Banco Human Resources Management - Research Paper Example

Introduction: The human resource management is one of the most complex and challenging tasks in modern business management. It deals with people’s dimension in management. In these changing times, it has become evident that it is the human resource of an organization that can lead the organization on the path of success. It is the human resources that decide the make or break of the business enterprise. Human resources can be called as one of the most valuable and unique assets of an organization. Acquiring and retaining good human resources is an essential pre-condition for the success of every organization. Hence even though most organizations do not take it seriously, a carefully planned HR strategy is required for HR success. “It is amazing that this important part of HR is mostly ignored in HR in most organizations because those at the top do not know the value of HR planning.” (Vareta). Those organizations that can implement this can be called as effective and efficient. The employees and managers who are competent enough are very essential for the integration of each activity in order to attain the ultimate objective which will be ensuring the survival of the organization in the long run. According to Leon C Megginson, the term human resource refers to “the total knowledge, skills, creative abilities, talents and aptitudes of an organization’s workforce as well as the values, attitudes and beliefs of the individuals involved” (Introduction to human resource management, P. 4). Call centre operations have a dual function of handling of handset of a telephone and a computer system on a tabletop, they keep answering to telephone calls while entering or modifying the data in computer. But the main activity is answering telephone calls. “Therefore, they must do it well and cost-effectively if they are to remain viable.” (Out sourcing call centre 2009). Here this case study deals with Banco call centre. The company is a medium sized one with around 300branches. Here we analyse their functioning, the problems that they have faced, the employee related problems, managerial problems, problems regarding the workforce, their financial position etc…They faced some problems in relation with employee productivity, their approach towards the business etc. These aspects are covered here in this analysis. Introduction about the case: Banco is a medium sized retail bank with over 300 branches scattered across the nation. The call centre of the company was situated on a green field site and was to be a pilot site for tele-banking business of the bank. They decided to centralise some of their branch activities as they faced tough competition. Banco had set tough targets and standards for their employees illustrating the importance to quality customer service in the organization. For example, no more than 2% of routine calls should be abandoned and not more than 1% of key customer calls should be abandoned. Moreover, 90% of calls should be picked up at the initial point of contact within 15 seconds and the same percentage of problems should be solved at this. Another thing was the establishment of an 80 member team of advisors to handle key account holders. This eye for quality was what differentiated the company from its competitors and it helped to pursue aggressive sales approaches, economies of scale and providing of a wide range of services. The organizational structure: An organization consists of a group of individuals working together at different levels, different areas, with an aim to achieve the organizational goals and objectives. So the people who work together in an organization need a defined system or structure to integrate and direct their plans to achieve the desired organizational results. “The organizational structure defines the organizational units and the work flows to align the behaviour of the units to the higher-level goals of the system.” (Glossar 2009). This organization had 404 staff working, among them 220 were working inside the call centre. Majority of them were full-time, and they had a greater percentage of part timers too (35%). They have a trade union through which the managers communicate with the employees. The organization was following centralized structure for decision making. It gave emphasise on team working. Here in this case, the call centre is headed by a Centre Manager. He is the person who is responsible for taking decisions. He frames policies etc...Under him a Customer Service Manager works. Below him comes the team leader, where each team leader had to lead 15 members. These Team Leaders are responsible for motivating the team and their performance. In the organization the team members are designated as Customer Service Operators, where these CSO’s are given specific targets. Technology: Many call centres use a number of different technologies to help improving the performance and customer experience. The main technology at Banco call centre is that it is into telephonic banking, which is designed to give top quality service to its large customer base. The call centre integrates the computer and telephone technology, which is designed to provide fast and accurate services to its clients, and also to monitor, record, and measure the staff performance. Here the employees are given high service target, where 98% of their target is to do telephonic calls. If the employees are doing continuous telephone calls it may cause bad health. To reduce this, the organization can allocate job responsibilities, practise job rotation, conduct some recreational activities on weekends, etc Employees: Employees are the key assets of an organization. “It is commonly accepted that internal characteristics are transferred to the external environment via the employees of the