Human Resources Management Challenges in Higher Education Institutions in Tanzania

Abstract

People constitute the most important resource in any organisation because they use other resources such as money, machines, materials, methods, information and time that enable organisations to function. People make organisations produce the goods and or services needed in the society to meet day-to-day needs. One of the challenges is the shortage of academic staff in Tanzanian Higher Education Institutions that leads to increased moonlighting and hence poor quality teaching, due to the staff being over-deployed. Another challenge is shortage of HRM experts and the lack of well trained and experienced staff in the area, it is not possible for HEIs to recruit and retain a good manager for an extended duration because of demands for HRM. There are twenty three (23) HRM functions prior to underlining the fact that Human Resources are the most important resource in any organisation. The evolution of management of human resources in HEIs since the 1960s has been reviewed indicating that it was only very late in the 1990s and early 2000 that most Tanzanian HEIs started to realise the critical importance of HRM. The author has presented 14 (fourteen) critical challenges facing HRM in Tanzanian HEIs prior to highlighting a number of potential future challenges that deserve to be anticipated in time