Decisions, Decisions, Decisions: HR and The Decision Making Process

Decisions, Decisions, Decisions: HR and The Decision Making Process

Alyzae Feroze, MPS 

04/06/2016

How to cut costs, what training methods are most effective, and who should we hire? These are all examples of decisions that HR teams have to make on a regular basis. But how to do we arrive at these decisions and what is the best way about it? An effective decision making process is extremely important in the human resources field because it helps push the company towards it’s goals in compliance with it’s core values and as result creates a seat at the table for HR to be viewed as a strategic business partner. Effective communication can enhance this process and offer ways is in which larger amounts of information can be used in order to make the most satisfying decision. This can be achieved by identifying and adhering to the decision making process, incorporating different decision making styles, and finally taking time out to provide feedback. 

            Before embarking on the journey to solve any problem or task that requires a firm and comprehensive decision, it is essential that the team be well aware of the decision making process. Organization is usually half the battle and having formal procedures that organize the decision-making process can maximize the amount of information available. Instead of “shooting in the dark” all team members can be on the same page at the same time. For example, a typical Mintzberg decision-making process consists of three phases; the first phase is called identification and it requires recognition and diagnosis. At this stage team members can formally and systematically discuss the situation at hand and brainstorm ideas. The next stage is development, where team members search and design a plan of action. This stage can also include many forms of communication such as verbal, non-verbal, and interpersonal. The last stage is called selection, this were the group judges, analyzes, bargains, and authorizes the decision. This method usually increases the amount of information available because it allows for a systematic and uniformed process rather than a dodgy and unorganized approach that can commonly occur.

            Another method that can generate lager amounts of information is the incorporation of different decision-making styles, having people on the same team that can incorporate a variety of different approaches to the decision making process will only enhance the amount of information available to the team. For example, having someone with a directive style on the team will eliminate a lot of ambiguity and make sure that all tasks are completed in an efficient, logical, and pragmatic way. An analytic team member is likely to analyze each and every detail, they may take their time but they do a thorough job. The conceptual team members are great for increasing the amount of information available because they tend consider many different possibilities and discuss options with as many people as possible before coming to a conclusion. Finally, the behavior style employees on the team are great with interpersonal skills; they are receptive to ideas, supportive, warm, and avoid conflict.  This method will generally increase information available to the tam because the group is not relying on style alone, instead they must consider all different approaches and styles and this will in turn broaden their horizons.

            The final method that can generate larger amounts of information is the feedback process after the decision is made.  It is essential to always reflect and analyze as group what went wrong, what went right, and what they would do differently next time. This practice will increase the knowledge base of the group so the next time around they will each be more informed than the last time and better equipped to make satisfying decisions.  A few tips in the feed back process are intension; it should always be toward improvement rather than putting someone down. Specificity helps avoid ambiguity and frustration when the problem isn’t fully understood. Descriptive feedback is better than evaluative because it describes what the employees have done in an objective way rather than in a judgmental way. Finally, feedback should be clear in order to be effective and fully understood by recipients. This method ordinarily increases the amount of information available to the team because it gives them a chance to process and reflect upon shortcomings.

What is your style of decision-making as an HR or OD professional?

1.     Luthans, F. (2011). Introduction to organizational behavior. In Organizational Behavior (12th ed., pp. 13-15). New York: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.

Talent Management – Answering Whats, Whys and Hows of Employers, Managers and Employees

“I have been experiencing a major decline in business even after adopting sound business strategies, hiring best available human resource and investing huge sums. I am searching like crazy what to do to get these setbacks fixated?” “My subordinates are a total mess and complete chaos. I don’t know why I am unable to get the best out of them”. “My boss, never lets me do what I am absolutely capable off, instead he forces me to do what I am least interested in. I am tired off my job – quitting seems to be the only option available with no ray of hope for a new job. How can I deal with this crisis?”

These and likewise Whats, Whys and Hows are a continuous cry, Strategic Human Resource Management (SHRM) consultants are destined to listen to every other day. However, yet another uphill task in front of them is to satisfy their clientele and provide them with a solution viable for all in the organization i.e. employers, managers and employees.

The crux of the matter, according to SHRM experts lies in lack of Talent Management - a comprehensive terminology defined by Association for Talent Development (ATD), formerly ASTD as,

“A holistic approach to optimizing human capital, which enables an organization to drive short- and long-term results by building culture, engagement, capability, and capacity through integrated talent acquisition, development, and deployment processes that are aligned to business goals” (ATD, 2009).

