Application Of Quality Of Life In HR Activities: An Essay.

Relevance of Quality of Life to Human Resource Management

Discuss about the application of Quality of Life in Human Resource Activities.

In today’s competitive business world, organisations generate a competitive advantage over others by effectively managing their human resource activities. The human resource management (HRM) is referred to the system implemented by a corporation for managing its human capital. It includes functions relating to the management of human resources which concerned with recruiting, motivating and managing people in a company (Wright and McMahan, 2011). With the growing demand for skilled labour, hiring and retaining talented employees has become a key focus for HR department in companies since it provides them a competitive advantage. However, HR professionals face multiple challenges while managing human capital such as high attrition rate, lack of upward communication, job dissatisfaction, unproductive workers, disputes, lack of motivation, and others. All these factors are linked to employees’ quality of life in the workplace. Quality of work life is defined as a degree to which employees are able to satisfy their significant personal needs through their experience in a corporation (Koonmee et al., 2010). Employees’ quality of work life is substantially relevant because it directly influences their work; therefore, organisations focus on implementing strategic human resource policies for performing HRM activities such as job analysis, HR planning, training and development and maintaining health, safety and security for improving employees’ quality of life at the workplace. This essay will focus on analysing what factors influence the quality of life of employees and evaluating its relevance to human resource management. Further, this essay will focus on examining how the quality of work life applied to different human resource activities by analysing different examples.

Quality of work life enables members at all levels in a corporation to participate in the shaping of the organisation’s cultures, environments, outcomes, and methods. There are a number of factors which influence the desirable quality of work life of employees such as adequate and fair compensation, opportunities for development, safe and healthy working environment, opportunities for career growth, constitutionalism, quality of work, social integration, and special relevance to work. Work is an integral part of people’s life, and it directly influences their overall quality of life. According to Yeo and Li (2011), quality of work life directly influences employees’ job satisfaction level and their performance. Therefore, HR department focuses on improving quality of work life of workers since it results in improving their performance as well. Employees who are satisfied with their work are more likely to perform better since work is not a burden for them. Lack of positive quality of work life can negatively affect employees along with the organisation. Low quality of life results in poor morale, occasional sabotage, reduction in productivity, absenteeism, poor performance, disputes and others (Gayathiri et al., 2013). Ultimately, consequences of the low quality of work life resulted in negatively affected the organisation. Therefore, employees’ quality of work life is highly relevant to human resource management since it directly influences their and company’s performance which require organisations to implement appropriate policies for improving employees’ quality of work life.

Factors Influencing Quality of Life of Employees

While performing different HRM activities, such as job analysis, compensation management, HR practices, training and development, performance appraisal, and workplace safety, managers have to ensure that they maintain employees' quality of life. For example, during recruitment and selection process, HR managers should ensure that they hire candidates with right qualifications and select them for right position so that they did not get dissatisfied by the work and receive growth opportunities (Jackson et al., 2011). The HR managers should carefully perform job analysis process in order to ensure that they understand each aspect of the job which allows them to match them with job applicants’ qualifications carefully. After hiring a candidate, managers should use effective HR practices for ensuring that the employee is satisfied with his/her job. Effective HR practices directly influence the quality of work life of employees and it also positively influences the firm’s overall growth (Clarke and Brooks, 2010). Each worker should receive appropriate compensation for his/her work in order to ensure that he/she is able to live a decent life and afford basic amenities. Furthermore, employees’ who perform excellently and exceed their targets should receive incentives for their performance. As per Equity theory of motivation, an employee’s output should be equal to his/her input which ensures that he/she is satisfied with his job (Bratton and Gold, 2017). Moreover, HR policies for training and development of employees also improve their quality of work life since provide them opportunities for growth and improve their lives.

In recent years, organisations focus on implementing effective HR practices for positively influencing the work life of employees which improve their performance as well. For example, Google Incorporation is one of the leading firms in the technology industry, and it is able to improve its performance based on effective HR planning. The company is able to hire talented employees from worldwide because of its effective HR structure which provides facilities such as free lunch, unlimited sick leave, free tuition and training, support from supervisors, planned family vacations, and time to work on personal projects (D’Onfro, 2015). These facilities assist in improving employees’ quality of work life at Google which also encourage employees to give their best to the organisation. Similarly, corporations can implement effective HR activities for improving employees’ quality of life. For example, HR managers should facilitate upward communication channels in a company which allow employees to share their feedback, issues and opinion with the top-level management which makes them feel like a part of the organisation and it establishes a positive culture in the firm (Ooi et al., 2013). The companies should also offer performance-based appraisals, bonuses and vacations to employees. Effective corporate culture that promotes positive relationships between employees and management also improve quality of work life along with the firm’s overall growth (Bagtasos, 2011). Therefore, it can be seen that employees’ quality of work life has significant relevance to human resource management since it affects a company’s overall progress. The corporation can implement different HR practices for addressing the issues faced by employees in a firm which result in promoting a positive quality of work life of employees.

Application of Quality of Work Life to Different HR Activities

From the above observations, it can be concluded that human resource management policies focus on managing and controlling human capital in an organisation by performing activities such as recruitment and selection, job planning, performance appraisal, compensation management, training and development, health and safety at workplace and others. The quality of work life is referred to the degree up to which an employee is able to satisfy its needs through its job. It has significant relevance in human resource management since it affects employees as well as the company’s overall performance and growth. Lack of positive quality of work life hinders the performance of an employee which reduces his work quality as well. Therefore, organisations are required to implement effective HRM policies for positively influencing the quality of work life of employees. They can improve job analysis and recruitment and selection procedure to ensure that only right candidates are selected in the firm, and they are hired as per their qualifications. It provides them higher growth opportunities and improves their quality of life. Maintaining healthy and safe working environment promotion of upward communication also encourages employees to perform better. Organisations should focus on implementing effective HRM practices for improving employees’ quality of work life since it improves their performance and sustains the company’s future growth

References

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