Developing HR as a Core Competency: An Approach for Gaining Competitive Advantage

Environmental changes are remodelling the approach with which organizations create value and conduct business. These changes have initialised the urgency of creating a scenario where the organizations will be in a position to create and sustain difference in their capabilities and functions over and above their competitors. Consequence of this ongoing challenge is particularly compelling HR function to step up their capabilities for adding value so that the only non-imitable resource of the organizations, namely, capabilities of employees can be identified and utilized as a source of differentiator. Though till now the process of inculcating a set of competencies by HR function has been initialized but has not been fully implemented due to lack of awareness on the part of the organisation about the benefits derived from such competencies. This necessitates the need for identification of the set of competencies required for HR function and inducting them into the practices and policies of HR. The present study, therefore, is an attempt to explore different kinds of competencies which will craft HR not only as a source of competitive advantage for the organizations but also as a core competent component of the organization. The study also suggests that HR should take a leading role in implementing competencies suitable for the business to attain its ultimate objectives.