Wesfarmers is a conglomerate company, it was established in 1914. The company operates in chemical, fertilisers, coal mining and safety products. It has the largest private employers in Australia, with 220000 employees. In 1984, it was listed on the Australian Security Exchange and grew as a retail conglomerate. With the continuous success, Wesfarmers started operating with Cole’s group. The Company targets the department stores retailer in Australia (Wesfarmers, 2018).
In the first phase of report, the market analysis will be discussed to identify the strength and weakness of the company. After that, the report will be made on the role and function of human resource management. And at the last phase, the recommendation will be provided to handle the challenges.
Vision of Wesfarmers is “to become the best retailer in the market” and the mission and core value of the company is “to maintain the employee alignment”. The company has selected the right path to achieve the objective (Wesfarmers, 2018).
It has been analysed that the company has large market share in the private sector of Australia and New Zealand which is the great advantage for the company. Due to the high market share, the company has a strong network with the supermarkets which attracts the consumers. It is observed that the company has many local suppliers that is why, company faces the problem of old material or common material. Thus, the company is facing he problem of new ideas to extend the business in the new market. The company has many departments which is a major weakness because the company cannot gain the profit on all services. Wesfarmers has an opportunity to grow with the online market and it can enter into the new retail sector with the help of the employees. But the company faces the challenge of non-performing employees. The company has a good name in the market thus; the company has a high competition in the market which is a high threat for the company (Olander, Hurmelinna, Laukkanen, & Heilmann, 2015).
It has been evaluated that the company faces the biggest challenge of restrictive trading hours. Due to the minimum contribution of the employees towards the work; the company did not finish the work at the restrictive trading hour just because of the high turnover of employees. The company has the low growth rate just because of employee’s inefficiency towards the work. The company is facing the loss because of the higher wage rate as compare to employee’s performance. Wesfarmers provides an opportunity for Women in decision making but the company is facing the problem of low average education of employees and unskilled labour. It is observed that the company adopts the new technology to target the new customer (Wesfarmers, 2018).
From the above analysis, it is observed that the company is facing the challenges of average qualification, the efficiency of an employee, labour turnover, new ideas or minimum participation of employee towards the work and the non- performance of an employee. In the next phase of the report, is based on the role of human resource management to reduce or handle these challenges.
Recruitment and selection
Wesfarmers recruits the employee with the high skills in its organisation. It has a responsibility to hire the right person in the right place. The human resource management of the company follows the process at the time of recruitment from which they can hire the right person and the best talent for the company (Black, Washington, & Schmidt, 2016). The company identifies the factor before the recruiting process such as the size of the organisation, vacant vacancies of the company and the requirements of the job.
After completing recruitment, the human resource management follows selection process. This role of human resource management helps the company to improve the productivity of the company by hiring the highly skilled employees. Human resource management follows the process in which it is compulsory for the company to clear the aptitude test for the professional vacancies. This step of human resource management helps to hire the highly qualified employees in the organisation (Budworth, Latham, & Manroop, 2015).
Encourage the employees
It has been seen that the Human resource management of the company helps to reduce the labour turnover by encouraging them towards the objective. Wesfarmers faces high labour turnover of employees just because workers move for the incentives and wages. It encourages the employee by offering them incentive and bonus. Incentive and bonus is a major part which attracts the employees to stay long in the organisation like Wesfarmers provides the fair work commission to the employees who work in the field of Coles (Wesfarmers, 2018). The company provides numerous benefits to the employees like the discount on supermarkets, transportation charges and many others. It also provides the career opportunity to the employees by promoting them for their rank. Human resource management of the company analyses the individual employees and provides the incentive to the employees (Grant, 2016). Human resource management of the company set the incentives and bonus according to the quality work of the employee. This role helps the company to reduce the labour turnover and encourages the best talent to stay in the company (Akhter, Hussain, Bhatti, Shahid, & Ullah, 2016).
