H&M Market Operations

Introduction
Market orientation refers to the company’s ability to monitor competitor’s actions. It also involves the ability to monitor how these affect the people’s preferences. Market oriented companies ensure that all business aspects are considered in the operations of the company. They also ensure that they are competitive in the various areas (Jackson, Randall and Steve 34).Companies must respond to the customers’ current and future needs in order to answer the customers’ needs. They must also ensure that they deliver it in a better way than the competitors do. Market orientation within a company means that the company ensures meeting customer needs and wants is its priority. This is done by ensuring that the company products are developed in a way that they meet the new and developing needs in the market. The aspects employed in running business in H& M are all very considerate of the customers’ needs and preferences. This is fully shown in the range of products offered by the company and the prices offered. It is also evidenced by the treatment that customers get while shopping in the company.

Products
H&M’s main desire and vision is to offer quality and fashionable products to all clients at reasonable prices. The company offers a wide range of products to its main categories of clients who include men, women and kids. The company researches on the needs in these categories and ensures that it offers products that are in line with the customer’s needs and preferences. The women categories products include bikinis, blazers, swimwear, and lingerie and other main products. The company also offers sportswear, shorts, Jeans and jackets for men and many products in the baby category.

Prices
The company also ensures that it offers its products at affordable prices to the customers as a way of wining the market. It also does so because it cares about the consumers’ pockets as it targets consumers in all classes. The company attains the objective by ensuring that it buys its products in large quantities and earning large discounts. The company also avoids intermediaries by purchasing directly from the suppliers. It also invests in a cost effective distribution channel that helps ensure that the pricing is favorable to the consumers.

Place
H&M management also ensure that the entity is market oriented by ensuring that it sets up stores in many regions of the world. This is dome with an aim of ensuring that customers in different regions of the world can access the company products. The management does this to ensure that they meet the needs of all customers in the different regions. The company has stores in Asia in Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, China, Hong Kong and Thailand. It also has stores in Europe in Austria, Bulgaria, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Spain and Turkey. It also has stores in the Middle East and North Africa, in Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, Morocco, UAE and Israel. Other stores are in North America in Mexico, Canada and United States. H&M also has stores in Chile, which is located in South America. The stores are established in the various locations to ensure that the customer’s needs in the various regions are addressed. It is meant to ensure that these needs are met.

Human Resource Operations
Human resource department is the main field that is involved in the market orientation as the personnel within the firm determine the customer satisfaction. The human resource department within H&M plans, organizes, staffs, operates, and resources the organization. The resourcing aspect within the organization requires use of the technological, natural, human and financial resources. These help in the management of the organizational goals. The human resource department is especially involved in the determination of the people who work within H&M. They engage in the recruitment of workers and in offering direction to all the people who work within the firm (Kumar 56). The department also deals with the compensation strategies and performance within a firm. It is clear that firms are highly engaged in a bid to be competitive in the market. This is done with an aim of attaining an edge against the company competitors so that the firm attracts and attains the best workers. The HR uses the strategic measures of ensuring that it only attracts the most qualified and competent workers in the market place. The hiring process in the organizations is very strict as the department ensures that it offers a competent image that attracts only the best workers.

The department performs the function of training and development on the already employed employees so that they are well informed in the recent trends. The function is performed with an aim of improving the skills, attitudes and even the knowledge that individuals have in the organization. Employees in H&M are aided in this function to produce the best results in their various tasks. Employees are also developed to ensure that they possess higher capacities to perform their duties (Kumar 56). HR also ensures that employees are fully oriented towards the proper employment of organizational culture that will match customer expectations. The organization also ensures that the employees are coached and mentored towards producing the required products within the organization. Training and development are performed with a core purpose of ensuring that employees are trained to provide consumers with the best products and services (Kumar 56).

The HR also ensures that the company is market oriented by encouraging the work force to be innovative as a way of filling any gaps that may exist in the market (Dransfield 34). The company hires the most qualified people to fulfill the function of high innovation. This is helpful as the personnel are able to predict the customer needs and thus develop items that are higher than the competitions. The HR function further ensures that the workers are motivated towards their task fulfillment. This is geared towards ensuring that the workers give the best results in the market (Jackson, Randall and Steve 34). Conclusively, all the HR functions are geared towards ensuring that the consumer needs are met. This then shows that the HR has a great role of ensuring that H&M remains competitive and that they meet the current and the future needs in the market.

Market segmentation
Demographic segmentation
H&M uses the demographic method of market segmentation where factors like gender, age and social economic factors of the target markets.
Gender segmentation
H&M Company uses the gender where the focus is on the women products because the target group makes the largest purchases from the store. The company also focuses more on women because there are a wider variety of products in this category. They also mainly focus on the small sized women with the largest clothes available in the store being size 16. This is done because the small sized woman tends to be more into fashion and style and this explains why they make more purchases from the company. Some of the products that are offered in the women categories are lingerie, jackets and coats, skirts, cosmetics, sleepwear tops, shirts and blouses. They also focus on the men’s category where they offer a variety of clothes like vests and t-shirts, hoods, jeans, pants, sportswear and Swimwear. More than this, they offer shorts, cardigans, and sweat shirts.

Age segmentation
Age is also used as a segmentation strategy where clothes are provided for kids between one and a half years and eight years. The company also produces clothes for children between the age of eight and fourteen years as these form a large percentage of the company products. The products offered in the kids’ category are newborn baby clothes and baby basics. They also offer baby kits to ensure that they address all the needs that customers hold in this category.

Geographic factors
H&M Company also considers the location of the customers to determine the products that need to be provided in the different regions. The company management ensures that the products offered in each of the company stores match the requirements of the people in the locality. Some of the differences in the products in the different regions are shown by the quality and nature of products offered in different stores. The stores in the USA and Europe include summer wear and winter wear. The summer wear in these regions consists of light clothing like shorts, bikinis, small tops and short dresses. This differs from the products offered in the Middle East region as the Islamic culture prohibits women to wear clothes that expose their body parts. The company management ensures that it offers its summer products like swim wear, bikinis and shorts to the stores located in the western parts of the world. The products are also offered in the stores located in Europe while the more conservative clothes are offered in the stores located in the Middle East and North African regions. The company products in Europe and America are also made with the consideration of the summer and winter seasons. The products offered in North American regions are however not made with the considerations, as the regions do not experience summer and winter seasons.

Benefits and risks of market segmentation
Market segmentation is important as it helps the firm to ensure that all the customers in the different segments are fully satisfied. This serves to ensure that customers’ needs in the different locations are met by the segmentation strategy. Segmentation also proves to be advantageous to the firms as they gain customer loyalty and thus make more sales and higher profitability. The other advantage is that the company production department becomes more innovative as it seeks out for ways to address the needs in the different segments. Increment in productivity serves to ensure that the firm remains competitive. The practice is also associated with some risks such as the wrong products being developed for an identified segment. This result to the firm’s failure and it may also result to immense losses for the company. The problem can be avoided by ensuring that prior research is done before the product is sent into the market.

Benefits of Commissioning Other Fashion Houses
H&M gains several benefits from commissioning other fashion designers who are renown in their various fields. Karl Lagerfeld is a fashion designer who owns three fashion houses that are well known around the world. These fashion houses are Chanel, Fendi and Karl Lagerfeld. H&M collaborates with him as they offer a limited range of their clothes for men and women in the different fields. The results in this are that the company makes more sales because they attract loyal customers of the Lagerfeld brand. Karl Lagerfeld has built a name that has gained customers’ trust and thus customers buy more and more of his brand. Association with the brand produces more relevance to the H&M brand and thus more people buy the product because of the loyalty they have for the former. H&M also gains significantly by commissioning Stella McCartney to design some of its clothes ranges. The company gains the benefit of increased sales especially due to Stella McCartney’s good reputation. Stella McCartney has a reputation of having unrivaled skills in tailoring and of being very ethical in ensuring that her products are animal free. She also has a reputation of being an ethical designer and of being highly talented. Collaborating with this company helps H&M to gain more customers as the Stella McCartney already has a good reputation. Some customers buy products From H&M because of the collaboration and this helps the company to make more sales.

The other advantage drawn is that the company gets to produce and be associated with more variety of products. It also helps the company to be more innovative due to the new ideas and designs introduced by Stella McCartney. H&M is also able to reach a higher number of clients as Stella McCartney has stores in many parts of the world where H&M does not have its own. These include places like Romania, Uzbekistan, Venezuela, Lithuania, and Panama among others.

