Human Resource Management Strategies Of Virgin Australia: Analysis And Evaluation

Overview of Virgin Australia

Virgin Australia is an Australian based airlines organization that provides great value as per the customer service is concerned. The purpose of the report is to analyze the human resource management strategies that are used by Virgin Australia. This report will provide an overview of the company. This report will also provide the human resource management strategies that are used by the airlines organization. Evaluation of the stated human resource management strategies are also done. A brief understanding regarding the relation in between HRM strategies and company strategies will also get discussed. Recommendation will be provided along with the reflection feedback.   

Virgin Australia uses their young fleet resources to provide exceptional customer service to the clients during their travel to and from 45 locations domestically in Australia.

Figure 1: Virgin Airlines

(Source: Kellner 2017)

Virgin Australia was initially founded in 1999. It was initially named Virgin Blue in the starting stages. The airlines organization started its operation in the year 2000 on 31^st of August. The referred airlines organization has a total of 4 hubs, namely Auckland Airport, Brisbane Airport, Melbourne Airport and Sydney airport. The cities where that stays under focus of the airlines company are Adelaide airport, Gold Coast Airport and Perth Airport. The Frequent flyer program that is in use is Velocity Frequent Flyer. The total fleet size of Virgin Australia is 101. The destinations that are covered under the belt of the business organization is 52. The company slogan that the airlines company follows is “This is how we fly’’. The parent company of the airlines organization is Virgin Australia Holdings. The headquarters of the referred airlines organization is situated in Bowen Hills and Brisbane. The Chief Executive Officer of this organization is John Borghetti. Richard Branson is the co-founder of the organization. Brett Godfrey is another co-founder and former Chief Executive Officer of Virgin Australia.     

The strategies that are used for performing human resource management strategically in Virgin Australia are as follows: –

• Work Life Balance

1. Providing flexibility in the working schedule
2. Shared parental leave
3. Enhanced maternity leave

• Pay and rewards

1. Annual performance bonus
2. Bonus providing scheme for permanent employees.

• Extra Benefits

1. Staff recognition scheme
2. Voluntary benefit scheme
3. Subsidized tuck shop
4. Long Service awards
5. Employee referral program

• Providing Pension and group

1. Group personal pension plan
2. Income protection plan
3. Life assurance for four times the salary that is provided

Situational analysis of human resource management strategies of the chosen organization can be performed with the help of SWOT analysis.

S (Strength): the growth rate of the employees in the organization is high. This acts as a major reason behind retention of the employees. With better growth rate the employees get more financially stable  

W (Weakness): the salary that is provided to the employees are not at par with the standardized market rate. This might lead to less efficient retention of employees

Human Resource Management Strategies of Virgin Australia

O (Opportunities):   with the introduction of new products and services, the employees of the organization has the opportunity to grow as an individual with respect to gradual increase in knowledge

T (Threat): with increase in competition in the field of aviation, employees get higher range of diversity in the employment and might switch organization in case better salary is provided.   

Strategies implemented: –

• Work Life Balance

1. Providing flexibility in the working schedule: Virgin Australia provides flexibility in shift hours (Samson, Daft and Donnet 2017). According to Adam’s Equity theory, providing flexible shift timing will help in bettering the relation of the employee with the business organization
2. Shared parental leave: According to Frederick Herzberg, providing better work balance for personal life issues increases employee loyalty towards the business organization (Kellner 2017). on implementing this strategy, the employees of this strategy helps in better management of the business proceeding

• Pay and rewards

1. Annual performance bonus: According to Expectancy theory, the with the help of proper appraisal provisioning, the main advantage that is enjoyed is that the employees stay content and stay keen on performing better for having better appraisals
2. Bonus providing scheme for permanent employees: According to Expectancy theory, employees gets highly motivated in case they are provided with bonus in case of performing in a better manner (Bamber 2018). This aspect also helps in retaining of employees and this increases the quality of the performance that they provide

• Extra Benefits

1. Staff recognition scheme: From Frederick Herzberg’s theory, providing recognition to the employees of the organization on providing good performance is also considered to be method of retaining employees.
2. Voluntary benefit scheme: According to Adam’s Equity theory, sense of achievement and praise acts as a motivation for the employees. This aspect helps in having a better financial management of employees.  
3. Long Service awards: According to Reinforcement theory, the reward gettable task must get rewarded (Alaoma and Voulvoulis 2018). In case Virgin Australia, provides awards for performing better for a prolonged period gets rewarded, the employees perform in proper manner.

