Introduction
Human resources make up the foundations of every business functions in an organization. As a result, human resources contributed to the overall success or failure of an organization’s activities. Human resource development (HRD) boasts the management and growth of an organization. HRD entails education and training that is provided to an employee when they are first hired in an organization. The importance of HRD is that it provides new employees with the opportunity to acquire new skills, knowledge and resources, which will contribute to their ability to fulfill the tasks they are assigned within an organization. The processes offered through the HRD process are critical in the HR department and the employees as it contributes to equipping the employees with developmental activities that will increase their performance and retention. Lack of proper training, learning and development will lead to poor performance in the personal and professional skills of the employees. Despite the contributions of the HRD in an organization, it faces critical issues that affect the performance of the human resource.
Main HRD Issues and Functions
HRD plays a critical role in the classroom and education industry in general. Educators are emphasizing on the importance of learners’ readiness to join the workplace ones they have completed their studies. Students require different learning outcomes that enhance their critical thinking and problem solving abilities. Without these skills, students may find themselves not being adequately prepared for the expectations of the work environment. When the students receive relevant training and learning skills while they are at school, it prepares them to be ready for the job market. Consequently, this makes the job of the HRM easier when they are recruiting and assigning roles and responsibilities to their employees. Furthermore, the organization will not have to invest a lot of time in training their employees beforehand.
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In adult education, HRD involves encouraging the leaners to engage in practices that build on the skills of “learning to learn.” This involves the adult educator providing the adult learners with tasks that require them to use their problem-solving skills. For instances, learners may be asked to evaluate their learning process and identify how the skills and knowledge they have acquired can be applied in different areas of their lives. According to Litster (2016), by focusing on the skills of learning to learn adult literacy approaches should not only invest in providing learning or skills, but also create an atmosphere that is conducive for discussions and reflecting – which encourages the participants to analyze their learning experiences. Consequently, learning to learn is perceived as a HRD function that allows the students to recognize the best learning approaches for them and the strategies that they can implement to enable them to have more control over and improve their learning outcomes.
In adult learning HRD functions to support the learning needs of the student. According to Tibbetts and Hector-Mason (2015) transitional stages such as Information Revolution, provide the student with different opportunities for learning. For example, adult learners that engage in this process find themselves combining different skills and strategies to enable them take advantage of the available opportunities and resources. Thus, the function of HRD in adult learning is rooted in this form of learning that is defined by the theories of: andragogy, self-directed learning, learning-how-to-learn, real-life learning, and learning strategies (Tibbetts and Hector-Mason, 2015). These models of learning are imperative to understand the approaches that adult learners use when learning on different online platforms.
In adult literacy HRD has played a significant role in incorporating technology as part of the learning strategies to improve and develop literacy outcomes. Litster (2016) asserts that most of the adults’ learning practices take place on the internet – and literacy education programs that do not integrate technology in their learning approaches risk failing to train the adults on the current digital literacy skills and knowledge that are critical for them to meet the expectations placed on them by literate groups. Thus, ICT and digital literacy skills are one of the primary HRD issues that adult learning faces. Pappas (2015) argues that adult learners do not have adequate time to spare and participate in formal and non-formal adult learning activities; therefore, they have to rely on their intrinsic motivators. Including technology as part of the adult literacy education programs, can motivate and facilitate their participation in the learning process – by ensuring that there are enough resources and support systems available, which adults can utilize when they have the time (Pappas, 2014). Technology introduces the chance of integrating multimedia and other interactive resources that can enhance adult learning programs and make them more appealing, realistic, encouraging and inspiring to adults to improve their reading and writing practices.
The other issues of HRD in the classroom, is that the learners have different learning styles, speeds and requires varying amounts of support to fulfill the learning expectations. The learners’ abilities to engage in adult literacy are influenced by their readiness to learn. According to Pappas (2015), an adult learners’ readiness to learn can be affected by different factors such as change or the desire for self-development. In contrast to children who are told what they should learn, adults have to understand why they need to acquire certain skills and knowledge and the role of these acquisitions in their growth and development.
