Human Resources Management in Business free essay sample

Human resources department is a part of business that deals with its staff. The department is seen as part of strategic management, in the effort to achieve the goals of the business, and is crucial to the businesss success. Some of the human resources departments responsibilities include recruitment, retention, selection, job enlargement/enrichment, motivation and leadership, job role allocations, training, and payroll appraisals. The departments decisions are influenced by, however, internal issues for workforce planning. One of the issues could be the cost of its operations. The business would want to minimize cost, so any decisions made by Human resources should be cost-effective. Another issue could be the companys business strategy, for example when the company want to expand, the Human resources department would have to recruit more employees; if the company wants to cut costs and increase profit, the department would have to consider reducing the number of staff. We will write a custom essay sample on Human Resources Management in Business or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page It is also responsible for training current employees for any new equipments. There are also external factors that affect how workforce planning is carried out. These external factors include government actions that affect the business environment. For example, the government can impose new minimum wages that would increase the Human resources departments spending on wages payment. The education situation of the country can also affect Human resources, as education is the means that workers gain their skills; without proper education, Human resources wouldnt be able to recruit highly skilled workers without paying large salaries or recruit foreign nationals. An important external factor is the economic situation of the economy. If unemployment rates are high, Human resources would be able to recruit new employees much easier and cheaper than when the economy is in boom, which makes labour more expensive. The age ranges of the labour force can affect Human resources decisions, since they dont want to recruit too old of employees who are going to retire soon. The business often want more young employees who can potentially contribute to the company for a long period of time, and can also be more innovative. Another external factor is technology advancements, as this may result in the introduction of new equipments into the company. The Human resources department would then have to organise training for their current staff to enable them to work with the newly acquired machineries. There are many benefits to Human Resources planning. One of the most important purpose of the Human Resources department is to motivate staff. This can be done by means of promotions, training, and rewards. Another benefit is that Human Resources help import important skills into the business through the process of recruitment. Human Resources would compose a recruitment process that selects the right people for the business. Without a Human Resources department, a firm cannot efficiently recruit employees that they need. Also, the department helps the business plan the right number of workers. They make sure that there are no redundancy or shortages of labour in the company, and if there is any, Human Resources would fix this either by cutting or recruiting staff. Human Resources department also ensures smooth operations in regards to labour management. This means they make sure that employees arrive when they are needed, and are allocated to the right tasks, and that each workers know their role within the business. In addition, they resolve whatever arguments that may arise between the workers and company management, making sure that the employees are clear of company regulations, and that management are clear of their workers conditions. Finally, the Human Resources department ensures that no laws are broken in regards to labour employment. For example, the recruitment process must not violate discrimination laws. All necessary laws are briefed to staff to ensure no illegal activities are conducted within the company. Before selecting staff for any position, key skills needed for that particular job need to be identified, creating a list of criteria for candidate selection. British Sugar is one of the largest provider of sugar products in the UK. Their Human Resources department has been directed to recruit three new production managers, as part of the companys expansion project in China. The Human Resources department has identified the key skills for a potential production manager: Confidence: the manager needs to be confident in handling large responsibilities, whether it be meeting production deadlines, ensuring worker safety etc. They need confidence to be able to make decisive actions, taking the initiative without too much dependence on higher directives. As they direct the production process, confidence is also needed for negotiating with suppliers, making the best deals for the factory. Technical skills: a production manager has to be sufficiently knowledgeable about the production technology of their factory, to be able to understand and resolve technical problems should they arise. Technical knowledge of a manager does not have to be detailed, but must be sufficient to issue correct directives to the factorys engineer force. High technical skills is preferred, as the manager will be more likely to be innovative in improving production methods of the firm. Communication skills: a good production manager is able to communicate to all different divisions of the company. They are quick to absorb information from different levels of the company, whether it be top management or floor workers, and then provide quick and effective feedback. Communication skills are crucial in a manager, as it helps him ensure the coordination between different