Mathew Williamson is also a very prominent fashion designer that has been in existence for more than 15 years. The fashion designer is prominent and famous for his award winning career. He won the 2008 award for the red carpet designer. He is also famous for the famous dresses and prints that he makes for his clients. H&M draws this advantage of attracting more clients into its product range by commissioning him to do some of the clothes range. Collaboration adds expertise into the company’s line of products and thus increases the quality of products. It also increases the company clients as faithful followers of Mathew Williamson also become interested in H&M products where he has added his expertise. It also increases the range of products that are finally availed to the customers within the company. This increases the customers’ expectations and purchases from the company. It in turn serves to increase H&M’s sales as the company is in a position to attract more customers. This is especially because the company products are also availed in Mathew Williamson’s stores and thus the company makes more sales in more locations. H&M Company also gains more customer loyalty because customers learn to trust the quality of products offered. The company also makes more profits because of increased sales and less expense.

Market Challenges
H&M is likely to encounter some challenges in the market including loss of customers to competitors. There are a rising number of fashion designers in all parts of the world and this has served to drift customers from their loyal suppliers to the new entrants. This is especially when the designer comes with new trends that capture the market’s attention. If H&M fails to constantly, revitalize its line of products there is a threat of decreased sales and drifting customers to other firms within the market. The company is also likely to encounter a downfall in regions like the Middle East where inhabitants tend to favor stores that are owned by their own local companies. Fashion also tends to lack market in these markets as most of the people wear their religious clothes that are made by their own designers. This means that the local stores owned by H&M in the Middle East are likely to encounter a downfall based on the decreasing market.

The company is also likely to lose some customers as some of the collaborators like Karl Lagerfeld has been caught stating that he fears for his image to be tainted by the collaboration. He considers H&M a lower end brand and thus he may withdraw from any collaboration with the company. This may result in loss for the company as some of the customers who purchase form the company due to the collaboration may also cease from making the purchases.

The company also faces the threat of extinction by the law that may limit the use of its products. Some fashion designers like Stella McCartney ensure that their products are free from animal products as an ethical measure. The animal extinction laws may be changed to ensure that raw materials from the animals are not used in production and this many put H&M in trouble. The company therefore ought to ensure that it makes its productions ethically. The company should thus ensure that it has alternative ways of making productions to ensure that it iseffective.

The company also is likely to face the challenge of employee dissatisfaction and it does not raise the number action strategy. The rising competition demands that the company should add to the employee pay to ensure that they are not drawn to work for competitor firms. This is difficult at the time when the company is making more investments in new regions. The finance department should this come up with a strategy of ensuring that all employees are satisfied within their various dockets.

Conclusion
Conclusively H&M should be more vigorous in its affairs than it has in the past to beat the upcoming competition. It should also ensure that it collaborates more with upcoming and already established fashion houses to ensure that it remains competitive in the market. The company should also ensure that its employees are fully satisfied so that they remain motivated and productive. Innovation should also be used as a key component in the company culture as this will ensure that new designs are introduced often.

Works cited
Dransfield, Robert. Human Resource Management. Oxford: Heinemann, 1998. Print.
Jackson, Susan E, Randall S. Schuler, and Steve Werner. Managing Human Resources. Mason, Ohio: South-Western, 2011. Print.
Kumar, Raj. Human Resource Management: Strategic Analysis Text and Cases. New Dehli: I.K. International, 2011. Print.

Insert Surname 10

Determining Organizational Culture

Organizations formulate their values and norms according to the way they react to environmental influences. According to Pfister (2009), external adaptation and internal integration perceive culture as means to which organizations deal with their changing environment (p. 38). Recognizing people’s values would help in determining the organizational culture. This study will analyze ActionAid International, as it attempts to understand the challenges organizations face in creating an effective organizational culture.

ActionAid International works all over the globe to eliminate poverty and social injustices. ActionAid International focuses mainly on food rights, HIV/Aids, education and emergency. The organization is strictly driven by the global organizational culture. The management of such an organization should endeavor to develop a clear mission statement that incorporate values and norms that are acceptable to diverse cultural backgrounds (Nelson & Quick, 2011, p. 576). Through integration of its mission of fighting poverty and eradication of injustices, ActionAid International can strive to create an effective organizational culture by consulting the existing environment.

The task of determining an effective organizational culture is quite challenging as there exist numerous obstacles that are difficult to evade. Culture is not touchable. Culture defines the characteristics of a given organization. It is exceedingly hard to compute people’s personalities than their beliefs. Most organizational culture studies are qualitative in nature, and qualitative measures do not predict nor generalize their findings (Condrey & Perry, 2005, p. 343). ActionAid International is always faced with challenges of recruiting executives who can maintain a global organizational culture. Since ActionAid is a global organization, it usually suffers from centralization pressures as its clients come from different cultures that do not support the existing culture. Challenges such as globalization, technology and management of ethical behaviors push for an organizational culture that is adaptable to changing environment.

References
Condrey, S. E., & Perry, J. L. (2005). Handbook of human resource management in government. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Nelson, D. L., & Quick, J. C. (2011). Organizational behavior: Science, the real world, and you. Mason, OH, USA: South-Western Cengage Learning.
Pfister, J. (2009). Managing organizational culture for effective internal control: From practice to theory. Berlin: Physica.

DETERMINING ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE 2

Running Head: DETERMINING ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE 1

Running head: NATURAL KNIBBLES

Staff Development Issues at Natural Knibbles

Question 1: Key Characteristics of Natural Knibble’s Orientation Program and its support of the organizational goals
Knibble’s orientation program introduces new employees to all the operations within the organization. New employees learn of all potential future careers that are accessible to them in the organization through the orientation program. In this program, new employees are paired with experienced employees who train them on how to perform all the tasks in their respective position. The new employees will get new ‘buddies’ each month for three month who train them on the requirements of different positions. This program orients new employees with all the operations of the organization before they can settle on one permanent position.

Knibble’s goal is to improve its profitability in the existing markets and penetrating new markets. To this extent, the organization required employees who are focused on quality and conversant with the new approach to work. The orientation program creates a channel through which experienced employees can transfer their skills and knowledge on the new production approach in Knibbles to new employees. This form of training is cheaper relative to other training programs and enables the organization to meet its goal of maintaining its current cost levels.

Question 2: Forms of Training and Development
Kane
Kane had problems adjusting to positions offered to him at Knibbles. Unlike like Lisa, Kane did not get any development opportunities after the orientation program and has not had enough time to master one task before moving the next. Kane requires simulations, off the job training, and mentoring. Simulations and other forms of off-the-job training allow employees to learn in a different environment away from the daily work pressures (Pride, Hughes, & Kapoor, 2012, p. 258; Cornelius, 2001, p. 92). Mentoring allows an experienced employee to train a new employee on one task and evaluate them as they implement the knowledge and skills learnt (Durai, 2010, p. 259; Searle & Skinner, 2011, p. 159). These forms of training would help Kane to develop skills in one task at time before moving to the next task.

Lisa
Lisa adjusted easily to her new position in sales enquiries and she does not move frequently to other positions as Kane. Since Lisa has other opportunities to develop her career, she requires on-the-job training. This kind of training allows employees to learn through instructions from their superiors or trainers (Snell & Bohlander, 2012, p. 305; Buhler, 2002, p. 149).
Question 3: Advantages and disadvantages of Peer Evaluation
Peer evaluation encourages a collective responsibility for an organization’s performance in the market and the quality of products offered to customers. Every employee participates in the growth and development of an organization by ensuring that their teammates or colleagues are performing at par. The management receives constant and timely feedback on the development and performance of employees though peer evaluations. Peer evaluations are efficient for tasks that employees have mastered. Thus, employees can give honest feedback to their colleagues on their performance (Krausert, 2009, p. 149; Leonard, 2012). Peer evaluation may foster cooperation among employees. However, peer evaluation may create mistrust and rivalry among employees (Lehky, 2011, p. 65).

Peer evaluation may encourage stiff competition among employees instead of the intended co-operation (Lehky, 2011, p. 65). Peer evaluations sometimes lead to conflicts among employees when some employees feel that their colleagues have judged their performance unfairly. Depending on the nature of social relations among employees, peer evaluation may discourage teamwork (Baldwin & Migneault, 1996, p.171; Boyett & Boyett, 2004, p. 71). Knibbles would choose peer evaluations because they are cost effective and they would encourage collective responsibility to its performance. Knibbles has established a friendly working environment where employees feel as part of a family. Thus, peer evaluations may not result in conflicts among Knibble’s employees.

