Etiquette refers to good manners required by an individual to find a place in the society and gain respect and appreciation from others. Similarly good manners and etiquettes are required at workplace to be successful. Employee etiquette refers to codes of conduct an individual should follow while at work.

Some of the basic work manners include –

1. Get to the workplace and all scheduled meetings on time. Much as many people become angry when standing in a slow moving line or waiting for a doctor to see them an hour after their appointment, being consistently late is equally disrespectful of your coworkers’ time. The only thing more damaging to team harmony is arriving late and then leaving early.

2. Always maintain a professional appearance. Certainly, many company dress codes have changed dramatically in the past decade. However, remember, an employee still represent their employer. So one should always be professionally dressed.

3. Show everyone respect and display your winning smile. Simple displays of respect, friendliness and smiles can accomplish wonders at the workplace. One will notice a change in other employer behavior as they “infect” coworkers with their empathy and enthusiasm and greet their fellow workers with a smile.

4. Use your manners or practice new ones if appropriate. Simple no-no’s like constantly interrupting someone, not knocking before entering an office or forgetting your “please” and “thank you” responses can do more damage than one might imagine. Using basic manners, however, makes a much stronger positive impression than one may realize.

5. If possible, avoid eating at your desk. There is little need to keep the work area clean  and to stop  advertising the coworkers  with the pungency of the midday meal.

6. Accept responsibility for your errors. Humans are not perfect; they eventually make mistakes. Always do the best at work and always except own flaws as much as one enjoy their praise.

Workplace etiquette is always important to efficient operations, high performing employees and  personal career advancement options. Leaving all  personal problems out the moment one step in the office. It is unprofessional to mix personal and professional life. Keep them separate. As a responsible employee one must not disclose confidential information or not use cell phones during the work. So in all it can be said that an employee should maintain high ethics and morals at work as much as they prove to be ethical in their personal lives.

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When  we look around in the office at schools colleges or in the society where we live, we generally come across a lot number of people with different tastes, cultures, some we dislike or some we like. This is diversity and it involves understanding that each individual is unique, and recognizing our individual differences.  In the past HRM was considerably simpler because our work force was strikingly homogeneous. Today’s work force comprises of people of different gender, age, social class sexual orientation, values, personality characteristics, ethnicity, religion, education, language, physical appearance, marital status, lifestyle, beliefs, ideologies and background , different economic status and so on.

Diversity not only involves how people perceive themselves, but how they perceive others. Those perceptions affect their interactions. Successful organizations recognize the need for immediate action and are ready and willing to spend resources on managing diversity in the workplace.

Managing differencesity at workforce involves a lot of challenges. These Challenges of diversity in workplace are –

1. Communication – one of the biggest challenges is communication cultural and language barriers need to be overcome for diversity programs to succeed. Ineffective communication of key objectives results in confusion, lack of teamwork, and low morale.

2. Resistance to change – There are always employees who will refuse to accept the fact that the social and cultural makeup of their workplace is changing. They are coming from different backgrounds and one or the other employee may not find it apt in every situation arising in the organisation.

3. Management of diverse population- Another challenge faced by organizations striving to foster a more diverse workforce is the management of a diverse population. Managing diversity is more than simply acknowledging differences in people. A number of organizational theorists have suggested that work-teams which are highly diverse can be difficult to motivate and manage for a variety of reasons.

Implementing diversity inclusion initiatives must start with the commitment from the top. Ignoring diversity issues costs time, money, and efficiency. Some of the consequences can include unhealthy tensions; loss of productivity because of increased conflict; inability to attract and retain talented people of all kinds; complaints and legal actions; and inability to retain valuable employees, resulting in lost investments in recruitment and training.

