HRMT 386 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Social Reproduction, Human Resource Management, Human Resources
2 Jun 2018
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Unit 1
Review Your Progress
You should now be ready to write two- to three-paragraph answers to these
questions:
1. Why do organizations and individuals enter into an employment relationship?
Employers hire workers to accomplish tasks. In this way, employment is an
economic relationship: there is an exchange of value between the worker and
the employer. Specifically, workers agree to provide their time and skills (i.e.,
their labour) to the employer in exchange for remuneration (i.e., wages and
benefits). Workers enter into this relationship, in part, because they must
exchange their labour with someone to acquire money by which to purchase the
necessities of life. The agreement that workers strike with employers is called
the wage-rate bargain.
In terms of employment, this typically means the following:
o The duties and obligations of the employer and employee are asymmetrical: the
employer issues orders, and the employee obeys them.
o Employers must profit or fail; thus, employers face pressure to cheapen and
intensify labour as one means to increase their profitability.
o Employers’ interests lie in maximizing profits, while workers’ interests lie in
maximizing wages and controlling their conditions of work.
2. What does the word resource in the term human resource management
suggest about the nature of the employment relationship?
The concept of “Human Resource Management” implies that employees are
resources of the employer. As a type of resource, human capital means the
organization’s employees, described in terms of their training, experience,
judgement, intelligence, relationships, and insight – the employee characteristics
that can add economic value to the organization. In other words, whether it
assembles vehicles or forecasts the weather, for an organization to succeed at what
it does, it needs employees with certain qualities, such as particular kinds of skills
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