Question:
Discuss about the Human Resource Issues in the Operations of MiningCo.
In the mining industry, attaining skilled human resources is highly challenging due to the hazardous work conditions. MiningCo is operating a number of coals mines at the isolated locations all over the world. The staff workers are fly-in and fly-out on a rotational two-week roster basis. The staff workers work for two weeks in the field and send another two weeks at home. The company has made several employment policies so that the employees can work efficiently within the workplace. However, with the economic recession and economic downturn, it is important that the company implements strategies to effectively manage their human resources. These strategies should be able to enhance the performance of the workforce for the organization. The performance of the staff members can be enhanced by increasing the motivation and the engagement of the staff with the organization (Armstrong & Taylor, 2014). The present report will discuss the impact of the performance management initiatives on the motivation of the staff in the mining industry. Moreover, addressing the talent requirement in the mining industry is always challenging for the organizations. At the lower level in the mining industry, the employee turnover rate is very high; therefore, it is important that the organization makes a crisis management plan so that the human resource requirements in the place can be addressed.
In the present epoch, the employee performance management has attained supreme importance due to its immense benefits for the organization. The performance management schemes motivate the staff to perform in a better manner as there remuneration is linked with their performance. The motivation of the staff is difficult to achieve especially when the workplace conditions are hazardous. The employees remain in vulnerable state of mind and are not focused at their work. In the mining industry, manpower remains the most important parameter in the overall production. Therefore, HRM should have proper strategies so that the productivity of the employees can be enhanced. The motivated employees work efficiently, harder and in a better manner than the unmotivated employees (Kramar, 2014). In the mining industry, the level of motivation in a significant amount of employees is low which is challenging for the managers. There are two types of motivation, namely, intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation. The intrinsic motivation refers to the motivational factors which the embedded to the work. It means that the worker really enjoys working the task, or he has a desire to help others or likes to work in a healthy and enjoyable work environment. The intrinsic motivation is derived directly from the job that the worker is doing. On the other hand, extrinsic motivation refers to motivation that which is derived from the outcomes of an action (Sparrow, Brewster & Chung, 2016). It refers to various financial and non-monetary rewards derived from the outcomes of the work.
The managements motivate the employees by several tangible rewards such as promotion, payment, punishment and intangible rewards such as praise and recognition in front on other people. The performance of the employees is demonstrative act which is conducted with adequate skills, competency and the behavior (Kramar, 2014). The HRM department of an organization is responsible for developing the talent within the organization. They facilitate the departmental activities by organizing the structure, scheduling the tasks and recruiting appropriate employees so that maximum output can be achieved by appropriate tools. The employees who are satisfied with their work and operations are more productive. They employee motivation tools ensure that the employees are satisfied with the work conditions. According to Maslow’s performance theory, there are five stages of an individual’s needs which are, physiological needs, safety needs, social needs, self-esteem needs and self-actualization. These factors motivate the employees in the company to work harder. In the mining industry, the safety issues are the most important as the workers have to constantly work at hazardous locations (Purce, 2014). The failure to implement the safety practices can affect the motivation of the employees and other valuable resources of the company. Although money is the basic need of the employees, safety practices at the workplace is important to motivate the employees. Another important motivational factor is increasing the job security of the employees. Job security is important for the motivation level of the employees. In this regard, several strategies have been proposed to increase the employee motivation in the organization:
Designing Effective Reward Policies: The employee compensation is the best method to increase the motivation of the employees in the organization.
Safety Training Programs: In the mining industry, safety is the best method to motivate the employees. The employees are concerned about their personal safety and wellbeing (Choudhry, 2014).
Arranging activities for Employees: The people working in the mining sector struggles with their social lives. It is important that the company makes adequate provisions so that for the employees to enjoy their social lives (Budhwar & Debrah, 2013).
The company should implement a performance management approach for managing the performance of the employees. The performance management should be able to scrutinize the performance of each employee. The direct managers of the employees should give feedback to the subordinates regarding their performance. The managers should give positive and constructive feedback to the employees so that their morale does not decline and the employees perform well. Other than that, the organization can also establish targets so that the employees remain motivated to achieve them (Dawood, Miller, Patacas & Kassem, 2014). Other than that, the organization should also distribute incentives for the work done beyond the set targets. The employees must be make familiar with their strengths so that they can perform well at the workplace.