Question 4: HR Strategies of Developing Effective Career Planning Processes
Knibbles can engage external experts when developing career-planning processes. External experts have vast experience in career planning and may help an organization to identity loopholes or inefficiencies in its current processes. Engaging employees and their immediate supervisors in the career planning processes is important. Employees, their supervisors, and their peers may offer important information on the kind of employee training and development that an organization requires to improve its performance. It is also important to inform employees of any changes in the career planning process, its goals, and their effects on their positions in the organization (Deb, 2006, p. 253). An evaluation of the human resource needs in the present and future production processes in an organization is important in career planning. Such an evaluation enables an organization to focus its limited resource of the right candidates (Rothwell, 2005, p. 50)

Constant evaluation of employees enables an organization to identify the kind of training and development that could be offered to existing employees instead of hiring new employees (Rothwell, 2005, p. 50, Kumar, 2010, p. 63). The career planning process should also incorporate anticipated changes in the market, industry and within an organization (Bhattacharyya, 2011, p. 191). Thus, Knibbles needs to engage its employees more in its career planning especially in the initial stages instead of informing them of changes in the implementation stage. The organization should also conducted an evaluation of development needs in its employees and anticipated internal and external changes

Question 5: Hiring HRD Consultant
Cherrie should have hired a HRD consultant to design and deliver the required programs in Knibbles. This is because the programs that Cherrie has developed in the past six months have not yielded satisfactory results in the career development of employees. For instance, the orientation program was not effective in training Kane on the operations of the organizations. Both Kane and Lisa kept moving from one position to another before they could master a task. Consequently, their performance was poor as indicated by the peer evaluations. A HRD consultant has skills, knowledge, and experience in employee training and development. Thus, the consultant would have delivered effective programs.

References
Bhattacharyya, D. (2011). Performance Management Systems and Strategies. India: Dorling Kindersley Pvt Limited
Boyett, J, H., & Boyett, J, T. (2004). The Skill-Based Pay Design Manual. Lincoln: iUniverse
Buhler, P. (2002). Human Resources Management: All the Information you need to manage your Staff and Meet your Business Objectives. Massachusetts: Adams Media
Cornelius, N. (201). Human Resource Management: A Managerial Perspective. Connecticut: Cengage Learning
David, A, B., & Migneault, R, L. (1996). Humanistic Management by Teamwork: An organizational and Administrative Alternation for Academic Libraries. Englewood: Libraries Unlimited
Deb, T. (2006). Strategic Approach to Human Resource Management. New Delhi: Atlantic Publishers and Distributors
Durai, P. (2010). Human Resource Management. India: Dorling Kindersley Pvt Limited
Krausert, A. (2009). Performance Management for Different Employee Groups: A Contribution to Employment Systems Theory. New York: Springer
Kumar, R. (2010). Human Resource Management: Strategic Analysis Text and Cases. New Delhi: I.K International Pvt limited
Lehky, S. (2011). Peer Evaluation and Selection Systems: Adaptation and Maladaptation of Individuals and Groups through Peer Review. Ellicott City: Bio Bit field
Leonard, E, C. (2012). Supervision: Concepts and Practices of Management. Connecticut: Cengage Learning
Pride, W, M., Hughes, R, J., & Kapoor, J, R. (2012). Foundations of Business. Connecticut: Cengage Learning
Rothwell, W, J. (2005). Career Planning and Succession Management: Developing your Organization’s Talent-for Today and Tomorrow. Connecticut: Green Publishing Group
Searle, R, H., & Skinner, D. (2011). Trust and Human Resource Management. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing
Snell, S, A., & Bohlander, G, W. (2012). Managing Human Resources. Connecticut: Cengage Learning

Natural Knibbles 1

HR Management in Woolworths Company

Introduction
HRM (Human resource management) is practice of managing the human resources or workforce of an organization. HRM is charged with such responsibilities as attracting, retaining, selecting, training, rewarding, and assessing of an organization’s employees, while at the same time overseeing its culture and organizational leadership, and ensuring that it complies with labor and employment laws (Robert, 2011). Torrington, Hall and Taylor (2008) define HRM as the organizational function, which focuses on the recruitment, management, and provision of direction for the workforce. It the function of an organization dealing with all people-related issues and correspondences in such aspects as compensation, performance management, hiring, safety, organization development, employee motivation, benefits, training, administration, and communication.

HRM entails a comprehensive and strategic approach to the management of workers/employees as well as the culture and environment of the workplace. Effective HRM fosters effective contribution and productivity towards the overall direction of the company as well as in the realization of the goals and objectives of the organization (Robert, 2011). Thus, all firms must have effective management techniques in performance appraisal, training and development, reward management, career management to name a few (Armstrong, 2006).

This paper examines performance appraisal and training and development systems in Woolworths Limited. The purpose of the paper is to examine the two HR practices, and establish how effectively the firm applies them in actual sense. The goal is analyzing the consistency or inconsistency of the company’s HR in practical terms. To achieve this goal, this paper will discuss the ways in which the Woolworth’s HR department develops effective strategies in training and development and performance appraisal in gaining a competitive advantage.

Company Overview
Since the commencement of operations about a century ago, the Woolworths Company has changed Australian retailing face in significant ways. The business began as a Sydney-based single basement store but currently operates shopping centers across most regional and metropolitan centers in Australia. Its business is offering fresh and superior quality foods to its large customer base across the nation. The company operates some supermarkets in reaching out its customers and has become a household name. Presently, the company operates more than 745 supermarkets, which serve approximately 13 million customers each week in Australia. Its operations are driven by the commitment of providing its customers with the best prices, freshest produce, as well as best possible service (Woolworths, 2012).

The company website describes the staff of Woolworths as passionate about service to customer. To achieve this, the firm’s employees strive towards assisting the customers in enjoying fresh and healthy food at all costs through offering useful safety information and food handling, expert nutritional advice, as well as delicious recipe suggestions. The company is incessantly looking to the future by searching for new and better mechanisms of delivering everyday convenience and superior quality (Woolworths, 2012).

Human Resources Practices in Woolworths
According to the company website, Woolworths is a fast-paced, dynamic, people-intensive, and ever-changing environment for working in. Company has staff working on its shop floor and in support-roles but all composes a very critical component of its successfulness. As such, the company always looks for motivated workforce to champion its business operations into the future. This is achieved by offering its trainees and recruits as well as the other employees some rewarding and challenging career options, which play pivotal roles in achievement of their career goals and objectives (Woolworths, 2012). The careers part of the company website puts it better by inviting those individuals driven by motivation and urge for success to join the company since its human resources management aims at aiding people to make appropriate career choices (Woolworths, 2012).

Within Woolworths Limited, the HR function operates as a reliable business partner towards the overall organizational operations. The HR assists the company in meeting its diverse organizational objectives through ensuring that it has the most effective labor force for fueling and sustaining its overall growth and development. Moreover, the HR function has the responsibility of supporting the firm’s line managers in the recruitment and selection, remuneration, career and succession planning, employee relations, performance management, and learning and development activities (Woolworths, 2012c).

Training and Development:
Every manager or supervisor at any work is concerned about the management of employees since their effective leadership and management permits the realization of organizational goals (Robert, 2011). Thus, Woolworths must have effective employee leadership and management in order to capitalize upon their strengths and ability in contributing towards the realization of goals and objectives of the company. The main aim of having effective employee leadership and management is to promote such factors as employee engagement, employee development, employee retention, and employee motivation (Torrington et al, 2008). These factors cannot be realized in any firm without having effective training and development systems for the employees.

The way in which the HR welcomes new employees into Woolworths remains a critical issue. The HR ensures that employees are oriented sufficiently as this forms the basis for a successful, lasting employment relationship (Aguinis & Kraiger, 2009). The firm has recommendable continuous training and development, both on the job and in classrooms, to ensure that their employees succeed in their current and future organizational roles. According to Woolworths (2012b), the Woolworths Company have devised some unique training and development strategies by offering some short certificate and diploma courses to its employees at subsidized rates. The company website have cited such training programs as Certificate II in Retail Operations, Certificate III in Retail Operations, Certificate III in Warehouse and Distribution Management, Certificate IV in Woolworths Management, and a Diploma course as being provided by the group.

DeNisi and Pritchard (2006) argue that effective training and development of the employees guarantees that an organization has ready employees to take up any lateral move or promotion. This also fosters succession plans since organizational succession plans for each position relies upon the effectiveness of training and development. The firm starts its training in the recruitment stage. According to Sims (2007), a firm must ensure that it picks smartest people it can find when selecting, recruiting, staffing and hiring. Thus, Woolworths must have effective mechanisms of selecting, recruiting, staffing, and hiring since these foster the retention of the best and most outstanding employees. This further shows that the firm must have effective policies, procedures, and strategies for recruitment, staffing and hiring to ensure that workforce talent and ability is managed and retained effectively.

Examining the issue of effectiveness in workforce training and development, Armstrong (2006) considers employee involvement and empowerment as essential philosophies and strategies for enabling employees to come up with effective decisions concerning their work roles and jobs. As such, Woolworth needs to ensure that it has effective mechanisms of employees involvement and empowerment as this assist them in owning their work as well as taking responsibilities concerning their results. For instance, the Woolworths supermarkets are highly customer sensitive and having effective employee involvement and empowerment in the business operations assists the employees in serving the customers at the organizational level in which the consumer interface exists (DeNisi & Pritchard, 2006).

According to Torrington et al (2008), effective labor training and development plays a key role in ensuring that the labor force continues developing essential skills for both the present and future success of the organization. As such, Woolworths Limited Company must have effective training provision, needs assessment, and training application or training transfer on its various job obligations to provide necessary framework for the organizational training and development.