Talent management strategy, if aligned properly with the organization’s vision, mission statement and goals, can do wonders. A comparison of the aforementioned definition with the one given by CIPD below reveals no big differences.

“Talent Managementis the systematic attraction, identification, development, engagement, retention and deployment of those individuals who are of particular value to an organization, either in view of their ‘high potential’ for the future or because they are fulfilling business/operation-critical roles” (CIPD, 2009).

Talent Management Strategy for any organization emerges out from its business plan. A well designed Talent Management process involves the active participation of almost all HR functions from job analysis to critical skills gap analysis.

Any organization, spending time and resources on its workforce planning always remains at a definite edge as in return a right person recruited at the right time at the right place positively adds up to its profitability charts. Workforce planning saves the organization from the exploitation of its precious financial resources in the years to come.

Gone are the times, when Talent Acquisition was deemed enough to run the business affairs smoothly without any fluctuations. Now, there is a tug of war between talent hunters to choose the best out of market at any cost making human capital retention a big challenge. Without having a sound Talent Management Strategy, now it is almost impossible for companies to keep their human potential hundred percent intact with them for long. So, the need for succession planning, employee engagement, training and development, handsome compensation and benefit packages along with performance management gets multifold.

Unless your business strategy is not properly aligned with the talent management strategy, there will remain a dearth of collaboration and coordination at both ends – employer and employee sides, hampering the overall growth of the organization. In today’s competitive business world, hiring the best possible candidate is not enough, but you also need to provide them with a dynamic platform to progress and proceed further.

Talent Management strategy keeping in view an employee’s potential gears them upward in the organizational hierarchy via succession planning. Adds further to your human capital’s growth is strategic training and development strategy as it not only gives the employees an opportunity to explore their talent and skill set but also makes them more productive and confident in their respective spheres.

When an organization gives it’s human asset due attention by assigning them tasks they are most desirous to achieve, the ones related to their job descriptions promising higher monetary returns i.e. compensations and benefits, they love to invest all their energies for maximizing the profits of their organizations. They feel a sense of achievement with every step forward. Collectively holding the signboard, “No worries! We stand by the company in every of its thick and thin”, they really leave behind no Whats to worry about for the employers.

They become least complainant; least bothersome for the top management – resolving most of their Whys.

And when the organizations’ employees are well satisfied with their current placement and future career roadmap, are duly compensated and encouraged for every single effort, are provided opportunities to enhance their professional portfolio, are awarded for top notch performance and are respected for bringing progress to the business just like a business partner – then the doorway to all Hows filled with anxiety and distraught automatically gets closed.

Talent Management is like a bridge that fills the gap between Employers, Managers and Employees with all sitting on one table, taking best possible decisions and adopting most suitable measures to make their businesses collectively grow. Such are the conglomerates creating success stories to be remembered long after!

What does TimeTrax offer to the HR Manager?

Really, so What does TimeTrax offer to the HR Manager? 

A truly robust Human Capital Management Software solution, TimeTrax places tremendous power and precision in the hands of the HR department. From visibility into every action or transaction that an employee makes in the organization through the use of web-based eDashboard to granting each employee the flexibility and comfort of self-service for applying and viewing statuses of leaves, travel requests, expense approvals etc. through the use of smartphones and handheld devices. 

TimeTrax thus offers value to each individual in the organization individually and the HR department collectively; thereby improving its acceptance and ensuring a quick turnaround time coupled with a marked ROI.

TimeTrax achieves this feat by bringing the various HR functions under one unified web-based platform – from the basic monthly routine processes of Attendance/Leave/Travel/Payroll management to the periodic processes of Hiring/Documentation/Training/Separation management. The system goes on to provide the complex and highly strategic modules for Appraisal/Performance management and finally, the robust eDashboard for the senior management’s reporting needs.

Mr. Amir Shadmani, Plant HR Manager at Reckitt Benckiser states “We like it (TimeTrax) as a time keeping software, which reports in many different types with different formats & for gathering data of usual, time to time business requirements.”

Mr. Farhan Tariq Mir, Manager HR Planning at Wateen Telecom states “We are very pleased with the TimeTrax attendance system by EfroTech. It is a very useful tool, which is easy to use with good reports. Overall it is an excellent product.” 

