Secondly, the findings of the research indicated that most of China SMEs do not think that the human resource management plays an important role in the interior of the enterprise and they think that it is not necessary to set up the independent department of the human resource management in their enterprises. Most of SMEs in China do not believe that the human resource management can bring benefits to the development of their enterprises, and most of them do not have the special department of human resource management and ask other departments such as finance department to deal with the human resource management affairs for the enterprise. This finding is supported by Zhao (2008). In the new century, the competition between enterprises has been more and more intense and the core of the competition is focused on the competition of human resources. It is more and more important for enterprises to have a good human resource management in order to succeed in the market. It was found by Zhao (2008) that most of enterprises especially SMEs in China have not realized the important role of human resources in the development of their enterprises and the importance of managing human resources to the competition of enterprises in the market. The research suggested that upon the background of network, verbalization, diversification and globalization, small and medium sized enterprises in China should make necessary changes in many aspects such as goals, ideas and ways of human resource management in the future in order to survive in the intense competition.
But on the other hand, the finding of Karami et al (2008) supported the importance of human resource management. The findings of Karami et al. (2008) showed that increasing the core competencies of the firm, in particular in HR, is the key element to the success of the firm. Moreover, it was posed that the growing involvement of the HR in the development and implementation of business strategy will lead to the increased effectiveness of the organization and the industry as a whole. Lastly, in order to increase firm performance and to benefit from HR capabilities, it was recommended that practitioners and SME CEOs should increase the involvement of their HR specialists in the processes of strategic management in their firms.
Thirdly, the findings showed that there are obvious differences in the human resource management practices, and the differences are mainly realized in four aspects of history, cultural differences, degree of attention and experiences . This finding is also supported by research evidence of Cunningham and Rowley (2007). Cunningham and Rowley (2007) did a research to emphasise the development, importance and pressure on the under researched area of Chinese small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) and human resource management (HRM) and provide a review and research agenda especially relating to the debate on convergence vis-à-vis divergence. This research examined recent research papers that are discussed and possible convergence and the pressures on HRM and its practice in Chinese SMEs. In this research, key elements in Chinese HRM are highlighted and four main dimensions of HRM are compared in terms of Western and Chinese characteristics and their cultural impacts and problems based on a conceptual framework to locate influences on Chinese HRM. The findings of the research indicated that the continuing influences on HRM suggest that a distinctly Chinese HRM approach combining Western practice with Chinese characteristics may be one way for SMEs in China to develop, and it is central to a better understanding of Chinese SMEs and helps fill some of the gap in the analysis of HRM in Chinese SMEs.
Lastly, the findings of the research also indicated that the current human resource management is not effective in Chinese SMEs. For most of SMEs in China, their human resource management is not effective enough to support the operation and management of the whole enterprise and other departments of the enterprise. Harris (2000) considered evidence from a recent survey of small businesses, which examined their main employment concerns and the sources of advice they use on employment relations matters. The survey’s findings illustrate the particular challenge increased employment rights presents to the smaller organisation. It identifies a need for more intensive support tailored to the specific circumstances of individual firms in developing proactive approaches to human resourcing which not only comply with but also reflect the spirit of the legislation.
On the other hand, the human resource management in most of Chinese SMEs does not have the perfect functions and most of them just have the function of recruitment and selection with their human resource management. Human resource management generally should include many functions such as recruitment and selection, motivation, performance appraisal, reward management, training and development, and employee relations. But because most of Chinese enterprises do not pay attention to the human resource management and realize the other important functions of the human resource management, so the human resource management is mainly just used as a simple tool for recruitment and selection in most SMEs of China. This finding is similar to the findings of the research of Jin (2008). Jin (2008) did a research to investigate human resource management of Chinese SMEs on a new vision of globalization. China is gradually involving in world economic system upon the background of economic globalization, and globalization has brought many impacts on many SMEs in China. Human resource management is particularly important to SMEs compared with the large enterprises, but it was found in the research that Chinese SMEs have shortages in many aspects of human resource management such as bias ideas of HRM, inefficient development of human resource and lack of scientific system of human resource management.
4.3.2 Problems involved with the implementation and development of human resource management in China’s SMEs
SMEs have to face more problems including problems of human resource management. The findings of this research indicated that SMEs in China have to face more problems in the human resource management compared with the large enterprises in China. This was also found by the research of Szamosi et al (2004). In that research, it was found that compared with the large enterprises, SMEs have many disadvantages in resources, talents, governmental support, strength, funds etc. so that SMEs have to deal with more problems during the process of developing and implementing the practice of human resource management. Large enterprises have more resources to invest in human resource management, and can attract more professionals in human resource management to work in their enterprises . So they generally have advantages in human resource management than SMEs and can face few problems during the process of implementing the practice of human resource management.
