Advantages and Disadvantages of ICT

Once the talented individual has been recruited the organisation it's time to keep a check on their performance and recognise need of skilful training required. It's very important to keep the staff motivated to get the best out them which is yet another function of HR, HR department arranges periodic reviews to assess their staff. Because line managers are in daily contact with the employees and can best measure performance, they are usually the ones who conduct the appraisals. Other evaluators of the employee's performance can include subordinates, peers, group, and self, or a combination of one or more (Mondy and Noe, 1996).

Cherrington (1995) illustrates how performance appraisals serve several purposes, including: guiding HR actions such as hiring, firing, and promoting; rewarding employees through bonuses, promotions, and so on; providing feedback and noting areas of improvement; identifying training and development needs in order to improve the individual's performance on the job; and providing job related data useful in HR planning.IT can be a very useful tool for appraisal processes as through IT systems like ACT! We can easily monitor the performance of the employee by constantly updating information about their tasks and the results they achieved, on the other hand it can also be used to remember important dates for the employees as it will alarm you their birthdays and etc. which can be a useful to motivate the staff by building a healthy friendly environment.COMPENSATION AND BENEFITCompensation is the salary paid to the employee for their services to the organisation which benefits refers to the motivational and appreciation of the employees by paying them insurance, pension, holiday pay, sick days or discounts etc. an employee's performances is directly influenced by these techniques of HR. It has been seen through surveys where employers appreciate more there employees through offering benefits have achieved much better results than the others who don't.

This makes the employees feel more appreciated and know they are worth something to the organisation. Compensation should be legal and ethical, adequate, motivating, fair and cost-effective, and able to provide employment security (Cherrington, 1995).TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENTThe most important role of HR is to recognise the need for providing training to the staff where required, as performance appraisals not only assists in determining the rewards to be given out but the identify the need of training to acquire necessary skill to improve the workforce in their current position and also prepare them for future opportunities, as the organisational structure continuously keeps changing through the expansion the need of training and development programs increase accordingly. "Training focuses on learning the skills, knowledge, and attitudes required to initially perform a job or task or to improve upon the performance of a current job or task, while development activities are not job related, but concentrate on broadening the employee's horizons" (Nadler and Wiggs, 1986, p.

5).Education, which focuses on learning new skills, knowledge, and attitudes to be used in future work, also deserves mention (Nadler and Wiggs, 1986). Because the focus is on the current job, only training and development will be discussed. Training can be used in a variety of ways, including orienting and informing employees, developing desired skills, preventing accidents through safety training, supplying professional and technical education, and providing training and executive education (Cherrington, 1995).Every training method mentioned has its benefits to both the employee as well as the organisation, some of the benefits are to cut down the learning time and save the time and money wasted in new recruitment. By teaching the employees to be familiar with the new technology is better to have recruited new personal for the job as it improve the loyalty and motivates the staff, while in production department it can reduce the number of accidents happening because of lack of training of staff to know how to use the machinery properly, providing better productivity and also it can enhance the level of customer services through skilful training improving quality, quantity and productivity.

The type of training usually depends upon the time and budget available one of the ways of training is to mentor the staff or one day workshop which allows participants to demonstration to how to do their work efficiently. But these days IT has made this process a whole lot easier by providing online crash courses and training where the employee can learn within their own time without taking a day of work learn at home or are at their desk.IT based training programs can be delivered anywhere in the world without having to actually travel saving time and cost at the same time. Training focuses on the current job, while development concentrates on providing activities to help employees expand their current knowledge and to allow for growth. Types of development opportunities include mentoring, career counselling, management and supervisory development, and job training (Cherrington, 1995).

EMPLOYEE AND LABOUR RELATIONSAlong with keeping the track of properly trained staff human resource developers also make sure that there are groups of employees organised as unions to address and resolve employment related issues. Unions have been around since the time of the American Revolution (Mondy and Noe, 1996). Most of the people joining these unions are to either have higher pay or to eliminate conditions. Some of the outcomes of union involvement include better medical plans, extended vacation time, and increased wages (Cherrington, 1995).

Now the function of HR is make sure the relation between the employees and the employer are smooth and always in good friendly environment where they are appreciated and treated as a part of family.SAFETY AND HEALTHHealth and safety is one of the major issues in the world these days where there is high governmental involvement in the issue regarding the safety of the employees. HR is required to make sure the rights of the employees are not violated in any case, while the employees work in safe and healthy environment. Mondy and Noe (1996) define safety as "protecting employees from injuries caused by work-related accidents" and health as keeping "employees free from physical or emotional illness" (p. 432). ).

In order to prevent injury or illness, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) was created in 1970. Through workplace inspections, citations and penalties, and on-site consultations, OSHA seeks to enhance safety and health and to decrease accidents, which lead to decreased productivity and increased operating costs (Cherrington, 1995). Health problems recognized in the can include the effects of smoking, alcohol and drug/substance abuse, AIDS, stress, and Through employee assistance programs (EAPs), employees with emotional difficulties are given "the same consideration and assistance" as those employees with physical illnesses (Mondy and Noe, 1996, p. 455).IT has dramatically changed the face of health and safety as the technology updated so did the ways to provide people a safer environment with the launch of computer based systems that constantly keeps a check on the environment the staff works in and alarming as soon as something hazardous happens.

For examples laboratories are always under a check of these new IT based systems which detects even the minor changes to the environment which could defy the health laws. Then there are new breed of security and fire alarm systems that automatically informs the appropriate authorities in case of an emergency before anyone realises what's happening.Revolution in Information and communication technologies (ICT) is dramatically changing the way of life and how things are done in nearly every aspect of human activity. The global economy is putting a competitive pressure on businesses compelling them to embrace ICT to keep up with the market at its frenetic pace. ICT gives it the competitive edge, convince, quality of service, affordability, creativity and much more advantages.

Information Technology Association of America (ITAA) defines (Mitchell et al.1998) "study, design, development, implementation, support or management of computer-based information systems, particularly software applications and computer hardware." According to a study by the International Data Corporation (IDC) for theWorld Information Technology and Services Alliance (WITSA) released in October 1998, the world IT marketplace was approaching a size of US$2 trillion in the second half of 1998 (WITSA 1998). It is also growing at a rate substantially faster than worldwide GDP.

Data for the study were gathered from the 50 largest country markets in GDP terms. Which shows how the field has grown over the past a few decades and how important it is for an organisation to update itself with ICT capability to keep in the race. ICT plays a significant role in not only organisations but also the daily human life from business to leisure and our society.