Woolworths could heed to the advice given by Manasa and Reddy (2009) who claims that organizations could tailor their skill development needs through paying attention to their employees needs, as well as having such organizational HR activities as icebreakers, team building, coaching, and mentoring activities to ensure that employees’ development is assured throughout their careers. Such methods of employees development and education compliment the other methods done via seminars or workshops and training classes. The chief methods that Woolworths have adopted include such management responsibilities as mentoring, coaching, as well as building the company into a viable learning organization.

Performance Appraisal:
Performance evaluation or appraisal refers to a periodic and systematic process, which assesses the job productivity and performance of an individual employee in relation to some pre-established organizational objectives and criteria (Muchinsky, 2012). According to Abu-Doleh and Weir (2007), performance appraisal is the process through which a consultant or manager examines and evaluates the work behavior of an employee by measure it against preset standards, documenting the comparison’s results, and utilizes those results in providing feedback to evaluated employee as a way of showing where and why he/she needs improvements (Vemic, 2007). During a performance appraisal session, managers not only examine the performance and productivity of the employees but also consider such other factors as accomplishments, organizational citizenship behavior, strengths and weaknesses, and potential for improvement in the future among others (DeNisi & Pritchard, 2006). Thus, performance appraisals are used in determination of the employees in need of training; those to be promoted, retained, demoted, or even fired (Jenks, 2009).

Woolworths Limited is clear on its performance appraisal and understands that employment of people commences with the realization that it requires staff and ends when such employees leave the company (Robert, 2011). To the company, performance appraisals compose an essential component of ensuring effective staff management and evaluation. The company uses appraisals in assisting the development of individual employees, improvement of organizational performance, as well as feeding into business planning (Saks et al, 2010). Woolworths conducts its formal performance appraisals for all organizational members (staff) on an annual basis, with each member of staff being appraised by the respective line manager (Torrington et al, 2008). According to Abu-Doleh and Weir (2007), the CEO or managing director does the directors’ appraisal, while the company owners (represented by the chairperson in most cases) appraise the CEO depending on the structure and size of the firm.

The company’s performance appraisals facilitate effectiveness in the monitoring and management of standards, delegation of tasks and responsibilities, as well as agreeing objectives and expectation of the company. The performance appraisals of the staff also set up individual needs and requirements of training and also foster the analysis and planning of the organizational training requirements (Robert, 2011). The performance appraisals are also typical in feeding into the organizational grading reviews and annual pays, which normally coincides with the company’s planning for the subsequently coming trading year (Desimone, 2011). Through the performance appraisals, the performance of each individual employee is reviewed against the agreed upon standards and objectives for such trading year and as agreed upon during the previous meeting of appraisal (Abu-Doleh & Weir, 2007).

Woolworth needs to tailor its performance appraisals to facilitate succession and career planning for crucial jobs, individuals, as well as the whole organization. The company’s staff motivation is demanding some improvement and thus the performance appraisal should play a crucial role in enhancing it. According to Torrrington et al (2008), performance appraisals are imperative for behavior and attitude development, staff motivation, communication and alignment of organizational and individual aims, as well as fostering constructive relationships between the staff and management. Thus, Woolworths must provide clear formal, recorded, and regular reviews of employees’ performance, which should provide essential information for future development plans (DeNisi & Pritchard, 2006).

In whatever form taken by job performance appraisals, they remain critical for the management of organizations and individual employees. In most cases, appraises and managers normally hate appraisals hence try all they can to avoid them. The appraisal, to these people, is time-consuming and daunting. This makes the appraisal process an emotionally challenging and difficult administrative chore. Actually, the annual appraisal session may going down on record as the only time the manager and appraise engaged in a constructive one-to-one discussion since the last appraisal period (Aguinis & Kraiger, 2009).

This explains why the appraisals are usually stressful hence defeating the entire purpose. To Woolworth, this should not be the case as this problem has a remedy. Performance appraisals could be much easier and relaxed if the manager were to meet individual team members regularly for some meaningful face-to-face discussions across the year. The managers should have some constructive regular discussions on career, work, progress, aims, hopes and dreams, development, common interest, and life among others. These could make the appraisals much easier due to the fact that these discussions will facilitate trust and knowledge of each other hence minimize all uncertainty and stress during the consequent performance appraisals (Robert, 2011).

Performance improvement is the core reason why firms use performance appraisals. This performance improvement is primarily at the individual employee’s level and eventually at the organizational level (DeNisi & Pritchard, 2006). The other elementary reasons for conducting performance appraisals include their application in making employment decisions such as terminations, transfers, promotions, etc.; criteria in research such as test validation; and aiding in communication, for example allowing the staff members access to information about their performance and the organizational expectations.

The appraisals also help in the establishment of personal training objectives; transmission of personal development objective feedback; administration of wage and salary; as well as being a channel of documentation to assist in following up on the legal requirements and decisions of the company. In addition, the performance appraisals should be used in formulation of the job criteria as well as individual’s selection to ensure that the best-suited employees are assigned the fitting organizational tasks (Manasa & Reddy, 2009). Woolworth needs to employ the performance appraisal results as part of monitoring and guiding the career development of employees (Spinks et al, 2009). Moreover, the company should employ them in work motivation via employment of the results in reward systems (Manasa & Reddy, 2009).

A Recommendable Sample Performance Appraisal Form for Woolworths:
Due to nature of its business, the Woolworths Limited Company needs to develop an appropriate plan for performance appraisal, which needs to comprise a development plan. Therefore, this section develops a sample of an effective performance appraisal form, which utilizes graphic rating scale, discussed below. It is worth noting that this evaluation form consists of two major sections: performance plan and development plan to capture performance appraisal and training and development requirements for each employee.
Woolworths Limited Performance and Development Form/Plan
Name of Employee:Department:Position Held:Date Started:Appraised By:Date Due:
Part 1: Performance Plan

Goal Achievement EvaluationKey Responsibilities123451Quality of service management 2Meet targets of employee productivity3Complete one-on-ones with all staff members4Foster team communication5Change management in the team6Appropriate recognition and reward7Assisting others8Achievement of targets of employee attendance 9Turnover targets achievement 10Meeting financial targetsLine Manager/Supervisor’s Comments:
Capabilities/BehaviorGoal Achievement’s Evaluation1Integrity123452Passionate about organizational/individual outcomes3Effectiveness in communication4Treat colleagues and customers with respect5Business strategy’s contribution6Consideration of their actions’ impact7Attention to detail8………910Line Manager/Supervisor’s Comments:

Part 2: Development Plan
Development ObjectivesActivities of DevelopmentDate DueStatus Comments1.2.3.
Part 3: The Overall Comments
Line Manager/Supervisor’s Comments:
Employees Comments:

Part 4: Signing Off:
Performance/Goal Planning Review Line Manager/Supervisor:Date:Employee:Date:Line Manager/Supervisor:Date:Employee:Date: Woolworths should have a performance appraisal plan like this. The performance appraisal plan has two distinctive sub-sections with the first being interested in rating the performance of the employees depending on their key responsibility areas, while the second component provides the managers or supervisors with an effective opportunity of rating the employees’ behavior, regularly according to the values of the organization (DeNisi & Pritchard, 2006). The plan includes an essential section for the comments of the manager, which is a synopsis of the performance of the individual employee.

The management of Woolworths will encounter a major challenge since most employees will request for clarity concerning the constitutes of the variation between the rating scale scores. In fact, this clarity will be hard when the management refers to intangible measures and may find them belaboring on some criteria hence evade the intended use of the form. However, provision of such clarity will be easy once the company comes up with such tangible measures as realization of sales target (Muchinsky, 2006).

Gathering of Performance Appraisal Data:
Woolworths Limited could use three means of data collection for performance appraisals: objective production, judgmental evaluation, and personal evaluation. In the objective production, the company could use such measures as production numbers, sales figures, electronic monitoring of data entry for data entry clerks in its stores, etc. However, the company requires employing performance appraisal measures depending on job held by an employee and its duties. Personal evaluation is a technique of recording the employee’s withdrawal behaviors such as accidents and absenteeism. Unexcused employee absences, to most companies, indicate poor job performance regardless of all the other factors remaining constant (Staw, 2008). However, an employee’s rate of absence may not be an effective indicator of the dedication of an employee in his/her job or its duties. Both personal evaluation and objective production methods have criterion inadequacies, which could lead to reduced measure validity (Muchinsky, 2006).

The final method is judgmental evaluation, which seems as to be a method of collection, hence qualify to be a methodology. Raters are one of the most common methods of getting performance appraisal data (Muchinsky, 2012). However, the method is still prone to errors such as central tendency, leniency, and halo-effect errors, since raters are usually human. Such errors originate predominantly from the social cognition as well as the perspective in that the way in which employees are judged and evaluated in diverse contexts link with the manner of acquiring, processing, and categorizing data and information. Rater is an essential part of this mechanism. Rater training is defined as the process in which raters are educated with the aim of empowering them to come up with more accurate performance assessments, usually achieved via reduction of the halo, central tendency, and leniency errors’ frequency (DeNisi & Pritchard, 2006).

