Retention and Motivation Plan for Utilitiscan Company - Assignment Example

? Retention and motivation plan for Utilitiscan company Retention and motivation plan for Utilitiscan company Result of the previous survey The recently conducted survey revealed several glaring issues among the workforce. The survey revealed that 89% of the employees felt there were few if any opportunities to improve their skills, 87% responded there were no promotion opportunities and 74% felt there was little relationship between their performance and their pay. There was also a question about the performance review that it has not been done in a long time or had not been done at all and that there are favoritism among some employees. Issues raised by the survey The fact that the person who conducted the survey, Paul had previously worked as Director of HR for Utiliscan and later moved to Plasted as HR Director, is very revealing that there is an issue of lack of professional advancement in the company. Interpreting the issues that were raised by the survey, a close examination would reveal that they were in fact interrelated as employees perceive that the lack of performance reviews to be the root of other issues that include lack of opportunities to improve their skills and therefore, no opportunity to be promoted. Moreso, the employees also thought that since there is no performance review, it will not matter how they perform because they will be receiving the same pay regardless of how they do their job. This caused the employees to feel despondent because they see their jobs as career dead ends without any prospect of getting better nor advancing in the career ladder nor an increase their pay. Such that it will not be surprising that employees will leave the company at the first sign of opportunity as attested by its former HR Director and the very person who conducted the survey. Implication of the issues of the survey Employees are undermotivated and this causes not only low productivity but also high attrition rate. Both are inimical to the company because low productivity will not only undermine the company’s competitiveness but also fails to optimize the capability of its workforce. High attrition rate is also costly to the company in many ways. First, it costs money to recruit and train the new employees. Second, there is also an opportunity cost associated to it and also when waiting for the new employee learn the job. And lastly and worst, the skill of the previous employee which has been acquired from the company is transferred to its competitors with minimal cost to the competitor such as the case of Paul, the former HR Director. If the current exodus of employees to competitors will not stop, Utiliscan will inevitably lose its valuable knowledge base to its competitors through its lost employees and that could mean losing the business in the long run. Solution The solution to the root of the problem is the implementation of performance management and making the job interesting so that employees will be more motivated to work. Performance management is the procedure or method used in evaluating the performance of a certain employee for a given period of what the employee has done or how productive he or she is. It is also the process of obtaining relevant information about an employee and determining its worth to the organization by analyzing the given information. The analysis of an employee’s performance involves its recent accomplishment in the organization, its deficiency, strengths and weakness to determine whether the employee is suited for promotion or needs to be retrained. It also serves as a feedback mechanism to immediately solicit information from the employees about their jobs so that management can quickly respond to them. Included in performance management is career-pathing where employees can see where their careers will be going if they are going to do well with respective jobs. Performance management can also address the issue that 87% of the employees think that there were no promotion opportunities. Performance appraisal, a tool of performance management, can provide the mechanism for reward or remuneration for good job performance and thereby addressing the issue that 74% felt there was little relationship between their performance and pay. Motivation is a critical factor in a workforce. A motivated workforce yields optimal productivity and avoids attrition rate. In the survey, while pay was mentioned as not commensurate to work, it was the lack of interesting that demotivates the employees more. Pay is not only enough to motivate employees to work. Pay, perks, bonus or other monetary incentives can only do so much to motivate people to work. According to Herzberg, what it does however is just to stimulate people to endure the grind of work and will only likely to perform until they get the next pay raise. For Herzberg, what really makes people tick are “intrinsic rewards such as interesting, challenging work and the opportunity to achieve and grow into greater responsibility” (2003 pg. 49). In an organizational setting, this can be done through “job enrichment” whereby employees are provided with responsibilities where they have the opportunity to psychologically grow and have the fulfillment that they did a terrific job with an interesting work. This could answer the glaring issues in the survey that reveals that almost all employees (89%) felt that there were few opportunities to improve their skills. This concept of Herzberg about motivation is not only an academic musing. This has been tried and proven in an actual organization. This can be seen at work at Semco, a Brazilian company where employees are rotated among the various functions of the organization for diversity, increased functionality of employees and higher productivity due to higher learning curves resulting to a 600% increased in productivity (Semler 1993). Employees are empowered to make decisions with their work that employee job satisfaction with Semco is rated as one of the highest in Brazil with a long waiting list of prospective applicants who wants to join Semco (Semler 1993). This is important to note because one of the problems of the company is attrition and low motivation, where people are leaving the company which would cost the company in terms of opportunity lost, training the new hires and waiting for the learning curve to pick up. With the implementation of job enrichment programs that makes work more interesting, productivity could shot up such as the case in Semco where prospective applicants are lining up to join Semco because it is perceived as one of the top companies to work for in Brazil. It could also happen to Utiliscan. Conclusion The plan discussed in this paper does not only intend to impelment performance management to institute performance appraisal and career pathing but also to motivate employees so that they will perform more. Given the high rate of discontent in the company, one could only surmise the lost potential of its employees. It is also the intention of the plan to motivate employees to prevent the escalation of attrition rate that undermines the company’s competitiveness not to mention that it costs the company in terms of training, learning curve and opportunity cost. It is anticipated that with the implementation of performance management with its concomitant tool of performance appraisal and career pathing, along with job enrichment programs such as job rotation, retraining, work will become more interesting and employees will no longer see their jobs as career dead ends and boring. Ultimately, it is the goal of the HR Department of Utilitiscan for its employees to have job satisfaction that they will not only stay with the company but will also find their work fulfilling and enriching. References Herzberg, Frederick I. (1987). 'One more time: How do you motivate employees?  Harvard Business Review, (65):30, 48-61. Semler, Ricardo (1993). Maverick!: The Success Story Behind the World's Most Unusual Workplace. Warner Books Read More