SHRM in the third world countries

The assessment of strategic human resource management in the third world countries fundamentally questions the application of Western management theories in the context of third world countries. If we have the courage to say that they (Western management theories) are not relevant, are we suggesting that we have different theories? Or we do not have any? Then how do we manage? Is the managing of affairs in this context effective? There are no clear answers to these questions as third world countries are not homogenous either. The degree of relevance SHRM has in these countries depends on the factors indicated below.

Environmental factors

Economy – the status of poverty

SHRM requires the support of the countrywide economic environment. Poor countries particularly those in Sub Saharan Africa are preoccupied with problems of hunger, general diseases, HIV AIDS pandemic, water shortages and other basic needs. This situation even affects strategic management in most organisations because senior managers who are expected to be drivers are also part of the wider system trying to make ends meet.

General education and professional skills

The quality of the workforce depends on the general quality of general and professional education of the country. In the poorer countries, the quality of education is lower and as a result it is difficult to get staff of the required levels of competence needed to develop, drive and sustain business strategies. This is one of the reasons that most international firms resort to hiring unnecessarily expensive expatriates to head strategic positions in an organisation.

Technology

SHRM will work where an organisation is able to acquire the best available technology if the business strategy is beyond mere survival. With the exception of strongly emerging countries, which to some extent may not qualify as being third world countries (Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, Malaysia, Thailand and even more recently India) the rest of the countries are technologically dependent on the developed countries. Lack of capital required to acquire modern machinery and equipment has been a major setback in modernising most of the processing industries that are now in the hands of the private sector after many decades of public ownership and mismanagement. In Tanzania, Morogoro Canvas Mill Ltd and Tanzania Portland Cement Company Ltd (Twiga Cement) are cases that illustrate this.

Infrastructure

One of the main reasons for the failure of poor countries to attract sufficient foreign direct investment is lack of efficient infrastructure - roads, telephone services, electricity, railways, air and water networks. Even if the organisation has excellent business and human resource strategies, with poor infrastructural support, the chance of failure is higher than success. This is a disincentive for devoting time and energy to developing SHRM, particularly in medium and small-scale firms.

The extent of urbanisation

Organisations located in big cities are more likely to develop and use business strategies than those in semi urban or rural areas. Managers can learn from other firms in the neighbourhood, network, get information on time, obtain a well-educated workforce, and get access to emerging markets etc. Urban centres in poor countries are far less comparable to big cities worldwide. Therefore, it is unrealistic to expect business and human resource management strategies in poor countries to work in the same way as they do in developed countries, let alone the existence of these human resource management strategies in the former.

Cultural issues

Managing organisations in third world countries is far more influenced by cultural issues than the Western management school of thought on business strategy or human resource strategy was designed to address. After all, the concepts and the language used in human resource management are devoid of cultural diversity, corruption, as well as an obsession for following the rules and regulations (inherited from colonialists) and paternalistic behavioural expectations by society. Others are the meanings attached to concepts such as ‘risk’, ‘deadline’, ‘quality work‘ and many more which do not seemingly fit the context of other countries, although there is quick learning and adapting in the form of imitation in order to catch up with the ‘civilised society’. It is immoral to use corruption as a means for exercising strategies where there are barriers. For example, circumventing corruption to get a business licence or tax clearance may prove very costly and at times it may create hostility that may lead to sabotage of the organisation from those in powers of position in government.

There is no doubt that most managers in these countries learned their management styles over a few years of college education but they have learned much more from experience which has nothing to do with managing modern organisations. For some, the only experience was from colonial masters where they were employed as clerks, for others it was through working as public bureaucrats, and for the luckiest ones it was through management of public enterprises (already dead and raised to life by private investors) whereby using the rule of thumb was the underlying management philosophy. For decades, managers have been operating in an environment where coming to work late has become normal, working for two instead of eight hours a day is acceptable, staying around with nothing to do is part of a daily programme, stealing company’s money and other resources for selfish ends is perceived as a good way of avoiding poverty and embarrassment at old age… the list is ad infinitum. Therefore, new management concepts cited above and many others such as objectivity, honesty, transparency, and commitment to work are as alien as the operating business environment today. Some emerging powerful organisations have realised this limitation and have resorted to recruiting young university graduates so that they can nurture them and develop an appropriate organisational culture.

Although the fresh blood seems to accommodate these new management concepts, paternalism remains a hard nut to crack because it is an integral part of the society. Human resource strategies may be there but favouritism based on family membership, ties to relatives or other members of ones tribe, regional affiliation, and religion seem to hinder effective recruitment and selection, placement, promotion, transfer, rewards, and all other staffing functions. Too few good employment opportunities, poverty and the growing number of family dependants resulting from the HIV AIDS pandemic exacerbate this situation.

Increasing globalisation is now pushing poor countries and organisations to adapt to the way of thinking and doing that the developed world uses. The main drivers for change are major world institutions including the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and the International Finance Capital and Multinational Corporations. These institutions determine and control capital flows to poor countries in the form of conditions including the production of viable strategic business plans.