Human Resources Development (HRD) and Human Resources Manage

What is lacking in Human Resource
Policies in Pakistan

Human Resources Development (HRD) and Human Resources Management is a sub-discipline of Management, emerging out of the felt needs of US Navy when Captain of a Man of War called a meeting of Officers & other ranks in an emergency situation; providing rights on equal footings for Officers and ratings to discuss the situation and arrive at the solution. Initially the hardened top brass resisted the move, but subsequently discovered that amazing results were forthcoming. Hence this practice initially adopted in US Navy, was also tried in the provate sector; and the results found satisfactory, gained acceptance as an intellectual discipline known by the term Management. Slowly & gradually , allied concepts also evolved embracing the financial & accounting techniques; simultaneously taking care of the concepts like discounted cash flow, Management Information System (MIS), Financial Information System (FIS), time overruns, and cost overruns for ensuring optimum utilization of the resources placed at the disposal of Management in order to achieve the desired/predetermined Objectives.

Needless to mention, that gun does play a positive role during the course of a battle; but ultimately it is the man behind the gun who matters. Hence specialised training for developing the Human Resources (HRD) and harnessing these resources for achieving the desired objectives (HRM). Due to this break-neck competition between two or more commercially behavioural configurations, the real good human resources were hired by offering attractive terms in order to make a certain commercial entity viable in relation to its competitor.

Readers should be well within their rights to ask for an example. Though a number of examples could possibly be cited, but the most obvious choice should be Japan; where nothing grows for want of space & no industrial or mineral resources are available for the purposes of industry & which per force has to depend entirely on import even for the raw material required for turning out finished industrial products like automobile. Only the value-added component has made Japanese trade commercially viable, and the credit of capturing the automobile market goes entirely to its highly specialised human resource equipped with extraordinarily sharpened industrial skill.

Now let us get down to Pakistani scenario, where quality of education is still subservient to Lord Mcauley' policy in the 19th century for an agrarian society. These standards further deteriorated after Independence due to haphazard and irrelevant changes, and its standards are still in the decline. A sizeable chunk of Pakistan's GDP is being wasted in the name of purposeless education; which of late has been turned into a profit yielding industry. How long will this state of affairs going to last-nobody knows. What are our academic requirements in various sectors, has never been worked out. What are the specialised areas for building our national economy, is still in the dark. Technically skilled & trained manpower is unemployed becdause the field has already reached saturation point. Who is responsible for this negligence, has not been determined. Colossal national resources are being lost & are still being squandered. Why, nobody knows?

The process of industrialization has been retarded, field of employment is becoming from narrow to narrower, inflationary spiral has set in; but has anyone bothered to analyse why? Higher salaries are need of the hour, but can we invest from our own resources? Answer is no. How about foreign investment & why is it shy? Doesn't this scenario call for an intensive & extensive survey for determining the causes before further investment is made in human resources in the field of education? Isn't iot just about the time to go for a planned change in the right direction, if human resources are to be developed? Their management is a subsequent issue, because they are at the minimal stage; and a very very careful approach is necessary for their development in the desired direction.

Jamil Zaidi[b]