Business Development Of Progressive Enterprises

Problem

Discuss about the Business Development Of Progressive Enterprises.

The main purpose of the assignment is to research on an organization and develop a business case that determines the information needs in real organization. The selected organization is Progressive Enterprises that is based in New Zealand and operates in retail sector (Weaven et al., 2014). The current segment analyze the information needs of Progressive Enterprises in a functional area (Human resource) and the value it offers to identify the critical success factors of retail industry in New Zealand. Progressive Enterprises is one of the grocery companies in New Zealand that occupies second position in terms of revenue with $4957 million. This company is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Australia’s largest retail company named as Woolworths Limited. The company faces stiff competition from Wesfarmers Limited and ASDA who are also retail giant in and across Australia and New Zealand. Progressive Enterprises continues to exhibit attractive performances in New Zealand retailing industry (Keller & Kotler, 2015). The critical success factors of Progressive Enterprises is due to several factors that includes maintaining the strengths of main supply chain that is important success factor in the retailing industry. Progressive Enterprises still continues strengthening their online stores when they believe that online commerce had become growing market especially during special occasion. Furthermore, Progressive Enterprises improves their online services by conducting huge investments in the IT systems. Progressive Enterprises believes in delivering fresh food to the people where the customers are aware of the benefits of quality goods (Sheth & Sisodia, 2015).

This business case is taken from the company named as Progressive Enterprises that is based in New Zealand and operates in retail sector. To this, the functional area that is problematic part at Progressive Enterprises is Human resources (Keller & Kotler, 2015). There are various cases faced by Progressive enterprises while operating in the retail sector. Some of the problems are listed below with proper justification:

• High turnover- It is known that retail sector is troublesome for having a high rate of employee turnover (Baker & Parkinson, 2016). This was exactly the case with Progressive Enterprises. In this industry, it is noted that employees routinely come and leave the company and this poses challenges to the human resource department (the functional area selected for this study). Training and developing becomes difficult for the human resource department to build loyalty if there is constant recruitment and hiring process goes on (Nordhielm & Depena-Baron, 2013).
• Diversity- Staff members coming from diverse backgrounds poses trouble in developing cohesiveness. From the point of view of HR, they face challenges in managing the diversity by avoiding any conflicts and promoting the spirit of tolerance as well as collaboration and teamwork (Meffert, 2013). 
• Misconceptions- The management of Progressive Enterprises must overcome a number of common challenges as well as misconceptions that are popular in the work environment. These problems include long duration work hours, no full-time jobs benefits, no growth opportunities and low pay (Keller & Kotler, 2015).
• Seasonal demand- At Progressive Enterprises, they always experience seasonal demand fluctuations (Baker & Parkinson, 2016). During this time, the retailers often try to add temporary staff to best serves the customers. At this time, the management of Progressive Enterprises uses fewer skilled and trained workers for work who does not have tools to best serve the customers (Sheth & Sisodia, 2015).

• The problem with high turnover can be addressed by the management of Progressive Enterprises (Baker & Parkinson, 2016). They can address the problems by recruiting the right people as well as building a rapport with the employees. At the time of interviewing the people, the Human resource manager should ask specific questions that relate to the type of work the employees of Progressive Enterprises need to perform. Informal social outings as well as fun games at Progressive Enterprises will help in building rapport (Keller & Kotler, 2015).
• The problem with diversity can be managed by the management of Progressive Enterprises. The HR department should include diversity discussions in store meetings as well as encourage employees where they can engage in discussing the differences. These techniques will be helpful towards building a cohesive team. A diverse workforce is a positive aspect that should prevail at Progressive Enterprises (Keller & Kotler, 2016). Diverse workforce will help Progressive Enterprises to better connect with its current marketplace as well as lead to more and better ideas and results in the future.
• The problem with misconceptions can be managed by the management of Progressive Enterprises. The management should offer regular eight hour work shifts for the employees working at Progressive Enterprises. The management should provide competitive pay as well as benefits to their full-time employees (Ingenbleek et al., 2015). When an employee work hard and establishes a good track in the business, the management should offer higher salaries and management positions for boosting their level of confidence (Baker & Parkinson, 2016).
• The problem with seasonal demand can be management of Progressive Enterprises. The management should develop a plan for assimilating temporary workers at the time of seasonal periods. To that, the management of Progressive Enterprises should conduct store meeting at the start of busy season as it is the best way to guide temporary workers learn the system and get familiar with the regular staff members (Keller & Kotler, 2015).

