Becton Dickinson Human Resource Management

Introduction Becton Dickinson (BD) is a company whose main business is to supply medical products and diagnostic systems to clinical laboratories, hospitals, pharmacies, and to physicians’ offices. The company had been involved in other businesses before the year 1983 when it started restructuring and focusing purely on health care business.Advertising We will write a custom assessment sample on Becton Dickinson: Human Resource Management specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More In fact, the company divested from a number of other businesses and used the proceeds to increase its capital layout in its health care division, namely medical and diagnostic products. The company became a leader in the manufacture of I.V. catheters. In addition, the company also bought back some of its shares worth 3 million. This move led to an increase in its profits between 1983 and 1986, after which profitability started declining. Its major strategy was to address new market requirements with peculiar products based on technology in order to build on its existing business and distribution strengths (Williamson 1). Assessment of Strategic Human Resource Management Profiling The human resource department is an important department in the profiling process. Profiling is a process that requires skills and expertise since it will have a major impact on the whole organization in the long run (Kozami 156). If the process fails the whole organization fails, and if it succeeds it is reflected in the success of the organization. Howe appointed Gilmartin to become the vice president for Corporate Planning. Profiling was introduced in Becton Dickson in the year 1988 when Gilmartin became the CEO. He applied the SHRM profiling process in the corporate strategies, following its success at the divisional level. This led to changes in the way the company was to be managed. The changes were to help the company in its developmental strategies.Ad vertising Looking for assessment on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More It became evident that SHRM would have a positive impact on the organization in the future, but its implementation would not be an easy exercise. However, Wessel was aware that the problem could be managed and make the whole process a success (Williamson 35). This indicates that the process of profiling, if conducted efficiently, can be helpful to the organization. It is a source of competitive advantage. It changed the divisional level towards the right direction. It also enabled the divisional manager to implement strategies in the division and reformulate them. One of the major aims of profiling is to ensure that the manager is capable of effectively implementing strategies in the organization. It is important to note that a strategy will always be successful if the manager is able to align it with all the elements of the organization. This was one of the bases of assessment in Becton Dickson. Strategic human resource management assumes that the workers in the organization are aware of the areas where the organization is not aligned with the strategies. They have experienced the organization and, therefore, they understand where the barriers are. Therefore, the SHRM should ensure that all employees are aware of the strategies. At Becton Dickinson, the SHRM had the initiative to ensure that every employee in the company was aware of the company strategies. In addition, the management was responsible for hiring the right individuals to ensure management talent within the organization that would help it in the implementation of the proposed strategies. The SHRM should also have devised ways of assessing the performance of employees. This would help them take the appropriate action in time in case the employees did not perform as expected. It is difficult for the organization to implement its development strategies if employees do not perform as they are expected to.Advertising We will write a custom assessment sample on Becton Dickinson: Human Resource Management specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More It is important to note that the human resource in an organization gives the company a competitive advantage (Salaman, Storey and Billsberry 2). It is, therefore, the responsibility of the human resource managers to ensure the organization has the right individuals for the various positions. The concept of strategic human resource management was introduced in BD by Fred Bryant in the year 1987. The HR managers set strategies, which the employees are made aware of and are required to act according to the strategies to achieve the organizational long term objectives (Salaman, Storey and Billsberry 2). Generally, SHRM links the human resource in the organization with the strategic goals to foster development and innovation. At first, SHRM brought succes s to the company since division presidents started to review the methods they use to organize and manage people; they used data to solve the organizational problems. However, this did not last for long. Some managers such as Ralph Biggadike felt that SHRM was not evenly implemented. Managers did not have the skills to manage complex processes that came with the introduction of SHRM. This called for standardization of the process. SHRM profiling was then introduced in order to help in the development of people who had the capability of implementing business strategy. This brought in changes in the organization. However, managers still complained that the process focused more on the negative aspects of the business and tended to ignore the positives. When SHRM was formed, it was to complement the strategic profiling. It was able to identify the barriers to the organizational strategies. First, cooperation is important for the success of strategies in an organization. The members of th e organization failed to cooperate; therefore, implementation of strategies failed. For instance, the management is responsible for appointments, and in BD there was a Management Review Committee (MRC) that was established for this initiative.Advertising Looking for assessment on business economics? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More However, the committee did not perform its duties to perfection for some reasons. First, the committee did not hold regular meetings to assess the performance of managers and their developmental requirements. Secondly, the members of the committee were always very busy such that it was not easy to have them all assemble for a meeting. Finally, they did not meet regularly to discuss openings in major positions, as well as the availability of personnel to fill in the positions (Williamson 11). In addition, the human resource of the company failed in implementing management development. They hired people to fill key positions from outside the organization. They could not identify low performers in time. Division managers felt that employees who were newly hired should have start performing immediately they joined BD. As a result, the HR managers preferred recruiting people from competitor companies. This led to lack of depth in the organization. Gilmartin recognized the problem and the need to discuss the problem with the HR vice president, Jim Wessel, so that they could find a way to align the company’s strategy with the human resource. SHRM profiling has the ability to address the issues that prevent implementation of strategies and change in the organization. Once the relevant issues are identified, the SHRM should come up with discussions on how to improve on them to ease implementation. SHRM profiling at Becton Dickson was able to spur organizational change. The managers were able to come up with change plans. But the poor communication was a barrier. This is one of the issues that SHRM addressed to enable implementation of changes. The cross-functional coordination also improved. It is, therefore, important for organizations to embrace introduction of SHRM profiling. Many organizations that have failed in strategic development can benefit greatly from SHRM profiling. Generally, the SHRM profiling process was beneficial to the organization since it br ought improvements in most business units. The human resource was aligned with the company’s strategies to improve the efficiency of the process. Despite these improvements, the process was faced with a number of barriers, which included conflict of interests, management issues, lack of coordination, poor communication, and lack of career development in the organization. These led to failure of BD to achieve the success it was expecting. It called for action to be taken to improve on these barriers. Recommendations Since SHRM profiling has the potential to improve on the overall performance of the organization, it is important for BD to continue with profiling as a strategy. However, SHRM should be carried on voluntarily. This way, the managers will be able to act proactively. They will find solutions to possible problems before the problems occur. This will prevent any chance of failure. Top managers need to resolve their management differences and interests. They need to im prove the communication network to be able to carry out efficient review processes. Solving the management issues in the organization will be vital in redesigning the continuation of SHRM. In addition, SHRM has the ability to complement strategic profiling and improve the chances of successful change implementation. When SHRM was introduced in Becton Dickinson, there were improvements in coordination of managers, the communication network also improved. This enabled changes to be implemented and strategic developments to be successful. I, therefore, recommend that SHRM profiling be embraced by organizations. It would be of much relevance in those organizations where some of the barriers to strategic developments are communication problems. Works Cited Kozami, Azhar. Business Policy and Strategic Management. New-Delhi: McGraw-Hill Publishers, 2005. Print Salaman, Graeme, Storey John and Billsberry Jon. Strategic Human Resource Management: Theory and Practice. London: SAGE, 2005. Prin t. Williamson, D. Alistair. Becton Dickinson (A): Corporate Strategy. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School. 1991. Print. This assessment on Becton Dickinson: Human Resource Management was written and submitted by user Lylah Hobbs to help you with your own studies. You are free to use it for research and reference purposes in order to write your own paper; however, you must cite it accordingly. You can donate your paper here.