Items Description of Module

Subject Name Human Resource Management

Paper Name Human Values and Indian Ethos
Module Title Concept of Human Values
Module Id Module No:- 01
Pre- Requisites Basic Knowledge of human values
Objectives To Study Various human values, their importance in the business organization
Keywords Human values, universality, new dimension
 QUADRANT-I
Module 01: Concept of Human Values
 Learning Outcomes
 Introduction
 Nature of human values

 Prominent human values

 Functions of human values

 Importance of human values in business organization

 Summary

1. LEARNING OUTCOMES

After studying this module, students will be able to understand:

 Meaning of human values
 Nature of human values
 Prominent human values
 Functions of human values
 Importance of human values in business organization

MODULE 1: CONCEPT OF HUMAN VALUES

INTRODUCTION:
Human beings have some sort of values attached to them like the way all entities living
on this earth pursue. The difference here which persists is that, these values are called by
different nomenclatures. For example, it can be human ethical and moral values. Out of
these three, human values are very essential. These values reside within each individual
and the same is reflected by the individual’s character. Formally, these are expressed in
various laws, declarations, debates, meetings, conventions etc. thereby protecting and
encouraging human rights. The first and important step taken by many countries around
the globe has been the recognition of these human values universally and encouraging the
implementation of these values in practical. The immediate aim of all these efforts is to
integrate every human being physically as well as psychologically and the ultimate goal
is to inculcate positive attitude, thinking, and behavior and utilize these universal human
values as the basis of developing cordial human relationships, in the spirit of mutual
respect of those values. Therefore, human values are those inspiring factor that encourage
us to utilize our moral values, particularly in the situation of conflict, so that we avoid our
negative attitude when dealing with confrontational situation.
MEANING OF HUMAN VALUES:
Human values can be defined as the belief, principles, followings, set standard that
individual follows as their guidelines in daily activities. These human values are an
important part of human nature. Without these values human beings are like flower
without fragrance. Professional ethics are mainly built on the basis of these principle
human values. From the societal point of view, these values are set of behavioral
practices that individuals choose to practice in the light of maintaining interpersonal
relationship. In the present era, human values plays a pivotal role in maintain peace and
protecting society. Establishing human values into practical form contribute towards
maintaining morality within the society. By correlating human values with personal
relations, human being can live in harmony with others.
NATURE OF HUMAN VALUES
I. Human values are universal:
Human values are universal in nature. These values are mutually shared by all human
beings, no matter to which religion, caste, creed, culture, nationality or history they
belong to. Some of the eminent human values can be grouped as follows:
 Imbibe civility in nature.
 Giving respect to others.
 Having honesty in behavior.
 Developing a habit of sharing among individuals.
 Develop loyalty, solidarity and fairness in behavior.
 Establish a feeling of brotherhood, friendship, empathy, love and compassion for
others.
 Inculcating openness, listening, welcoming, acceptance, recognition and
appreciation in nature.
II. Human values and culture:
Human values are specifically concerned to culture. Each persisting culture has its own
value system, ethics and ethos. In countries like India and Japan, value system occupies
the center stage in all activities, including those in business enterprises. Behavior that
exert a positive relation with other human being are rewarded and having empathetic
behavior for others are highly valued. On the other hand, behaviors which are anti-social
are always condemned and are punished by the society. Therefore, culture promotes
cultivating positive values in human being.
III. Implantation of Human values:
The initial process of implanting human values begins with the childhood of human
being. These values are passed on by parents to their child and are further implanted
throughout the child upbringing. As the child grows through its life phases, they learn
more about these values from their friends groups, teachers, elders, leaders and society.
The values which are learnt includes honesty, discipline, love, peace, justice, trust,
civility, loyalty, appreciation and openness for the environment. In addition to this,
subordination of individual interest before the larger interest is more desirable human
values. People who hold outstanding human values are usually regarded as well as
admired. It is generally visible in society for the individuals who are encouraged in
profession like teachers, doctors, lawyers which are viewed as persons holding high
moral and ethical code of conduct for their profession. These kind of noble human values
are highly encouraged in society and on the other hand negative values are discouraged.
IV. Human values encourage peace:
If there is peace in the environment it encourages prosperity and this is attained by
inculcating finer human values. It is by implanting such finer human values; people can
better appreciate and give respect for the peaceful relationship among individuals. By
putting human values into practice and it ultimately leads to bringing prosperity. Thus,
these values can prove to be an encouraging factor for peace. Also, by putting these
values into human relationship, it will surely enhance better mutual understanding among
individuals. As far as business organizations are concerned, if these values are better
