Unit 1

Question 1

capacity to work

Answer 1

• Whether the worker actually produces anything during this time and whether the worker produces what the employer wants is uncertain. It is up to the employer to turn the capacity to work into actual productive work.

Question 2

capital

Answer 2

• In this way, employment entails cooperation between workers (sometimes called “labour”) and employers (sometimes called “capital”), because both parties benefit from a profitable business.

Question 3

capitalist economy

Answer 3

• A capitalist economy is characterized by the private ownership of capital, the allocation of resources through market mechanisms, and the profit imperative.

Question 4

employment relationship

Answer 4

• Workers enter an employment relationship, in part, because they must exchange their labor with an employer in order to acquire money. They require this money to purchase the necessities of life.

Question 5

gender-based analysis

Answer 5

• Gender-based Analysis Plus is an analytical process used by several Federal government departments to assess the different experiences of women, men and non-binary people to policies, programs and initiatives.

Question 6

human resource management

Answer 6

• Human resource management encompasses a variety of tasks designed to ensure that the work required by the employer is completed as efficiently as possible. More specifically, HRM is intended to maximize the profitability the employer realizes from employing workers. This is consistent with the profit imperative that most employers face in capitalist economies.

Question 7

labour

Answer 7

• workers agree to provide their time and skills

Question 8

labour market

Answer 8

• In a labour market, employers buy and workers sell the workers’ capacity to work

Question 9

labour process

Answer 9

• Is concerned with analysing how a workforce’s labour power (its ability to work) is directed towards the production of commodities (goods and services) that can be sold at a profit.

Question 10

male norm

Answer 10

• Given this, it is fair to say that most jobs are designed on a “male” model of employment. Specifically, jobs are designed assuming that paid employment is the primary task of the employee, and social reproduction is handled by someone else. This pattern often pressures women to “choose” part-time or flexible positions in order to accommodate their other responsibilities.

Question 11

non-standard employment

Answer 11

• Employment that is not full-time, permeant position. i.e., part-time, self-employed, seasonal, temporary, or contract work

Question 12

pluralism

Answer 12

• Some HRM practitioners—most often those who work in unionized workplaces—acknowledge that organizational conflict is endemic and stems from conflicting interests. This pluralist approach typically focuses on finding ways to identify and manage such conflicts.

Question 13

precarious employment

Answer 13

• These workers are frequently referred to as being “precariously employed” because they are often poorly paid, have little job security, and lack statutory and employment benefits

Question 14

remuneration

Answer 14

• (i.e., wages and benefits).

Question 15

social reproduction

Answer 15

• Social reproduction is the process by which a particular social structure is perpetuated over time.

Question 16

unitarism

Answer 16

• One of the strategies most often employed to disguise that HRM is an exercise of power is to assert that workers and employers have common interests (which, in some instances, they do). This is frequently referred to as a “unitarist view” of employment. In this view, HRM decisions are simply technical decisions about how to best achieve these common interests.

Question 17

wage gap

Answer 17

• Between men and women in the labor market

Question 18

wage-effort bargain

Answer 18

• This wage-effort bargain involves how hard employees are going to work, given the terms and conditions of their employment contract. This bargain is sometimes referred to as a “psychological contract” between workers and their employer.

Question 19

wage-rate bargain

Answer 19

• The first agreement that workers strike with employers about wages is called the “wage-rate bargain.”

Question 20

1. What is the purpose of human resource management, according to the textbook?

Answer 20

a. Successful organizations are particularly adept at bringing together different kinds of people to achieve a common purpose. This is the essence of human resources management (HRM). HRM involves a wide variety of activities, including analyzing a company’s competitive environment and designing jobs so that a firm’s strategy can be successfully implemented to beat the competition.

Question 21

2. What are the major functions performed by human resource professionals? How are these functions related to one another? (You may wish to draw a diagram to show these relationships.)

Answer 21

a. This, in turn, requires identifying, recruiting, and selecting the right people for those jobs; training, motivating, and appraising these people; developing competitive compensation policies to retain them; grooming them to lead the organization in the future—the list goes on.

Question 22

3. What will be the most important issue or challenge facing HRM in the future? How will this issue or challenge affect the practice of HRM?

Answer 22

a. Globalization
. Gauging the knowledge and skill base of international workers and figuring out how best to hire and train them, sometimes with materials that must be translated into a number of different languages, are also issues for firms. Relocating managers and other workers to direct the efforts of an international workforce is a challenge as well.