Nearly 1,000+ business setups have taken benefit from the TimeTrax suite over the last 16 years. Taking note of which TimeTrax has been honored with the title of ‘Best Human Capital Management Software’ at 3rd Global HR Excellence Awards 2012 for its outstanding achievements and exceptional performance in IT industry, both within Pakistan and also in various countries where the solution is available through the company’s Reseller Network. 

This award is truly an acknowledgement of the revolutionary Human Resource Information System, powered by the dynamic team of software experts at EfroTech. Building on its specialization of delivering core BPS – Business Productivity Solutions – on the web-based and SAAS/ASP models, EfroTech is regarded as a major player in the HRIS/HCMS and Supply Chain Management solutions space in this region.

Mr. Syed Zamin Zafar, Senior Vice President – IT at Jubilee Life Insurance states: “It has been a pleasure working with Efrotech. We have good business relationship with Efrotech since the last 8 years. The TimeTrax of EfroTech is core application in NJI for the monitoring of attendance and maintaining the payroll of all employees with the network of 10 locations in Pakistan using more than 10 devices.”

Generic in its design, TimeTrax caters to the needs of Banks, Financial Institutions, Education, Engineering, Pharmaceuticals, Chemicals, Information Technology, Telecommunications, Distribution, Healthcare, Trading, Shipping, Logistics, Media And Communication Industry with Organization size ranging from 15 Employees at Radiant Chemicals to an organization of 8,000+ Employees at Coca cola Beverages Pakistan Limited.

Mr. Abaidullah Anwer (Manager Business Systems) at Coca-Cola Beverages Pakistan Limited sums up as follows: “TimeTrax is core application in CCBPL for the monitoring of attendance of all permanent employees and third party labor more than 8,000 employees with the network of 18 locations and sales centers in Pakistan using more than 38 devices.”

Biometrics-based identification and access control is what makes the system most accurate and dependable. Utilizing fingerprint recognition as the core identification method helps in solving the complex problem of ensuring foolproof security. Staff can get access through fingerprints, RFID Cards or via their ID & password – or a combination of all of these.

Mr. Amir Riaz, Senior Manager IT at Cupola Group (KFC Pakistan) states: ” TimeTrax is a user-friendly application running in Multi-user environment to capture attendance, leave management with multiple attendance input options like RFID, Biometric and passwords which integrated with the Attendance system.”

Management Reporting is offered through TimeTrax as a variety of helpful tools to reduce time spent on paperwork and increase visibility to workforce. The Manager’s Dashboard – eDashboard – provides a quick overview of their entire workforce each day highlighting the number of late arrivals, absences, time-cards pending approval and leave requests. The most likable feature about the system is the leave request function, their employees can go in, put in a leave request and it goes in to their manager automatically and can be approved. 

Previously, the managers used to get faxes and emails from any of their various locations in multiple cities on log sheets, which they would then have to enter manually.  Now they have gone from a labor intensive, inaccurate system to something that is not only much more accurate, but provides visibility to the data, in one window.

TimeTrax system calculates the time each individual has worked based on pay rules, record their arrival and departure, providing managers with detailed information about attendance records, absenteeism, overtime including holiday and leave pay. It has multi-currency and multi branch setup, Loan Transaction, loan deduction, gratuity, expense claim & reimbursement, Complete track of quarterly, half-yearly and yearly allowances, Monthly payroll, pay-slip, salary advice, tax statements, EOBI statements and provident fund can be computed easily through ePayroll. 

TimeTrax also offers eLeave, an easy to use workflow tool that simplifies the process flows of planning, applying and approving of leave(s). Employee Self-Service (ESS) feature empowers your employees and department heads to self-manage leave applications and approval flow anywhere, anytime, through any browser and even on handhelds through mobile app.Employee’s Electronic Travel Manager through eTravel is a step forward in that direction which allows functional heads to manage and control their travel budgets with a click of a button, without introducing too many documents/formalities in the process. It has widely been appreciated and embraced by the organization due to its flexibility and user-friendly interface.

Shifa Ibrahim, Global HR Projects Manager, Global HR Business Partner Finance, IM & Marketing at AkzoNobel Powder Coatings states: “A truly Generic solution, eTravel is a lifesaver! Saving at least 10% of the time for HR, Admin and Finance personnel – even Line Managers – due to its comprehensive features which cover the whole Leave and Travel authorization cycle in almost every single industry vertical. Strongly recommended that HR professionals look into this intuitive solution and save valuable process time."

