In order to fully understand and appreciate high involvement management (HIM) one must first understand what it is. Once you understand HIM you will hopefully see the many advantages to this type of leadership and work practices. High involvement management is by definition “carefully selecting and retaining associates and giving them significant decision-making power, information, and incentive compensation” (M. Hitt, 2011, p. 592). High involvement management may seem to be as if one is giving up control and in a way a manager or supervisor is. By incorporating HIM into the work place can benefit the company and the employees.
I.1 Benefits to the company
By implementing high involvement management the company can and will benefit in several ways. The first and most important way would be the increase in human capital. Increasing human capital begins at the hiring phase. When the managers sit down with a prospective associate and take an active role in the interviewing process the manager can ask important questions that would require the applicant to ‘think outside the box’ when answering. In addition the supervisor can encourage the applicant to ask questions. I feel that this would enable both the applicant and the manager to better understand if the company/applicant is the right fit. If a company does not participate in HIM then they risk higher turn overrates than companies that do.
The investment into human capital does not end at the hiring phase that is just the beginning. After the hiring of the associates the company needs to ensure that each associate has the appropriate training to perform their duties and beyond. It is one thing for a company to invest time and money into their employees just to get them proficient at their designated duties, but it is another thing to train your employees to perform their duties as well as other. In high involvement management training is not a onetime thing it is