cultivated into the organizational culture by the leaders, it is surely going to strengthen
the foundation of workplace i.e. strong integration of human resources which would
further lead to bringing peace and prosperity in the organization.
V. Human values encourage individual growth:
From the point of view to encourage individual growth, human values are of great
importance. The basic thing is to focus on the self personality development. Complete
knowledge regarding oneself is the first and foremost thing that needs to be taken care of.
Today, there are many situations, where many people rely on other to follow their ideas
to be successful which is completely fair because for the simple reason that we all have
role models which influence our thinking. But still there exist a thin line discrepancy
between individuals perspective of doing things. Human values which follow the basic
features of Indian education focus on growth and advancement of individual. Indian
education system which is the oldest system in the world has such qualities that do not
exist anywhere in the world.
VI. Difference among Human values, Ethical values and Moral values:
Although three of them fall under the wide category of value system, there exists a thin
line difference among them. Ethical values can be categorized as respectful behavior
towards other human being, plants as well as animals without harmony them, while moral
values are in fact the same but today moralizing rhetoric is not well received. On the
other hand, human values are considered much more as developing positive attitude
directly concerned with the behavior.
PROMINENT HUMAN VALUES:
Some of the prominent human values can be categorized as follows:
1. Genuine: One should have genuine feeling for others. Behavior should be honest,
warm and heartily for people around you. Individual’s feeling should be such that it is felt
genuinely by others.
2. Modesty: One must be humble in his/ her approach. There should not be a feeling of
superiority within an individual. Modesty and humanity in nature have a far more
everlasting impact on the people.
3. Self-Respect: One should try to be someone whom people around give respect and
seek advice from. One who never consider material gains over and above his/her own
moral values. One should never allow anyone to move you away from doing what is right
and acceptable.
4. Rationality: One must be rational in its thinking. Your values should be such that it is
not easily influenced by other’s thinking. Have a rational approach towards comparing
situations, acts, people etc. Don’t let prejudice or emotion affect you or your judgment.
5. Courteous: One should always show courtesy while behaving with others. Always
adopt an approach of good manners even though others around you may not.
6. Incorrupt: One should opt a strong approach for withholding one’s life values. Don’t
let outside powers to corrupt you. It must be known to the external environment that you
are not the person whose moral values and reactions are saleable.
7. Civility: One must have a great civic sense. It is very pertinent to know how to behave
in society and extend courtesy to others.
8. Wisdom: It is important to have knowledge but more important to have wisdom. One
should try to understand the real qualities of people and apply his/her wisdom for the
greater good of humanity.
9. Wholesome: One should be conducive of not only physical wellbeing but also
psychological as well as spiritual wellbeing also. One must be completely attentive and
active while interacting with others.
10. Charity: Establishing a feeling of empathetic and compassionate behavior towards
others helps the individual to grow his/her personality. Learn to extend a helping hand
towards other even though they themselves are not able to help you.
FUNCTIONS OF HUMAN VALUES:
Values are composed of different characteristics. Most of the imbibed values are learnt in
the very early stages in our life from family, relatives, friends, school, media and other
different sources of society, which later on becomes a part of our personality. These
values are generally shared and reinforced by those with whom we interact. It can be
individual specific or can be general. It can be different from culture to culture. One may
value aggressiveness, another reverse and third may give little attention to this dimension
collectively, thus, having divergent views on a single topic of concern. One society may
value individual achievement as in USA whereas another may emphasize family unity
and support as in India. The values of hard work and individual achievement are often
associated with individual capitalist societies whereas holistic and spiritual growth may
be the goal of others. Therefore, human values serve a lot of functions. The main
functions are as follows:
(i) Values mend various prospects of individual’s personality and also influence the
socio-cultural aspects of the individual.
(ii) Values build up different pillars supporting the society and integrate social relations.
(iii) Values play an important role in the integration and fulfillment of man’s basic
desires in a stable and consistent manner which is necessary for his living.
(iv) Values influence individual’s attitude and serves as the basis for evaluating the
behavior of others.
(v) They have an important role to play in the conduct of one’s social life.
(vi) They facilitate to create norms for day to day behavior.
(vii) Values are mainly originated from experiences of various social actions made up of
both individual and social responses and attitudes.
RELATIONSHIP OF HUMAN VALUES AND CORPORATE SECTOR:
In the present era, as the corporate sector is expanding day by day business firms are
becoming more competitive in nature and for the system to deal with complexities with
peace and harmony, human values acquired an important place in our socio-economic
environment. Human values are the guiding forces that take into account human element
when we interact with other human beings. These values can be categorized as positive