elements of the company. Problem-solving skills: the production manager should be able to independently deal with problems within their factory. They will be extremely resourceful in coordinating factory or company-level efforts to solve problems. This requires an intelligent person that can improvise upon their resources to damage-control and reverse the problem and put the factory back onto its original course. Motivating staff is an important part of company operation, as it ensure the employees do their best and be productive while working for the company. There is a variety of reasons why employees would want to work harder in their working environment. Such reasons could be money, bonuses, power, working with friends, social aspects of work, the need to provide for family, promotion, team work, and promotion. Frederick Taylor’s theory of motivation simply stated that all workers are worked by money. This means that in order to better motivate employees, the employer simply just has to raise their pay, and this would make them work harder. Taylor introduced the Theory of Scientific Management, which said that workers are naturally lazy and need close supervisions and control. The theory also says that managers should break down work to the simplest tasks to their employees. Workers also need adequate training and equipment to perform their simple tasks as efficiently as possible, then they would be paid according to the amount of products they had produced. The theory is often applied in mass production lines which involves repetitive tasks. Elton Mayo later introduced a new theory of motivation of his own. He believed that money is only part of the worker’s concern, and social needs are more important in motivating workers at their work place. Mayo published the Human Relation school of thought, which encourage managers to focus more on social interactions between workers. Mayo went further in his studies and conducted his own experiment at the Hawthorne factory in Chicago. From these series of experiments, he concluded that although physical conditions worsened, they do not affect the productivity of the Hawthorne workers. Instead, social factors such as better communication between workers and managers, better involvement in employees’ lives from their manager, and team work was what improved productivity levels. In the 1950s, Abraham Maslow introduced the Neo-Human Relation school of thought. This new theory focus on the employee’s psychological needs, which are structured into five different levels of needs. The theory says that once a lower level of needs is satisfied, would then the worker could be motivated by an upper level of needs. These levels of needs in lower to higher order are physiological needs, safety needs, social needs, esteem needs, and self-actualisation respectively. Managers also need to realise that each worker moves up this ladder at a different pace, and therefore might need different sets of incentives from worker to worker. In financial-related type of motivations, the most common motivation is salaries and wages. Salaries are what permanent employees are paid monthly or annually. Wages, on the other hand, is what is paid to workers per hour they have worked. These can motivate the employees, for the harder they work, the more they would earn. A piece rate system is when an employee is paid a fixed rate for each unit of production; In other words, they are paid by results, which motivate them to achieve better results. Commission and fees are similarly dependent on the results of the workers. Commission is a percentage of the sale revenue, and fees are fixed amounts that are earned after sale. The more the employee sells, the more commission or fees they get, motivating them to sell more. Fringe benefits are any non-wage payment or benefit such as pension plans, profit-sharing programs, vacation pay, and company-paid life, health, and unemployment insurance. Having these extra benefit with their jobs can make the employees feel more secure and work harder. Performance-related pay or pay by performance is money paid relating to how well the employee works. This would motivate them by giving them knowledge that the better they perform in their field, the better their assessment would be and the more they would be paid. Profit sharing is another way of motivating staff, it consists of a plan that gives employees a share in the profit of the company. Each employee receives a percentage of those profit based on the companys earnings. This makes staff work harder, knowing the more their company earns, the more they would get in shared profit. Share ownership is when employees who have worked in the company for a long time are given part of the business as shares. These shares would give the employees power, and they get to take part deciding how the company is run. Other than financial motivations, there are non-financial ones that could boost motivation while costing minimal for the business. Job redesign involves restructuring the elements including tasks, duties and responsibilities of a specific job in order to make it more encouraging and inspiring for the employees. Job enlargement is basically increasing the employees work load, so that they feel more responsible and work harder. Job rotation is when employees are moved between two or more jobs in a planned manner. The purpose of this is to expose the employees to different experiences and wider variety of skills to enhance job satisfaction and to cross-train them. Job enrichment is a variation of job enlargement. Job enrichment adds new sources of job satisfaction by giving the employee additional authority, autonomy, and control over the way the job is accomplished. Team work is a Cooperative effort by the members of a group or team to achieve a common goal. Working in a team may motivate employees to do better to fulfill their part on the team. External link for employees motivating can be found