In judgmental process, Woolworths could use such performance appraisal mechanisms as graphic rating scale, employee comparison methods, or behavioral scales and checklists. The graphic rating scale, however are the most commonly utilized methods in performance appraisal. This method entails the employment of a number of factors in judging subordinates performance depending on the level of possession of such traits or factors (Muchinsky, 2012).

In the employee-comparison criteria, subordinates are compared against one another instead of being judged against the pre-established criteria, hence elimination of the leniency and central tendency errors though halo effect errors still occur. Raters rank subordinates in the rank-order system from the best to the worst and the one’s dimension on performance are known by establishing how good or bad the employee is. Another way is paired-comparison system in which the rater must choose the 2 most effective subordinates from a group on each parameter and then rank the employees according to the rate of selection as being among the best (Muchinsky, 2012).

The company could also use forced-distribution system, which is essential for the large ratees’ groups. The raters use one or multiple dimensions in evaluating each employee after which they are place them in normal distribution category. Through this forced-distribution mechanism, Woolworths could identify the 10 percent lowest performing employees and dismiss them, if need be, and retain the 90 percent higher performing subordinates (Smart, 2006).

Behavioral scales and checklists is the other viable mechanism of performance appraisal in Woolworths. In essence, behaviors of individuals happen to be more explicit than traits. Critical incidents technique/method concerns the distinct behaviors indicative of an employee’s good or bad work performance (Muchinsky, 2012). Organizational supervisors need to record the behaviors perceived as job performance relevant of their employees and maintain a continuous tally of the good or bad modes of behavior. This could be followed by a performance discussion (Staw, 2008).

Conclusion
In conclusion, human resources management is a vital function of any firm and thus must be staffed with effective and efficient personnel to handle its various organizational roles. Among the key functions of the HR function is management of staff/employee through training and development of their talents and needs and performance appraisal. As such, each firm must have some clearly defined goals for facilitating the realization of these organizational functions as they ensure that the company’s operations face minimal or no challenges related to the labor force. Due to the nature of its operations, Woolworths Limited must ensure that its staff are effectively qualified and equipped in handling diverse customer and organizational obligations to ensure that its operations run smoothly, including into the international markets in the current globalization and technologically advanced age. This paper has shown the essence of training and development within the firm and the effective performance appraisal techniques, which are in use and should be adopted by the firm to enhance its effectiveness in the increasingly competitive global markets.

References

Abu-Doleh, J. & Weir, D. (2007). Dimensions of performance appraisal systems in Jordanian private and public organizations. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 18(1): 75-84.
Aguinis, H. & Kraiger, K. (2009). Benefits of Training and Development for Individuals and Teams, Organizations, and Society. Annual Review of Psychology, 60, 451-474.
Armstrong, M. (2006). A handbook of human resource management practice. London: Kogan Page.
Chiang, F. & Birtch, T. (2010). Appraising performance across borders: An empirical examination of the purposes and practices of performance appraisal in a multi-country context. Journal of Management Studies, 47(7): 1365-1393.
DeNisi, A. & Pritchard, R. (2006). Performance appraisal, performance management, and improving individual performance: A motivational framework. Management and Organization Review, 2(2): 253-277.
Desimone, Randy L. 2011. Human resource development. [S.l.]: South-Western Pub.
Hofstede, G. (2009). Culture’s consequences: Comparing values, behaviors, institutions, and organizations across nations, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Jenks, J. M. (2009). Do your performance appraisals boost productivity? Management Review, 80(6): 45-47.
Manasa, K. & Reddy, N. (2009). Role of Training in Improving Performance. The IUP Journal of Soft Skills, 3, 72-80.
Mayer, C. M. & Gavin, M. B. (2006). Trust in management and performance: Who minds the shop while the employees watch the boss? Academy of Management Journal, 48(5): 874-888.
Muchinsky, P. M. (2012). Psychology Applied to Work (10th ed.). Summerfield, NC: Hypergraphic Press.
Pettijohn, L., Parker, R., Pettijohn, C., & Kent, J. (2007). Performance appraisals: usage, criteria, and observations. The Journal of Management Development, 20, 754-771.
Robert, L. M. J. J. (2011). Human resource management: Essential perspectives. S.l.: South-Western, Division O.
Saks, A. M., Haccoun, R. R., Belcourt, M., & Belcourt, M. (2010). Managing performance through training and development. Toronto: Nelson Education.
Schraeder, M. Becton, J., & Portis, R. (2007, Spring). A critical examination of performance appraisals. The Journal for Quality and Participation, 20-25.
Sims, R. R. (2007). Human resource management: Contemporary issues, challenges and opportunities. Greenwich, Conn: Information Age Publ.
Smart, B. D. (2005). Topgrading: How leading companies win by hiring, coaching, and keeping the best players. New York, New York: Penguin Group.
Spinks, N., Wells, B., & Meche, M. (1999). Appraising appraisals: computerized performance appraisal systems. Career Development International: 4(2), 94-100.
Staw, B. M. (2008). Organizational psychology and the pursuit of the happy/productive worker. California Management Review, 28(4): 40-53.
Sudarsan, A. (2009). Performance appraisal systems: A survey of organizational views. The Icfai University Journal of Organizational Behavior, 3(1): 54-69.
Torrington, D., Hall, L., & Taylor, S. (2008). Human resource management. Harlow [u.a.: Financial Times/Prentice Hall.Bottom of Form
Vemic, J. (2007). Employee Training and Development and the Learning Organization, Economics and Organization, 4(2): 209-216.
Woolworths (2012b). Traineeships Can Assist you by Offering a Rewarding and Exciting Retail Carrer, retrieved on 18 May 2012 from, http://www.wowcareers.com.au/wowcareers/woolworths/yourcareer/learninganddevelopment/training+programs.htm
Woolworths. (2012). Company website accessed on 18 May 2012 from, http://www.wowcareers.com.au/wowcareers/woolworths/home/
Woolworths. (2012c). Human Resources, retrieved on 18 May 2012 from, http://www.wowcareers.com.au/wowcareers/woolworths/yourcareer/supportservices/human+resources.htm
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HR Management in Woolworths Company 18

3M Leadership Model Case

Significance of the competency model
In the swiftly changing business environment, a number of organizations are becoming familiar with the value of a workforce, which is well skilled, technically proficient, and capable of adapting to changes. 3M’s competency model acts as an integrative structure for the organization’s overall Human Resource system. The competency model also enables the company to side with the Human Resource system both vertically and horizontally. Vertically in the sense that it aligns HR practices with the strategic objectives of the organization and horizontally in sense that it aligns HR functions with other functions in the organization. This makes sure that there is unity and uniformity in all the aspects of HR activities in the organization that can influence performance.

The changing business demands are shifting the roles of HR but the competency model in 3M has enabled the company to manage disruptive technologies and come up with new ways of engaging with employees. 3M’s competency model is connected to the company’s business goals and strategies. This will offer an insight to core competencies that are common in the organization. In essence, the company needs to address future growth of the organization and leadership succession within the organization.

Approaches for Addressing the Needs
For 3M to tolerate the competitive business environment while maintaining its growth, the company has to strengthen its leadership in the existing senior management cohort. In addition, the company must create a pool of talented leadership. Even though 3M had developed approaches that makes sure that there are development behaviors and skills that supports corporate objectives, the company needs to come up with approaches that identifies competencies that necessary in changing its leadership philosophy. This will make it possible for the company to deal with the swiftly changing global business environment. In addition, the company will be in a position to pursue growth plans. 3M ought to come up with an environment that free to support experimentation, reinforce curiosity, and reward risk-taking.

Leadership succession has been a problem with 3M. The company is reputed for promoting individuals from within. For the company to make sure that individuals filing the leadership positions have a prevalent understanding of the company’s diverse businesses, an approach to managing succession plan needs to be introduced. The company needs to set up prescribed and in-depth development programs for possible coaching and mentoring practices. This approach will see smooth transition of leadership within the company without any struggle. In addition, the company has to establish a culture that prioritizes its leadership development by tying human resource development activities directly to the business strategies. The culture should also be able to establish business issues that each development activity is designed to address. The company should also use its performance management process to examine and exploit performance and develop its employees. 3M will remain competitive if it adopts these approaches.

Legal implications
There is an increasing need for Human Resource professionals to offer considerable input to the strategy of the company and the core competencies that are developed are faced legal implications. When a competency model is used to make employment decisions, the process of categorizing the competencies has to stick on some standards. These employment decisions comprises of promotion, hiring or selection of employees. Employees who are selected are more likely to be trained which may lead to reassignment, promotion, evaluation, compensation, termination, and certification. If this model is not competent enough, the organization will not be in a position to defend such decisions successfully leading to legal battles. If a completed competency model used in selection process is not able to distinguish between essential and non-essential competencies, then it headed for legal battles. Legal battles are likely to hurt the growth of the organization.

