ABSTRACT:
Management of an
organization plays an important role in designing Human Resource policies and
their execution. It reflects the attitude of the top management about the
‘people’. Human Resource Development (HRD) has assumed considerable importance
in the recent years. Be it a business organization, or a bank or an office, the
development of human resources is necessary for its efficient and effective
working. In an evolutionary process when developing economy struggles to attain
higher levels of living. It can hardly over look the need of developing its
human resources to meet bigger and developing new challenges of raising the
quality of life of the masses. Human Resource development is a continuous
process to ensure the development of employee competencies, dynamism,
motivation and effectiveness in a systematic and planned way. HRD has been
given due importance by all the organizations in India as it aims at developing
all the employees of an organization in a planned manner to acquire and apply their existing capabilities as well
as their inner potentials. The present study has been made to analyse and
interpret HRD and Management in Banking Sector Industry in India. Major public
sector bank SBI has been chosen for the study. The results show that the
relationship between management and HRD quite good in this bank and improve in
efficiency.
Key Words: HRD, management, People
as Assets, Willingness, Commitment, Trust etc.
INTRODUCTION
‘People’ is the most important and
valuable resource every organization or institution or institution has in the
form of its employees. Dynamic people can build dynamic organizations.
Effective employees can contribute to the effectiveness of the organization.
Competent and motivated people can make things happen and enable an
organization/institution to achieve its goals. Therefore, organization should
continuously ensure that the dynamism, competency, motivation and effectiveness
of the employees remain at high levels. Human Resource development is thus a
continuous process to ensure the development of employee competencies,
dynamism, motivation and effectiveness in a systematic and planned way.
T V Rao (1991) in his work on Human Resource Development has
defined HRD in organizational context as a process by which the employees of an
organizational are helped in continues planned way to a) acquire or sharpen
capabilities required to perform various functions associated with their
performance or future expected roles b) develop their general capabilities as
individuals & discover & exploit their inner potentials for their own
and/or organizational development purposes and c) develop an organizational
culture in which superior – subordinate relationship, teamwork &
collaboration among the sub-units are strong & contribute to the
professional well-being, motivation & pride of the employees.
HRD is concerned with the development of human resource in an
organization. Development means improving the existing capabilities &
helping them to acquire new capabilities required for the achievement of the
corporate as well as individual goals.
Leonard Nadler of George Washington University (USA) who is
acclaimed as the originator of the concept of HRD sometimes in the early
seventies defines it as a series of organized activities (such as training,
education & development) conducted within specified period of time &
designed to produce behavioral change.
HRD in Banking Sector
The core function of HRD in the
banking industry is to facilitate performance improvement. Factors like skills,
attitudes and knowledge of the human capital play a crucial role in determining
the competitiveness of the financial sector. The quality of human resources
indicates the ability of banks to deliver value to customers. HRM strategies
include managing change, creating commitment, achieving flexibility and
improving teamwork. Liberalisation has not only triggered changes in the whole
economy, including the banking sector, but has also thrown up challenges for
banks, in general, and public sector banks, in particular. Whether Human
Resource Management (HRM), an important element in the business process
evolution, post-liberalisation, has given a strategic telescopic focus is
subject to debate. The primary emphasis needs to be on integrating human
resource management strategies with the business strategy. HRM strategies include
managing change, creating commitment, achieving flexibility and improving
teamwork.
‘State Bank of India (SBI), with a 200 year history, is the
largest commercial bank in India in terms of assets, deposits, profits,
branches, customers and employees. SBI provides a range of banking products
through their vast network of branches in India and overseas, including
products aimed at NRIs. The State Bank Group, with over 16,000 branches, has
the largest banking branch network in India. The Government of India is the
single largest shareholder of this Fortune 500 entity with 61.58% ownership.
SBI is ranked 60th in the list of Top 1000 Banks in the world by "The
Banker" in July 2012.
Review Of Literature
A number of studies have been conducted with respect to Large
Scale Industries on HRD practices in this bank. However, little effort has been
made to study HRD practices in state bank of india.
Abraham 1988: 48-64, in his
studies on HRD practices have been made in the past. A review of literature has
been made to highlight the type of practices, other organizations are making so
that a linkage could be established. HRD climate is an integral part of
organizational climate.
Raman (1989:342-365) in his study
on HRD experiences in State Bank of India underlines the main objectives of HRD
for the bank is to create a climate of openness and trust, build a
collaborative culture whereby everyone is an important member of an effective
team, promote human capabilities and competencies in the organization, bring
integration of individual and organizational goals, improve quality of life.