here: http://www. forbes. com/sites/glennllopis/2012/06/04/top-9-things-that-ultimately-motivate-employees-to-achieve/ The fundamental method which British Sugar would use to motivate their staff is to make them feel safe. Feeling safe would clear the employees minds from external worries, helping them to focus more on their tasks and try harder to achieve. This method would include providing their employees with adequate facilities to work in. This means that British Sugars factories and offices would to the most basic safety regulations such as fire safety, electrical safety, and protection from hazardous conditions inside their factories. British Sugar would also make sure that their facilities have appropriate security measures to protect employees and their possessions safe. This method of motivation is one of the most basic levels of Maslows hierarchy of needs. Another method that British Sugar uses is providing extra employee benefits beside their regular salaries and wages. They would give company cars for manager and directors, along with free O2 mobile phones. British Sugar also looks after their employees by providing them with free healthcare in the form of free check-ups with company nurse, eyesight tests and glasses, and subsidised scheme with AXA. Families of employees can also enjoy company benefits with provided child vouchers and team meals for spouses. British Sugar’s factory workers are also provided with free safety work wear. There are numerous other benefits that employees can enjoy working for British Sugar, which includes sports clubs, gym facilities, free parking†¦etc. A popular method of motivation from Taylor’s school of thought is recognition. British Sugar would give out tokens of appreciation and to recognise employees/teams that have made a significant contribution over and above that reasonably expected. Company managers would award their employees with vouchers, meals, bouquet of flowers, or bottles of wine to boost their work morale. Long Service Awards are given to employees with significant length of service. Annual bonuses of ? 400, ? 600, ? 800, and ? 900 are given to employees who have served 20, 30, 40, or 45 years in the company respectively. British Sugar also use chances of promotion to encourage their employees. This is a process known as internal recruitment. When a position is open, employees are often promoted to fill the position instead of recruiting new people externally. This keeps the employees motivated to work harder, knowing there are chances of future promotion. Another method of motivation used by British Sugar is performance management. Performance management is a proactive and continuous process of communicating and clarifying role responsibilities, performance expectations and priorities in order to ensure mutual understanding between managers and employees. To ensure the proper functioning of the business, British Sugar would have to maintain a high level of cooperation and satisfaction in its employees. Making employees cooperate would increase productivity, reduce labour turnover, and make sure that they can maintain the quantity and quality of work they are capable of. One of the methods of doing this is by communication. This method involves staying in touch with the staff to make sure they are updated with company information. When staff have the information that they need for their job, they will be more likely to be oriented towards their tasks, and be able to do it correctly and more efficiently. Communication with employees can be done by many means. It includes emails, which are quick, efficient, and reliable. Face-to-face communication is an important form of communication, often in the form of meetings; however it has time and distance limitations , for example a manager might not have the time to see all of his employees to talk about new policies, while he could just send them all an email. There are other methods such as telephone calls, which can be made easily over long distance or face-time technology that allows employees to communicate despite the long distance. Another way of improving employees cooperation and commitment in the business is making them more involved in it. In British sugar, this is know as the â€Å"quality circle†. British Sugar would engage its employees group discussions, where groups of workers meet and discuss the good and bad side of the issues that they face. The employees would try to resolve their problems together, and discuss ways to improve how they work and how the company works. This method generates a feeling of involvement, employees would feel that they are a contributing part of a team, and therefore view their work more positively and become more inclined to cooperate with other employees as well as the company managers. Clear employment contracts also help boost staff cooperation and commitment. A clear contract would have to explicitly explain the details of the job, such as explaining the roles and duties that the employee is expected to carry out, along with the hours of work required. The business would also need clearly identified procedures such as disciplinary policies or grievance policies. A clear pay structure that explains basic time as well as overtime is essential. All of these will reduce arguments in the company, enabling more efficiency and cooperation within the business. Motivational methods are a way of getting more cooperation from staff. Motivated employees would perform better while feeling better about their prospects than demotivated ones, therefore cooperating more in their work. Similarly, training and charity links should also be used to boost the morale of workers. Training would increase the employees motivation and performance, as well as charitable activities such as helping out the local community. A well-motivated workforce with high morale is more likely to cooperate with the company and to each other. The culture of the business