Keele University Prospectus Undergraduate | 2016 | Page 124

BUSINESS AND MANAGEMENT

Human Resource Management
Overview

The Human Resource Management teaching group
within Keele Management School has over
20 years of experience of delivering quality academic
programmes and are the main provider of courses
in Human Resource Management and Industrial
Relations in the UK at both undergraduate and
postgraduate levels. We are a research active group,
which means that our teaching is informed by the
latest trends, developments and knowledge in
employment matters. Our main research interests
and publications lie in the following areas: public
sector pay; pay modernisation and part-time work;
gender discrimination and equality; trade union
organisation; industrial relations in the EU and
internationally; job regulation and front line work;
employment of migrant workers, asylum seekers and
refugees; the regulation of work and the work-life
balance of white collar workers; Britain as a particular
variety of capitalism. We pride ourselves on the
quality of our course and the pastoral care and level
of academic support that we offer to our students.
The Human Resource Management programme has
a sequential structure that starts from the principles
and gradually builds up your critical understanding
of human resource management through the study
of a balanced and flexible curriculum. The dual
honours system allows you to engage with a broad
range of other subjects, like business management,
psychology, sociology, economics, politics and
history. The programme enables cross-fertilisation of
ideas from one area of study to another as well as the
development of knowledge and skills in two subject
areas. It allows you considerable scope to tailor
your own learning through the selection of elective
modules. This promotes your ability to engage either
in further postgraduate opportunities in human
resource management and related subjects or to
secure graduate level employment.

Course content
First year
Core modules:

Management in Context provides an introduction to
management and organisations and places them in
a historical, political and economic context.
The British and Global Economy provides an
introduction to the study of institutional economics
exploring contemporary developments in the global
economy from a historical perspective.
Foundations of Human Resource Management
explores the nature of the employment relationship
from a historical perspective identifying the principal
theoretical bases for understanding the development
and practice of human resource management.

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Depending on your other principal subject,
modules can also be taken from a range of
school electives, including:
• The British and Global Economy
• Market and Hierarchies
• Accounting Principles
• Marketing Principles
• Business Law
• Globalisation
• Financial and Management Accounting
Depending on your other principal subject,
modules can also be taken from a wide range
of attractive free standing electives, like modern
languages, music, physics, computer sciences,
criminology and politics.
Second year
You will build upon your knowledge gained
in the first year by taking the following three core
modules, which examine the key issues affecting
HR professionals:
Workforce Planning explores the theory and practice
of employee resourcing, retention and associated
managerial processes and practices.
Industrial Relations addresses the collective aspects
of the employment relationship by looking at the
nature of industrial relations in the UK and in the EU.
Managing Human Resources provides a critical
understanding of the management of labour in
the 21st century environment and of workplace
procedures and forms of employee representation
and employee involvement.
Depending on your other principal subject,
modules can also be taken from a range of
school electives, including:
• Pay and Performance
• Corporate Social Responsibility
• Social Theory at Work
• Critical Perspectives on Management Research
• Organisational Behaviour
Depending on your other principal subject, modules
can also be taken from a wide range of attractive free
standing electives across the university.