But of course there are benefits of diversity in an organisation such as Organizations employing a diverse workforce can supply a greater variety of solutions to problems in service, sourcing, and allocation of resources. Employees from diverse backgrounds bring individual talents and experiences in suggesting ideas that are flexible in adapting to fluctuating markets and customer demands, it can help in providing the broader service range as well as provide a pool of ideas and experiences from variety of people from different background. On the other hand, diversity is claimed to bring potential benefits such as better decision making and improved problem solving, greater creativity and innovation, which leads to enhanced product development, and customer satisfaction.

Diversity provides organizations with the ability to compete in global markets. Hence it is necessary to properly manage the diversity at workplace to get the best results out of it and use it in a positive way removing differences.

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Performance Appraisal is a systematic evaluation of an individual with respect to performance on the job and individual’s potential for development. It is a part of human resource management. Performance appraisals are a part of career development and consist of regular reviews of employee performance.

Performance Appraisal is the assessment of individual’s performance in a systematic way. It is a developmental tool used for all round development of the employee and the organization. The performance is measured against such factors as job knowledge, quality and quantity of output, initiative, leadership abilities, supervision, dependability, co-operation, judgment, versatility and health. Assessment should be confined to past as well as potential performance also.

Appraising the performance or getting a review of employees performance can be done through  Formal annual performance appraisals , Probationary reviews , Informal one-to-one review discussions , Counseling meetings  , Observation on the job , Skill- or job-related tests , Assignment or task followed by review, Psychometric tests and other behavioural  assessments.

The performance appraisal can help during promotions, training and developments, compensation reviews, competency building, improving communication, evaluation of HR programs.

Historically, Performance appraisal has been conducted annually (long-cycle appraisals) , however, many companies are moving towards shorter cycles (every six months or every quarter), and some have been moving into short-cycle (weekly) as it provides a detailed review of an employee and what measures in all to be taken for their development or as to take any disciplinary actions.

Performance appraisals of all types are effective if they are conducted properly, and better still if the appraisal process is clearly explained to, agreed by, the people involved. Managers need guidance, training and encouragement in how to conduct appraisals properly.

Performance appraisals are important for staff motivation as well as help in goal setting by matching the individual workers goal and performance with organisational goals.

Holding regular informal one-to-one review meetings greatly reduces the pressure and time required for the annual formal appraisal meeting. Hence performance appraisal is very necessary for an organization and should be conducted timely.

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Work life balance in simple words means maintaining a balance in the work i.e. career, ambitions and giving the best performance to reach at the top of attaining self satisfaction at work and in the personal life style i.e leisure, family, health, enjoyment, trips, etc .It implies managing the work in such a way that one’s lifestyle doesn’t get affected by professional burden or we can say a win-win balance is to be maintained between both.

According to a major Canadian study conducted by Lowe (2005), 1 in 4 employees experience high levels of conflict between work and family, based on work-to-family interference and caregiver strain. If role overload is included, then close to 60 percent of employees surveyed experience work-family conflict.

An important aspect of work-life balance is the amount of time a person spends at work. It has been surveyed that long working hours may impair personal health, jeopardise safety and increase stress. That is it will not only hampers ones productivity at work but also affects the personal lifestyle and increases health risk such as excess alcohol consumption, weight gain and depression of the person or less time is left for enjoyment or for leisure.

Other reasons may include: job security, work demands or overload, work-role conflict, job dissatisfaction, poor working conditions and extensive use of communication technology that blurs the boundaries between home and work. Work-life conflict is a serious problem that impacts workers, their employers and communities. This problem is increasing over time due to high female labour force participation rates, increasing numbers of single parent families, the predominance of the dual-earner family and emerging trends such as elder care and because of the globalisation. Because of this rat race and these issues employees are unable to maintain a balance between their work and life.

But this will prove fatal not only for employees personal life but also for the organisation resulting in poor health conditions of workers at work resulting in low productivity, absenteeism, less punctual employees etc. Hence it is necessary to maintain a proper work and life balance

Therefore companies should ensure work time flexibility, have supportive managers, flexible corporate culture etc. and also employees should ensure self management and should strive for managing the stress and time to be effective at maintaining balance between work and life.