organisation.” (Haris 2009, p.102-114). Hence, the quality aspiration of Banco will depend on how they perform. A call centre is a place where ample number of human resources work. These workers must be motivated to do their work smoothly. They can be motivated by giving better reward in monetary terms and non-monetary terms. Here in this case we could find a crucial problem with regard to employee turnover and increased absenteeism. They had 404 employees working with them. The managers could communicate with the employees through the trade union which is there in that organization. Here this organization is just considering its employees as mere money making machines. They are not rewarded properly. Also we could see high attrition and absenteeism. To reduce this situation, the organization can reduce the pressure given to them by assisting them with proper training and development programme, practicing good appraisal systems, weekly holidays, reducing overtime works by employing more number of staffs, improving the pay scales, giving perquisites, etc… Work roles: Employees are the inevitable part of every business organization. Their contribution to the growth of the organization cannot be ignored. The call centres have more human resources than the physical assets. The nature of the job in a call centre varies according to the job profile of the individuals. Here in Banco call centre they employ more than 400 people. The employees of the organization have quite a good service targets. The work done by the employees are assessed daily by checking the calls made by them and the operational activities that they have carried out each day. Another thing is that 98% of the total work hour of the employee must be on the phone. They have to work in shifts round the clock. More over the employees are asked to do overtime work. And they have to be fresh on the telephone all the time. Training of employees was done through coordination from personnel from training and development department of the bank. They were to develop a training plan for the new staff. Problems and challenges: In today’s competitive market, in order to withstand competition, organizational structure needs to be flexible. Call centres are increasingly popular in today’s society; it is there where many companies have centralized customer services and the support functions. The one important feature of the call centres is that they employ large number of people and the office working is seen round the clock where employees are asked to work in shifts. Making good money, good offices, and working for the US and UK companies can be called the main influencing factor that makes the call centres a major hit across the country. The employee faces many problems working with these call centres. Banco the retail bank with 300 branches nation wide faced a number of problems and challenges. They found that the profitability was getting reduced. The organization followed centralized structure for the decision making, which is the characteristic of every formal organization. Another problem that they faced was that majority of their customers were switching from them as they were getting better services from other service providers. Banco faced a number of problems and challenges within the organization. The organization did not have a proper communication channel to communicate with the employees. Even if they want to communicate with the employees they have to use the medium of the trade union. The main problems are in relation with IT, they were sometimes facing difficulty in dealing with inexperienced management team and as specified earlier, they had a centrally determined HR policies and procedures that paved the way for the irregular working of a call centre. Labour turnover was another problem. It was at a very high rate of 35%. They faced relatively high absenteeism. The employees were also not paid properly. Pay package was comparatively low while comparing with other call centres. HR roles and activities: Human resource manager is a person who could integrate the needs of the organization with the available resources in that organization. It has to be noted that in a dynamic work environment, the boundaries of a job cannot be clearly defined. A human resource manager must integrate all the managerial functions such as planning, organising, controlling, coordinating, staffing etc in the organization. He must act as a mentor, facilitator, counsellor, executive etc. for the employees and should be responsible for motivating, and inspiring the employees, which in turn increases employee morale towards the organization. He must be able to win the confidence of the employees. “But, in most the ultimate aim of the function is to: "ensure that at all times the business is correctly staffed by the right number of people with the skills relevant to the business needs", that is, neither overstaffed nor understaffed in total or in respect of any one discipline or work grade”. (Human Resource Management 2008). If the manager has appointed a wrong candidate for a position with high job responsibility, all the functioning will be in disorder. Employee resourcing: “Effective recruitment and selection, improving employee performance and reducing staff turnover are fundamental to success in modern work organizations.” (Employee resourcing course guide 2009) In the call centre the employees must be selected based on the qualification and experience. In order to know about that, the candidates should be put through various assessment steps to test their abilities in sales, customer service or any other requirements to meet the demand. Here in Banco, they follow two types of recruitment, the external recruitment was initially handled through the two channels, the Central HR function for permanent staff, while agencies were