The proposed solution will benefit the organization in moving forward as the performance management schemes will enhance the performance of the organization. The employees will be motivated to work harder and achieve new targets. It will also increase the engagement of the employees with the organization (Bardoel, Pettit, De Cieri & McMillan, 2014). Moreover, the company would be able to achieve high performance with less number of employees.
Under MiningCo, a large number of mines are operating as independent entities and there is little staff rotation between them. However, in the recent times, the economic crisis in Greece and the increased terrorism or ISIS has increased the desire of the foreign professionals to leave the company. In this case, it is important to address the shortage of the human resources by adopting novel recruitment strategies. The organization should also take efforts to curb the hysteria arising from the shortage of workforce (Kaynak, Toklu, Elci & Toklu, 2016).
When a significant amount of workforce will leave the organization at a short notice, the remaining employees of the organization will feel overburdened with the work. It will increase the dissatisfaction of the employees with the work and thee organization. In this scenario, it is important that the organization adopts an effective communication approach to interact with the employees. The employees should be communicated that in the present, due to workforce shortage, the burden of the work on an individual employee has increased (Celma, Martínez?Garcia & Coenders, 2014). It is important to communicate that the organization is taking all the initiatives to fulfill the human resource requirements and needs the support of the employees. As discussed above, the organization should also implement performance management system so that the performance of an individual employee can be enhanced. If the employees are self-motivated to perform in a better manner, the requirement of the number of employees will decline. It is important that the organization should implement such techniques to enhance the performance of the employees.
The communication plan of the organization should be made specifically so that it can communicate with each and every employee on a regular basis. It ensures that no negative rumor is spread within the organization. In the mining industry, the performance of the organization is directly related to the work of the employees. Therefore, it can be critiqued that it is important to keep the employees motivated (Alfes, Shantz, Truss, & Soane, 2013). It is important that no negative rumor is spread against the organization. Such rumors decline the morale as well and the performance of the employees. It also negatively impact on the employee retention rate. The dissatisfied and the disgruntled employees leave the organization and switch to other companies.
The communication system must be able to communicate with each and every member of the organization. The employees at the lower level of the organization or the front-line workers faces drastic impact from the lack of communication mediums. These people are at the most vulnerable stage as they don’t know how to attain proper or accurate information for the organization. These employees should feel insecure for their jobs and easily switch their jobs to other companies. The direct managers of the employees should be given responsibility to constantly communicate with them so that they remain aware of the process (Kehoe & Wright, 2013). The communication plan of the organization should have following components:
The senior executives of the organization who are wishing to move to their nations should be retained within the organization. The HR manger should consult with them and discuss that adequate measures will be taken to ensure the safety of the employees within the mining sites as well as the workplace (Long & Perumal, 2014). The remuneration of the employees should also be made attractive so that more employees can be retained within the organization. Moreover, the organization will also abide by the safety laws and regulations so that the atmosphere presented to the employees is secure and positive. If the workplace environment is secure and positive, the employees of the organization will be more satisfied with the work. The organization must explore the current safety laws and regulations in the local area and should implement them within the organization. When the company abides by the local laws and legislations, it should be able to maintain positive image and cordial relations with the government.
Another important strategy in the present scenario is adopting different recruitment strategies. The organization should focus on the recruitment of the local employees so that the retention rate of the employees remains high. Other than that, the organization should also focus on the recruitment of the employees who are able to stay for long-term within the organization. The organization should select the professionals who are sincere about their professional life. The HR manager can select these kind of employees by looking at their past work and evaluating their behavior in the interview process (Sikora & Ferris, 2014). The candidate must be passionate, motivated about their professional life and loyal towards the organization. The organization should also focus on the recruitment of the local employees as they tend to stay for long-term within the organization. Following factors should be considered in the recruitment of the employees at different organizational level within the organization:
MiningCo should establish a recruitment method to prefer the local candidates in the recruitment process. The organization should prefer local candidates over the foreign candidates as they tend to work longer for the organization. It is important to recruit the candidates who stay for longer duration within the organization as the training and development cost to the organization becomes very high with a high turnover rate. The organization has to significantly invest to train new employees. Therefore, it is important to recruit the employees who show long-term commitment to the organization.
