Human resource management as a strategic business partner in the minds of stakeholders in the fast moving consumer goods industry

Human Resource Management (HR) as is known today is argued to have started as an approach which took naissance early in the 1900s from both the scientific management approach and the human relation approach (Grobler, Warnish, and Hatfield, 2002:5). These two approaches were considered at the time as the most effective means of managing employees and were designed to find ways in which human capital could be best utilised for the benefit of their respective organisations. Such role and objectives have improved over the years but are still not well known. This study aims at assessing the effectiveness of HR as a strategic business partner in the minds of stakeholders operating in the Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) industry. The study argues that a well established and managed Human Resource department is a strategic partner for organisations operating in the FMCG industry, and adds value to such businesses. In order to evaluate the quality of the service delivered by HR in the FMCG, a series of interviews were conducted among retail store managers and their employees. The data was collected using structured questions. Based on the flow of the interviews, unstructured questions were also added. In these interviews HR was evaluated on five grounds namely: training interventions, strategic recruitment, employees’ motivation, retentions strategies, and the implementation of the grievance procedure.