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We all know that recruitment is the major work to be done by human resource department of an organisation. In simple terms we can say that recruitment is hiring of employees.

Recruitment is a process of attracting, selecting and appointing suitable candidates for jobs within an organization.

From the above definition we get that it is a process i.e it includes a long chain of activities in hiring or appointing an employee in the organisation. It is basically a 7 step process.

Recruitment process involves the following steps:

1. Identify vacancy
2. Prepare job description and person specification
3. Advertising the vacancy
4. Managing the response
5. Short-listing
6. Arrange interviews
7. Conducting interview and decision making

It starts out with Searching out the sources from where required persons will be available for recruitment. First a job analysis should be done where the new recruitment are to be carried out and gathering , assessing and recording the information and hence identifying the vacancy accordingly if there are new jobs created or if there is a substantial change in the nature of the existing jobs, after identifying the vacancy the next step is preparation of job description and the person specification according to the job for which he/she is to be recruited or we can say the minimum qualifications expected out of them or what the job demands from a person to be recruited , etc. The next step is advertising the vacancy which involves preparing the advertisement and then accordingly choosing the media to advertise such post like advertising in the newspapers or through social media , TV or putting up hoardings etc. and It is generally considered a good practice to give closing date of a minimum of two weeks after the advertisement appears.After the vacancy has been advertised and the organization get various response through calls or emails the next to be done is managing the response as to segment them and segregate them and selecting the best suitable candidate according to the job description and the required qualities in a person which match the job description which is done under short listing , i.e only the best candidate according to the written required condition under the advertised post are selected. And the last one is arranging the interviews and accordingly making the decision from the shortlisted candidates. This can be done in a two way process also like first holding a group discussion among the shortlisted candidates and accordingly the interview so as to get the idea how well they can contribute to the organization and to get a view whether they are upto companies standards or not. Once selected they are offered the job letter.

Hence, Recruitment is a positive process of searching for prospective employees and stimulating them to apply for the jobs in the organisation.

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Introducing HR policies and procedures gives organisations the opportunity to offer a fair and consistent approach to managing their staff. Human Resource policies are systems of codified decisions, established by an organization, to support administrative personnel functions, performance management, employee relations and resource planning.

Every company establishes hr policies according to the organisations circumstances and taking into consideration various other factors such as employees, environment etc.

The establishment of policies can help an organization demonstrate, both internally and externally, that it meets requirements for diversity, ethics and training as well as its commitments in relation to regulation and corporate governance of its employees.

There should be a link between hr policies, strategy and procedures. HR policies should flow from HR strategies, and complement HR procedures.

· HR strategy is a statement or framework determining how HR can support business or organisational objectives, focusing on longer-term people issues and macro-concerns about structure, values, commitment and matching resources to future need.

· HR policies provide more general and practical advice and guidance for managers and others on a range of employment issues.

· HR procedures support and supplement HR policies where appropriate by giving a step-by-step account of specific arrangements that apply in particular circumstances

· SUBJECTS COVERED BY COMPANY In HR POLICIES

Some of the basic human resource issues to be addressed in these policies should be :

· Equal Employment Opportunity policies

· Employee classifications

· Workdays, paydays, and pay advances

· Overtime compensation

· Meal periods and break periods

· Payroll deductions

· Vacation policies

· Holidays

· Sick days and personal leave (for bereavement, jury duty, voting, etc.)

· Performance evaluations and salary increases

· Performance improvement

· Termination policies

Companies should also revise their hr policies from time to time as the company grows and as the regulatory and business environments in which it operates evolve. So there is a need for companies to be updated from time to time.

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It is often found that workers or employees in an organisation change from one employment to another sometimes for better prospects, sometimes for better working conditions or sometimes they are forced to leave their jobs. Such mobility of labour is called labour turnover.

Labour turnover is defined as the proportion of a firm’s workforce that leaves during the course of a year.There are 3 method of calculating labour turnover – Replacement Method , Separation Method , Flux Method( which is the combination of both the methods)

It is important to remember that all businesses lose staff – for a variety of reasons. These can be avoidable causes or unavoidable ones.

