CULTURAL INFLUENCES ON HUMAN RESOURCE

MANAGEMENT PRACTICE IN ZAMBIA.

CONCEPTUAL CLARIFICATION OF
MAIN TERMINOLOGIES,
SEQUENCE AND STRUCTURE OF THE PAPER

• Human resource, what it is.

• Human resource management, what it is.
• Culture and its dimensions, what they are.
• Dimensions’ influence on human resource
management practice.
• Conclusion.
 THE CONCEPT OF HUMAN RESOURCE.
• Human resource: is a set of individuals comprising the work
force of an organization.
• Human capital:
• refers to skills, knowledge and
competencies embodied in the employees of an organization.
• Human resource management: refers to the
practice and processes of optimising the use of
employees to realise the vision of the organization.
• Ingrained in optimal utilization of the work force is also the
element of human resource development or capacity building.
 Human resource management continues.
Human resource management entails:
• Formulating the objectives of the organization.
• Planning for the required work force of the
organization.
• Designing the work break down structure of the
organization.
• Identifying roles responsibilities in
the organization.
• Implementing the programmes of the
organization.
• Monitoring and evaluating the activities of the
organization.
 Planning to acquire the work force for the
organization.
This involves recruitment, often conducted in
two approaches: Internal recruitment and
external recruitment.
INTERNAL RECRUITMENT
• Internal recruitment is achieved by:
• Internal advertising.
• Recommendations from supervisors, using the
current employee inventory.
• Selecting from former workers.
• The approach is ideal for old organizations.
 EXTERNAL RECRUITMENT
The above can be conducted by:
• Advertising in the electronic and print media.
• Using bureaux in schools, colleges and
universities.
• Applicants at the gate.
• Engaging consultants.
• The approach can be used by both old and new
organizations.
 Human resource development.
Human resource management also involves
capacity building for the organization’s work
force often conducted through:
• Skills training programmes ( short and long
term).
• Structural re-designing of the organization.
• Appropriate placement of personnel.
• Balancing between the workload and the number of
workers to perform the task.
• Motivating the work force.
 ANALYSIS OF EMPLOYEES ATTRIBUTES.
It is a component of human resource
management to conduct what is also known as
demographics of the work force in an organization.
This means re-organizing the whole work force into:
• Age groups.
• Gender groups.
• Skill level groups, connected to
educational/professional attainments.
 THE CONCEPT OF CULTURE
Culture is, in this paper, understood to refer
to:
• Patterned ways of thinking and reacting.
• Values, beliefs, artefacts and
practices held commonly by a social group and
acquired over a long time span.
• The passage of value systems to future generations
through the process of socialisation.
The value systems that guide practice are dynamic.
 CULTURAL DIMENSIONS.
Connected to the preceding definition of culture
are the following dimensions:
• Individualism.
• Collectivism.
• Power Distance.
• Masculinity and
• Femininity.
 INDIVIDUALISM DIMENSION IN CULTURAL
CONTEXT.
Individualistic cultural dimension observes that:
• Individual interests and values are
emphasised.
• Ties between and among individuals are loose.
• Institutions promote the “I” beliefs, attitudes
and sentiments.
• Individual institutions prefer those who can
paddle their own canoe.
 COLLECTIVISM IN CULTURAL CONTEXT

Collectivist cultural values:

• Emphasize group work.
• Put premium on synergy.
• Encourage group achievement.
• Seek group security and protection.
• Perceive the group to be more paramount
than its constituent parts.
Power Distance in cultural context.
The above dimension:
• Tries to explain the extent to which power and
authority are distributed in the social
organization.
• It asserts that power and authority are
distributed un equally in the group.
• Most values and beliefs, particularly held by
superiors are those of the vertical hierarchical
arrangement of the organization.
 MASCULINITY IN CULTURAL CONTEXT.

In the above dimension, cultural values, beliefs

and practices are those that:
• Promote male superiority in performance.
• Encourage the superman attitudes.
• Tend to assign more roles to the male folk.
• De-emphasize female participation in public
life.
 FEMININITY IN CULTURAL CONTEXT

In societies where femininity cultural values are

vehemently espoused:
• Women are considered to be the main movers of
development.
• They are viewed as the main unity of analysis in
an organization.
• Society regards women to be of high integrity,
responsibility and can be trusted with
organizational tasks.
 CULTURAL DIMENSIONS’ INFLUENCE ON HUMAN
RESOURCE MANAGEMENT PRACTICE.

Influence on recruitment: the state bureaucracy.

Middle level and lower level functionaries.
• Vacant positions are advertised.
• Individual applicants are invited to apply.
• Interviews are conducted for individual applicants.
• On the basis of the strength of individual
qualifications and performance in the interviews,
individual candidates are offered jobs.
• Verdict: the Public Service Commission is influenced by
individualistic cultural values in its recruitment.
RECRUITMENT AT THE HIGHER LEVEL IN THE
STATE BUREAUCRACY.
• Positions of Secretary to Cabinet, Deputy Secretary to
Cabinet, and Permanent Secretary are occupied by
presidential appointees.
• The president considers individual loyalty and support
for him and the governing party. He also, on account of
advice from the Secretary to Cabinet, takes account of
individual educational and professional qualifications,
including individual competencies.
• Verdict: The appointing authority is influenced by
individualistic cultural values in this recruitment exercise.
RECRUITMENT INTO THE POLITICAL DOMAIN

• The recruitment practice de-emphasises

individual educational and professional
attainments.
• Political parties or constituencies look for candidates with
wide popular support.
• Political campaign requires cooperative effort.

Verdict: Collectivist values and beliefs influence recruitment

in this case.
STRUCTURAL REFORM OF BUREAUCRACIES
• Senior bureaucrats in the state and private organizations
conduct structural adjustment in their administrative
machineries because:
• They want to improve the size of the span of control in
the organization.
• A good span of control improves coordination of activities
in the organization.
• Structural re-organization can improve administrative
communication, a socially interactive action and reaction.
• Verdict: The Zambian Civil Service which has restructured
some of its ministries was influenced by collectivist values.
 MOTIVATING THE WORKFORCE.
• The Zambian Government has in the past improved
salaries for functionaries in the state bureaucracy.
• Recently, salaries and other conditions of service for
UNZA lecturers were upgraded.
• In making that management decision, the
Government was influenced by what was good for
the group and not for the individual.
• Verdict: The government was influenced by
collectivist values.
 VERTICAL HIERARCHICAL ORGANIZATIONAL
CHARTS AND POWER DISTANCE
• In many government ministries and private
institutions, organizational charts are posted on the
walls.
• The charts show vertical hierarchies of power
relations.
• They indicate the chain of commands.
• The chain of commands indicates who is supposed to
receive orders from whom?
• The superior officers in these organizations enjoy their dominant positions of
authority.
• Verdict: The vertical, hierarchical power relation
arrangement was drawn largely influenced by power
distance value interests.
 MASCULINITY AND RECRUITMENT
• Sections of the defence force such as the tank
division attract more male than female personnel.
• More male than female soldiers are recruited and
placed into the division where they fight on foot.
• Many private companies running passenger
transport businesses prefer employing male than
female drivers.
• Verdict: masculinity values influence these organizations to
recruit male rather than
female employees.
 FEMININITY AND RECRUITMENT.
• The Zambian state bureaucracy, as well as many private
organizations, prefer to employ female rather than male
secretaries.
• Business airliners operating flight transport
services, with offices in Zambia, prefer to
employ more female than male air hostesses.
• The Ministry of Health, a Government institution,
recruits more female than male nurses.
• Verdict: The recruiting institutions are influenced by
femininity values.