The primary functions of any HR support services
include the following :-
Employment Legislation
Understanding and interpreting current employment law legislation is an
important part of any HR section within a business, whether in-house or
outsourced to a specialised company. Getting this wrong can cost a
business a lot of money in fines and compensation so ensuring all the
business polices are up to date with current laws is a must. New
employment laws are emerging on a regular basis and since in law,
ignorance is no defence, a business needs to ensure that it implements
all the current requirements.
Disciplinary and staff claim issues
HR support departments are responsible for dealing with any disciplinary
issues against staff who break company rules or who break laws while at
the business premises or on company business. There are many levels of
warnings which by law must be followed before an employees contract can
be terminated.
Staff may make claims against the company or against other employees or
mangers. These revolve around various type of discrimination such as
racial, sex or age but can also include issues such as bullying. It's up
to the HR department to deal with these as quickly and effectively as
possible and with the minimum expense to the business.
Staff recruitment
Although there is usually a large departmental input into recruitment, hr
departments are usually ultimately responsible for writing and placing
adverts for staff including such things as qualifications or experience
required, organising and conducting interviews with potential employees
and the letters and contracts of employment.
Staff training
Training of staff includes the running of courses on specific issues such
as health and safety at work, systems training, company policies as well
as people management. Often a business wants to introduce a new policy or
roll-out a new system or way of doing things. The HR department is
usually responsible for this function
Organisation of people
This can include such things as ensuring that enough staff are available
on particular days, for example a supermarket hr department needs to be
able to assess in advance what it's labour requirement will be on a
particular day, perhaps by using previous years sales figures, to
determine how many staff need to be made available. They will then ensure
this by communicating directly with the staff. For example, it may be
very busy in the run-up to the Christmas period so extra part time staff
may need to be recruited or overtime for existing staff arranged to meet
customer demand.