Recommendations for Management Positions
3M needs to come up with management competencies that can direct and inspire staff towards achieving objectives and meeting challenges. The competences should also advance ownership and accountability for preferred outcome at every level in the organization. The requirements for management positions should
Offer employees with clear direction and back up their quest for meeting objectives
Make sure that responsibilities, roles, and reporting lines are undoubtedly defined, understood, and accepted
Farm out work properly to employees by offering them with the essential support to meet up their objectives
Offer employees with standard feedback and identify good performance and deal with performance issues
Build and maintain mutually beneficial work relationship and alliances inside and outside the organization
Encourage people from different parts of the organization to work together
Develop plans into clearly defined objectives that take into considerations changing circumstances
Focus on the future needs of the organization in the ever-changing business landscape.
Adopt an approach that is in a position to deal with performance problems, provide feedback to the employee, and build up an action plan for improvement.
Select employees based on a careful analysis of the competencies necessary for positions offered in the company.

Work Cited
Alldredge, Margaret, and Kevin Nilan. “3M’s leadership competency model: an internally developed solution.” Human resource management 39.2-3 (2000): 133-145.

Insert Surname 3

Metrics for Total Rewards Programs at CT-HAVAC

Elements of Total Reward Program consist of all the things that a company can use in order to attract employees and they include bonuses, salaries, and incentive pays (Yasgoor & Bressler, 2008, p. 103). At CT-HAVAC, it is significant to recognize and reward employee performance through Total Reward Program. The anticipated Total Reward Program at CT-HAVAC is an all-inclusive assortment of benefits that extends beyond the normal paycheck. The program will help the company to retain, attract, recognize, evaluate, and develop talented staff capable of fulfilling the vision and mission of the company. It is one thing to have a reward plan and another thing to be able to track the efficiency, impact, and sustainability of the program. CT-HAVAC understands that the best way of knowing if a reward program is excellent or awful is by measuring the program through metrics.

Metrics
Human resource metrics are definite measures that are tied to the human resource pointers. Metrics are naturally used to access human resource functions and results in an organization. According to (Mathis & Jackson (2012), metrics can be developed using quantity, costs, timeless, and quality to track human resource’s effectiveness and efficiency. CT-HAVAC is planning to spend massive amount of money for employee compensation programs. Just like other expenditures, compensation expenditure has to be evaluated in order to find out how effective they are. CT-HAVAC is committed to a Total Compensation Strategy that will reward performance through competitive cash compensation program including base pay and variable compensation for employees.

Increased on the job performance
Increased on job performance is a metric that measures employee performance once the reward program is introduced. CT-HAVAC anticipates increased employee performance because of the total compensation program.
Return on investment
Return on investment is a type of metric that is used to measure how investments and their returns are faring. At CT-HAVAC, it is anticipated that invested dollars will bring a high rate of return.
Tactical accountability measures
This type of metric provides crucial information in regards to compensation and benefits programs as percentage of operating expenses.
Revenue per people cost dollar
This metric measures the marginal performance of the organization in relations to spending on people programs.

Organizational Goals and Program Outcomes
CT-HAVAC is an ambitious company that expects to growth to be one of the best companies in the world. By introducing the total compensation programs, the company hopes to retain its employees and attract the best talent.
Increased on the job performance
The company believes that the new compensation programs will attract the best talent to the company. The company anticipates that the program will increase job performance by 25 percent in its first year of introduction with a low termination rate of one percent. Under this program, the company plans to optimize its core leadership competencies to enhance service delivery, improve operations, and improve communication. This metric will support the company’s growth and the retention of key research and development.

Return on investment
According to Rico (2004), return on investment shows the value of investment in human resource. The total compensation program will see the company spend almost $500 per employee per month. The company revenue is anticipated to increase by an average of $50,000 for every employee under the anticipated incentive program. The program will return $100 for every $1 spent. The rate of return ratio is 2 to 1. This good ration will enable the company to realize its ambition faster than projected. When the company rolls this program, it will totally overcome the challenge of hiring employees because there will be reduced staff turnover. The company employees’ will actually give their best and the company will remain sustainable and competitive (Rico, 2004, p. 197).

Tactical accountability measures
This metric provides information about employee benefits relative to compensation programs. The higher the compensation cost are, the more impact it will have on the organizational expenditure. CT-HAVAC will follow such cost in order to make decisions regarding the appropriate benefits to offer to employees. This will enable the company to trim down employee turnover expenditure and realize its objective.

Revenue per people cost dollar
Revenue per dollar spent on employees cost is anticipated to increase through the program up to 30 percent but through overtime programs, the company believes that it will increase the productivity of the company. Workweek is defined as consecutive period of 168 hours that does not need to be calendar week (24 hours × 7 days). Through the total compensation program, the company may use 14-day period and pay for overtime hours worked beyond eight. This will enable the company meet its objectives and remain competitive in the industry.
CT-HAVAC wants to retain its talent and even attract more because it will able to keep away from shortsighted perspectives. The structure of thinking on retention is through compensation as a Total Reward Program. The challenge for Total Reward Programs through compensation is very clear. During an economic crisis, the company may not be able to sustain the program.

References
Mathis, R. L., & Jackson, J. H. (2012). Human resource management: Essential perspectives. Mason, Ohio: Southwestern Cengage Learning.
Rico, D. F. (2004). ROI of software process improvement: Metrics for project managers and software engineers. Boca Raton, Flor: J. Ross Pub.
Yasgoor, K. S., & Bressler, S. C. (2008). Kaplan human resource certification. New York: Kaplan.

HUMAN RESOURCE METRICS 4

Running Head: HUMAN RESOURCE METRICS 1

Training Key Areas

Abstract
This is an explanation of the significance of organizational and individual training in legal requirements, diversity, and employee growth for organizations’ and workers’ motivational and information needs.
Significance of Training in Legal Requirements, Diversity, and Employee Growth for Organizational and Personal Information and Motivational Needs
Organizational activity within an area, whether a market, industry, or both, applies with reference to specific objectives, such as profitability, growth, quality service, expansion, and timelines. To succeed, organizational operations involve the desire to influence certain aspects in the operational environment in particular ways to achieve favourable advantages.

Organizational elements, including production models, service, and market contact, require subscription to suitable designs and approaches to achieve such influence. Training in various aspects aims at skill and information development to enable quality and efficiency in such subscription and models (Wood, 2009, p. 17-23, 56-64). Training in legal requirements for an organization and employees involves development of skill and information on important aspects in organizational operations that relate to laws and provisions governing such services and their interaction and influence within the operational scope. It involves creation and maintenance of awareness in the organization and among individual workers of the basic standards and requirements, mainly enforced in governance, which are obligatory in view of their actions and services within the organization.

Training in legal requirements involves provision, explanation, and education on laws, provisions, and guidelines that relate to production and services in order to develop knowledge among employees and in the organization of how to act, serve, and behave in their capacities to avoid violating, contradicting, or ignoring them. Such training is important at both personal employee and organizational levels on two fronts: information and motivation. Legal requirements training provides information for the organization in order to allow policy design and execution that does not violate, negate, or contradict basic entitlements, social welfare, and general socioeconomic standards within the scope/area of operation. The training allows the organization to observe all guideline standards and obligations in its policy design and execution to prevent violations of fundamental industrial, welfare, social, and market provisions aimed at maintaining safe and desirable environments (Walsh, 2009, p. 3-29). Such training is important for the organization as violations of legal provisions in its policy design and execution would damage its brand and service image and threaten losses in legal processes, hindering its expansion, profitability, and other objectives.

Training in legal requirements is necessary to align organizational policies and their execution models with market, welfare, social, and industrial provisions in the operational scope and promote its success. It is also a key component of organizational motivational needs through preventing unnecessary legal, brand image, social welfare, and industrial inconveniences that promote potentially uninspiring, unsettling, and demoralizing disruptions, distractions, and unnecessary costs in organizational operations (Walsh, 2009, p. 3-31).

Legal requirements training provides information for individual workers on how to carry out their daily organizational roles and assignments in ways that do not violate industrial, social, service, and market provisions aimed at consumers’ and general safety and wellbeing. It educates them on appropriate actions to take and behaviour to exhibit in various organizational and service situations to avoid such violations. Such training is relevant for employees’ motivational needs through enabling them to avoid action courses and behaviours with potential to cause uninspiring, unsettling, and demoralizing disruptions, distractions, and unnecessary costs in their assignments and responsibilities (Walsh, 2009, p. 3-31). It enhances employees’ motivation through allowing them to execute assignments and responsibilities without incurring costs or violations of industrial, service, social, or market provisions that may affect their motivation through demoralization.

