Human Resources Management

Effective human resources management is a key ingredient in building and sustaining a country’s land administration infrastructure. Whether it is building new systems or reforming existing ones, the recruitment, training, provision of support for, and evaluation of employees will ultimately be far more important than matters pertaining to technology and process. Yet traditionally, human resources management has not been given much serious attention in the land administration field. Within the broader public administration arena, however, the human resources management function is increasingly being recognized as a central organizational concern and that ‘its performance and delivery are integrated into line management; the aims shift from merely securing compliance to the more ambitious one of winning commitment. The employee resource, therefore, becomes worth investing in, and training and development thus assume a higher profile’ (Storey 1991). What distinguishes modern human resources management from the more traditional personnel functions is its focus on utilizing human resources to strategic management objectives. Effective human resources management seeks to: 1. link human resources management issues to the overall strategy of an organization; 2. build strong organizational cultures aimed at uniting employees through a shared set of goals and values (‘quality’, ‘service’, ‘innovation’, etc.) and by promoting a commonality of interests amongst employees and management; 3. recognize employees as a resource, as social capital that can be developed and can contribute to competitive advantage; 4. replace traditional top-down communication, coupled with controlled information flow, to a sharing of information and knowledge; and 5. achieve flexibility and adaptability to manage change and innovation in response to rapid changing circumstances (Burt and Spector 1985). This section examines briefly some of the principal human resources management issues, particularly as they relate to developing countries. The focus will be on concerns within the public sector (where most of the core land administration activity occurs), the broader issues of developing local capacity in both the public and private sectors, and the requirements for developing professional associations. Significant emphasis has been given in recent years to the challenges of building and sustaining institutions for capable public sector administration in the developing world.