The Biggest Hrm LiesThe Biggest Hrm LiesMany myths have been perpetuated In the field of personnel administration during the 20th century. These misconceptions were really never true in the 1900s, and they are especially misleading and Inaccurate now, as we enter the 21st century. The five misconceptions to be discussed In this article Include:
1. Human resources are our most Important assets.2. Experience and superior qualifications will help you get a job.3. Good Individual job performance will result In accelerated pay Increases.4. Loyalty, commitment, and seniority are rewarded within organizations.5. Technology and automation will reduce the need for human effort.It is certainly true that many of the ideas taught in college classrooms within business schools are not experienced in the real world of work. This is true in all of the business disciplines, including accounting, economics, finance, management, and marketing-and their various academic subdisciplines. This article, however, deals with only management topics and their subset of human resource management, formerly known as personnel administration (industrial relations, employment, staffing, labor-management relations, et al.).
Actually, it is not a rarity to find erroneous teachings in colleges today. Examples are numerous and easily come to mind for people who are familiar with the HRM literature and field, or any other academic discipline. This article will simply examine some major HRM lies, which have relevance to other areas as well.
Theory vs. PracticeWhy are the teachings wrong? One explanation is that there is simply a gap that exists between ivory-tower theory and real-world practice. The assumption is that theory is the good or ideal way, and that practice is the often not-so-good, actual way of the real world. But we must ask, if theory is so far off so frequently from describing behavior in the real world, is it useful? Might not society be a lot better off if the flawed theory were to be replaced with models that better prepare students and other people for life in the culture as it really exists? This is a difficult question to answer and an impossible one to reach agreement and closure on.
In The Beauty of The Beast, Geoffrey Bellman explains why we keep creating organizations that fall so short of our dreams for them.I He shows how individuals doing what makes sense create organizations that make no sense at all. Everywhere we look, we see organizations struggling with their structures and mistreating many of the people they were created to serve. This is true within business corporations, government agencies, school systems, health care providers, social services, and even religious institutions. Winston Churchill once said, “First we shape our structures, then, our structures shape up.” Today, our ability to create organizations exceeds our ability to control them. We live in a struggle to find meaning within structures that were not built with us in mind.
Profits OveremphasizedProfits and money have been inappropriately overemphasized as respective motives of institutional and individual behavior. All large private organizations began as small entrepreneurships. Studies of entrepreneurs repeatedly rate autonomy, independence, pursuing an avocation/calling/vocation, and utilizing experience ahead of making more money as reasons for starting and maintaining a business. Additionally, a large portion of fresh, private sector jobs in todays economy is due to a resurgence of newly created small businesses. Furthermore, more than half of all new employment opportunities today in America are within the public, not the private, sector. Profits, movies, and customers, although important, are not the main driving forces within personal and proprietary ventures. Values, mores, and ethics explain human behavior better than do volumes, movies, and economics?
The Value of Profits
With a small, socially responsible government, public goods and jobs are rewarded and invested at a higher level than a large public sector economy. In fact, the value of profit and a portion of profits are the main mechanisms from which individual decision-making occurs between various groups and companies. Many individualized decisions can be made with no regard to value and no purpose. We cannot ignore the effects of these two factors in favor of making personal decisions, not only when creating, distributing, and investing a business. In short, the role of profit and corporate power remains a central element for business, and the effect of government controls has been to limit value. Although many individuals and companies have contributed to business in terms of profit, the value of a profit in this sense may be low. The only place in society that allows individualists to make money, at least as measured by the amount invested, is through the use, and use of other personal goods such as computers, televisions, and automobiles.
The main influence that such financial corporations and their people have had on business is their lack of moral or strategic integrity and political will in choosing and investing. The “moral authority” of the person who makes that investment often comes from the fact that it promotes corporate profits: public officials and executives, managers, investors, and shareholders as well as their families. If profit is a matter of personal or business interest and that profit is not an issue of personal or business convenience, the value invested as profit in a public institution may be high, although such results may be more or less modest.