itself will also affect how its employees cooperate. If the company has a culture of cooperation and an atmosphere of teamwork, then the employees are more likely to have more cooperation in their work. Training in a large organisation such as British Sugar is carried out extensively. An example of British Sugars training operation is their Graduate scheme, a scheme in which British Sugar finds apprentice in universities. The company would offer university graduates a period of vocational training, with the assurance of a job at the end of their training, in addition to have year-long job placements for engineering students. British Sugar also organises over 1000 training courses every year involves all levels from senior managers to new apprentices and our seasonal workers. The company encourages its sites to play an active role in local communities through media visits, schools activities, agricultural and environmental events. British Sugar have regular dialogues with leading and local non-government organisations. They also organise sponsorships and charitable funds, allocated to their employee fundraising activities through a Supporting YOU to support others programme. Measuring the workforce can be done by a number of ways. This is generally looking at the key indicators in the business workforce such as labour productivity, health and safety, labour turnover and absenteeism. Labour productivity is how much the workers produce in terms of goods and services per hour worked. In the business, it can be measured by looking at the efficiency of individual or teams. However, this method should be used with cation, because there are factors that could affect labour productivity such as the age of machinery, type of sector that the business is in or whether production is automated or labour-intensive. If machineries are old, they wouldnt be able to produce as much, therefore being the cause of low labour productivity. A business in the secondary sector would be more productive than one in the tertiary sector since manufacturing makes more products than service. Similarly, a business that has automated production will be much more productive than one with labour-intensive production, since machines are able to mass produce more products than individual workers. A business can try to improve labour productivity by using motivational tools such as bonuses. Training can also be used to add productivity to workers, and business plans help staff work more efficiently. The business can also buy new equipments to improve productivity of their workers. Another measurement is health and safety. As it is one of the motivational factor, the quality of health and safety at the workplace can affect the staff. The better the health and safety standard, the better the staff will perform. The business must consider the possible causes of poor health and safety, such as poor equipment, dangerous environment and also the poor training in the matter. Labour turnover can also be used to measure a companys workforce. Labour turnover is the proportion of staff leaving the business over a period of time, usually each year. A company can lose their staff due to de-motivation, retirement, social factors, better opportunity elsewhere ,or that the employee wants to start their won business. Staff leaving can also be involuntarily as their positions become redundant or they are fired due to performance. A high labour turnover is generally not good because it spawns many problems such as the loss of productive capacity, the costs and the time taken to recruit new staff, and the extra training and induction programmes to new employees. However, new staff can bring benefits such as introduction of new ideas to the business, or more efficient workers. Absenteeism is another measurement to the companys workforce, as it tells managers how much their staff go on break from work. This can be a substantial problem for the business, because production output will suffer if employees are absent, projects will run into delays, and the quality of products affected due to the lack of staff. There are many other costs associated with absent staff, such as sick pay, and temporary staff pay, which is often expensive. Absenteeism also cause de-motivation in the business, as other employees will have to take the work load of the absent employees. To lower the level of absenteeism, the business can issue fines to absent staff, improve the safety of the work environment so staff would want to be at work, and improve their motivational methods. British Sugar uses a range of performance indicators to evaluate and improve their performance. SMART targets are a set of criteria that are based on the specific words: specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time-specific. These criteria are applied in the process of making goals and objectives, to maximise the business chances of obtaining them. Punctuality is the characteristic of being able to complete a required task or fulfill an obligation before or at a previously designated time. Attendance is the frequency with which a person is present. An appraisal system, or performance management, is a proactive and continuous process of communicating and clarifying role responsibilities, performance expectations and priorities in order to ensure mutual understanding between managers and employees. It is very useful as it is both a motivational strategy and a review system where mangers can assess their employees. The appraisal system would fulfill the employees social and recognition needs according Maslow theories, motivating to work harder to achieve more and be more recognised. The system is not without flaws, however. The appraisal system can be very costly, requiring a lot of administrative work, and is time-consuming. It is also exposed to favouritism. Managers can tend to trust and praise some employees more than others, causing distrust discontentment among team members.

