Strategic HR Management & Leadership
Strategic HR Management & Leadership
The different factors that have contributed to the growth of temping agencies serving the public sector in recent years.
Problems associated with the recruitment and retention of permanent workers in the public sector
higher payment rates for agency workers compared to permanent workers
Willingness to welcome shifts in the public sectors, especially in the National Health Service sector.
In the local government sector, the growth is number of services workers is largely driven by the need to realize specific set targets, rules relating to employment and the funding criteria in the sector. Agency workers help to reduce backlogs in various matters in the sector such as housing benefit administration.
General shortages of skilled permanent workers in the public sector (Overell, 2003).
2.Using the various models and analytical tools presented in Chapter 4:
a)Analysis of the labor market described in the article
The article by Overell (2003) describes Britain’s labor market where the use of agency has been expanding significantly. A good number of jobs and occupations in the UK public sector are undertaken by workers who are not permanently employed to work in the sector but work short-term temporary contracts. Employment agencies are central in the assembly of this temporary workforce (Overell, 2003). This is driven by the fact that Britain is one of the least regulated labor markets in the European Union with few restrictions on the use of agency labor. The trend is also caused by overreliance of the public sector on temporary workers. The payment rate for agency workers is higher compared to that of a permanent worker. As such, yearly government spending in the sector has risen by £790m (Overell, 2003).
Lower payment rates in the public sector, among other reasons, has seen a huge number of UK workforce prefer to be employed by the agency firms than by the public sector. This has resulted into acute shortages of skilled permanent workers in the public sector (Boheim & Zweimuller 2009, p. 3). In certain cases, some agency workers have been accused of providing poor services in the public sector. This has often raised questions regarding the credibility of selection and recruitment of employees by the agencies. Inspite of this, analysis indicates that owing to the shortage of permanent workers in the public sector, the use of temporary workers is ineluctable. However, the issue of shortages in the public sector can be solved by managers through efficient short-term and long-term initiatives addressing the problem.
b) Strategic choices made by public sector managers in interacting with the labor market.
Even though professionalism of some agency workers has been questioned in the past, there is an apparent need for services of such workers in the UK public sector. To address the issue of shortage of permanent workers, managers in the public sector have embarked on various strategic choices in an attempt to effectively interact width the labor market. One of the approaches is the selection and recruitment of more permanent workers in the long-term. This is aimed at reducing reliance on temporary of agency workers in the future (Hamilton & Yau, 2004). The other measure is to enhance more efficient management of the relationship of the public sector with employment agencies. This is a short-term solution which involves negotiation of contracts with employment agencies so as to get preferential rates (Hamilton & Yau, 2004). The public sector has addressed the issue of employee retention through re-valuation of payment rates for permanent workers. In the National health sector for instance, a reform program called Agenda for Change was established and whose purpose is to revise payment rates for permanent workers to comparable rates with those earned by employees in other sectors (Overell, 2003).
3.The long-term labor market developments that are necessary in order for skills shortages in healthcare and other public sector professions to ease
In order to address the problem of shortage for skills in the healthcare and other areas of the public sector profession, there is need for long-term innovative training and service delivery models. In UK, retention of workers has been identified as the greatest issue leading to skills shortages (Hamilton & Yau, 2004). Long-term solution to this problem will require application of workforce redesign models. These are models that provide short-term training solutions as well as other strategies that ensure job satisfaction and retention for workers (Kilpatrick et al, 2006, p. 3 & Bach, 2000, p. 10). The models also focus on innovative outreach and recruitment strategies for potential workers. Effective application of these models will require development of training and accreditation for specific professions facing skill shortages in the public sector. This should be followed by incentives that increase job retention and satisfaction for permanent employees in the public sector through various support services and appropriate professional development such as offering promotions and competitive salaries and wages (Kilpatrick et al, 2006, p. 3).
References
Bach, S., (2000), HR and new approaches to public sector management: improving HRM
capacity, Viewed 30 January 30, 2012 from, HYPERLINK “http://www.who.int/hrh/en/Improving_hrm_capacity.pdf” http://www.who.int/hrh/en/Improving_hrm_capacity.pdf
Boheim, R. & Zweimuller, M., (2009), The Employment of Temporary Agency Workers in the
UK: With or Against the Trade Unions? Viewed 30 January 30, 2012 from, http://ftp.iza.org/dp4492.pdf
Hamilton, K. & Yau, J, (2004), The Global Tug-of-War for Health Care Workers, Viewed 30
January 30, 2012 from, http://www.migrationinformation.org/Feature/display.cfm?ID=271
Kilpatrick, S., Johns, S., Millar, P., Le, Q. & Routley, G., (2006), Innovative solutions to skill
shortages in health: research and practice, Viewed 30 January 30, 2012 from, HYPERLINK “http://eprints.utas.edu.au/1353/1/kilpatrick_et_al_NRHA.pdf” http://eprints.utas.edu.au/1353/1/kilpatrick_et_al_NRHA.pdf
Overell, S., (2003), Agency workers: ‘High costs, poor skills,’ claim critics, Viewed 30 January
30, 2012 from, HYPERLINK “http://wps.pearsoned.co.uk/ema_uk_he_torrington_hrm_7/79/20382/5217846.cw/content/index.html” http://wps.pearsoned.co.uk/ema_uk_he_torrington_hrm_7/79/20382/5217846.cw/content/index.html