Training in diversity involves education on the nature and productive methods of influencing variety in organizations’ operational environments, such as cultural, industrial, ethical, and social variety. Such training is important for organizations and personal workers on information and motivation fronts. Diversity training provides organizations with information on the nature and productive approaches of handling cultural, industrial, ethical, social, and other diversity in the operational area. It offers the organization knowledge on existent and observable variety in markets, societies, and industries, and on skilful and productive approaches to influence such variety to realize profitability, growth, quality service, expansion, and timeline objectives (Mathis & Jackson, 2011, p. 45-49). With information on the nature and productive methods of influencing variety in operational areas from diversity training, organizations gain competent capacities to design and employ productive policies to influence relevant aspects in the operational areas to realize operational objectives.

Such information is an essential component of organizational motivation through inspiring clear strategies and objective plans that have realistic and context-fitting possibilities of success in enabling progress towards operational aims. Training in diversity offers workers information on the characteristics and nature of cultural, market, social, ethical, industrial, and other variety in the operational space. Such information is valuable for workers as it prepares them for such variety and equips them with adequate skill resources to apply to influence it towards intended outcomes. Diversity training is essential for employees’ motivation as it educates them on what to expect in cultural, market, social, ethical, and industrial variety and on how to influence it to realize specific objectives (Mathis & Jackson, 2011, p. 45-49; Jackson et al, 2011, p. 301-306). It is important for their motivational needs through simplifying and reducing necessary effort in their roles and assignments.

Training in employee growth involves improvement and addition of knowhow and experience to keep up with variations, mainly increases, in skill and knowledge demand in time. It entails upgrading employees’ skill resources and experience levels to satisfy higher and broader demand for expertise in an employment position. Training in employee growth is beneficial for organizational information requirements as it widens and increases its resource reservoir and potential to utilize in the advancement of organizational goals. Through employee growth training, the organization achieves better and more competent information on how to advance its objectives (Mathis & Jackson, 2011, p. 100-112; Jackson et al, 2011, p. 269-275).

Such training satisfies organizational motivation requirements through updating and enhancing its resource capacity and competence in addressing and influencing new and more complex industrial and operational environments and challenges that would have had the potential to reduce or disrupt its effectiveness. It serves to inspire the organization’s progress through assuring its resource readiness and adequacy to address changing operational demands. Employee growth training offers workers information on the nature of changes in their roles and assignments, and skill and experience information on how to address and excel in them.

It offers information to update their competence and skill varieties and amounts to handle changing structures and models in their employment assignments. Such training is fundamental for sustained motivation in their positions through allowing simple, trouble-free adjustment to variations in their job models and assignment demands. Continuous update of employees’ competence and skill varieties and amounts through training makes adjustments to role and assignment structure changes less complicated (Mathis & Jackson, 2011, p. 104-118; Jackson et al, 2011, p. 269-275). This motivates workers through inspiring and stimulating productivity, enjoyment, and excitement in their jobs, and encouraging continued improvement in employment performance.

References
Jackson, S., Schuler, R., & Werner, S. (2011). Managing Human Resources. Cengage Learning, Stamford, USA
Mathis, R., & Jackson, J. (2011). Human Resource Management: Essential Perspectives. Cengage Learning, Stamford, USA
Walsh, D. (2009). Employment Law for Human Resource Practice. Cengage Learning, Stamford, USA
Wood, G. (2009). Human Resource Management: a Critical Approach. Taylor and Francis, London, UK

Training Key Areas 1

Needs Analysis and Delivery Methods

Introduction
The major target of all organizations is to run smoothly and to be successful in all the operations they undertake. This noble task lies greatly with the human resource department. The department is charged with the management task which involves organizing individuals and groups in the place of work. It also formulates the policies to be followed in that organization and is involved in hiring and firing of employees, staff recruitment, undertakes needed research on behalf of the organization, and projects the future need to staff the organization.

In general, human resource department in any organization deals with the needs of the people in that organization and the needs of the organization. Individuals in any organization have different aspirations and needs that can be got during the regular appraisals. These needs and aspirations should be taken in to consideration and ways to meet them should be devised by the human resource department. If the needs involve taking opportunities at the local learning institutions to improve themselves, the opportunity should be granted by the organization. The organization should also be ready to create opportunities within the organization for the employees who take the challenge and improve themselves (Witkin & Atschuld, 1995).

There are various methods of determining the needs in a particular organization. However, these methods are determined by various factors, and as such, they vary from one organization to the other. The driving element of need analysis is to achieve the user’s satisfaction. These elements could include performance and the behavioral changes expected the projected solutions on any economic costs and benefit (Soriano, 1995). The first step should involve checking the organization’s present situation against the existing standards or the newly set standards. This means that there should be a thorough investigation in to the current situation against the desired or the projected situation.

Delivery Methods
Delivery methods are the ways through which an organization is able to establish the employees’ performance and the need gaps that need to be filled. Each method is always unique in its own ways and works well depending on certain circumstances. Every human resource manager should be able to determine which one works well for his organization (Hasan, 2007). These methods are not wholly independent thus they are highly interdependent. The use of questionnaires is the best methodology as opposed to others. This is because it is able to honestly reveal the feelings of the employees in the organization with ease. A questionnaire is easy to prepare. It is then given out to the employees who can fill it in at their most appropriate time. These employees are given an opportunity to be honest because most of the questionnaires do not ask the respondent to include their names. With this surety, the employees do not fear any form of victimization for writing what they feel could be inadequate in the organization. This is advantageous compared to an interview because an employee can fake satisfaction with the operations of an organization to avoid future attacks from the boss in question.

Pros and Cons of a different Delivery Method
It is easy to analyze the data provided in the questionnaire since it comprises of similar questions. Most of the questions in a questionnaire do not need a lot of time to expound on since they are interrelated. Unlike in an interview, the employee has all the time to fill in the questionnaire since they could carry it home. In an interview, there is a set time that the panel spends on each employee. There is much that is left out because the panel seeks to interview as many people as possible. An interviewing panel can only select a few employees to represent the feelings of the others. This means that the information received does not fully represent the feelings of all the employees (Witkin & Atschuld, 1995).

In an interview, the employee’s thoughts are easily manipulated. This is because, there is no time to think and reflect on the question posed to him. Some of the employees are shy to express their dissatisfaction in such a formal setting and this alters their honesty levels. They also shy away from the truth since they want to be seen as satisfied and contented with the situation of the organization at that time. However, the same employees provide different information given a questionnaire. This is because they have ample time to think and reflect on the posed question without disruption or shying away.

There are many other delivery methods that an organization can use to in the efforts to establish the service gaps in its services delivery. They include observation, job descriptions, appraisal reviews, problem solving conferences, drive pattern identity, analysis of the organizational policy, and the difficulty analysis among others (Soriano, 1995).All these methods have their pros and cons and this means that in order to achieve a realistic picture of an organization’s services delivery; it is good to combine various methods. Some methods like direct observation are the best in some cases. However, they cannot be solely depended on since they use a lot of time and can be bias to some extent based on the observer. They also cover just a small population and some people behave differently when there is an unfamiliar person within their environment.

The Final Project Recommended Methodology
For the final project, a questionnaire will be the most appropriate method to use to collect the information. Before formulation of these questionnaires, there is need to identify the focus group. This is the targeted population that the interview will be carried on. There are three levels of a focus group. Primary target is the basic since it includes the service’s direct recipients. Secondary target is the group that delivers the services and the tertiary target involves inputs and resources in to the solution on the findings. Emphasis should be put on the primary target since it forms the foundation of the secondary and the tertiary. The collection of data on the focus group should be well distributed to ensure a well representing outcome. Formulation of the questionnaires should also put into consideration the level of education of the target group, the language that that focus group uses and the number of the targeted respondents.

From the questionnaires, it is possible to establish the need and to generate possible solutions. The needs might be conflicting and this calls for a more elaborate way of handling such a case. The most immediate needs are given an emphasis while the others are dealt with as the urgency demands. The conflicting needs should be addressed with care to avoid more wild effects from the targeted group in the efforts to safeguard their recommendations (Hasan, 2007). Since any survey is meant to better service delivery to the focus group, it is always wise to communicate the outcome to the targeted group so that there is no resistance when the recommendations are being implemented.

References
Hassan, G. (2007). How to conduct a Training Needs Analysis. Retrieved on 8th March, 2012 from: http://www.dirjournal.com/guides/how-to-conduct-a-training-needs-analysis/
Soriano, F. (1995). Conducting Needs Assessments: A Multidisciplinary Approach. SAGE Human Services Guide #68. SAGE Publications: Thousand Oaks, CA.
Witkin, B. R., & Altschuld, J. W. (1995). Planning and Conducting Needs Assessments: A Practical Guide. SAGE Publications: Thousand Oaks, CA.

