IMPACT OF IT ON HRM

Information Technology and Its Impact on Human Resource Management

Information Technology and Its Impact on Human Resource Management

Introduction

There is little or no room for argument of the notion that 'people' are one of the key assets determining the success or failure of an organization and hence the importance of the knowledge, skills, attitudes and behaviors of those people for the betterment of an organization. 'People' are the key asset that is capable of growth and development. Though a company does not have absolute power over this asset, they can make use of certain tools and techniques to exert some vital influence over the way they perform towards achieving the mission of the organization. The concept of Electronic Human Resource Management known as e-HRM meaning "the adoption of technology in delivering Human Resource [HR] practices due to the digital revolution in the world is such a tool that organizations can employ to manipulate the performance and behavior of the people on whom they rely on to achieve business success."

The biggest prospect for HR to add value to business is to play a vital role in the development and implementation of strategy. HR can earn significance by showing the vitality of human capital in the quest of an organization's strategies. Ulrich has argued that HR should move to the role of strategic business partner in addition to performing an administrative and transactional role, being a 'change agent' and 'employee champion'.

The use of technology in HR is believed to be an opportunity for HR professionals to become strategic partners of the business. The assumption is that e-HR would allow HR to become more efficient and provide accurate information for decision making when and where they are needed. The association between e-HR and strategic partnering of the human resource function is that the e-HR system has the potential to allow HR department's time to focus on more strategic initiatives. If HR services can be delivered through the use of technology, HR has access to data of strategic importance so that HR can contribute towards developing and implementing strategies. It is believed that the adoption of this new technology has gradually evolved over the years and as a result will shape the typical HR job shifting the focus from administration to strategy development.

The idea that technology can allow more time for practitioners who would otherwise have spent it on administrative tasks, could focus on more strategic issues, has been frequently observed in the literature. Even 10 years ago, there was evidence that by automating as many processes as possible, HR was able to significantly reduce the time spent on routine administrative tasks, a allowing HR staff time to concentration more strategic aspects of the HR role and to be seen as partners a in a business. Research by Watson Wyatt has demonstrated that the most commonly recognized business benefit of e-HR is 'allowing HR to re-focus on becoming a strategic business partner.

Past literature has therefore proposed that technology may help to facilitate a change in focus for the HR function from administrative and transactional work to strategic work. However, this hypothesis has seldom been investigated empirically. Keebler and Rhodes reported that while two-thirds of the survey ...