The business organization should also establish retention strategies in this regard. It is important to offer flexible and positive work environment to the employees so that they can work efficiently and become satisfied with their work. Offering flexible and employee-friendly atmosphere can increase the rate of employee retention within the organization. The business organization should focus on developing employee-friendly policies so that the employees are retained within the organization. The HR department of the organization should focus on developing policies so that the employees can easily share their qualms and issues with the management. The HR department should focus on immediately resolving the issues and problems of the employees so that their level of satisfaction with the work remains high (Kramar, 2014).
While recruiting the candidates in the organization, the business organization should assure that the employees are retained for the maximum period. The organization should also introduce a clause in the employment contract which assures that the employees will work for the organization for a maximum period of time. The business organization should communicate to the employees that it is investing significant financial assets in the induction of the employees within the organization. Therefore, it is important the employees will work in the organization for the maximum period of time.
The organization should also allow employee cross-over between different entities. The company work as a group of different independent entities. All the subsidiaries of the company are working as independent entities and have an independent workforce. Several times, there is workforce crisis in some situations whereas few entities have a large number of workforce (Brewster, Houldsworth, Sparrow & Vernon, 2016). Therefore, MinesCo can address the situation by allowing employee crossover between different entities. The entities with surplus amount of workforce can transfer a limited amount to the entities with employee shortage. It will increase the efficiency and the optimization of the human resources.
All the companies in the mining industry suffer from talent shortage at one time or another. It is important for the organizations develop a crisis management team which can help resolve these avoidable situations. The crisis refers to extreme situations in which some external event leads to major disturbances at the workplace. The workplace crisis occur at short notices and create chaos within the organization. It also leads to the feeling of fear and uncertainty among the employees.
It is also important that the management identifies the early signs of crisis and warn and prepare the employees for it. Once the organization has identified crisis in the organization, the employees must take immediate actions to resolve the situation.
The crisis management team is designed by the organization to address the crisis situation in a business organization. Its primary aim is to protect the organization against adverse effects of crisis and prepare it by the threats from the external environment.
The business organizations form crisis management team to determine the future course of action in an adverse situation. It prepares the organization to address the inevitable threat. These teams try to bring out the organization from difficult times as soon as possible. They are dedicated to the crisis management and helps the organization to come out of difficult situations as soon as possible. There are significant roles of the crisis management team such as: it assists the organization in detecting the early signs of disasters and identify the problem areas in the organization. It also contribute the organization to discuss with the employees the situation of crisis management and discuss the situation the area of concern. It should also encourage the employees to face different situations with determination and courage. The organization is also assisted to be prepared for the crisis. Generally, the crisis management team of an organization incudes head of departments, CEO and departmental crisis, board of directors and HR representatives. The crisis management of MiningCo will also comprises of the following professionals. The crisis management team of the company should also analyze the situation and form a crisis management plan to save the reputation and finances of the organization in the industry. The business organization should also define the function of the crisis management team in the organization. A team leader should be appointed who can take charge of the situation and encourage the employees to work as a single unit. The crisis management team should work on different problems and shortcomings which has resulted in the crisis at the workplace. The team members should identify how the current processes can be improved and smoothened for better functioning of the organization. It is important to develop alternate plans and strategies for the organization. The team should also make efforts to attain accurate information from the organization. The plans must be implemented for better results and proper feedback should be given time to time for the better efficiency of the organization.
Conclusion
Summarizing the report, it can be concluded that the human resources are the best resources of a business organization. It is critical for the success and achieving the objectives of the business organization. MiningCo is a mining organization operating in different parts of the world. The different entities of the organization work as an independent subsidiary and each subsidiary has its own set of human resources. It is difficult to find human resources with appropriate skills and talent. Therefore, organization should develop human resource strategies to address the situation. The organization should develop a performance management initiatives to enhance the performance of the employees. Other than that, the organization should also develop a crisis management plan to deal with the organization.
References
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