Not only a travel workflow tool that manages authorizations and monitors travel costs, it also acts as a link between the organization and the travel agents; maintains the travel calendar of the employees and the organization; keeps a track of the expenses and acts as the employees’ travel manager. It manages the Travel Workflow and Authorizations, shares information electronically with travel agents, tracks travel costs, and the corporate Travel Calendar is available online to promote effective collaboration.

EfroTech is now a global software solutions supplier for numerous Fortune 500 companies, providing services in Afghanistan, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Sudan, Nigeria, Oman, UAE covering ASEAN, Central & South Africa through its resellers and further has its software deployments in India, MENA, Europe and Latin America. The footprint is growing further at a tremendous pace.

Elizabeth Von Atzigen, Director HR at Sheraton Hotel states: “It has been a wonderful experience working with EfroTech. The focus and determination of EfroTech’s team is there, the solution provided by EfroTech is timely and suitable. They are available, with their expertise, whenever the need arises. EfroTech has proven our decision of selecting their services profitable by adding real value to business.”

In all, TimeTrax is able to deliver for the entire needs of any organization – from the CEO to the HR Manager to every single employee in the organization. Rightly thus TimeTrax is termed as ‘The Best Investment for your Human Capital’.

Including Home-Grown Technology in the (Graduate & Post-Graduate) University Curriculum

The average – and not so average – institute around the globe would have the likes of SAP, Oracle and Microsoft applications, besides others, as part of the curriculum for Human Resource, Enterprise Resource Planning and Supply Chain disciplines to help students better understand the business processes in light of the software applications that are helping millions of organizations across the globe manage and monitor their processes.

This is an excellent step – equipping the students with the practical tools while exposing them to the theories and principals that have been kept in mind while developing these very applications. The flexibility these solutions offer the organizations is tremendous and are so generic in nature that an organization of virtually any size, maturity and industry can – almost always – customize them to their specific needs.

While the utility of inclusion of off-the-shelf software as part of curriculum has been in practice for decades and as such cannot be questioned for it truly has delivered a platform for fresh graduates to be recognized by their prospective employers as having a highly useful skill, the question does arrive though; ‘Why pay millions for licensing of expensive software, when just as good locally developed software solutions/products are available in the market?’. The question was posed to lecturers and professors at some of the leading universities in Pakistan and the response though skewed in favor of the original premise, was varied and some snippets are reproduced here:

The For:

"In an increasingly diversified and challenging business landscape, technology is playing vital role be it research, business positioning and promotion, corporate-academia linkages, distant learning programs etc.

IT market and more specifically customized solution providers in Pakistan have established themselves amongst the global giants. It is therefore expensive and unnecessary to buy off-the-shelf, orthodox solution from international sellers rather it is imperative that local solution providers who have grip over the challenges and can meet customization requirements of the institutions, with all global standards justified, are far better. Additionally software accommodations are easier and one on one interaction enhances the chance of continuous improvement. Hence it’s mutually beneficial to acquire systems and software solutions (like TimeTrax HCMS) domestically if available."

And…

“Any automation/system implementation process needs to match the organisation culture, the indigenous business practices of the industry and process maturity of the implementing organisation. In the end system implementation should prove its worth in terms of the benefits it provides to catapult the organisation/workflow to the next level. The advantage of using localized/customized software (like BizzTrax ERP) over imported systems is that it is easier to customize to local demands and culture and so from a change management perspective- easier to gain acceptability. When one implements imported software, the software is built on assumptions of foreign regulations and culture. International software implementations fail in local environment because their systems pre-assumptions do not match local expectations and hence implementing the system workflow becomes difficult and often is shelved.”

The Against:

“The role of universities has changed in today’s age of information revolution. It is no longer transfer of knowledge from old professors to the young generation. Universities today must produce entrepreneurs and nurture creativity. Training them to use software that someone else has produced limits their potential. The students must be taught to create new software and found new software enterprises that can compete with the best in the world and consequently add to the national growth.”

The Conclusion (if you will):

While conflicting views would exist to any issue, it would be important to register the idea behind introduction either of the two solution sets into the curriculum and the underlying objective:

As part of the MIS curriculum to help students build an understanding of Information Systems. As part of the HR curriculum to give students exposure of an HRIS/HCMS application for performing operations, defining workflows and affects of various available policy options in their industry. As part of the Supply Chain curriculum to give students hands-on exposure of how demand planning translates into the production plan through BOM explosion and also how secondary sales visibility assists with procurement planning, and so on.


Note: The brand-names SAP, TimeTrax, Microsoft, BizzTrax and Oracle are registered trademarks of their respective organizations.