External Influences

Labor unions were founded and exist today to assist workers in dealing with the management of an organization. As the certified third-party representative, the union acts on behalf of its members to secure wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment. Another critical aspect of unions is that they promote and foster what is called a grievance procedure, or a specified process for the resolving of differences between workers and management. In many instances, this process alone constrains management from making unilateral decisions. For instance, a current HRM issue is the debate over employers' ability to terminate employees whenever they want. When a union is present and HRM practices are spelled out in a negotiated agreement, employees cannot fire for unjustified reasons. However, although only about 12 percent of the work force is unionized, the effect unions have on other nonunion organizations, called the spillover effect, must be kept in perspective. That is, nonunion employees often look at what those in the unionized work force gain through contract negotiations. To maintain a nonunion status, then, HRM practices must be comparable to those where unions exist.

Management Thought

The last area of external influence is current management thought. Since the inception of the first personnel departments, management practices have played a major role in promoting today's HRM operations. Much of the emphasis has come from some of the early, and highly regarded, management theorists. Four individuals specifically are regarded as the forerunners of HRM support: Frederick Taylor, Hugo Munsterberg, Mary Parker Follet, and Eiton Mayo. Frederick Taylor, who is often regarded as the father of scientific management, developed a set of principles to enhance worker productivity. By systematically studying each job and detailing methods to attain higher productivity levels, Taylor's work was the first sense of today's human resource practices that we see. For instance, Taylor advocated that workers needed appropriate job training and should be screened according to their ability to do the job (a forerunner of skill-based hiring). Hugo Munsterberg and his associates made suggestions to improve methods of employment testing, training, performance evaluations, and job efficiency. Mary Parker Follet, a social philosopher, advocated people-oriented organizations. Her writings focused on groups as opposed to the individuals in the organization. Thus, Follet was one of the forerunners of today's teamwork concept and group cohesiveness. But probably the biggest advancement in HRM came from the works of Eiton Mayo and his famous Hawthorne studies.

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