• Providing Pension and group

1. Life assurance for four times the salary that is provided: According to Frederick Herzberg Motivation-Hygiene theory, hygiene factors plays a major role in increasing the retention of the employees.

Company strategies of Virgin Australia are as follows: –

• Providing benefit to the customers: With the implementation of the Frederick Herzberg theory, the main advantage that is gained includes better proposition of employee management (Wilton 2016). This includes the fact that the management of the project gets performed in a better manner with higher motivation of the employees. In case the employees stay content the functioning that will be provided will help in bettering the experience of the customers who are using the service (Elledge and Thornton 2017).
• Leading the way: With the implementation of Goal setting theory, Virgin Australia provides a brief and precise ideology to the personnel regarding the job prospect. This ensures the fact that the completion of the project gets performed in a better manner. This ensures the fact that the output that is provided by the employees are best in class and hence Virgin Australia succeeds in leading the way  
• Determination to deliver: With the implementation of Expectancy theory, the employees of Virgin Australia stay motivated as in case the quality of the job they perform is up to the mark the employees provide better performance.  

Conclusion 

From the above discussion, it can be stated that Virgin Australia has been proposing strategies that helps in retention of employees. Virgin Australia is recorded to be having one of the best human resource management strategies. This leads the fact that Virgin Australia has been providing better high standard facility to the users of the airlines. This includes the fact that the management of the business prosecution gets performed in a better manner. Virgin Australia has been implementing soft mode of strategic human resource management. Virgil Australia has been using Frederick Herzberg’s motivation-hygiene theory, Adam’s Equity theory, Expectancy theory, Reinforcement theory for better management of the project.  

Recommendations that are needed to be implemented are as follows: –

• Increase in basic pay of the employees: The basic pay of Virgin Australia has been comparatively low. In competition with other aviation organization, the basic pay is lesser. This insists the fact that the employees have the tendency to leave the organization. This reduces the retention ability of employees. In case the basic pay is increased the employees will tend to stay in the organization for a prolonged period. This will help in increasing the turn-over of the organization as the cost of training new employees can be mitigated.    
• Critical illness assurance: Critical illness assurance will implement the aspect that the management of the project will get performed in a better manner as according to Frederick Herzberg Motivation-Hygiene theory, providing hygiene related assurance helps in increasing the retention of the employees.   
• Group Wide annual party: Virgin Australia must provide a group wide annual party as this aspect helps in decreasing the fatigue of the employees. In case the fatigue gets decreased the main advantage that will be enjoyed incurs better performance of the employees throughout the year. Better relationship establishing among the employees and the higher authority will help in retaining the employees and human resource management will get performed in a better manner  

According to me Virgin Australia has a very stable human resource management strategy. With the help of proper implementation of the strategies that are related to human resource management in an efficient manner, the main advantage that is received includes better management of the project. These strategies acts as a main reason Virgin Australia being one of the best airlines organization, being second to only Qantas. According to me, in case Virgin Australia had not implemented the following theories, the human resource management would not have been this efficient. This issue might have resulted in lack of provisioning standards to the clients during their travel.

Reference 

Alaoma, A. and Voulvoulis, N., 2018. Mineral resource active regions: The need for systems thinking in management.

Bamber, G.J., 2018. Low-cost airlines’ product and labor market strategic choices: Australian perspectives. Members-only Library.

Elledge, A. and Thornton, C., 2017. Effect of changing land use from virgin brigalow (Acacia harpophylla) woodland to a crop or pasture system on sediment, nitrogen and phosphorus in runoff over 25 years in subtropical Australia. Agriculture, ecosystems & environment, 239, pp.119-131.

Kellner, A., 2017. Human resource management standardisation and adaptation in franchises. The Service Industries Journal, 37(9-10), pp.545-566.

Samson, D., Daft, R.L. and Donnet, T., 2017. Fundamentals of Management with Student Resource Access 12 Months. Cengage AU.

Schaper, M. ed., 2016. Making ecopreneurs: developing sustainable entrepreneurship. CRC Press.

Srisaeng, P., Baxter, G.S. and Wild, G., 2015. Forecasting demand for low cost carriers in Australia using an artificial neural network approach. Aviation, 19(2), pp.90-103.

Srisaeng, P., Baxter, G.S. and Wild, G., 2015. Forecasting demand for low cost carriers in Australia using an artificial neural network approach. Aviation, 19(2), pp.90-103.

Wilton, N., 2016. An introduction to human resource management. Sage.