Performance Management
Human resource management of the company hires the best-talented employees in the organisation. It helps the company to overcome of challenge of non-performance and inefficiency of the employee. The company failed to meet the requirement at the restrictive trading time, from which company faces the problems. Thus, it helps to improve the efficiency of an employee by measuring their performance on a regular basis. Human resource management of the company inspire the employees by awarding them for their work. It provides awards to the best performers, best performers of the company are appreciated by the other fellows who encourage the other employees to work hard and give their best in their work. It especially encourages that employee who did not perform well in their work. It helps the company to increase the productivity by encouraging the employees to perform well in their work (Buckingham, & Goodall, 2015).
Recruitment
Human resource management of the company recruits the employees by following the rules and regulation as well as procedure of the company. The company recruit the best employee by identifying the factors of the company like size, vacancy and requirement of recruitment. For this, the human resource management of the company is analysing the records of the other department documents. It is observed that each business of Wesfarmers has its own human resource team which manages the recruitment and selection of the company. Human resource management takes the help from the managers of another department. It indicates that the company did the recruitment with the help of the managers from other departments.
Selection
Human resource management of Wesfarmers follows the selection process to hire the high skill employee in the organisation. It is necessary for the candidate to clear the aptitude test, HR interview and the other interviews. These tests and interviews help the Human resource management to analyse the skills and intelligence according to the requirement of the job vacancy. Wesfarmers is a well-known company for its employees; it shows that the company selects the higher skilled person by following the procedure. To select the best employee, the other managers also help the human resource department by making the test papers according to the profession of the job vacancy.
Employee performance
Human resource analyses the performance of each employee. It helps the employees to improve their performance by encouraging and understanding their problem which is faced by the company. This function of the HR manager helps to improve the efficiency of the employee towards the work. It used the talent management system to analyse the skills and ability of the company according to their job requirements (Reeve, 2014). The company analyses the performance by the analysis of daily work performance of the employee. The management of another department records the daily work performance of an employee. Human resource requires the record to enhance the employee performance which is made by the manager (Anitha, 2014).
Training and Development
The human resource of Wesfarmers plays an important function to increase the productivity of the company by improving their concepts according to their job profile. Human resource organises the training session to train the employee as per the requirement of their profession. Training helps the company to improve the employee performance. The HR department provides the training to the selected candidates to explain the rules and regulation of the company. Training also helps the new employees to understand the basic concepts regarding the job. Human resource trains the employee themselves by explaining the policies of the company (Brewster, 2017). Thus, it indicates that the human resource manager manages the function without any help from the other department at the time of training of new employees.
Maintaining a good working environment
This function of management helps the company in influencing the employee to stay in the organisation for a long time. To maintain the environment of the organisation HR takes the feedback from each employee at the end of the month. It is observed that human resource management of Wesfarmers interacts with the employees and understands their problems and helps to reduce the problems. Wesfarmers has many businesses; especially the human resource of Cole business of Wesfarmers is more active towards the health of the employees. The human resource of the company provides the facilities to the employee so that the employees are influenced to stay long in the organisation and give their best (Brewster, Chung, & Sparrow, 2016). The human resource of Wesfarmers follows the Privacy Act at the time of personal interaction with the employee.
Lack of better working environment
It is analysed that the working environment of the company is good and it is very efficiently maintained by the Human resource team of the company. It provides many facilities to the employees to influence them to stay for a long time in the organisation. Human resource especially provides the facilities by understanding their performance or making good relationship with them (Karam, Gardner, Gullifor, Tribble, & Li, 2017). But it is observed that the company is still facing the challenges of high labour turnover which affects the organisation’s goodwill and decreases the productivity of the company. Thus, it can be said that the human resource management of Wesfarmers requires maintaining the healthy and safe environment so the rate of labour turnover will decrease and the company can expand the market easily (Bhatt, & Lakshmi, 2017).
Lack of motivation
Human resource management helps to motivate the employee towards their job by interacting with them, understanding their problems and many more techniques to improve their performance. It is observed that Wesfarmers has a good technique to improve the performance of the employee but it is still facing the problem of the minimum contribution of the employee towards the work and objectives. It can be said that the human resource department has to improve the technique of motivation to improve the employee performance (Miner, 2015).