Usha Krishna (1986) explores the
HRD sub-systems in the Sundram Fasteners Ltd. (SFL). The HRD unit there started
working on organizational structure (focusing on clarifying reporting relationships,
outlined key responsibility areas), manpower planning, placement, development
oriented performance appraisal system, training and development, rewards and
career planning.
Rao (1989: 210-25), Discussing the HRD initiatives in
Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) has mentioned that the areas were
identified as ‘Priority of Action’ include- improvement in work culture,
optimum use of installed capacity, increase in productivity, generate profits
through control of costs, customer satisfaction.
Rao (1992: 350-371), in his
analysis of 14 organizations, mentioned that L & T was the first to start
integrated HRD system, inspiring other organizations to do so. Several
organizations, however, made some innovations in the HRD Sub-systems. A Study
conducted by XLRI centre for HRD in 1984 shows that HRD climate data was
available for 6 organizations including Voltas , Jyoti Ltd. SBI, L& T ,
CGL, SBP and ICC. Examining the results, Rao and Abraham (1986: 73-85) reveal
that L & T and Voltas have HRD climate to the extent of 60 per cent on 100
point scale and remaining 5 are in the middle range (around 50 percent).
Objectives of the Study
The study aims at achieving the following objectives.
1. To study HRD and management in public sector bank in India
i.e., State Bank of India.
2. To study the subsystem relation to management and HRD.
3. To study the role of management in developing human resources
of their organizations.
Research Methodology
Banking sector is large one spread ever length and breadth of the
country so we are constrained to limit our study to public sector banks i.e.,
State Bank of India.
For the purpose of the study the date has been collected on the
basis of questionnaire which included questions on the perception of top
management about its human resources and creating HRD climate in its
organization. A sample of 120 respondents on random basis includes employees
from both the selected banks. For the present study respondents were drawn from
the various branches of the banks located at Ambala, Kurukshetra and Panchkula.
Statistical Analysis
The data was converted into scores
by using 5- point scale. The data was tabulated and summarized by adding the
scores of all the respondents and classified in two parts: The perception of
the top management about its human resources and HRD Climate of the
organization resulting there from. For the 1st part i.e. perception of the top
management about its human resources, the opinions of the respondents have been
presented on the 5 point scale by converting the respondents for each point of
the scale into percentage. For the second part i.e. HRD Climate, the opinions
of the respondents were sought on 13 parameters were added together to observe
as to what type of developmental climate existed in the public sector
undertakings under study. The opinions were converted into scores on 5 point
scale. Average scale of 3 and around indicated a moderate tendency on that
dimension existed in the organization where as score around 4 denotes „good‟
HRD climate on htat dimension. To make the interpretation easier, the mean
score was converted two percentage score by using the formula: (Mean Score -1)
x 25 = Percentage Score (Rao, 1991: 39). This was done by assuming that a score
of 1 represents 0 percent, a score of 2 respondents 25 percent, a score of 3
respondents 50 percent, a score of 4 respondents 75 percent, and a score of 5
residents 100 percent. The percentage score thus indicated the degree to which
the particular dimension existed in the company out of 100.
Limitations
As the study is limited to one public sector bank, its results
cannot by generalized due to different management perception and HR practices
in different organizations. Despite these limitations, the study provides
insight into perception of the management about HR which can be used for
further research in this area and can help the bank employees to improve HRD in
their organizations and thereby increase their productivity and efficiently.
Analysis and Interpretation
The policy and philosophy of the management plays an important
role in the development of Human resources in any organization. Effective
management policy is, therefore, viewed as a subsystem of HRD. As indicated
earlier, the opinions of the respondents have been analyzed to study the
Perception of the Management about its Human Resources.
1 The Perception of the Top Management about its Human Resources
The opinions of the respondents on
this subsystem on a number of variables including the importance given to Human
Resources by the top management, management’s commitment to ensure employee
development, willingness of the management to invest their resources for
employee development, readiness of the people to help each other, team spirit,
developing employee potentials, using employee potentials for career planning,
enhancing inter-group competence, encouraging people to improve their
capabilities, creating climate of trust, openness, collaboration, pro-activity,
its commitment to bring in organizational change, and its awareness to the
environment changes were obtained and analyzed as under:-
A) Importance given to Human Resources by the Top Management
Top Management believes that human resources are extremely
important and are needed to be treated more humanly in the organizations.
Opinions of the respondents on this variable (Table-1: a) indicate that more
than 33.83 per cent of the respondents sometimes true with the statement
whereas 19.83 per cent of the respondents mostly true and rarely true with the
statement. It indicates that the managements of this public sector undertaking
consider the human resources in their organization to be extremely important to
them. Further, 15.70 per cent of the respondents partially mostly true and
partially not at all true with the statement indicating that some of the
employees or the departments are not fully aware of the management policies or
do not agree with them.
