Roles of Personnel Managers

• Generally acts in Advisory capacity.
• Provides information, offer suggestions, counsels & assist all line managers in the orgn. and is not responsible for end results.
• Must exercise control very tactfully to win confidence and cooperation of all line managers.
• To persuade line managers to work with staff specialists and not against them.
• His authority comes from personnel policies & programmes & from advantage and result of accepted specialised knowledge.

Role of Personnel Managers
1. Advisory Role:

• Personal management is not a line responsibility but a staff function.
• He performs his functions by advising, suggesting, counselling and helping the line managers in discharging their responsibilities relating to grievance, redressal, conflict resolution, employee selection and training etc.
• Thus personnel manager plays an advisory role in managing men under his care.

2. Counselor Role: Discusses various problems of employees relating to work, career, their supervisors, colleagues, health, family, financial, social etc. AND suggests them means to minimise and overcome those problems.

3. Mediator’s Role: Acts as a mediator in case of friction bw employees, superiors and subordinates and employees and management so as to maintain industrial harmony.

4. Representative Role:

• Organizations’ Representative : To give an overall picture of organisational operations to employees particularly in case of industrial disputes or grievances redressal.

• Worker’s Representative : To represent their problems to management particularly in non-unionised concerns.

5. Clerical Role: Plays this role regarding time-keeping, calculation of wages, salary, allowances, incentive, compensation, maintenance of records etc.

6.  Fire Fighting Role: Plays this role of grievance handling, settlement of disputes, handling disciplinary cases, collective bargaining, joint consultation, interpretation and implementation of various labour laws regarding court cases, filing suits in labour courts, industrial tribunals, civil courts etc.

7. Welfare Role: Acting as welfare officer of the organisation PM provides and maintains canteens, hospitals, creches, educational institutes, clubs, libraries, conveyance facilities, co-operative credit societies, consumer stores etc.

8. Change Agent’s Role: Can convince both workers and management and take the lead in implementing changes in technology, organisation, production and installing organisation development techniques etc.

9. Decision-making Role: Plays dominant role in decisions regarding both major and minor issues of orgn. Involving human resources.  It formulates objectives, policies and programmes of HRM.

10. Executive Role: Once decisions regarding HRM are taken, PM plays dominant role in executing those decisions and programmes.