Strategic Human Resource Planning in Academia

Question: Discuss about the Strategic Human Resource Planning in Academia. Answer: Introduction In present scenario every organization is competing against each other in the market. What distinguishes an organization from their competitors is their business strategy. A business strategy is very important for the sustainability of the business in the long run and to secure a competitive position in the market. Business in order to succeed in the market should have a clear idea about their goals and objectives to be achieved in the future. Without any goals, an organization is directionless and cannot survive in the market. A goal cannot be accomplished without designing a plan or a course of action. Strategic planning refers to a future path that will fulfill the vision and mission of the entrepreneur and organization. It helps to analyze the current strengths and work on the weaknesses so as to achieve the goals effectively. Strategic planning involves determining the current position of the organization into markets by analyzing the competencies of the organization and external competitive environment. The next step in strategic planning involves defining the vision and mission that an entrepreneur wish to achieve in future for the overall benefit and growth of the business. One of the future goals or mission can be to work on the issues existing in the internal environment of the business. But the most important factor in strategic planning is the financial and human resources. Arranging funds is never a problem but finding the right individual with skill and expertise who believes in the vision and mission of the entrepreneur and be a strategic contributor in achieving the g oals and objectives of the organization. Human resources in any organization have been proven to provide a competitive edge in the market. The products and services can be copied by the competitors but there is no substitute available for the skill and competencies of an individual working in the organization. The department which is directly responsible for hiring, recruiting and training such employees is the human resource department. Human resource department in todays world is no longer stereotyped as the provider of secondary support functions to the main departments such as marketing and finance. The human resource department in the modern times referred to as strategic partner as they design strategies to increase the productivity if the employees so that they can collectively work towards achieving the organizations vision and mission with the help of effective strategic planning. Relationship between HR planning and strategic planning In order to succeed and achieve the objectives it is very important for an organization to utilize their resources affectively. As discussed above the most important resource is the human resources. Human resource planning refers to the hiring and recruiting the right individual for the right position required for the accomplishments of future goals and objectives. Both the strategic planning and human resource planning is interdependent on each other. The requirement of human resource is mainly dependent on the organizations vision and mission. The most important purpose of human resource planning is to ensure sufficient human resources to meet the strategic vision of the organization. The dependent factor here is a long term vision. A strategic plan defines the long term vision of the organization, without the strategic planning the requirement of human resource cannot be determined. Each step in HR planning process is related to the strategic planning. After making a strategic pla n, the current capacity of HR is identified and whether there skills and abilities are sufficient to achieve the long term goals. The next step is anticipating the HR requirement of the future. It includes analyzing the requirement of the workforce to achieve the desired goals. The gap analysis is also conducted which involves identified the gap between the present state of the organization and where they want to reach in the future. It also includes comparing the current workforce skills and abilities with the future requirement and then carefully designing HR policies to achieve the strategic goals. The last step involve adopting suitable HR such as restructuring which involves staff attrition or redesigning the position requirement, training the existing staff to contribute productively in achieving the goals, recruiting new skilled and abled staff to match the strategic goals. It is clearly evident that each step of HR planning is related to the strategic planning. Integrating HRM with the organizational strategic planning process The main problem in an organization is the HR department is not considered in the strategic planning process but rather they are considered suitable for administrative functions. HRM should be integrated with the strategic planning process in order to realize the long term organizational goals. Integrating HRM with strategic planning process is important because when the organization is preparing for the strategic change training the individual is very important to deal with the problem of resistance to change and so that they can perform productively to achieve the goals. Apart from this motivating and encouraging employee is important to increase their productivity and this can be only done with the help of effective HR strategies. The effective execution of strategic plan is very important and without the cooperation of employees it is not possible. To effectively implement the planned strategy communicating the organizations vision and mission to all the level of the organization is very important and HR plays a common link between the top level management who design a strategic plan and all the levels of management. They communicate the strategies to every individual so that they can contribute collectively to fulfill the desired objectives. Conclusion It can be concluded that strategic planning process is incomplete without the involvement and cooperation of the human resource department. Their role is not just limited to performing administrative functions, without their contribution an organization cannot achieve the goals and objectives. They are responsible in the human resource planning which is very important for the implementation of the planned strategy. A strategy is just a thought or a document which will not come into action without the support and strategic contribution of the employees. References Beauttah Mwangi, Waweru, and Kellen, Kiambati. "Integrating Human Resource Management with Organizational Strategies".Global Journal of Management and Business Research: A Administration and Management15, no. 7 (2015). Accessed March 24, 2017. https://globaljournals.org/GJMBR_Volume15/4-Integrating-Human-Resource.pdf. CANIA, Luftim. "The Impact Of Strategic Human Resource Management On Organizational Performance".Economia. Seria Management17, no. 2 (2014). Accessed March 24, 2017. https://www.management.ase.ro/reveconomia/2014-2/14.pdf. Danial Aslam, Hassan, Mehmood Aslam, Naeem Ali, Badar Habib, and Madiha Jabeen. "Human Resource Planning Practice In Managing Human Resource: A Literature Review".International Journal of Human Resource Studies3, no. 1 (2013). 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