forces that create humanity bonds among individuals. In other words, it creates
reciprocity of behavior with the help of which strong and harmonious mutual
relationships are developed.
In the context of corporate sector, the main aim of leaders in the organization is to create
an environment of strong human values. Organizations strive hard to create and maintain
value for all its stakeholders in the sense that it is the moral obligation on the part of the
organization to serve satisfactorily towards all its direct or indirect stakeholders. For
example: Owners expect business firms to maximize their wealth, customers expect that
they are being served with justifiable kind of product and services, employees giving
services to their organization expect to be compensated timely, suppliers expect that they
are to be paid in time and at last, society expect that the organization maintain its moral
and social responsibility within time etc. All these expectation from different
stakeholders needs to be taken care of by the organization and is the value system that
needs to be sustained.
IMPORTANCE OF HUMAN VALUES IN BUSINESS ORGANIZATIONS:
Management is the process of optimum utilization of organizational physical as well as
human resources to the extent of attaining its objectives in addition to serving the society
at large. Therefore, human value here also needs to be considered in order to maintain
cordial human interactions during working of the business entity. Thus, the process of
management deals with three important factors:
 Optimum utilization of physical as well as human resources.
 Attainment of organizational objectives.
 Serving the society at the end.
Thus, co-relating the human values as well as the ethical values with in the business
activities can prove to be very fruitful for the business organization. This can provide the
business units with abundant amount of opportunities as well as information for growth
in the modern business world.
In this changing, business scenario, it is very pertinent for the business organization to
develop ethical as well as human values on high priority basis within the organization.
Human values imbibes a common shared organizational culture by binding people
together which ultimately leads to increasing the organizational effectiveness. It helps to
binds the people collectively by combining their vision and mission for the larger interest
of the organization which will result in contributing towards organizational performance.
Organizational values are separate for each company and each business house is depicted
by its followed culture. Therefore, it is very essential for the organization to think about
their organizational culture first before planning for the next years. Hence, the key
benefits of values in an organization are as follows:
 Human values help to contribute towards organizations performance and
productivity.
 It directs the behavior of human being for achieving organization vision.
 Binds people together creating a sharing culture.
 Helps people to develop common vision.
  Enhance communication and teamwork.
 Develop strong organizational culture with better understanding of business
goals.
 Encourage innovation to support organization competitiveness.
 Improvement in serving customer real needs.
 Provides necessary information for the management for better business
decisions.
NEED FOR REVIVAL OF HUMAN VALUES IN BUSINESS SECTOR:
Today, there is a dire need for the organization to re-establish the core human values with
the business organization for the simple reason that now the organization’s motto is not
only limited to maximize the profit but it also need to fulfill some corporate social
responsibilities on its own. There is a large awareness about ethical and moral business
practices in the market. The core area of ethical leadership, value education, integrity and
workplace ethics are of great importance. Profit earning is not only the end option.
Hence, human values are of supreme importance and can somehow become our savior.
SUMMARY:
Human beings have some sort of values attached to them like the way all entities living
on this earth pursue. The difference here which persists is that, these values are called by
different nomenclatures. Human values can be defined as the belief, principles,
followings, set standard that individual follows as their guidelines in daily activities.
These human values are an important part of human nature. Without these values human
beings are like flower without fragrance. Professional ethics are mainly built on the basis
of these principle human values. . Establishing human values into practical form
contribute towards maintaining morality within the society.
Values are composed of different characteristics. Most of the imbibed values are learnt in
the very early stages in our life from family, relatives, friends, school, media and other
different sources of society, which later on becomes a part of our personality. In the
present era, as the corporate sector is expanding day by day business firms are becoming
more competitive in nature and for the system to deal with complexities with peace and
harmony, human values acquired an important place in our socio-economic environment.
SELF-ASSESSMENT
1. Define Human values and discuss prominent human values.
2. Explain the nature of human values.
3. What is the importance of human values for the business houses?
REFERENCES:
Pramod Sharma, “Business Ethics and Corporate Values: An Indian Perspective”
Ravitanaya Publications, Shimla, 2017
S.K Bhatia, “Business Ethics and Corporate Governance” Deep & Deep Publications,
New Delhi, 2004
A.C. Fernando, “Business Ethics and Corporate Governance” Pearson Publication, 2013
Harris & Hartman, “Organizational Behavior” Jaico Publication House, 2002
French, Bell & Vohra, “Organization Development” Pearson Prentice Hall Publication,
2009
S B Gogate, “Human Values & Professional Ethics” Vikas Publishing House, New Delhi,
2011