Business strategy and HR
What are the necessary conditions for determining a business strategy in an organisation? How can
organisations work to include HR issues within a business strategy?
The following conditions must meet in the paper
1) I want a typical and a quality answer which should have about 1400 words.
2) The answer must raise appropriate critical questions.
3) The answer must include examples from experience or the web with references from relevant
examples from real companies.
4) Do include all your references, as per the Harvard Referencing System,
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According to Cascio & Boudreau (2012), there are various ways of determining strategies
in a business which include: linkage, monitoring and control, annual business plan, human
resource, organization structure together with action planning. In order for an organization to set
up a business plan, it ought to come up with a standard and more detailed action plans that add
the required details in their strategies that later will be implemented for the business to be
profitable. Each of these actions, steps are assigned to one individual whose responsibility is to
ensure that they are implemented to accomplish the conditions of determining a business
strategy. In order to ensure these actions are accomplished, some money has to be set aside that
will be used to implement the actions and a specific date is set when the actions will have to be
ready.
Juul-Andersen (2013) states that, annual business plan is also a condition that has to be
met when choosing a right business strategy in any organization. When running any given
business the organizers are aware of some plans that they have to meet annually for their
business to be successful, therefore, there is a need to set funds aside that will be used to run
these plans. Due to this financial issue, these organizers meet and reason together on how and
where to get the required finances necessary to run their business plans efficiently. However, the
organizers tend to even ballpark these financial requirements so that they can have enough time
to deal well with their financial matters clearly (Director, 2014). These organizers have to be
committed to the plans on the table for the sake of the business success with an aim of gaining
more money from it. This method of planning early for financial matters helps the business
partners not to be shocked by financial matters when it comes to budget time and it also helps
link strategic plans to their business plans.
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In order to secure a successful organizational structure, the people in charge of its
implementation have to ensure that the intended strategy fits the current structure. They even go
an extra mile to inquire if the intended structure fits the current structure for the sake of avoiding
mistakes and revising the structure, which is a waste of time and resources. In any given
organization, when trying to develop new products, plans concerning the product need to be well
organized by ensuring that there is necessary commitment and developments in the business so
as to produce a good strategy of doing so. The new product mostly needs a humming factory and
a high manufacturing support, which is well structured to be able to process the product as
required, and this makes it a well preferred condition for a business strategy (Eigenhuis &Dijk,
2008).
According to Christensen (2005), monitoring of business plans helps to ensure that in
case a strategy is derailed back it is therefore kept on track even if it calls for the change of
schedule, change of strategy employed, change of action steps or even change of the business
objectives. The well-known organizations that have been successful in matters of strategy
implementation consider the use of human resource. Human resource is a highly valued
condition by investors in a business whereby, it comes out as a good business strategy in their
organization. Cooke &Saini (2010) states that, human resource does not involve a lot, but only
entails that the business management team should consider the communication needs of the
business. The actions of any business need to be articulated and the people who are in charge of
doing that are fully aware of the strategy that is about to be implemented and what can be done
to make it appropriate for that business at the given time. When a strategy is now implemented,
managers are always aware of each effect on human resource needs that come as a result of its
implementation; hence it is better to be more informed on the change that is needed for the sake
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of the strategy and how fast it can be provided. There is a need to also to know the implication of
the human resource on the strategies to avoid choosing a wrong strategy that may be more costly.
This calls for more training on the side of employees for them to be able to know how to handle
and even understand the changes imposed through the strategy implementation. Some employees
who have worked in organizations where the same strategies were applied also tend to be
employed in the new businesses who have just introduced the strategies since they are
experienced (Christensen &Higgs, 2008).
Cascio & Boudreau (2012) argue that another condition for all strategies in the
organization to be effective calls for direct linkage of all of them for the sake of an
organization’s success. An organization can best work to include human resource issues within a
business strategy by ensuring that they have good superordinate goals, they have a good staff,
employ the best skills in their business and have a good organizational structure. An organization
also needs to implement all the strategies required for a successful business and good style of
management with regard to best business systems (Director, 2014). The importance of human
resources is most effective when the business has become has achieved a lot of knowledge from
experienced workers and even when its technology has highly advanced. Human resource
strategies are best applicable where a business employs cost leadership strategies, since leaders
can best manage the business and keep it at ease. In order for cost leadership to be effective there
is a need to focus on its efficiency with a close range to earning more dollars and producing more
dollars with respect to the volume of the products produced. To some extend business human
resources tend to be more complex in a case where that business is competing on different
platforms or industries. Therefore, it becomes easy to structure incentive systems that align the
interests of the business with an aim of making it more successful and most prominent. The
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integration between business strategies and human resource management can be grouped into
three theories which are: resource-based theories, interactive theories and behavioral theories.
Behavioral theory is just a list of assumptions which demands that for a business to be
successful, certain behaviors should be evident among the employees. In a case like this, human
resource management is an elicit method that is used to ensure that all employees have the right
attitude and good behavior in job since their behavior is the key bridge to the business strategy
and the firm performance. According to Cooke (2010), the employees’ behavior in a given
business is the best method to help in achieving the best results in an organization; hence, human
resources tend to vary following the firm’s required codes and ethics. Environmental
characteristics are linked to the human resource management and are less connected to the
product-market strategy; hence this makes it not to interfere with market products having no
similar characteristics.
A good case example of a company that has integrated HR in their strategy system is the
Tata Consultancy Services, which is a large software company in India. Their program involves
in training engineers from divergent fields to improve their efficiency concerning their duties in
the organization. Aditya Birla group of companies is also another example of firms that have
made initiatives by ensuring that the business strategy is integrated with the HR strategy.
Implementation over strategy formulation is one of the characteristic implemented by the human
resource management to generate selected strategy formulation. It has been proven that people
are more adaptable and reliable as compared to strategies, since they can reason on their own and
make informed choices. The management choice and dominance are as a result of many models
relying too much on product life cycle and a catalyst. Resource based view of the firm is best
realized in a firm when it is immobile to save on time and cost (Robinson & Robinson, 2005).
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For human resource to take the top most rank it ought to be subsisted with other resources by
ensuring that it competes with other firms, and also poses unique characteristics for it to be able
to compete with their competitors and have a positive value to the firm.
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Bibliography
Cascio, W. & Boudreau, W. 2012. Short Introduction to Strategic Human Resource Management
(Cambridge Short Introductions to Management). Cambridge University Press
Christensen, R. 2005. Roadmap to Strategic HR: Turning a Great Idea into a Business Reality.
AMACOM
Christiansen, L., & Higgs, M. 2008. How the alignment of business strategy and HR strategy can
impact performance: A practical insight for managers. Journal of General Management.
Vol. 33 Issue 4, p13-33
Cooke, F., & Saini, D. 2010. (How) Does the HR strategy support an innovation oriented
business strategy? An investigation of institutional context and organizational practices in
Indian firms. Human Resource Management. Vol. 49 Issue 3, p377-400
Director, S. 2014. Pearson Financial Analysis for HR Managers: Tools for Linking HR Strategy
to Business Strategy (paperback). FT Press; 1 edition
Eigenhuis, A. & Dijk, R. 2008. HR Strategy for the High Performing Business: Inspiring Success
through Effective Human Resource Management. Kogan Page
Juul-Andersen, T. & Minbaeva, D. 2013. The Role of Human Resource Management in Strategy
Making. Human Resource Management. Vol. 52 Issue 5, p809-827
Robinson, D. &Robinson, J. 2005. Strategic Business Partner: Aligning People Strategies with
Business Goals. Berrett-Koehler Publishers
