When it comes to ‘best practice’, it is one of the
popular piece of jargon in the English-speaking world. Yet it was apparently
not until the 20th century that the idea began to be systematically
studied and enunciated (Osburn et al. 2011). Originally F.W. Taylor was the
management consultant who came up with the “one best way” of improving
efficiency of production in industrial settings in the US (Kanigel,1997).
Bedrock management principals of nowadays, initially controverted and resisted
from his efforts which led to time and motion studies, to designs of factories,
layouts of specific work area and work processes, development of specialized
machinery, tools, and other manufacturing equipment, and establishment of
production quotas (Osburn et al. 2011).
Even though the best practice concept was
systematically applied in the industrial and manufacturing interest in early
1900s, the term “best practice” in the reference to this applied concept was
not coined until 1960s, in the business and financial management fields
(Campfield, 1960) and from the 1970s in the manufacturing (Gregory & James,
1973).
Despite the elusive origins, once the term “best practice”
was out in the world, it was quickly widespread. This is probably because “best
practice” is an elegantly simple and appealing phrase that seems to have
generic application to all human endeavors (Osburn et al. 2011, p .4).
“Best practices can be inclusive of both
evidence-based and value-based practices. Best practices are empirically based
practices that have impacted recovery outcome variables and that have been
tested in a variety of geographical settings with a diversity of populations.
Best practices are also value-based practices that have recovery values
underlying the practice; the values should be able to be described and
measured” (Farkas & Anthony, 2006).
Video
01: What is a Best Practice
In 1998, “Best-Practice” was academically explored by
Jeffery Pfeffer (Leatherbarrow, 2010, p. 59). This model of SHRM can be
described as a number of specific HR practices that are universal and have the
potential to bring about enhanced performance for all organizations
(Marchington and Wilkinson, 2006, p. 72). Best practice is recognized to give superior
outcomes, whatever the situation (Delery and Doty, 1996).
According to Pfeffer (1998), there are seven
universally accepted practices which would help the organization to thrive among
other competitive and increase the organization’s profit.
·
Providing security to employees.
·
Selective hiring: Hiring the right people
·
Self-managed and effective teams
·
Fair and performance-based compensation.
·
Training relevant skills.
·
Creating a flat and egalitarian
organization.
·
Making information easily accessible to
those who need it.
Michelle Reynolds points out that following organization use the best practice approach in the modern society.
- FedEx Corporation - An American multinational delivery services company
- Sage Products, Inc. - A healthcare and medical sales and distribution company
- The Integer Group - Focus on advertising and marketing·
- Eileen Fisher - Clothing retailer which relies on the high-end customer service provided by its employees·
- AMX - Is in the highly competitive and fluctuating field of electronics.
- Hilcorp Energy Company - Manufactures, produces and distributes energy
List of references,
·
Campfield, W. (1960). An approach to
formulation of professional standards for internal auditors. Accounting Review.
35(3), 444 – 448.
·
Delery, JE and Doty, DH 1996, Modes of
Theorizing in Strategic Human Resource Management: Tests of Universalistic,
Contingency, and Configurational Performance Predictions.
·
Farkas, M., & Anthony. W. (2006).
System transformation through best practices. Psychiatric Rehabilitation
Journal, 30(2), 87-88.
·
Gregory, R. G., & James, D. W. (1973).
Do new factories embody best practice technology? The Economic Journal,
83(332). 1133-1155.
·
HandsonERP, 2014, What is a Best Practice,
viewed 30 November 2020, <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFXLOqsQAKg&t=2s>.
·
Kanigel, R. (1997). The one best way:
Frederick Winslow Taylor and the enigma of efficiency. New York: Penguin Books.
·
Leatherbarrow, C., 2010, Introduction to
Human Resource Management: A Guide to HR in Practice.
·
Marchington, M and Wilkinson A (2006),
People Management and Development: Human Resource Management at Work.
·
Osburn, J., Caruso, G. and Wolfensberger,
W., 2011, “The Concept of Best Practice”, Best Practice Usage and Shortcomings.
