Training Strategies for Al-Futtaim Retail Company - Research Paper Example

Training Strategies for Al-Futtaim Retail Company Introduction Al-Futtaim is a progressive regional business house in United Arabs Emirates (UAE), headquartered in Dubai. It is structured into six departments about the commodities that they produce and handle. These divisions are; financial service, electronics, automobiles, engineering, real estate and retail. As a human resource personnel in the retail department of this company, my task is to create a new employee-customer service training class for all new employees to this department. The organization focuses on a decentralized approach, giving individual business suppleness and adaptability to uphold competitiveness in the market. It employs more employees some of whom do not understand how maintain competition in the market. In relation of remaining relevant and competitive, our retail department in this company trains its employees in order to conform to this requirement. This approach benefits our employees by providing a clearly defined working culture in which employees have the necessary job satisfaction that enhances their productivity. The main concern of this training is to find out ways in which Al-Futtaim will expand into global retail through improved customers and employees relation. This will depend on the strategies and policies applied to the employees in relation to customer satisfaction. The policies and strategies will influence the employees. In relation to internationalization, a challenge on maintaining integrity, service and social responsibility is bound to arise Hipsher (2006). Description of problem The nature of the training will be descriptive. The description will focus on explaining the key issues of how and when to strategize the policies of the training. The information presented in the training will be on the strategies and policies availed from the existing and potential customers of this retail company. The information will assist in developing a roadmap to global retail expansion with special consideration on the strategies that the employees will be equipped. Justification of Needs Assessment for Al-Futtaim Retail Company The needs assessment for Al-Futtaim Retail Company gives the facilitators an opportunity to prepare adequate content to deliver to their expected audience. Inadequate number of employees is considered as a prerequisite to the training. The existence of web content with information containing this training may be reproduced for this training. The achievement of an organization depends on a number of factors such as the internal organization and coordination between the management and their sub-ordinate staff. Needs assessment helps an organization to discover any deficiencies that hinders it from achieving its goals and objectives. The aim of the assessments of needs is to determine the future and present training needs of the organization. Further, needs assessment can be used to diagnose the people-related issues of inter organizational groups, countries, communities and even international efforts Gupta (2007). It is used to point out the customer services and communication within an organization. In order to assist Al-Futtaim Retail Company to meet its objective of expanding into global retail based on effective strategies and policies formulated, it is important to equip the employees of this company with relevant skills, values and attributes that will guide this company in attaining its goal. Therefore, for employees to meet this requirement there is the need to equip them with this skill and this is attained through training. In addition, the Al-Futtaim customer service department is challenged with the inadequate number of employees to handle customer calls. Most customer service employees are not acquainted with the kind of products and services that this company produces and handles. Training employees, such new employees, will enable them to learn of the product and services that this company is handling and producing. Therefore, this training should be designed in a proper way that will not disrupt the organization’s activities but by meeting the customer services at a flexible time rate. Similarly, training of new employees of this company is justified in order to expose existing deficiencies that contribute to the company’s failure to meet its goals and objectives. Therefore, the new employee-customer service training should enable the customer service demands and requirements be fully met. In addition, the new employees of this department should be made aware to sensitize the customers on the available information to solve their problems without necessarily calling the customer service. It is only through training that the new employees of this company will be empowered with such authority, power and responsibility. Number of participants and the Audience The training is specifically meant for the new employees on customer service. The main aim is to enable the new employees in this department to acquire new skills concerning production, marketing and customer satisfaction relationship at the Al-Futtaim. In addition, managers of this company will be invited together with the sales representatives to ascertain what the training is all about in an organization. Here, all materials regarding the training session will be identified and distributed to the expected audience (prerequisites). This will provide the participants of this training with relevant information. However, the challenge of having workers who are no willing to take part in this study may form another basis of this study. Similarly, the unwillingness of the workers to take part in this training should be discussed. Therefore, motivation strategies need to be employed to enhance this process. Duration of Training The training will be in two sessions. The two sessions will be assigned for two hours each. The first session will be useful in the induction of new employees to the customer service who depend on the managers of the department. The facilitators of this session will use