The Huaorani of Ecuador

The Huaorani of Ecuador Introduction The Huaorani or Waorani is a group of indigenous Amerindians living in the Amazon rainforest and specifically in Ecuador. This community has very unique characteristics from other South American tribes. Besides speaking a totally different language, these people have isolated themselves from other communities by living in the Amazon forest.Advertising We will write a custom research paper sample on The Huaorani of Ecuador specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More The number of Huaoranis who speak the language fluently does not exceed 4,000 (Ziegler-Otero, 2007, p.33).They are not even familiar with the normal culture of Ecuador due to this seclusion. Their ancestral land is between Napo and Curaray rivers, a land that has been associated by logging and oil trapping (Lu, 2010). When some forest areas are cleared, the community will still look for other areas to embrace their lifestyle. The Huaorani community has strongly protected its culture from settlers and other indigenous tribes. This community comprises of four groups namely the Onamenane, the Tagaeri, the Huinatare and the Taromenane. Initially, Huaorani people were hunters and gathers who resided in the Amazon forest hunting wild animals as a form of subsistence. The practice however, changed gradually due to technological influence and interaction. Currently, these people live in the Amazon forest as their permanent settlement. They are sort of semi-nomadic horticulturalist community though they could be almost mistaken for foragers since they hunt animals and gather fruits and berries. However, they plant food crops wherever they go and do not employ modern agricultural techniques as they live far from the land. With the recent intrusions, the impact of the primary mode of subsistence on Huaorani way of life may be so strong that the community finds it difficult to adjust culturally according to the changes being encountered. Therefore, this paper i s focused on investigating the impact of semi-nomadic horticultural practices on key aspects of culture including kinship, social organization, gender relation and beliefs as well as values. Kinship One of the things Huaorani people consider most important is family life. A family will comprise of several groups of kin and ultimately grows when other people join the family. Anyone wishing to join a group is allowed but must build their own houses as they cannot live with the original land owners in the same house. These new comers either could be refugees from other villages or just members from other Huaorani communities joined by marriage.Advertising Looking for research paper on anthropology? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More A Huaorani kinship consists of a father, mother, children, spouses and grandchildren (Rival, 2002). In such an organization, there is a wide variety of help for the day to day chores that is de fined according to the ability and position of the family member. The sharing of daily chores has resulted in families having many children. The more children they have in a family, the more help they get for daily responsibilities. However, Huaorani is an individualistic community and each member of a group has some sense of autonomy. Every family member has a role to play in helping the family and laziness is not encouraged in fulfilling family chores. Even the children know what they should do or where they should help. Semi-nomadic horticultural practices have influenced the view of Huaorani kinship in a very different way. Relationships are always envisaged from ego’s viewpoint by reversing of nonreciprocal kin terms. As Rival (2002) observed, when a mature Huaorani is asked â€Å"Is A your child† the answer will be â€Å"I am the mother of A†, and not â€Å"A is my child†. In addition, this kinship system encourages diverse interpretations such that cross-cousin marriages are usually practiced (this practice is also observed in other nomadic Latin communities). Even the people value such marriages more than those from distance villages that have no relation to the former. The people do not consider any kin relation between members of different groups. However, they consider kinship relation with those living in the same village despite lack of blood connection. Rival (2002) affirms that cognates and consanguine are defined in terms of spatial proximity rather than genealogical proximity (p.115). Indeed, someone as close as a real sister is omitted if living in other village and has not been in contact for a long period of time. Usually, links between nonresident kin are reestablished to contract marriage alliance (Riva, 2002, p.116).Therefore, it can be concluded that the potential kin are simultaneously the potential marriage affine. Social organization Nanicabo or extended family unit is the fundamental unit in the Huaorani social organization of production and is impacted greatly by semi-nomadic horticultural practice (Ziegler-Otero, 2007, p.38). Food, which is acquired by any member of the family, must be distributed to all members of the Nanicabo before any is availed to members of other families.Advertising We will write a custom research paper sample on The Huaorani of Ecuador specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Hunting groups basically start in a single family, though others often join the party as it departs, predominantly in the more geographic dense villages particularly around schools. Within the Nanicabo duties are jointly performed and all goods including food are