People Management Assignment: Impact of Managing Employees during COVID-19

Question

Task: People Management Assignment task:
Change has been a constant theme over the past 3 yrs. and next year will be no different from dealing with the biggest remote working experience in history, to tackling new & nuanced issues such as furlough, redundancies & employees’ engagement amid a global pandemic... The skills & behaviors required by mgrs. of today have been put to the test their support too has been challenged.
Task Requirements: Reflective portfolio should contain several parts compiled in the form of written report use appropriate theory & relevant models, reflect on key topics covered throughout this module create a portfolio which demonstrates your reflection on:

1. current issues facing line managers relating to people management
2 The knowledge, skills, &behaviors to be an effective people manager.
3 Hr processes which underpin the performance management.

Answer

Introduction
In the business scenario, human resource management is an effective way of managing people working in an organization so that their performance can be maximised which helps companies to grow in the long run. According to Appelbomet al., (2021, p. 12), it ensures the hiring and recruitment of talents who have the required skills that make companies achieve their future goals and objectives like increasing revenue, profitability andare often considered assets of the business. Within the HR department, people administration is described as a collection of activities that encompasses the final operations of talent development, talent maximization, and retaining employees while also simultaneously providing assistance for the company and advice to a firm's personnel (Sim, 2020).Hence, the present study evaluates the context of change, which has been a constant theme within the situation of a global pandemic, which considers the experiment of remote working for different organisations. This highlights the skills and behaviours of the organisational managers for people management. Moreover, the processes which the HR underpins for improving the performance management is also mentioned within the study. Unitarism is an integral element in people management within business organization. The evaluation of unitarism helps business organization to focus on shared interests of staff members. Unitarism allows employees to explore their persona; opinions regarding strategic decisions.

Current issues faced by line managers related to people management
The situation of COVID-19 has shaken each organisation while creating a challenging and complex environment for the HR practitioners and line managers. The line managers were required to investigate ingenious solutions to ensure the continuity of different organisations along with helping their staff to cope with the extraordinary crisis. For instance, Google announced their employees to work from home during the summers whereas; the employees of Twitter were provided with the opportunity to work remotely indefinitely. However, on the other hand, remote working was not found to be suitable for the manufacturing industries and were required to be present physically while maintaining a social distance. On the other hand, many employees lost their jobs in the market. In this situation, the HRM department was urged to identify different job positions, which can be performed remotely. Hence, these circumstances and situations have come up with challenges for the line managers in the current situation of the global pandemic. This has also considered implications of the mental health of employees along with the person-environment fit that was perceived by the staff.

As evidenced by Hadjisolomou and Simone, 2021, p. 400, employee well-being and engagement is more essential than ever since businesses have finally recognised the potential it has to alter their workers' lives, decrease expenses associated with absenteeism and health safety, and foster a healthy workplace culture. Therefore, after the COVID-19 outbreak, the trust, wellbeing and retention has become the most common stressful topic among the HR processes which are urging the HR practitioner to invest in worker well-being that may result in enhanced resilience, improved employee participation, lower sick leave, and better effectiveness and productivity. Worker well-being goals should be incorporated across a company, ingrained in its environment, management, and people administration, to reap genuine benefits. The emotions of staff members and employees are associated with the management of business ventures. A trust has been built between different staff members within business organizations. The employee focuses versus focus for bottom-line has been found among factorial experiments for the members. The communication skills of the managers must be developed while communicating with their staff members and others. The social regulations had generated a feeling of gratefulness among employees (Akerstrom et al, 2021, p. 1916). From the study, it has been found that there was anger and fear for the organization. The fear has been the foundation of the trust in the organization. The outcome showed the practical and theoretical indications. Remote work has been the new policy of the company along with the collaboration in the physical world. Video conferencing and e-mail has been regarded as the substitution.

Unitarianism has been a theory on employee relations. The conflict has not been a feature of the employer-employee relationship. The theory has been stated that there is an importance in building the relationship of employment. The employee and employer show a relationship where the operation has been at the normal level while some anomalies have been found. The employees and managers tend to work towards organizational goals. The reasons have demonstrated certain differences within the business policies. The personality disorder and lack of communication have been found in this theory. The managers of business ventures can follow the core principles of Unitarian theory for managing people. For example, the HRM department of Wal-Mart follows the Unitarian theory for managing huge people. On the other hand, the recruitment must be based on the eligibility of the candidates.

Employee well-being is a way employees work related to health and happiness of individuals. In the process of people management, it is the responsibility of business organization to emphasize on the well-being of employees. Employee well-being ensures whether employees are safe or not.

Employee relation is an important element in people management. A healthy business environment requires good healthy employee relation. It is necessary to build a good relationship with employees for managing higher level of productivity and employee satisfaction.

Knowledge; behaviours and skills to be an effective people manager
The HR managers have been involved with the development of the workplace. The work has been organized with the members. The members have shown faith in a particular mission of the business. Teamwork has been a part of HR and has been a demand for creating top-level talent in the modern business environment. On the other hand, the HR manager has regulated the vision (Peeters et al, 2020). The applicants along with the involvement with the process of HR. have adopted the transformation.

