The Evolution of Human Resources in Companies

What Human Resources are about and how they have changed and developed over time, what's new and what is required, find it all here.

“Human Resource isn't a thing we do; it's the thing that runs our business.”

Human resources managers plan, coordinate, and direct the administrative functions of an organization. They oversee the recruiting, interviewing, and hiring of new staff; consult with top executives on strategic planning; and serve as a link between an organization's management and its employees. Basically, they are the building block that binds the company together.

In recent years, recruiting and hiring landscape has undergone a change. The emergence of new technology has revolutionized the way recruiters hire and professionals find new career opportunities.

The companies and the businesses have never done as much hiring as they do today. The amount of capital the companies spend is humongous to what it was in the past.

The executives have finally realized that a strategic and well-planned Human Resource Department is critical to organizational performance. The businesses are reshaping their organizations, changing their perception of work, and are redefining the relationships between top-level employees and the organizations that employ them.

In the early 1900s, the working conditions were adverse. The jobs were tough but their working conditions were tougher. Strategies like Scientific Management emerged where they focused on the output and not the physical and the mental health of the employees.

Workers were treated to be as expendable resources of the company and not as people.

In the early 1920s, the trends changed. Workers and the employees were considered to be someone with emotional and psychological needs too and not as a working puppet anymore. Departments and Sectors were formed to help the employees attain stronger compensation and also develop their internal skills. Human Capital was now considered synonymous with the knowledge an individual embodies in nurturing human growth.

When employees get the exposure to learn and grow during their job and be compensated fairly for their efforts and work, they become more valuable to the organization.

In the early ’60s, many Acts were brought in many countries’ legislatures. Making the Human Resource Department essential in every company and industry. Organizational management and industrial psychology soon invested more attention in Human Resources to pay more attention to employees’ needs for their achievement, advancement, and recognition by coordinating the nature of the work itself with a person’s skills and interests.

The employees were given certain rights to be considered for a job, but they also needed psychological motivators to bring autonomy, purpose, and mastery to the table so that the employees can excel in their work.

In the early 2000s, a new decade and HR is more complex than ever. New transpiring and emerging technology did shift the focus from personnel management and administrative tasks. The HR departments finally started spending their energies and efforts in managing the culture, strengthening, and building an alliance working to become a superpower.

Human resource management reached responsibilities far beyond administrative and compliance accountabilities. Having a critical understanding of the business climate that makes the recruitment and hiring at the best level adding value to the highest levels in the organization.

Now, the HR industry experienced a significant change in 2019 because of the alignment of the workforce The previous year has cultivated different measures and means on how the HR industry used to deal with the teams both in terms of hiring the candidates and engaging them. Artificial intelligence and Machine Learning technologies have become new trends in the HR industry making the lives of the recruiters a whole lot easier. The HR industry is now switching and integrating AI and cognitive technologies to mature further in the years. Predictive analytics provides powerful insights around performance, hiring trends, attrition, etc. HR Industry sees the need for talent in the startup sector with the startups increasingly becoming more successful alongside the disruption they bring to the market.