AVOIDABLE CAUSES

It includes reasons like :

1.Retrenchment of workers because of seasonal requirement , shortage of raw material , lack of planning etc.

2.Low wages.

3.Bad working conditions.

4.Dissatisfaction with the job.

5.Lack of training facilities leading to stagnation

UNAVOIDABLE CAUSES

Theses can be Personal betterment avenues , Retirement , Sickness , Accident and death , change of residence etc.

There are two types of costs included in labour turnover:

PREVENTIVE COST – These are the cost which the company incurs to prevent the labour from leaving the job. These costs are incurred in the form of giving more and more benefits to employees like medical facilities , transport facilities , housing , education for children of employees etc.

REPLACEMENT COST – These costs are those which are incurred after the workers have left the company. Such as cost of training new employees , cost of advertising the post, loss of production due to delay in appointing new workers, etc.

However, there are some advantages of a firm experiencing labour turnover:

• It gives the chance for new people to be brought into the business who may have fresh ideas and up to date market knowledge.
• Workers with specialist knowledge or expertise can be employed rather than having to train up existing lower skilled employees.

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The impact of our daily activities on the environment and the desire to go green has expanded from just individuals to organizations. More organizations are volunteering to operate in a more environmentally responsible way.

The Green Human Resources Management is based on green movement related to Protection of Environment and save the planet Earth from future disasters caused by the organizations in order to achieve their sole objective of profit maximization.

The Green Human Resource Management will play an important role in Industry to promote the environment related issues by adopting it, in management philosophy, HR policies and practices, training people and implementation of laws related to Environment Protection.

Green HRM will also help the employers and the organization in building a good corporate image and brand in the market by strictly implementing the ISO 26000, environmental audit, thinking about waste management and pollution. Even the new Companies Act  2013 make it mandatory for the companies having a net worth of more than 500 crores and annual turnover of 1000 crore or more to contribute towards the betterment of society.

Because of the excess consumption of natural resources as a raw material by the industries and other commercial organization there is tremendous pressure on the natural resources of planet Earth which has lead to discussions on topics such as ecological imbalances and bio diversity.

Many companies are adopting green HR which helps in reducing carbon footprint through less printing of paper, video conferencing and interviews, etc.

Some Initiatives companies can take to go green are-

1. Conducting an energy audit- Most local utilities offer businesses free on-site consultations on how they can reduce usage and save money.
2. Going paperless – Encourage e-mailing.
3. Recycle – Recycle glass, paper, plastic, metal trash and manufacturing waste materials.
4. Reducing business travel – Teleconference instead of traveling.
5. Buying green – Tell suppliers that company is interested in sustainable products and set specific goals for buying recycled, refurnished products.
6. Implement green manufacturing processes – Use energy-efficient equipment, and streamline processes to use fewer steps and less materials and packaging.

Benefits of Green HR Initiatives

Green HR initiatives help companies find alternative ways to cut cost without losing their top talent. Green HR refers to the contribution of people management policies and activities towards this broader agenda. It’s an important issue for HR because it is clearly an important issue for all employees, as well as customers and other stakeholders. It’s also one in which HR can have a big impact without causing much expenditure, good environmental management can improve sales and reduce costs, providing funding for green benefits to keep staff engaged.

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There are more devices connected to the Internet than there are people on Earth , that 40% of people socialize more online than they do face-to-face, 100.000 tweets are sent, 2 million queries are searched on Google and 684.478 pieces of content are shared on Facebook every minute.

Years ago, companies and human resources departments relied on background checks and references to vet candidates. While these methods still play a vital role in hiring, technology has made it possible for employers to recruit and vet candidates through social media.

Social recruiting (social hiring or social media recruitment) is recruiting candidates by using social platforms as talent databases or for advertising.

