Development of HRM Framework for Quality Management: Empirical Analysis of HRM Challenges

The paper attempted to make an empirical analysis of the HRM challenges to quality management and to develop a HRM framework that can support quality transformation. The three factors, namely, presence of HRM practices, HRM Administrative outcomes and HR deliverables for quality management was analyzed in detail bringing in their associations and mutual impacts. Hospitals with quality certification, hospitals that have initiated the quality certification process and hospitals, which had quality certification was selected for the research. The study used qualitative data collected from healthcare employees in Kerala collected through structured questionnaires, supplemented by secondary data and literature review. The collected data were analyzed and interpreted using frequency, percentage and Chi-Square. The paper concluded that the HRM challenges and issues of quality management and transformation is not the absence of HRM activities, but the negative outlook of top management towards investments in human resources. Though Human Resource Management practices are implemented as part of quality management, the administrative outcomes which are supposed to follow are missing in the majority of the cases. This adversely affects the expected HR deliverables and results in failure of quality management initiative.