There are various approaches that can be undertaken by the management of Progressive Enterprises of Progressive Enterprises to solve the problems identified. For each of the options identified, the main problem takes place when there is frequent recruitment and hiring activities (Hollensen, 2015). This give rise to bad image for any company there is constant hiring activities goes on. People often think that employees are leaving the company. But, the case may not be the same. It is a case of selection of employees for right job. It is a tough challenge of Human Resource Managers to select right people for right job. Otherwise, there will be always employees who will show no interest towards work (Baker & Parkinson, 2016).  

Solution

The approach that should be undertaken by the HR Managers is as follows with proper justification:

• Training- Human Resource Department at Progressive Enterprises should nurture an organizational culture that embraces a positive shopping experience for each of the customers (Baker & Parkinson, 2016). Training of employees will help them to know their job role and how to maintain relationship with the clients at stores. Knowledge of product is important component of customer-service equation as well as necessitates the future-benefit instruction that enables the staff members to be in contact with customers and be able to answer questions with proper suggestions as well (Foxall, 2014).
• Workforce management- Staff members are in pressure while working at retail stores of Progressive Enterprises as there is long business hours, seasonal nature of the industry and frequent promotional events (Sheth & Sisodia, 2015). These activities put staff members into pressure at stores as they have to meet the customer expectations. The scheduling of expertise of HR need to be aligned with the associate attributes for tasks and shopper profits (Keller & Kotler, 2015).
• Recruitment- Human Resource Managers who work for retail companies struggle to attract customer-oriented candidates who are comfortable with technology as well as willing to accept irregular hours, relatively low pay and holiday assignments. The Human resource department is in constant pressure as any bad hire can damage reputation of company and waste of resources. The solution is recruiting right employees for right position (Armstrong et al., 2015).

Risk is present in every business enterprises and it can only be mitigated by using approaches but cannot be avoided as whole. While working for retail sector, the Human resource department faces various types of risks such as redundancy. It is for this reason important for Progressive Enterprises to manage their functional area (Human resource department) so that they work hard for becoming true asset for the business (Ekpo et al., 2015). Retail sector is a growing industry as people will purchase things that are necessary to them, so companies in the retail sector enjoys high profit margins and market share in the competitive marketplace.

From the above discussion, it is noted that Progressive Enterprises has the ability to generate value in their business where staff members are working their best and that results in revenue generation for the company. It can never happen that a sector and functional area has no problem as such. The study had been conducted to bring out the problems that are faced by Human Resource Management in the retail sector (Baker & Parkinson, 2016). The value creation at Progressive Enterprises is in better position as they are working hard for meeting the customer expectations so that there is repeated customers and acquisition of new one as well. The main value creation of Progressive Enterprises is that they provides satisfactory returns to the stakeholders that keep them intact with the company and help in generating high profits in the upcoming financial year (Keller & Kotler, 2015).

References

Armstrong, G., Kotler, P., Harker, M., & Brennan, R. (2015). Marketing: an introduction. Pearson Education.

Baker, M. J., & Parkinson, S. T. (2016). Organizational Buying Behaviour: Purchasing and Marketing Management Implications. Springer.

Ekpo, A. E., Riley, B. K., Thomas, K. D., Yvaire, Z., Gerri, G. R. H., & Muñoz, I. I. (2015). As worlds collide: The role of marketing management in customer-to-customer interactions. Journal of Business Research, 68(1), 119-126.

Foxall, G. (2014). Strategic Marketing Management (RLE Marketing) (Vol. 3). Routledge.

Hollensen, S. (2015). Marketing management: A relationship approach. Pearson Education.

Ingenbleek, P. T., Meulenberg, M. T., & Van Trijp, H. C. (2015). Buyer social responsibility: a general concept and its implications for marketing management. Journal of Marketing Management, 31(13-14), 1428-1448.

Keller, K. L., & Kotler, P. (2016). Marketing management. Pearson

Keller, K. L., & Kotler, P. T. (2015). Framework for Marketing Management. Pearson.

Meffert, H. (2013). Marketing-Management: Analyse—Strategie—Implementierung. Springer-Verlag.

Nordhielm, C., & Depena-Baron, M. (2013). Marketing management: The big picture. Wiley Global Education.

Sheth, J. N., & Sisodia, R. S. (2015). Does marketing need reform?: Fresh perspectives on the future. Routledge

Weaven, S., Grace, D., Dant, R., & R. Brown, J. (2014). Value creation through knowledge management in franchising: a multi-level conceptual framework. Journal of Services Marketing, 28(2), 97-104.