of human resources addresses the fact that employees are rare resources and can have added-value for their organizations. Therefore, the highest goal of HRM is to help the organization with its performance in order to obtain the aforementioned added-value (Gholipour, 2013). b. Human resource management: it is defined as identification, election, recruitment and education of human resources for obtaining organizational goals (Sadat, 2006). Different dimensions of HRM are adjusted in terms of a system. In this system, the input is the value of resources and facilities and the information and technologies which are different from organization to organization. In addition, in a human resource system, the output includes supplication of human resources, satisfaction of employees and also supplication of social goals. These goals are realized European Journal of Management and Marketing Studies - Volume 1 │ Issue 2 │ 2016 104 Bahare Shahriari – DISCUSSING THE EFFECTIVE FACTORS ON MAINTENANCE OF HUMAN RESOURCES through short term and long term performance of activities such as recruitment, education, retention and application of labor force. In this regard, there are also certain environmental factors engaged with the aforementioned system which include governmental rules and regulations, environmental reactions, organizational rules, etc. (Mirsepasi, 2011). c. Maintenance and retention: it is the process of designing safety and health measures and supplication of welfare services (Seyed Javadin, 2006). Maintenance is defined as prevention from desertion and sustaining people within an organization. In fact, organizations need to adopt necessary precautions (Mirsepasi, 1996). Maintenance is a process in which the management of an organization tries to promote the sense of sustaining the career among employees through making use of elements including effective reward systems, education, promotion based on competence and providing suitable welfare facilities and services and etc. maintenance is in other words, defined as providing employees with suitable conditions so that they would not desire to be transferred to another organization (Khosh Neshin, 1998). Abdulahi et al. (2010) have stated that there are two definitions provided for maintenance in HRM related texts. These include: 1. preventing employees from deserting the organization; 2. supplication of mental and physical health. ”y retention of employees, it isn’t only referred to the physical aspects. Rather it is also referred to active presence of employees within the organization and being consistent with organization’s strategic policies. In other words, it is related to engagement of employees with their job and affairs and issues related to it (Farhangi and Samadi, 2010). Effective factors on maintenance and retention of manpower 1. Having a clear career: clearness of conditions for obtaining different posts, variability of jobs during service and the possibility to obtain them 2. Providing valid and related information at the time of recruitment. In other words, individuals must be made aware of successes of the organization and valid information regarding tasks and responsibilities must be provided for them. 3. Having an effective reward system: payment of salaries according to performance and competence, providing employees with financial facilities, providing welfare facilities 4. Having an effective evaluation system: clearness of evaluation indices. Clearness of managers’ expectations from employees, obligation of managers for recording the performance and behavior of employees, giving feedbacks to employees and talking with them. European Journal of Management and Marketing Studies - Volume 1 │ Issue 2 │ 2016 105 Bahare Shahriari – DISCUSSING THE EFFECTIVE FACTORS ON MAINTENANCE OF HUMAN RESOURCES 5. Assigning tasks based on competence: paying attention to education, experiences and skills of employees and holding in-service educational courses. Conclusions In the section of review of literature, we have pointed to some relevant previous studies along with their results. Each of these studies has elaborated on certain factors and variables effective on maintenance or retention. Results of previous researches manifest that in most organizations in Iran we are faced with major problems regarding maintenance of manpower, especially expert and skilled manpower. It is also noteworthy to mention that previous studies regarding this issue are inadequate in number and providing a suitable model for HRM requires more investigation and study in terms of the subject matter. On the other hand, it can be stated that managers have not paid much attention to studies performed in this subject. Therefore, with respect to results yielded from previously performed studies, in the present study the author has tried to make a more precise analysis of effective elements on maintenance and retention of human resources. In addition, these factors have been prioritized according to conditions of each organization. These efforts have been made towards promotion and optimization of manpower maintenance systems and reduction of costs yielded by desertion of post in order to make organizations able to diagnose their condition in terms of maintenance of manpower and take necessary actions for management and optimization of their activities in terms of retention of manpower. References 1. Abdullahi, B. et al. (2013), factors affecting the retention of skilled manpower in Ilam University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, International Conference on Management: Challenges and Solutions (unfortunately not mentioned the number of pages). 2. Arizi, HR. (2008), the role of evaluation and importance of justice on pay satisfaction, Journal of Ethics in Science and Technology, Issue 1, 2, 93-104. 3. Armstrong, Michael. (2001), Human Resource Management Practice, translation Khudayar Abel and Hassan successful first edition, Tehran, fara publication. 4. Armstrong, Michael. 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(2009), the social status of the police and its effect on retention of police personnel (Proceedings of the First Scientific Conference manpower retention of police personnel applied research office), Tehran, Pardis Danesh. European Journal of Management and Marketing Studies - Volume 1 │ Issue 2 │ 2016 108 Bahare Shahriari – DISCUSSING THE EFFECTIVE FACTORS ON MAINTENANCE OF HUMAN RESOURCES Creative Commons licensing terms Authors will retain copyright to their published articles agreeing that a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0) terms will be applied to their work. Under the terms of this license, no permission is required from the author(s) or publisher for members of the community to copy, distribute, transmit or adapt the article content, providing a proper, prominent and unambiguous attribution to the authors in a manner that makes clear that the materials are being reused under permission of a Creative Commons License. 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