B) Management gives importance to Human Resources
Top Management in State Bank of India believes that human
resources are extremely important and are needed to be treated more humanly.
More than 27.27 per cent of the respondents described the statement (Table-1:
b) as almost always true; whereas 31.40 per cent of the indents expressed the
statement to be sometimes true’.
C) Development of Subordinates by the Superiors
Top Management in State Bank of India believes that human
resources are extremely important and are needed to be treated more humanly.
More than 27.27 per cent of the respondents described the statement (Table-1:
c) as almost always true; whereas 31.40 per cent of the indents expressed the
statement to be sometimes true’.
D) Willingness of the Management to Invest their Resources for
Employee Development
The management of State Bank of
India seems to be willing to invest their time and resources for employee
development. This view has been confirmed by 31.40 per cent of the respondents
expressing it to be ‘sometimes true’(Table-1: d) where as 36.36 per cent of the
respondents considered it to be ‘Mostly true’. E) Management helps juniors
to learn their job
from the opinion of the respondents (Table-1: e), in State bank of
India, seniors in this bank take active interest in their juniors and help them
learn their job. There was good relationship between senior and juniors and
they help each other in their job. 31.40 per cent of the respondent viewed this
statement as ‘mostly true’ and 14.05 per cent of the respondents considered it
to be ‘almost always true’.
F) Creating Atmosphere of Trust and Openness
From the opinion of the respondents (Table-1: f) it can be
inferred that management of the organizations are creating an atmosphere of
trust and openness. The employees in State bank of India are not afraid to
express or discuss their feeling with their superiors. It appears that superior
and subordinate relationships are good. 13.23 per cent of the respondents fully
agreed with this view point where as 30.16 per cent the respondents considered
the statement to be ‘Mostly true’. . In the opinion of the respondents of this
bank, 56.44 per cent considered the statement to be ‘mostly true’, whereas
23.76 per cent considered is to be sometimes true and another 11.57 per cent
felt it to be rarely true.
G) Freedom to take Initiative (Pro-activity)
“Pro-activity” seems to exist in these units as evident from the
opinions of the respondents State Bank of India, it appears that the
organization partially allows the employees to take initiative and do things on
their own without having to wait for instructions from superiors as 25.62 per
cent of the respondents considered this statement(table-1: g) to be ‘mostly
true’ and another 30.58 per cent of the respondents considered it to be
‘sometimes true’ indicating that in some of the departments there is lesser
degree of freedom to take initiative. It may be due to the nature of work
requiring precision and quality in these departments.
H) Identification of Employee Potentials for Career Planning
The top management of Punjab National Bank makes efforts to
identify and utilize the potential of the employees. In the opinions of the
respondents of State Bank of India, were divided as 19.83 per cent of the
respondents considered the statement (Table-1:h) to be ‘almost always true’
whereas 33.06 per cent of respondents considered the statement to be ‘sometimes
true’. It can be inferred that employee
CONCLUSION
The following conclusions can be drawn on the basis of above
analysis and discussion:
1. Management policy is an important sub-system of HRD in both
banks. In view of the respondents, the management of both public sectors in
general believes that its human resources are important to them. In SBI,
management policy is better than PNB. Further, it is evident from the opinions
of the respondents that the management makes efforts to ensure that employees
enjoy their work. It appears that development of subordinate is considered to
be an important part of the job of the superiors in most of the cases. Further,
management also invests its time and money for employee development to some
extent as evident from the views expressed by the respondents.
2. More than 60 per cent of the
respondents in general agreed that the managements are making efforts for
identifying and developing employee potentials. Further, these potentials are
used for career planning of the employees. Employees are also encouraged to
improve their competencies and management enables them to enhance their
inter-group competence. 3. The management is trying to build up developmental
climate as evident from the opinions of the respondents. Nearly 65 per cent of
the respondents stated that there exists climate of trust, co-operation,
proactivity, openness and team work. It indicates that the HR development
practices in these organizations are picking up due to the philosophy of the
management.
4. A study of the parameters indicates that the opinions of the
respondents are closely associated on all these aspects which again strengthen
conviction of the top management about its commitment for the development of
its human resources.
5. Existence of good HRD was observed in this public sector
undertaking. It indicates that the management is building congenial atmosphere
for all round development of the employees.
On the whole, the study reveals that the top management has a
strong perception about the importance of its human resources that the
organization cannot grow without the development of the people working in it
and therefore, it is committed to invest its resources for their development.
However, there is still a good scope for improvement as indicated earlier. The
changing paradigms in HR need to be incorporated for better development of the
HR and the organization. New concepts are to be practiced and new policies need
to be framed for further growth of the organization.
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