·
Pfeffer, J 1998, Seven Practices of
Successful Organizations.
·
Reynolds, M., Companies with HR Best
Practices, viewed 01 December 2020.
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ReplyDeleteBest practices in human resource management refer to practices that are applied by the best organizations operating in similar conditions and pursuing similar goals. The essence of the positive relationship between applied best practices in human resource management and organizational performance is the effective and efficient system of human resource
ReplyDeletemanagement that enables to attract, employ and develop enough capable and motivated employees and achieve expected organizational performance by achieving desired employee performance. In human resource management, there are useful best practices that positively influence organizational performance, such as motivating jobs, positive selection, regular performance appraisal, performance-related pay or systematic training, but their application requires best fit to external and internal conditions that determine the positive effect of applied best practices in human resource management on achieved organizational performance. Best practices help to deal with the performance and competitive challenges. They serve to optimize the system of human resource management. They help to change the philosophy and style of management and leadership of employees.(Sikyr, 2015).
Human resource management enables organizations to achieve expected organizational performance and competitiveness by achieving desired employee performance (Armstrong, 2007, p. 30). Successful human resource management differentiates successful organizations from unsuccessful organizations (Marchington and Wilkinson, 2005, p. 3).
DeleteBest practice can also be called as the universalistic approach where firms pick and adopt best practices regardless of the company and its strategy. It is basically the thinking that some HR practices always work (Rose and Kumar, 2006).
ReplyDeleteThese best practices are actually results of learnings and experiences over the years which has resulted better performances (Rouse, 2007).
DeleteUsing best practices allows implementation of significant changes on an easier, faster and cheaper basis (Axson, 2007, p. 34). Their application is based on benchmarking, a systematic process of comparing organizational performance and competitiveness with the performance and competitiveness of the best organizations in a specific sector or region. The purpose of benchmarking is to understand why comparable organizations are better, how they have become the best in their sector or region and then take advantage and implement the necessary changes to improve organizational performance and competitiveness according to one’s own conditions (Dvořáková et al., 2004, p. 6).
DeleteBest Practice is a bundle of HR policies including the reward system that lead to highly motivated and committed employees who are the key to an organization's competitive advantage. There is a lack of clarity about the specific characteristics of either perspective as applied to pay model (Upadhye, 2016). The reward system should be such that it makes an arrangement to encourage the good performers and assist the way out for the poor ones, giving the organization a competitive advantage. (Upadhye, 2016).
ReplyDeleteLooking in the manner in which the best practice deals with attracting and retaining the employees, it emphasizes on employees that will assist an organization in gaining and sustaining competitive advantage. It achieves this through externally competitive pay levels. According to this however, a combination of a number of a number policies that are interrelated are responsible for highly qualified individuals apply and remain in an organization (Galpin & Skinner, 2004).
DeleteAccording to Armstrong (2006), The best practice can be mainly divided in to two parts internal and external. It is vital to have both internal as well as external best practices within the organization in the process of driving the company towards the successful development.
ReplyDeleteOrganizational competitiveness refers to an organization’s ability to gain and maintain market share in its industry and satisfy the needs of important stakeholders, especially stockholders – who want a return on their investment, customers – who demand a quality product or service, and employees – who desire interesting work and reasonable compensation for work done (Noe et al., 2008, p. 4).
DeleteAccording to Marchinton and Gruglings (2000), best practices emphasizes on retaining and attract the best employees in or outside the organization therefore, it will aid the organization to gain the competitive advantage to standard out.
ReplyDeletePerformance management refers to the management and leadership of employees to achieve the desired performance (results and behavior). The process of performance management has usually three repeating stages through which managers ensure that employees’ abilities, motivation, results and behavior are consistent with expected goals of organizations (Šikýř, 2013).
DeleteBest practice HR will outcome in higher levels of quality, productivity and low levels of absenteeism and wastage, based on concepts from expectancy theory (Guest 2000).
ReplyDelete