shared. Labor is divided according to gender where men are responsible for hunting and women take responsibility of gathering, gardening, cooking and child care. Regarding to decision making and social organization, the culture of Huaorani can be considered as highly individualistic a nd independent. Earlier before the missionaries came the community lived in small autonomous kin groups which made collective contribution to their economic activities. Within these kin groups there were no formal councils and headmen. Their hunting and gathering was a collective responsibility that demanded little directives or authorization. Even within Nanicabo and households, there was no overall power of persuasion beyond the individual. There were limited opportunities between the various groups to engage in shared decision making as well as conflict resolution due to hostility or warfare (Lu, 2010). Up to date, the individualistic pattern lingers among the sedentary communities which lack elaborate processes of making decisions. The social organization of the community is leaderless and decentralized, having few social obligations and limits on individual autonomy. Devoid of institutions to confer authority or impose social control, there are no ways of containing conflicts o r solving disputes. In case of a conflict or someone feels offended the only options are for the parties to separate or let the grudge go. Moreover, this lack of institutions to impose social control reflects lack of political structure to discourage individuals to exploit short-term advantages whenever a source opportunity arises. Therefore, decision making occurs at the Nanicabo or individual level, with little or no coordination at bigger scales and few contrivances to settle conflicts. The reason could be that the people had been made self-reliant by the practices of hunting and gathering which required individual contribution to solve the problems associated. Within the community, the only social organization existing in a larger scale is the consequence of school influence, and is tolerable though not treated seriously by the people. Such influence could be considered as a key driver for social change but has evidently indicated little effect on the community’s social o rganization. Semi-nomadic horticultural practice has made the Huaorani people to have abundant resources. They are isolated and free to do anything they want. Most important is that the land is free and thus no land ownership. The people can gather or hunt anywhere and can build dwellings wherever they want. Nevertheless, social boundaries exist between various Huaorani groups. Initially, the community kinship groups lived together in small populations where they did everything together.Advertising Looking for research paper on anthropology? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More This created a very strong culture of sharing among the kinship groups. But, with the growing population a small number of people share the day to day responsibilities throughout the community. There is still that spirit of sharing among those living in proximity. Among the various groups within the Huaorani community, there is little sharing and the groups tend to live separate ways. With such scarce sharing the groups have tended to avoid offending one another deliberately. Thus, the few hostilities witnessed have not been as fierce as expected for the groups (Lu, 2010, p.14). It can be argued that the avoidance of such hostility is triggered by the perception of threatening their livelihoods which is dependent on the harmony the people live in their isolated life. Nonetheless, there exist social boundaries between different groups and are certainly suspicious of attack. As a result, the groups tend to live far from each other. There is no doubt that each group attempts to protect their own territories by acquiring new lands deep in the forest rather than through force. For instance, the naming of streams after different people is an indication of social boundary (Lu, 2001). If a person discovered a new resource such as a waterway when walking deep through the forest, this finding will be taken to the group. The word would spread and the resource will eventually be named after the discoverer, and should be claimed by the village that he hails from. The village will let outsiders know about the finding and cannot partake of the resource. Reflecting on another side of the Huaorani community, it is true that they completely change during ceremonies. There is no sign of hostility and the people become warm and inviting. The drinking parties create friendship even beyond the social boundaries. In case one of the groups is in conflict with another, the festival is considered as the time to restore harmony. Therefore, the hostility will cease between the groups and both can merry together. Union between couple also occurs during these festivals. The community considers marriage to be sacred and the couple is expected to observe upright morals throughout. In that manner, the social organization of the community relate to the aspects that are centered on the semi-nomadic way of life. Gender relations The semi-nomadic horticultural practices by the Huaorani community resulted in the definition of major tasks for women and men. As a result, there is no assessment of greater worth or value on individual sex. The community has no strict sex roles but generally speaking Huaorani men provide their families with meat, cut down big trees for new farming lands and engage in warfare. Mostly, men hunt with spears and sometimes