Need of performance management system
The human resource of Wesfarmers evaluates the performance of an individual employee which helps to understand the challenges which are faced by the employees. Although human resource of the company has excellent technique to improve the performance of best performers still; company’s growth rate is slow which indicates the minimum contribution of employees towards the work. The company has to improve the technique to grow with the high-profit rate (Arnaboldi, Lapsley, & Steccolini, 2015).
Inappropriate Training and development session
It has been evaluated that the training and development session is provided by the company. HR manager organises the sessions for the new employees to explain them the rules and regulation of the company. It also organises the development sessions for the old employees year after year which improves the productivity of the company. But still, company faces the problem of the lower level of employee’s skill and capabilities which decreases the satisfaction level of the consumers. It can be said that the company has to improve this training and development session so that the employees understand the concepts of the company and help to expand the business in the new market. Till now the discussion is about the role and function of human resource management in reducing the challenges of the company. Now, in the next phase, the recommendation will be discussed that how human resource of Wesfarmers can reduce the problems.
SHRMP of working environment
Objective- To improve the working environment to influence the employee to stay for long period
Strategies- the Human resource of Wesfarmers has to offer more career opportunity so that they can stay for a long time (Schuler, & Jackson, 2008). Job enlargement and Job Rotations are some key strategies to enhance the interest level of the employees.
KPIs- Less employee turnover, increased average working time of an employee.
SHRMP of Motivation
Objective- To enhance the motivation level of the employees
Strategies- Human resources of Wesfarmers can provide the services such as discount in the supermarkets, accommodation facility to the labour. Labour is a major part of an organisation to increase its productivity. The company can provide better health and educational facilities for the families (Collings, Wood, & Szamosi, 2018).
KPIs- increased productivity, cost reduction and enhanced operational profit.
SHRMP of performance management
Objective- To improve the capacity and skills of the employees
Strategies- The Company can measure the performance of an employee by measuring the wastage of time and evaluating the time especially in packaging and distribution (DeNisi, & Smith, 2014). A regular audit of the operations will help in identifying the weak areas.
KPIs- Less number of defects in the operations and enhances quality of work delivered.
SHRMP of Training and development
Objective- To improve the training and development programs
Strategies- The Company can hire the skilled employees, and provide the training to the old employees in a year. The company can also provide the practical training with the help of artificial equipment’s. Wesfarmers can also arrange training session from training professionals from outside.
KPIs- enhanced productivity and growth rate of the employees (Dooren, Bouckaert, & Halligan, 2015).
Conclusion
From the above analysis, it has been concluded that the Wesfarmers has the largest market share in retail sector of Australia. But it faced the challenges such as high labour turnover, non-performers, employee inefficiency and others. Human resource management of the company plays a significant role to reduce the challenges. The functions of the company maintained the employee performance and motivate them towards the objective. It also used the techniques but still, it has been observed that the Wesfarmers still faces the challenges; thus it requires improving the employee performance. The company will grow with the high rate of profit by improving the training and development session, increasing bonuses and other facilities. It can be said that the company will grow with the high rate of profit in the online market in the near future.
References
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Anitha, J. (2014). Determinants of employee engagement and their impact on employee performance. International journal of productivity and performance management, 63(3), 308.
Arnaboldi, M., Lapsley, I., & Steccolini, I. (2015). Performance management in the public sector: The ultimate challenge. Financial Accountability & Management, 31(1), 1-22.
Bhatt, P., & Lakshmi, T. (2017). Decision Tree Approach for Capital Expenditure Decision-a Tool for Effective Strategic Human Resource Management. Ushus-Journal of Business Management, 10(1), 57-67.
Black, S. L., Washington, M. L., & Schmidt, G. B. (2016). How to stay current in social media to be competitive in recruitment and selection. In Social Media in Employee Selection and Recruitment. New York: Springer, 197-219.
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Karam, E. P., Gardner, W. L., Gullifor, D. P., Tribble, L. L., & Li, M. (2017). Authentic leadership and high-performance human resource practices: implications for work engagement. In Research in personnel and human resources management. UK: Emerald Publishing Limited, 103-153.
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Wesfarmers. (2018). Who we are. Retrieved from: https://www.wesfarmers.com.au/who-we-are/who-we-are
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