er management areas reflected different philosophies. Human resource management was planned in isolation, it used dissimilar language about work (tasks, results, outputs, outcomes, duties, key results) and about people (knowledge, skills, values, attitudes, commitments, competencies, capabilities, abilities) (p. 27).Articulation of the differences between a model of operational and administrative human resource management versus a strategic and facilitative role of human resource management is required. McLagan (1999, p.26) asserts that the human resource profession must spend more time in strategic and cultural work, and less time devoted to the traditional areas of administrative and operational human resource management. Ulrich (Cited in McLagan 1999, p.26) views human resource management as having managed records and administered services. “We've done a lot of day-to-day management handling performance problems, counseling, intervening, and policing policy.” However as the information and knowledge era has accelerated change, it has resulted in an increasing focus on the place of people, their issues and the pivotal role in an organisation’s success. A strategic human resource management approach takes into consideration the contributions that people make. Robbins et. al. (2000, p.389) affirms this position that an organisation’s human resources can be a significant source of competitive advantage. That to achieve this advantage however requires an essential change in the way managers’ view the organisation workforce, where the essential element is in working with the organisations people in partnership. The question of why does strategic human resource management matter needs to be addressed. The information and instant communication age makes knowledge easily accessible to all, including the firms competitors. This results in the ability for firms to readily reproduce technology, with no clear adva...