Human Resource Management 6

Motivation Plan

Introduction
The human resource forms the most important part of an organization, and tends to have needs that the workplace must satisfy. Motivation is a responsibility that is under all supervisors and leaders in the organization. Motivation includes guiding, directing and involving employees in daily organizational decisions. The management directs employees towards achieving methods of fulfilling their needs as they work to accomplish the goals of the organization.

When employees are motivated and growth oriented, they work happily with commitment and are more productive. It is important not to forget that each employee has different needs and the methods of motivation are slightly different. Motivation is therefore about communication, working together with enthusiasm, cultivating of common goals, knowing and helping one another to do a good job that is more meaningful. It entails creating a workplace where we can enjoy being because it gives meaning, direction and opportunities for growth of the organization.

We also seek to secure staff commitment through motivation whereby we develop and manage them to offer their best for the support of departmental aims and objectives. If staff feel that their decisions are supported generally and are guided in a right direction when they make mistakes, they will record positive behaviors, confident and are prepared to be more responsible in decision-making. The clear expectations, which they are factors of being valued, encouraged and trusted, will motivate employees to give their best. This leads to the organization achieving the ultimate goal of serving the community by provision of quality service, which our community deserves. Motivation therefore, comes with a word of encouragement and a sense of respect. Therefore, the power of acknowledgement creates enthusiasm to worthwhile work (Barrett, 2011).

Steps in a Motivational Plan
The first step is setting achievable goals. Nothing switches an individual off like an objective, which seems like an impossible mission. The best way to keep employees turns is to set goals that are fair and realistic in life, and this will motivate them to work and meet their objectives. A supervisor can offer the best rewards in the world but they the outcome will be meaningless if the targets are unachievable. Objectives must be relevant to the individual’s responsibility in the job. Perhaps the best way of setting goals is to approach the task from the point of view of the participant. Asking an individual to set goals may seem unethical but more often than not, they will set better self-objectives than those set by the company. Therefore, it follows that the desire to achieve targets improves because the figure benefit the community at large. It is clear to tell of unmotivated staff because they always review of the previous work done and follows the suit. Making them set their own goals will therefore motivate them to increase their productivity as they strive to achieve these goals (Mele, 2003).

Communicating effectively is another step of a motivation plan. Participants must be clear about the decisions that affect their work. Whether the information is conveyed in print, email or over the internet, participants ought to buy into the idea and understand what they need exactly to achieve objectives and earn themselves awards. This may involve measurement structures, which are devised, creating an incentive theme that is branded and provision of regular updates throughout the plan. This will enable the organization have many winners because success breeds success. However, in the arena of motivation, being able to recognize and reward all those who have succeeded promotes a more productive environment than one with many demotivated losers. Of course winners ought to be genuine but the process can be improves along by creating use of the reward structure. The reward structure for the winners will motivate others to compete actively among themselves.

The other step involves rewarding on a frequent basis. Employees need not be switched off by a plan, as they will lose interest quickly if they do not receive benefits. It must not be necessarily about huge awards values but about frequent winners. The organization ought to use the award budget creatively by reserving interim funds to keep the motivation levels high and ensure that the success is recognized early on in the campaign. Having an employee of the month is also an important program of implementing short-term goals, which helps to keep people focused. The criteria used could change every month to give every individual a chance to participate and demonstrate a particular skill. This consequently gives a chance for every average participant to compete fairly within the group ( Levounis & Arnaout, 2010).

Lastly, introducing an award scheme for customer service is also important in an organization. The objective of this program is to award staff and employees who provide good customer service, to motivate others in providing good customer service and to promote a service culture, which is customer-focused in civil service. Awards for the winners should not only be in monetary form, but also trophies, souvenir pins and gift coupons. This will eventually lead to a pool of fully motivated staff and employees in the organization and in the society.

References
Levounis, P., & Arnaout, B. (2010). Handbook of Motivation and Change: A Practical Guide for Clinicians. United States: American Psychiatric Pub.
Barrett, J. (2011). Aptitude Personality and Motivation Tests: Analyse Your Talents and Personality and Plan Your Career. United Kingdom: Kogan Page Publishers.
Mele, A. R. (2003). Motivation and Agency. U.S.A: Oxford University Press.

MOTIVATION PLAN 5

Running head: MOTIVATION PLAN 1

Human Resource Management: Challenges and Changes

Employees remain the most crucial resource in any firm. The success of a given firm depends upon its members’ capability. Moreover, most organizational challenges, problems, frustrations, as well as opportunities, are related to the organizational employees or members. This has made human resources management (HRM) to be ranked among the toughest managerial duties because human beings vary in terms of values, assumptions, attitudes, life goals, motivations, psychology, and aspirations. This paper is a personal reflection of the human resource (HR) challenges I face in my place of work (XYZ Hospital) where I work as a nurse, and the interpretation of the same by the other employees.

According to Sims (2007), HR face a number of challenges, including ineffective change management, inadequate compensation, learning and development hitches, problems in leadership development, organizational effectiveness, staffing, succession planning, management of benefit costs, and HR effectiveness measurement. In the current employment, the most dominant problems have been inadequate compensation, organizational ineffectiveness, and poor management of benefit costs. These problems affect all employees, including the supervisors and junior managers. The main reason for this is that the organizational interest is so much in increasing employees’ productivity at the expense of their motivation. The following three paragraphs will look into these challenges, with the last one being a conclusion for the paper.

Employee compensation is the amount of benefits and cash compensation, which employees receive for their organizational performance. Employers must understand that employees’ benefits packages and compensation compose a leading factor for a number of potential workers (Tropman, 2011). Inadequate compensation may tarnish the organizational competitiveness and attractiveness to job seekers. Consequently, HRM must offer exceptional total packages of benefits, but this has not been the case in XYZ Hospital since the employer is so much into cutting costs, including denial of adequate compensation. For instance, the organizational policy does not recognize, and/or reward workers for their overtime hours, a factor that affects nurses’ performance. Due to the high expectations and desire of serving the sick effectively, the nurses find themselves in a work-life balance dilemma, and it has not been easy for them. Comparing the organizational compensation package with those of other comparable employers it is clear that the hospital pays less by about 15%, and this has been a real ‘thorn in flesh’ for the nurses.

Organizational effectiveness refers to the effectiveness of a firm in achievement of the outcomes, which the firm anticipates to produce. This concept acts as a guiding principle for the organizational processes, and doubles as a motivator to the employees. The organizational effectiveness idea is particularly vital for external stakeholders as they are deeply interested in knowing the organizational efficacy in achievement of its objectives. Employees take pride in well-performing organizations, and it remains a daunting task for employees if they do not take pride in their organizational effectiveness (Argyris, 1964). XYZ has been ineffective in diverse ways, and this has seen the company losing business to its competitors.

This has mostly been catalyzed by lack of motivation among the nurses who end up not giving their best in accomplishment of their diverse organizational tasks and responsibilities. Most nurses complain about the company’s policies in selection and recruitment of new workers as most of these are hired on unethical grounds, including nepotism, race, and sexual favors. Such new employees end up getting better positions, including supervisory roles, at the expense of the older, experienced nurses.

Benefits management in any organization is an essential part of management of change, which is aimed at raising successfulness in the delivery of meaningful and quantifiable business benefits towads a firm. Benefit management focuses upon the manner in which diverse areas of business will benefit from organizational change, and offers an effective framework for the identification, planning, measurement, and active management of such benefits. Some contemporary firms do not have appropriate benefit management systems, and this has been a major challenge for organizational effectiveness (Ghoshal, 2005). In XYZ Hospital, workers face hardships in this issue, and it has led to immense nurses turnover. This has affected all workers, as there has been an increasing desire of working for a friendlier employer. Moreover, nurses find it hard to associate with the organizational benefits management scheme due to its complexity.

Looking at the contemporary competitive world, the managerial level employees will need more strategic and conceptual skills. Therefore, managers should ensure that they maintain an appropriate, pertinent, as well as up-to-date employees’ training, especially for some specific skills among the lower level workers. They must be proactive, capable of predicting technological advancements, as well as prepare their workers for the diverse changes in technology, which might occur. Such an intiative will be highly successful, particularly when the organizational HRM is wholly aware of such changes, and has effective mechanisms of handling them. The organizational managers should also understand that they retain the guardianship role concerning the key organizational assets. Besides, they are the analysts and protectors of their workers, and directly answerable for productivity. Their success in safeguarding the employees’ interests, as well as resolving their diverse challenges, will go a long way in motivating workers.

References
Argyris, C. (1964). T-groups for organizational effectiveness. Harvard Business Review 42(2): 60-74.
Ghoshal, S. (2005). Bad management theories are destroying good management practices. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 4(1): 75-91.
Sims, R. R. (2007). Human resource management: Contemporary issues, challenges and opportunities. Greenwich, Conn: Information Age Publ.
Tropman, J. (2001). The Compensation Solution: How to Develop an Employee-Driven Rewards System. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Human Resource Management: Challenges and Changes 3