The HR manager is known to be involved with decision-making and this has influenced the processes of business. HR has been regarded as the partner in business. The decisions are implied directly for the businesses so that growth could be maintained. Many organisations like Morrison’s have been involved with objectives where they are intended to meet those business requirements. Business organizations have come across skills, which can be found in the future projects of the business. The Human Resource department has developed the Skills Matrix. The major influence of this framework was experienced on the top decisions of the organization. Talent Edge has been the right example of a people management process where HR managers masterly manage their staff members for meeting organizational goals. However, the primary ways have been found in decision making. There has been proper management of human resources and the companies have been dealing with issues critically. The decision of HR is based on priority where the operations of the business are connected with it. The HR manager shows great skill in team building. For instance, in companies like Sainsbury, the employees have been kept under one roof. The target in common has been found and productivity has improved. A balance has been created through team building. The basic elements have been a part of them. The activities in team-building were four in total. The activities included communication, solving problems, decision-making skills, work related to planning and developing trust. The HR managers take the instant decisions. Patience and integrity have been found in the team members of HR management. The role of managers is to understand the needs and requirements of the staff members associated with the short-term and long-term business goals.

According to Kryshtanovychet al., (2021, p. 170), the activities are generally focused on the Strategic Contingencies Theory. Problem-solving has been regarded as the priority based on this theory. The leader is found to have an opinion about this world. The use of this theory can help the organisation to create subunits or departments to exert power. Hence, the control of these powers can help to serve as the basis of intra-organisational power.

The corporate governance and agency theory has represented the theory of Transaction cost. This theory can help in creating the optimum culture of an organisation by minimising the exchange costs. The governance framework, on the other hand, has been explained in the Transaction cost theory. The effects of transactions have been associated with it. Hence, the above theories and frameworks can help in the job of HR to take effective decisions while building a strong team for an organisation specifically for the global pandemic situation in the recent days.

HR processes underpinning the performance management
According to Zhu et al., (2020, p.5858), the role of HR managers in implementing corporate strategies has been significant as it has been seen over the years. Hence, the role of managers has evolved from being an appraiser to an enabler. Performance management means monitoring the performance of employees in a workplace. It is a cyclical process. Continuous communication happens between employees and managers throughout the year. According to Zhong et al., (2021, p.228), the objective is to discuss where they are heading shortly and also give feedback along the way. The performance management process starts with an employee joining the organization and ends with the employee quitting the organization. In the global pandemic situation, companies expect their employees to work to the best of their abilities, which in turn increases productivity and ensures the profitability of businesses. It can be described as setting goals, reviewing what has been done so far, and giving feedback. Based on performance, employees can also be rewarded from time to time with salary hikes, promotions and many more. Generally, performance management can consist of three elements: planning, coaching and reviewing. To achieve the goals of companies, the first step is to build a solid plan. This helps employees to identify areas where to work and to spend most of their time. Here time management skills can be considered. The goals of the employees should align with the goals of the company. That means employees should be doing whatever is necessary for the success of the business.

The next step is to provide constant feedback to employees on their performance for the entire year, simultaneously giving support to increase their productivity wherever required. According to Shanafeltet al., (2020, p.2133), 360 Degree Feedback is a method or procedure that allows employees to obtain confidential, constructive criticism from others who work with them. This usually consists of the employee's management, colleagues, and immediate supervisor. 360 Feedback may also be a valuable growth tool for those who are not in management positions. The progress of employees can be measured by reviewing them regularly. Managers can review the performance of employees at least once a year. In this step, managers provide feedback to employees within the business organizations. According to Sivanandam (2020, p.424), managers identify the strengths and weaknesses of employees and give feedback accordingly. Here, HR managers make employees aware of their full potential and make employees work to the best of their abilities. Every employee is expected to contribute to the overall success of the business. To make things easier for businesses like Google, technology has been used to monitor the performance of employees as it is used for various other activities like school projects, assignments, and similar others. It has a significant impact on a business in terms of contribution towards its success. One can make use of performance management software that is easily available now from various sources. The performance management system is software that generates a document mentioning the employee performance in a year.

Performance management review
360-degree appraisal
360-degree appraisal is an advanced kind of appraisal, used by business venture to judge performance of employees. In the study, managers integrated the appraisal for judging performance of the staff members. In terms of reviews, feedback can be gathered. Based on feedback from the management, employees of business organization can get the opportunities to improve their level of productivity. It has been evaluated that performance management reviews are necessary for the growth of business by judging performance of individual. In this context, unitarism is necessary to be implemented to emphasize on performance where share interest of individual can be beneficial for further growth of business.

Recommendations
After assessing HR efficiency, a firm should consider its shortcomings and strive to introduce new ways to enhance HR effectiveness and here are some pointers to help the firm to improve their HR effectiveness.

• Improve internal organisational communications.
• Create an efficient training programme.
• Give staff more frequent feedback.
• Create a corporate vision for the firm.
• Make use of available technologies.
• Use data to their advantage

Increasing HR performance is largely based on a firm's unique circumstances. Enhancing corporate collaboration, for instance, is reliant on the firm's composition and growth. Developing a corporate perspective is founded on the firm's mission and broad goals; constructing a successful training programme necessitates knowing the precise series of innovative workers and their specialisations.

Conclusion
To conclude, the present study describes about the good people management skills that are necessary for the overall development of an employee. It ensures the productivity of employees in a workplace. Hence, the present study has evaluated the impact of good people management skills in an organization during the global pandemic situation through assessing the current issues that the line managers are facing which are related to the people management. Moreover, the study describes the skills, knowledge and behaviour that the effective people managers need to endure fir improving the performance within the operations and functioning. Lastly, the HR processes which underpins the performance management has also been defined within the study along with providing the recommendation that describes how the HR effectiveness could be improved that benefits the company. Moreover, the study has used 360-degree performance management review for judging performance of staff members within the business venture.

References
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