Social recruiting uses social media profiles, blogs, and online communities as a talent database to find and search for passive candidate data and information. It also uses social media to advertise jobs either through HR vendors or through crowd sourcing where job seekers and others share job openings within their online social networks.

5 companies who have nailed social media recruiting by creating stronger employer brand on social media and are going above and beyond to hire top talent through Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other social media networks. These are Marriott, Dell, Sodexo , Taco Bell , UPS.

3 BEST human resource apps for social recruiting

LINKED IN

Linking people, skills and opportunities that’s what they say. It has become no. 1 recruiting social media site providing professional data. Because resumes come in dozens of different formats, they are a nightmare to search and compare side-by-side. LinkedIn profiles are consistent, meaning that they all contain the same format in every profile. This consistency makes it easier for recruiters and hiring managers to compare different prospects side by side on the same factors. Allowing individuals to apply instantly for a job without having to update their resume is a powerful advantage that linked in provides. Although many think of LinkedIn as a recruiting tool, it is also evolving into a professional learning and sharing site. There are more than a million professional groups that employees and recruiters can use to learn and share.

FACEBOOK

When you recruit through Facebook, you are taking your recruitment efforts globally. Facebook is the largest and most widely used social media network in the world. When you recruit through this medium, you are given the opportunity to select from a world’s worth of talent to help your business succeed. Other than Facebook providing you with a seemingly infinite network of potential recruits, it’s not too heavy on the wallet as well.

TALKING CV

This smart social recruiting platform allows both candidates and recruiters to post a professional video, audio and text introduction. Candidates can use this app in lieu of a boring paper resume or CV, to attract the best hiring companies. This can be a great way for recruiters to break the ice with passive candidates before trying to approach them for a great new assignment, and to shop their candidates around with a recorded video

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Technology is surely driving the world crazy.

Then why not human resource? Are there more exciting developments on the way that help to recruit, retain and engage your talent?
Technology has changed the business world many times over.This impact is seen in nearly all areas of business, including human resources, where technology continues to have a significant impact on HR practices.In many organizations, employees now see the face of HR as a portal rather than a person. This transformation of HR service delivery, known as “e-HR”, requires a fundamental change in the way HR professionals view their roles.
For instance, in Europe, Watson-Wyatt (2002) found that 70% of the organizations surveyed used the Internet to deliver HR services to employees with most respondents planning to enhance substantially their e-HR capabilities.

The use of technology has been shown to lead to faster, more accurate and more efficient processes, and reduced
HR costs.It can lead to more effective communication and customer service.Its need has been so much because of the ageing human resource software system whereas cloud hr software is now easy to buy and most companies are shifting to it.Unlike traditional software which is highly customized by IT, these new systems can be replaced.
Some of the areas where it really helped the human resource department are-

RECRUITING-

Before the Internet, HR recruiters had to rely on print publications, such as newspapers, to post jobs and get prospects for open positions. Other methods such as networking also were used, but HR recruiters did not have the ability to post a job in one or more locations and have millions of people see it all at once. Technology has made recruiting more efficient and, in the hands of the right recruiter, more effective as well.

TRAINING-

The ability to access company information and training programs from remote locations eliminates the need for trainers to work directly with new hires on all training. Some interaction will always be necessary on some level,but training in virtual classrooms makes it possible for the HR professionals to train a large number of employees quickly and to assess their progress through computerized testing program easily and in a more efficient manner.

DATA STORAGE AND RETRIVAL –

Human resources professionals generally process a considerable amount of paperwork. The use of electronic imaging has made it possible for companies to store and retrieve files in an electronic format. Technology also makes it possible for human resources professionals to simply print the forms that are needed for employees or update it on forums.

PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT-

Enhanced performance management is another byproduct of technological improvement. Human resources professionals can use computer technology to assess employee performance and also to get employee feedback to be used for the betterment of the organization. Various software programs also help to access the performance of the employees , any improvement and to ensure that they are meeting performance standards.

Hence, technology is a major revolution in human resource management.

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