Table of Contents
Woolworth’s Human Resource Management
Assignment topic:
Discuss Woolworth’s Human Resource Management Strategy.
Assignment:
Introduction
Human resource management is a crucial aspect for the growth of any company and just like any other company or organization it is extremely important for Woolworth’s growth too. This necessitates the establishment of HR departments to oversee and control the operations of employees and guarantees that they are comfortable and productive at all times. Woolworth may be Australia’s largest retailer, but in order to maintain its market position and exceed customer expectations, the company’s human resources must be up to par. To better understand the roles and function of human resources in business operations, one must clearly understand what the human resources department does and most importantly the core definition of Human resource management. After which other aspects of HRD can be explored to determine the precise role of human resource management in any business operations
Defining of Human Resources Management (HRM)
“The practice of recruiting, hiring, deploying and managing employees of an organization” is the basic definition of human resources management (HRM), it is usually referred to as (HR) human resources. The HR department of a company or an organization sees through all the responsibilities of creating and putting into effect policies and the law governing workers. They are also responsible for maintaining the relationship of the company with its employees. All of these roles and functions play a huge part in ensuring that the correct people are hired for an organization. Therefore for Woolworths, it is important to have a department that manages and controls all operations in order to increase retention rates and bring down turnover rate.
Woolworth’s Background
Woolworths Group Limited is the largest supermarket retailer in Australia, the brand started its journey in 1924 by Percy Christmas, Cecil Scott Waine, Stanley Chatterton, Ernest William, and George Creed. And since then the company has emerged as the largest supermarket retail chain in Australia. The corporation is headquartered in Bella Vista, New South Wales. It operates in Australia and New Zealand. According to Woolworth’s official website, the market leader has 995 stores in Australia with 115,000 employees that are employed across its supermarkets, convenience store, customer service department and distribution centers. And now Woolworth is hoping to expand internationally, in order to do that successfully it is necessary for the group to have a well-oiled HR department so that it can hire and assign reliable staff in the new branches in order for it to be managed effectively.
The Human Resource Department
Woolworth’s 115,000 staff serves approximately 28 million consumers every week. Woolworth at the same time was challenged by the old age, manually processed HR system that threatened to halt its growth. To maintain its reputation and to further grow Woolworth initiated an HR transformation program to help achieve its vision of “to provide the best possible convenience, value and quality products and services to their customers”.
Strategic Human Resource Management
The HR department’s first task is to do an evolution of Woolworth’s present HR policies and procedures. This will aid in determining the particular HRM techniques taken by companies like Woolworths. The data will then be analyzed utilizing static management tools to establish the benefits and drawbacks of existing HRM policies and guidelines, depending on which changes may be made to assist the organization in developing stronger policies. Woolworths utilizes three sorts of strategic management tools to assure the effectiveness of its strategies: strategy formulation, strategy planning, and strategy control. Each aids in the management of a distinct component of the company plan, ensuring that the strategy’s success rate is maximized. The following things must be addressed in every strategy.
- Company’s mission and vision,
- Company’s current status and future growth plans,
- Company’s current working environment,
- Goals to achieve future development goals.
All the things mentioned above need to be addressed in order for the strategies to be effective and to attract skilled human resources.
Roles and Functions of Human Resource Department
To achieve goals, it is essential for a department to have a clear set of rules and functions. These roles and functions are not limited to only the human resource department of Woolworth, it applies to other departments as well as its individual staff members. For the company’s growth, it is critical to clarify each department’s and individual’s duties, since this will hold them accountable for monitoring and being responsible for their jobs. Every job role and department has four roles:
- Planning: Planning is necessary for any strategy to succeed since it describes the project’s aim and tactics for achieving the goals.
- Organizing: Using SWOT and any analysis tools, through this, the staff will be able to understand the different aspects of the project after that they will need to be organized based on their importance. Also using strategic management tools like Gantt Charts aid in outlining the particular schedule depending on which stages the project requires to be completed, thus it will set a deadline for the said task.
- Directing: Every department needs to have a manager, a team lead, subject matter experts, senior associate and junior associate and tasks are assigned to them as per their abilities and expertise, this is what we refer to as Directing.
- Controlling: Woolworths also need to have a control system in place so that it can help them outline the regulation, policies, and processes to be followed by all the staff. The process through which organizations make decisions is also outlined by this controlling mechanism. The role of decision making is given to the staff based on their authority and role in an organization. Though the final decision is always made by the Managing authority.
To guarantee maximum company success, these roles and functions must be followed at all times.
Staff selection, recruitment, and retention
Woolworths recruits the best talent in the organization to ensure that each operational activity is performed in the best manner. One of the foremost functions of the human resource department is Recruitment. It aims to obtain and hire staff that is qualified and efficient enough to do that task assigned to them so as to achieve the goals and objectives of the company. Woolworth has a well organized and functional HR department that sees through all the organization’s staffing needs. The department is continuously expanding as the organization’s staffing needs are increasing.
Human Resource Policy development
Another important feature and the main focus of Woolworth is its HR and staffing policies. As the world’s demand for skilled staff is increasing day by day, companies need to come up with competitive HR and staff policies to maintain their market position. You must be wondering why is it important? It is important to ensure that the staff have the top quality facilities which will help keep the staff happy and comfortable which will, in turn, increase the retention rate. Working conditions, employee expectations, facilities as well as incentives and performance benefits must all be addressed in the company’s HR policy. It is also very important to have a fixed opening and closing time in the policy
Resignation and Termination procedures
Like any organisation, in Woolworth, the resignation and termination procedures are simple and foretell. There are clearly defined instructions about the resignation and termination procedures, notice periods are issued by the party that wants to depart or by the employee or if in case it is not issued then the breaching party needs to compensate it with the amount specified in the agreement or company’s policy. Furthermore, if the employee is fired during the probation period, which is when they are under the supervision and not a permanent staff member then the company is required to issue a notice that is shorter than the notice period of an employee that has passed the probation period. A sound resignation and termination procedure ensures that the company is never low on staff and they have enough time to interview and hire a new employee.
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Performance and Talent management
Woolworth has adopted various initiatives to help reduce and manage the gap in employee performance. Performance management refers to the continuous process of identifying, measuring and developing the performance of an employee in an organization, its primary purpose is to work to achieve the organization’s goals and objectives. Performance management is an important aspect of HRM. It is utilized to foster a work environment in which individuals are encouraged to achieve their best and deliver high-quality results.
Conclusion
This blog was mainly focused on the roles and functions of the Human Resource Department and how that helps in better business operations. The company used in this blog is a renowned retailer giant in Australia, Woolworth. However, everything mentioned in the blog can be used in any organization through its HRM policies. As the things mentioned above are imperatives for a business to work effectively.
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