In different types of organizations whether they are small, medium, even large companies, there exist resources at their disposal, which happen to be essential for their persistence such as human resources. Carrying out the process of administrative practices for managing resources is of a vital importance because in this way appropriate management of these can be guaranteed. With good management and resource management companies or organizations can achieve the objectives and goals that arise day to day everything in order to be increasing as such and providing the best service to the public. It is worth mentioning that for efficient task not only involves delivering products or services in a timely manner and with quality features but it is necessary that the result of the processes performed has been obtained with a minimum of resources.
In the last decades of the twentieth century a set of economic, social and cultural transformations can be witnessed with dizzying complexity and no precedents of this type. This increasing complexity which changes the landscape of business, is also highly relevant for the changes of human resources management, especially when related to supply and demand of this vital resource, human capital. Globalization encompasses a process of increasing internationalization of financial, industrial, commercial and international political relations and the emergence of new productive, distributive and consumption processes offshored geographically through horizontal expansion and intensive use of technology, that make the ancient paradigm of locally embedded supply and demand obsolete. Much of this phenomenon is related to internet, being one of the emerging trends and also relates to cultural identity of employees, which happens to be crucial precisely for the optimization of human resources. But what does identity mean? Identity as an essential group of characteristics and circumstances that can make someone or something or some group recognizable, without confusion with another unit or entity or group of these.
How globalization affects Human Resources and the supply and demand then? In several aspects, as the organizations move employees from one country to another, from one region to another, through job posting practices as MNCs encourage employees to run for positions in other countries, through collaboration as in the same office can coexist employees from different geographic, and racial origins, through training activities that are performed by regional teams, making employees to travel more. Another emerging trend is related to the hiring process. Human resources managers start using internet in order to discover more details on the character of the candidate, posted on social media. However, privacy does not need to be seen as a potential threat to the users. Privacy, is thus rather a function of perception and understanding of the tools that are being used, than a rising thread putting humanity into a major danger. Companies that use social media based data in order to do a hiring decision can be entering a realm of private life of the candidate. This realm is however not to be intended to be considered as a source of informatoin for the professional life. Companies that put too much emphasis on the social media related sphere of personal information are abusing the privacy of the candidates, which is privately exposed to the public. However, certain overlook should be nevertheless available to HR managers. The company that will risk its resources when hiring a new person, must be able to evaluate all potential risks that are related to such move. On the other hand, the inspection of private sources should be consulted with candidate or in case of encountered discrepancies between the philosophy of the company and the life values of the candidate as apparently shown in the social media should be clarified o personal level. Social media is not a good and a reliable source of information as such it should be considered only as a complementary source of information. Companies that do not see this particular side of social media sources are in my opinion doing wrong analysis that may lead them sooner or later into errors and will be reflected in the way the business is done from the point of view of human relationships, in the long term (Gustatson, 2010).
Portability, or the cosmopolitan capacity to understand the cultural identities of others, the capacity to adapt and to function effectively in any foreign context, thus becomes more important as a competitive ability of organizations, while a consensus is emerging among practitioners as well as scholars alike that the business arena has grown more intense and competitive than in the past because of globalisation and in order to succeed and to survive in this era, organizations are to focus on their original strengths, which also relates to understanding of identities of the employees (Scott, 1995).
The process of globalization undoubtedly leads to an ever increasing cross and interdependence in economic, cultural and political activities across national as well as cultural borders with the awareness of the reduction of boundaries globally mixing the global with the local and permits human resources managers to shift human capital with an unprecedented speed. Institutions and organizations are clusters of human collaboration where the process of globalization can be both viewed in its full scale, reflecting both local as well as global identities. While the global penetrates the local, also the local is able to retain its original character, co-existing in interplay between cultures, on global as well as on local level. This present concept of interplay of economic development and globalisation is in fact the extension of the two key rationalist movements that provide ideological and cultural foundations of the framework of the contemporary world, the liberalism and the Marxism.
Human resources management thus becomes a strategic discipline concerned with the management of the most precious asset in corporations, which is the human capital, the employees and management of its supply and demand (Raftery, 2013).
- Gustatson, K. L. (2010). Increasingly, companies hire only by social media. McClatchy- Tribune Business News, Washington (Oct. 4)
- Raftery, T. (2013) Human Resources & Capital Management system. Human Capital & Resources Management. IAAP LLC.
- Scott, R. 1995. Institutions and organizations. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