being used on a pilot basis for temporary staff. However, the focus in recruitment and selection had been on identifying good communicators with good personality and attitude but once employed and trained, they were ‘re-programmed’ and instilled with a sense of conformity. They can even think of recruiting candidates through references, etc…If they are able to recruit and place right candidate for the positions, they could reduce the cost that is incurred on training etc… Learning and Development: “Learning and development involves the continual improvement of competencies in the organisation.” (Definitions: learning and development ) The employee sourcing department must try to update the data constantly to make sure that they have the right candidates available. After an employee is placed in the organization, the employer must track the performance of the employee. If the employer feels that the employees are not performing up to the desired standard they must be provided with training. Here in Banco call centre, the team leaders are made responsible to give training for the Customer Service Operators as and when necessary. Reward Management: The reward management can be defined as “Employees may see compensation as a return in exchange between their employer and themselves, as an entitlement for being an employee of the company, or as a reward for a job well done.” (Reward management 2007) Rewards are one of the most important motivating factors for the employees. The rewards can be monetary and non-monetary. Here in the case of Banco call centre, they were considering the employees as mere money making machines rather than considering them as human resources. Rates of pay were relatively low. However, there was no clear professional growth for the staff at the call centre, and one can see that the immediate earnings were more likely to attract and retain the staff just for short run. The employees were asked to work round the clock and they did not get any benefits for that. In addition to this, the contractual working hours were considered inappropriate to meet the requirements. Rewards are necessary to motivate the employees; it increases commitment, it develops team working etc… Employee Relations: The employee relations can be defined as “employee relations involve the body of work concerned with maintaining employer- employee relationships that contribute to satisfactory productivity, motivation, and morale. Essentially, employee relations are concerned with preventing and resolving problems involving individuals which arise out of or affect work situations.” (Employee relations 2009). Here, Banco has not given that much importance for employee relations. The HR manager must emphasize on this to increase employees’ commitment. He must ensure that the organization is free from the conflicts, employee disputes etc…It can be noted “that key to competent employee relations is in effective communications. For the mutual benefit of the employers and the employee, dialogue rather than passing orders down the line will be the way companies will operate.” (Communication is key to employee relations 2006) The human resource manager must handle all the grievances that the employees are having. The human resource manager must try to make the work environment free from stress and strain that decreases the productivity of the employees. The employees must be given weekend holidays; they could arrange picnic, etc…for the employees. “Information is also provided to employees to assist them in correcting poor performance, on or off duty misconduct, and/or to address personal issues that affect them in the workplace. Employees are advised about applicable regulations, legislation, and bargaining agreements. Employees are also advised about their grievance and appeal rights and discrimination and whistleblower protections.” (Employee relations 2009). Conclusion and recommendations: In simple terms the call centres can be called as a place which integrates the use of computers and the telephone. The name of the call centres came into the list of employment only before 10-15 years. It is the young generation that goes behind these call centres as they are offered high pay, etc. The job at the call centre could sometimes be called as a stressful one, where the employees have to work day and night. The people working in call centres are at present showing a very high rate of attrition (30-35%). In order to reduce this, the human resource manager must adopt some strategies. Firstly, since these call centres are showing high attrition and absenteeism the first task of the human resource manager is that he could track absenteeism. The HR manager can conduct exit interview while the employees are quitting from the job so that they could know the reason for the turnover. Another problem that the employees face is with regard to reward system. Monetary rewards are the most motivating factor for any employee. For that the employees must be provided with adequate pay, allowances, perquisites etc. The HR manager can appoint right candidates who are experienced in the managerial position so that problems related with lack of experience can be avoided. They could develop a flat structure of organization so that they could bring out effective coordination among the employees; increase the communication among the employees as well as between employees and employer. Moreover, the employees must be trained properly so that they can contribute the maximum. Bibliography Communication is Key to Employee Relations: Our Bureau. (2006). [online]. Business Line. Last accessed 31 March 2009 at: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2006/12/22/stories/2006122200670700.htm Definitions: Learning and Development. [online]. APM. 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