The function of HRD in adult literacy is to introduce opportunities to improve education through various innovations. According to Tibbetts and Hector-Mason (2015) technological innovations such as the internet and social media have played a vital role in revolutionizing communication, information and the approaches that are used in teaching and learning. As a result, technological innovations and advancements have introduced both educators and learners new demands that require the education sector to revise their instructional methods, and invest in those that focus on addressing the targeted needs of the learner. Collaboration is one of the main educational methodologies that have been designed to improve the teaching and learning approaches in schools by fulfilling the targeted needs of the learners. As part of HRD, collaboration refers to the act of partnering up with an individuals or a group in order to achieve the desired outcomes. Tibbetts and Hector-Mason (2015) assert that collaboration has been relevant in adult literacy by designing and implementing various guidelines that support collaborative learning programs. Collaboration is vital to improve the educator’s effectiveness in delivering skills and knowledge; thus, it may be necessary to introduce significant changes in some programs and teaching methods.
Schools need to modify the teaching methods and shift from concentrating on specific isolated methods, whereby students are taught according to their ages and the subjects that they take. According to Tibbetts and Hector-Mason (2015) the new developments in education have encouraged both educators and learners to adopt the knowledge-value approach that discourages the notion that students need to learn isolated skills and knowledge suitable for a specific career, and shift to learning different skills and acquire knowledge that enables them to transition effortlessly from one career to another. As a result, in the field of education, educators are now emphasizing on the need of training learners on soft skills that will enable them to succeed in their career while working with a team or independently. If students do not acquire the right soft skills while in school they tend to struggle in balancing different projects and meeting their career objectives. Richman (2015) asserts that soft skills are crucial in the workplace since they assist an individual to work effectively and efficiently with others. This is because learners are expected to use the skills and knowledge they have acquired beyond the classroom. Furthermore, human relations occur in and outside the classroom thus, students have to learn appropriate ways to interact with others.
In the workplace, HRD is made up of various activities that encourage behavioral change and expose employees to new learning opportunities. Richman (2015) explains that the function of HRD in the workplace is to develop the skills and resilience of the employees to meet the current and future expectations of the organization. Therefore the overall objective of HRD in an organization is to motivate the employees, encourage them to be productive and achieve high performance. At the workplace, HRD is used to introduce development activities such as training, career planning and development, changing management and providing feedback and appraisals. All these methods are used as part of the HRD to increase performance.
The development of communication and technology in the world has introduced various challenges in HRD within the workplace. Technological advancements have forced employees to be agile and rapidly adapt to the new technologies in the industry. These possess an issue in HRD as employees find replacing their old skills with newly acquired skills due to technological advancements as being challenging. Although some of the employees may quickly adapt to the changes, others will struggle and the organization may be required to introduce training and development approaches to help them learn. To improve the performance of the employees, an organization is required to train and upgrade the skills of its workforce to meet the current requirements of the new age.
Conclusion
HRD is the integrated use of available resources to improve the effectiveness of an organization. The primary function of HRD is towards career development by enhancing the abilities of an individual or a group. In adult literacy HRD plays an important role of improving the key competencies of the educators and the learners, which enable both the teachers and the students to perform and achieve their desired learning outcomes. Through planned learning activities, adult literacy has succeeded in equipping learners with relevant skills and knowledge that they can apply beyond the classroom and advance in their career. On the other hand, in the workplace, HRD is used to initiate and manage changes – by ensuring that the individual and organizational objectives are fulfilled. The main HRD issue is technology and its advancements. Although technology has improved how students learn and workers perform their duties it poses a challenge since it is constantly changing.
References
Litster, J. (2016). The principles of adult learning. UCL Institute of Education.
Pappas, C. (2014). 9 Tips To Apply Adult Learning Theory to eLearning. e-Learning Industry. Retrieved from: https://elearningindustry.com/pedagogy-vs-andragogy-in-elearning-can-you-tell-the-difference
Pappas, C. (2015). Pedagogy Vs Andragogy In eLearning: Can You Tell The Difference? e-Learning Industry. Retrieved from: https://elearningindustry.com/pedagogy-vs-andragogy-in-elearning-can-you-tell-the-difference
Richman, N. (2015). Human resource management and human resource development: Evolution and contributions. Creighton Journal of Interdisciplinary Leadership; Vol. 1, No. 2, pp. 120 – 129
Tibbetts, J., & Hector-Mason, A. (2015). Utilizing Practices That Reflect 21st Century Learning Contexts . Collaboration in Adult Education.
