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Operations and Human Resource Management: Working Together for a Better Tomorrow

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Operations and Human Resource Management: Working together for a better tomorrow
Lori A. Erickson
East Tennessee State University

Introduction Historically, operations management and human resource management have been separate fields, only interacting for administrative issues regarding payroll and other matters (Boudreau et al., 2002). However, human resources play an integral role in the development of strategic plans for organizations. Since no operations can take place without the human capital necessary to implement the operations, special attention should be paid to the linkages between the operational strategy and the human resource strategy of the firm. According to Ahamd and Schroeder (2003, p. 19) “human resources are …show more content…

If employees are not paid, they will not work; if machines are not running, employees have nothing to do; if the bills are not paid, the plant cannot continue operations. The majority of the functions within a firm are interrelated and dependent upon one another.
Human Resources as a Strategic Partner in Operations Martell and Carroll (1995) stated that there are two types of human resources: strategic and operative. They went on to describe four characteristics of human resource initiatives: (1) They are long-term oriented; (2) They are connected with the corporate strategies; (3) They are connected with the organizational performance; and (4) The line managers are involved in the details of decisions regarding human resource management. Too often, both operations managers and human resource mangers forget that they are working toward the same goal. Often, human resources will adopt policies and procedures that are hard for line managers to implement, and line managers expect human resources to have an inherent understanding of the processes taking place on the plant floor. The relationship between the best human resource practices and organizational performance must always

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