National Policy on HR - the need of the hour

Lionel WIJESIRI

A National Human Resources Policy is in the offing. Human Resources Senior Minister D E W Gunasekera said recently that an expert committee has been working on it during the past year and the draft of the proposed policy is now available for public inputs. The objective of the policy, he said, is to promote the goal of full, decent and productive employment and the optimal utilization of human resources of Sri Lanka by improving labour market competitiveness and employability.

The senior minister also observed that the current unemployment rate in the country is low as 4.9 percent. However he observed that studies have revealed that even though the unemployment rate has gone down, the poverty rate is on the rise in certain provinces such as the Uva. He noted that 62 percent of workers are belonging to the informal sector which is the most vulnerable group. The majority in this sector are dropouts from schools after the O-L examination. A national policy has been initiated to address these issues related to the country's workforce.

Acceptance

Management gurus generally agree that implementation of a National Human Resource Development policy is a complex issue, with many interrelated and competing issues. Complicating the development of sound HRD is the fact that the goals and objectives of many participating agencies tend to conflict, nullifying and diluting the positive impact of their individual aims.

Nonetheless, as a developing country, we should not lose sight that the current competitive global environment is challenging us to develop ambitious HRD policies if we are to accomplish the goal of sustainable human development. Additionally, appropriate resources will have to be targeted and used for training systems for organizational development with long-term gains in productivity that are needed in the global context.

First of all, the genuine recognition and acceptance by both public and private sectors of the need for a National HRD policy should be considered critical in the successful development of such a policy. Most developing countries have undergone debates about it, but since the early 2000s there has been an increased global emphasis on redefining and refocusing the parameters of the public and private sectors with attention to the role of the market economy and the range of civic institutions.

Differences

Particularly, the public sector has to undergo different aspects of the change processes, such as structural adjustment at the national level and social adjustment at the local level. These processes not only contain issues which are difficult to resolve, but also require new skills and capacities of public officials.

The general argument amongst the public implies that the public sector is less effective and efficient as compared to the private sector. Whether this argument is right or wrong, efforts to make it more effective and efficient are advantageous.

In the public sector, managing people has traditionally been the task of personnel administration. In the execution of the involved tasks, personnel administration is perceived to have been regulative and inhibitive of the human attributes. There are deficiencies created in the application of personnel administration systems, which could be addressable through modern human resource management strategies.

There are descriptive differences between 'personnel administration' (in public sector) and Human Resource Management (in private sector).

In the public sector, employees are regarded as public servants and are expected to comply with central rules; Line Managers have no responsibility for human resource management and diversity. In the private sector, employees are regarded as 'human beings' in the first place and, therefore, a 'resource'. As human beings, they are diversified and resourceful and are not necessarily expected to dogmatically comply with rules and prescripts; they are expected to provide professional advices and guidance in the application of management theories and practices; Line managers are primarily responsible management and development of human resources (HR).

Human resource management places the employee at the centre of development and acknowledges that he is more important than policies, rules and prescripts. Therefore, personnel administration system in the government sector and its practices that the application of rules and prescripts from its administrators is more crucial, requires re-consideration towards a new paradigm.

Linking the education system

The linking of the education system to the labour market is another factor that will contribute significantly to the development of sound HRD policy and programmes. At present, the education system cannot meet the demands placed on it because of the rising youth population. On the other hand, those with degrees cannot get jobs.

This imbalance between available human resources and their inappropriate preparation for the workforce prompts to recommend an immediate change in the culture of education. The experts have to study at length the varying degrees of training demanded by national conditions and suggest further analysis of demographic trends. Concurrently, a forecast of economic growth can be linked with demographic analysis in order to develop a realistic macro-HRD policy and to focus training programmes in key areas.

Questions

In this context, there are few questions which could be raised regarding the linkage between education and the labour market: (1) What redirection or new inputs are needed by the education system? (2) How can we train recent graduates, mid-careerists and senior officials? (3) How can the productivity of education be measured? (4) What are the implications of the increasing gap between knowledge workers and the rest of the labour force? (5) What is the knowledge gap within professions? and (6) How does the specific culture value education?

Future workforce

Identification of the workforce of the future should be another concern of the Expert team in their deliberations on HRD policy. When we anticipate the future needs of public and private sector personnel, we should identify a number of conditions that will define the nature of the workforce of the future.

These conditions set a context for future development of personnel as well as the working conditions that will allow them to perform their tasks: (a) Deeper understanding of what the public sector and private sector each exists for. This should be seen as critical to providing the personnel with understanding and a context that will motivate them to work; (b) Employees should be treated as assets to be invested in, managed and cared for; (c) Policy development and decision-making should be based on objective analysis and projections; (d) Mechanisms are needed to facilitate information sharing, decision-making and trust between political actors and bureaucrats; (e) The gap between knowledge workers and the rest of the labour force impacts on salaries and perks.

Few other critical issues also exist. How can workers be shifted among organizations and sectors to benefit productivity? How does one train unemployed workers? What are the societal implications for reduced unemployment in some areas and increased unemployment in others? These are some elements that will impact HRD policy planning and programme development. Serious thoughts need to be given to these issues as well.

Training

Training and professional development should also be a major focus of human resources development. Both the actual and perceived impacts of training on HRD policies must be viewed with concern. Training in the public sector is presently focused on the top and middle managers with very little attention to the lower levels or the total organization. Trained personnel were neither utilized properly, nor provided with working conditions appropriate for application of their acquired skills and knowledge to their organizations. There should be a sufficient number and quality of professionally trained people to address emerging challenges generated by the dynamic socio-economic conditions.

Although training of public personnel has often concentrated on the routine application of bureaucratic rules and regulations, trained personnel are required to shoulder responsibility for developing strategies to promote economic growth and development for which they were not trained. Likewise, public personnel trained abroad were often educated in strategies of development, and upon their return were required to apply routine bureaucratic rules and regulations. At the same time, emphasis should be placed on organizational training and institutional capacity building to which individual training and performance should be linked.

Finally, in looking toward the future of the human resources development, we must note two more important points: HRD should be programmatically effective, culturally sensitive and cost conscious an effective HRD policy-making should be sensitive to the changing environment including the demographic profile and global economy.

(The writer is a corporate director with over 25 years senior managerial experience. [email protected])