this opportunity to identify the expectations of the participants who are mainly the new employees. It is during this session or time when the rules and regulations to guide this training session will be formulated through the discussion with the participants of this training session. The second session will be useful in making the employee relevant with the organizations products. It will mark the actual stage where the facilitators will deliver the right content to the trainees to enhance their customer service interaction skills. Arrangement of training facilities and the location of training The location of training should be in the boardroom to allow the participants fully to pay attention to the training session. The boardroom can accommodate more employees that are new. In addition, it is well equipped with computers that will allow the participants fully to access the information on the internet resource. Similarly, this facility or boardroom should be arranged in a manner that allows a round table discussion. This will enhance the instructor interaction with all the participants. Preliminary Lesson Plan The preliminary lesson plan should give an overview of what the customer service department will undergo training to meet the expected standards. The preliminary plan of the lesson will be structured as it follows: Lesson 1: Overview and Introduction The major topic of discussion here is to allow the facilitators introduce themselves and provide background on their customer service experience. The customer service employees will introduce themselves and state at least the expectations they endeavor to achieve out of the training session. The facilitator will then provide the overview of the training including the training outcomes, agenda and the linkages in the lesson. In addition, issues related to customer service are addressed adequately at this session. Similarly, the facilitator will identify the resource materials to be used and make sure those, which were not availed to the participants early, are distributed to them. The participants and the facilitators then agree on regulations and rules that will guide the whole training session and contribute to the already set ground rules. Method of instruction during training The method of instruction due to the large number of new employees is: Lecture method; In relation to this, the lead facilitator of the training welcomes new employees who are the participants to the training and reviews the objectives of the customer service. The new employees are led to introduce themselves. The facilitators assess the roles of the participants and the challenges they are likely to face in the retail department and make a request to the new employees to state what they expect at the end of the training. Considering the diverse audience that was expected to attend this training, the facilitator of the Al-Futtaim Retail Company training team will confirm the presence of all the expected audience. The facilitator will then discuss with his or her audience (new employees) the importance of customers. Training Session Schedule Activity Allotted Time (a) Occurrence 1: Introduction and 20 Minutes Overview of training Occurrence 2: training outcomes and 10 Minutes Setting of training rules (b) Occurrence 1: customer service 5 Minutes Expectations and Learning Occurrence 2: addressing of expectation 15 Minutes And outcomes Occurrence 3: course overview and Introduction (c) Occurrence: Discussion on Customer service 50 Minutes Asking questions and Clarification Adjournment Justification for use of Lecture method Lecture method is an effective way of instruction in any learning situation. The use of this method is because the participants of the training session are many and, therefore, in order to address such a huge session, this method proves to be effective. Similarly, this method is effective as it allows the facilitator or the presenter to highlight out key issues in the presentation and then give time to the participants to ask questions at the end of the session. This enables such facilitators to gather enough gist of the content they would like to share with the participants. In order to motivate the employees who will attend a training session, it is important to provide certification for all the new employees who will have finished the training session. You have to ensure that you inform then in advance of this so that they are motivated and can ascertain that they underwent the training session on customer satisfaction. In addition, you can offer some of the retail products to these employees in order to attract motivate and retain them for excellent service delivery Kusluvan (2003). In order to obtain the feedback from the trained employees, I designed the survey questions that helped me to ascertain the customer service satisfaction about the training of the new employees. This is available in the appendix. Works Cited Gupta, K., Sleezer, C., & Russ-Eft, D. F. (2007). A practical guide to needs assessment. San Francisco, CA: Pfeiffer. Hipsher, S. (2006). Regional Internationalization Strategies of Firms Originating from the Greater Mekong Sub-region: An Exploratory Case Study. ProQuest. Kusluvan, S. (2003). Managing employee attitudes and behaviors in the tourism and hospitality industry. New York: Nova Science Publishers. Appendix Survey Questions 1. How many times do “you” visit Al-Futtaim? - Daily - Weekly - Monthly 2. Do "you" like store design of Al-Futtaim? - Yes - No 3. How do “you” find the atmosphere at the reception of the Retail Company? - Convenient - Acceptable - Crowded 4. Do “you” feel the display items have a high quality? - Yes - No 5. How do “you” find customer service in the stores? - Excellent - Good - Bad 6. Does Al-Futtaim provide products that are suitable for "your" lifestyle? - Yes - No 7. Have “you” visited Al-Futtaim’s website? - Yes - No 8. Did the website display all the products from the store? - Yes - No 9. Could "you" find the Al-Futtaim shops easily? - Yes - No 10. Do the item description labels and prices help "you" to make decisions? - Yes - No Read More