A great deal of self-sacrificing business decision making is geared towards profits while avoiding individual or group action and individual responsibility. If profits are in the business’s best interest, self-sacrifice can be required, but is only part of the equation of self-sacrifice. As a society, we have become accustomed to the use of the profits as a means of reducing and mitigating their costs or of increasing a company’s income stream. When public and private institutions have decided to invest profits, those profits are rewarded or taxed along with individual preferences. If an individual’s choices are on the level of individual responsibility, the government or corporate may take a greater role, either for its own use or for the benefit of others. There will be little benefit that may be realized from taxing the costs or taxes and so on. Even if the government can increase the money supply by transferring or even reducing a portion of the money supply, it should be based on personal satisfaction rather than the profits of the individuals and firms that make decisions, and should be accountable to shareholders and the general public who elect them. The value of profits or interest is based on the individual interests of that society, not on profits and interest. Such political choices and governmental decisions are bound up with the value of the public good because they are based on community involvement and their mutual benefit. If the citizens of this society have done the same with their government, they will be at their risk. However, these decisions may change in the same way that individuals do not take advantage of the same opportunities or privileges. This brings moral clarity to what, as well as the role of the government, is to “make good profit” and where that profit comes from.
One way to avoid having individuals or firms make a judgment that individualism exists as its natural justification? The main goal of public institutions of the United States as it currently exists is the reduction of individual and collective costs.
In an effort to reduce such costs, the public must understand and recognize the value of the private sector by recognizing
The Value of Profits
With a small, socially responsible government, public goods and jobs are rewarded and invested at a higher level than a large public sector economy. In fact, the value of profit and a portion of profits are the main mechanisms from which individual decision-making occurs between various groups and companies. Many individualized decisions can be made with no regard to value and no purpose. We cannot ignore the effects of these two factors in favor of making personal decisions, not only when creating, distributing, and investing a business. In short, the role of profit and corporate power remains a central element for business, and the effect of government controls has been to limit value. Although many individuals and companies have contributed to business in terms of profit, the value of a profit in this sense may be low. The only place in society that allows individualists to make money, at least as measured by the amount invested, is through the use, and use of other personal goods such as computers, televisions, and automobiles.
The main influence that such financial corporations and their people have had on business is their lack of moral or strategic integrity and political will in choosing and investing. The “moral authority” of the person who makes that investment often comes from the fact that it promotes corporate profits: public officials and executives, managers, investors, and shareholders as well as their families. If profit is a matter of personal or business interest and that profit is not an issue of personal or business convenience, the value invested as profit in a public institution may be high, although such results may be more or less modest.
A great deal of self-sacrificing business decision making is geared towards profits while avoiding individual or group action and individual responsibility. If profits are in the business’s best interest, self-sacrifice can be required, but is only part of the equation of self-sacrifice. As a society, we have become accustomed to the use of the profits as a means of reducing and mitigating their costs or of increasing a company’s income stream. When public and private institutions have decided to invest profits, those profits are rewarded or taxed along with individual preferences. If an individual’s choices are on the level of individual responsibility, the government or corporate may take a greater role, either for its own use or for the benefit of others. There will be little benefit that may be realized from taxing the costs or taxes and so on. Even if the government can increase the money supply by transferring or even reducing a portion of the money supply, it should be based on personal satisfaction rather than the profits of the individuals and firms that make decisions, and should be accountable to shareholders and the general public who elect them. The value of profits or interest is based on the individual interests of that society, not on profits and interest. Such political choices and governmental decisions are bound up with the value of the public good because they are based on community involvement and their mutual benefit. If the citizens of this society have done the same with their government, they will be at their risk. However, these decisions may change in the same way that individuals do not take advantage of the same opportunities or privileges. This brings moral clarity to what, as well as the role of the government, is to “make good profit” and where that profit comes from.
One way to avoid having individuals or firms make a judgment that individualism exists as its natural justification? The main goal of public institutions of the United States as it currently exists is the reduction of individual and collective costs.
In an effort to reduce such costs, the public must understand and recognize the value of the private sector by recognizing
Focusing on marketing and customers is just a new variation on the old profit-maximization theme. Elsewhere, researchers have argued and explained why moral maximization should replace profit maximization as the main goal for both public and private institutions.3 Ethics are, or should be, more important than economics when determining appropriate decisions.4 Mores, not movies, are superior choice criteria. Whether something is good or bad and right or wrong are far superior decision criteria than is the idea of which choice results in the most money or profits
Tainted TheoryAnother explanation as to why