with blowguns which are made collectively by men and women. Men usually make the blow gun while women make the darts. Women perform most of the agricultural activities such as planting, weeding and harvesting as well as preparing me als and taking care of the young ones. Although this happens rarely women may also engage in hunting and men may perform other agricultural task than just cutting trees. Indeed, they do different things so as to equal out the roles. Huaorani lives matrilogically, meaning that the couple lives with their parents (Lu, 2001). Nonetheless, both women and men attend ceremonies especially the famous dancing marriage ceremonies. Most of these ceremonies are impacted by the knowledge of the people about the nature. For example, the ceremony of human birds is associated with the knowledge about birds’ way of life and migration when the food is gone. In fact, the life of birds is symbolic to such festivals which sometimes also lead to marriage. Men and women decorate with body paints, jewelry, feathers and other ornaments (Lu, 2001). While the men become aggressive during the ceremonies, women are expected to hang out with each other. In some ceremonies, both women and men may dance to gether or sing the same songs yet they must avoid each other. Sometimes, couples, brothers, sisters and cousins do not talk or look each other. This means that the social roles and presentation must reflect the gender variation defined in semi-nomadic horticultural practices. Beliefs and values The semi-nomadic, horticultural mode of subsistence of the Huaorani community has led to a belief system that affirms the whole world to have once been a forest. Thus, the people consider the forests as their real dwelling place while the rest of the world is very unsafe to them. Therefore, this society lives in isolation within the forest setting. According to their beliefs, living in the forest offers protection from attacks from other communities such as witchcraft. Like most of the hunters and gatherers, the rivers and forests form an integral aspect in the lives of the Huaorani people. According to cultural anthropologists like Lu (2001) who have studied the community asserts that plants and animals consistent with the belief system of the society have both spiritual and physical existence. Raymond (2006) note that the Huaorani people have a respect for animals despite them being hunters because they believe that people return to earth in form of animals after death and in particular as termites. The people hunt wild animals for food security but still carry the belief that the spirits of the killed animals can harm the people and must be placated. During their hunting scenes, they regard snake and jaguars in a special way. The reason is that they consider snakes to have the optimal evil power while the jaguar has the most magnificent plunderer. Through extensive gathering, the Huaorani people possess astounding knowledge regarding the medicinal and botanical value of plant with the forest. Thus, they take plants to be part of their lives and indicate their characteristics. As noted before the practice of staying completely isolated in the forest has made Huaorani people to believe that the forest is the sole protector from predators and animals. Accompanied by strong influence of nature, the people consider some animals and plants to be sacred. There are certain plants and animals that are not hunted due to their sacred positions in the minds of the people (Raymond, 2006). For instance, the warbler which is a small bird known to migrate to the Amazon forest is considered as to bring blessing to the people. The jaguar and eagle are also considered sacred animals because it is believed that people came about after the two animals mated. Indeed, the hunting and gathering form of subsisted has oriented much of the community beliefs to plants and animals. Conclusion The impact of semi-nomadic horticultural practice on the culture of Huaorani is evidently very strong and may require an immeasurable effort by the people in order to accommodate the changes expected. Their kinship point of view is dictated by their nomadic life such that their practi ces on some aspects such as marriage would seem absurd in other cultural settings. Their social organization is centered on the forest life of hunting and gathering to the point of deriving a social interaction that is only fit for the isolated life of the forest. The gender relation of the Huaorani is defined by the roles and responsibilities of both women and men as pertaining to semi-nomadic horticultural life. The beliefs and values of the people have entirely been characterized by animals and plants that have been learnt through the forest life. While any intrusion may compel the people to change their culture, it will evidently be difficult for the Huaorani people. References Lu, F. (2010). Patterns of indigenous resilience in the Amazon: a case study of Huaorani hunting in Ecuador. Journal of Ecological Anthropology, Vol.14 (1), p.5-21. Lu, F. E. (2001).The common property regime of the Huaorani Indians of Ecuador: Implications and challenges to conservation. Human Ecology, V ol. 29 (4), p. 425-447. Raymond, B. H. (2006). Subsistence modes of the Huaorani. American Indian Culture Research Journal, Vol.112 (8), p. 86-92. Rival, L. M. (2002). Trekking through history: the Huaorani of Amazonian Ecuador. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. Ziegler-Otero, L. (2007). Resistance in an Amazonian community: Huaorani organizing against the global economy. Oxford, UK: Berghahn Books.