Different Approaches of Strategic Human Resource Management Policies - Assignment Example

Strategic Human Resource Management Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Introduction 3 Task 1 3 Different approaches of strategic HRM policies 3 Resource based strategic HRM approach: 3 Strategic fit approach of strategic HRM process 4 High performance administration strategies 4 Task 2 6 Relation of strategic HRM with operational structure of fashion and apparel industry of UK: 6 Task 3 8 Next Plc background and operational structure 8 Task 4 10 Requirements of the strategic HRM policies in Next Plc operations: 10 Conclusion and recommendation 13 Reference list 14 Introduction Organisations are facing the intense challenge of globalised environment. Globalisation increases the compatibility and conflicts among the organisational operational activity. Organisational operations are maintained by the human resource is one of the most important resources that organisations require to maintain their operations. In the global world, organisations are seeking to improve the ability and skills of employees in terms of increasing the operational efficiency (Analoui, 2007). Efficiency of employees determines quality of products and service of any organisation. Strategic HRM aids organisations in making proper set of human resources that will help them to meet the requirement of the clients spontaneously. In the current study, the researcher has selected Next Plc in terms of describing strategic HRM policies. Next Plc is one of the UK based multinational fashion retailer firm. Next Plc is having more than 55000 employees during the year 2014 in their global operations (Nextplc.co.uk, 2015). Task 1 Different approaches of strategic HRM policies Resource based strategic HRM approach: In globalised competitive world, businesses are adopting resource based human resource policy. This strategy will increase the capability of the employees to operate as per the available resources. Organisations should maintain proper balance between the resources available with them and opportunities underlined in the market. In case of service industry human resources is a very important factor. Resource based strategic HR approach will aid management in increasing growth rate and sustainability. Strategic HR methods are increasing the potentials of resources or employees of any firm. Development of resources helps organisations in becoming more productive. Moreover, managers are required to maintain sound organisational success. Employees are empowered to think creatively and input certain new dimension in the planning process (Alagaraja, 2013). Strategic fit approach of strategic HRM process In the contemporary market, HR strategies are seeking for an effective development of strategies as per the capability of employees. Business strategies are changing their dimension of strategies into perpendicular fit options. Mainly management is imposing different integration strategies for business resources and employees capabilities. Organisational planning method will develop and utilise employees’ capabilities properly (Armstrong and Armstrong, 2000). Straight down integration of the operational strategies among the employees will increase understanding among employees. Business polices are interlinked with the HR strategies in terms of providing proper guidance to the employees. However, organisations are required to link strategies with preceding ones. Horizontal integration will increase more support for the employees regarding the operational support (Armstrong and Armstrong, 2011). High performance administration strategies Globalised form of businesses is adopting the performance management system to increase more efficiency among employees. Mainly this type of policy was introduced in the United States to fetch high performance from the employees. Operational management systems are employing strategic HR practices to get high or increased performance (Bratton and Gold, 2000). Human resource managers are concerned about the development of organisational and employee’s productivity. Production and service providing companies are required to maintain quality. Skills and knowledge of the employees will increase compatibility of the organisation. Customer service attributes will gradually increase with the help of effective human resource management. Globalised organisations must be competitive enough to increase growth of the market share and consumer satisfaction. Profits can be increased along with shareholder value increment (Bratton and Gold, 2000). High performance system of the retail firms is adopting different policies of strategic human resource policies. HR managers are showing care and empathy for the employees. Strategic HR policy is adopting modern techniques for recruitment people. Organisations are selecting candidates on the basis of their skills and abilities. Training people is another crucial strategic fit for the organisation. Information is disseminated among the peoples in a more lucid manner. Individual employees are empowered to provide the feedback to the organisational HR management in terms of developing the working conditions. Job design is clarified among the employees in terms of expressing the roles and responsibilities. Employees are allowed to participate in the strategic development process along with that brainstorming process is used. Managers are required to evaluate the attitude of the employees (Chadwick, 2005). Strategic human resource management includes certain set of performance appraisals process for employees to motivate them. Employee’s performance appraisal will increase potential skills and abilities of employees. In addition, complaint management procedures will increase the feeling of value among the employees. Promotions are the part of appraisal management system. On the contrary, compensation needs to be having proper financial beneficiary for the employees in terms of their service. High performance strategies will increase the ability of the workforce management (Chen, 2009). High dedication management is another policy of the contemporary human resource policies. Therefore, organisations are using proper policy in increasing the loyalty among the employees. Loyal and satisfied employees will be working more efficiently. Overall development of appraisal policy will help the organisation in addressing employee requirements and perception very well (Collings and Mellahi, 2009). Task 2 Relation of strategic HRM with operational structure of fashion and apparel industry of UK: Strategic HRM is providing the organisations with a developed strategic direction that will help them in getting more compatibility and sustainability. Strategic HRM will aid the management will aid organisations like Next plc, Marks and Spenser’s and Debenhams to achieve predetermined goals in the UK or the global fashion market. Strategic HRM emphasises that human resource in the fashion and retail industry will be aiding fashion and apparel organisations in terms of sustainability (Collings and Mellahi, 2009). Figure 1: Process of strategic human resource management (Source: Kaufman, 2001, p.517) Business operations are facing certain risk regarding offering proper quality. Strategic HRM is the process that emerged from modification of human resource management policies. Operational functions of fashion and apparel organisations employees can be managed as per the mission and vision statement of the fashion market organisation. Major goals and objectives of fashion and apparel organisations are retaining their position of leading position in the UK fashion market. Continuous development of the product quality will be depending on the performance of the employees. Organisational structure of Next Plc is promoting proper policy regarding appraising employees. In addition, flexibility of the employment structure will increase the rate of innovative ideas (Dessler, 2000). Strategic HRM policy in the global world is increasing the demands and feasibility. Mainly organisations are using it to increase the competitive advantages. Simultaneously, Next Plc will be using strategic HR policies in meeting the challenge of competitors. Human resource of the organisation will meet more goals as the skills and efficiency is appraised more frequently. Objectives of any organisation can be achieved with synchronised plans along with proper interlinking of employees (Gilmore and Williams, 2009). Managing of human resource in the global firms is one of the major strategic fit. HR managers are imposing targets and benchmarks for the performance of employees. Employee and candidate selection process is getting more emphasised based on skills and ability to meet industrial standards. Strategic HRM policy will include training seasons for the employees along with the assessment of development. Appraisals are designed on the basis of achievement of each individual employee as per organisational objectives. Strategic HRM policy in the fashion market will be increasing development policies that will disseminate career opportunities. Ladders will emphasise their skills of training and guiding lower level employees. Apart from that commitment is required from employees. Employee’s characteristics must be moulded as per the organisational goals and objectives (Kaufman, 2001). Task 3 Next Plc background and operational structure Next Plc is one of the major UK based multinational fashion and clothing retailers. The company operates in various area of the world. They are listed in the London Stock Exchange and FTSE 100 index. Therefore, Next Plc is having huge set of internal and external stakeholders. Next Plc functions with the help of a sound retail chain system. The organisation started their operations during the year 1982 with the help of the UK based store. They offer a variety of collection which are fashionable and trendy. Moreover, they started offering of footwear and accessories targeting women customers gradually after the success of garment products line (Nextplc.co.uk, 2015). Next is encouraging internal skilled design team in terms of offering high quality clothes. They are developing more stylist and comfortable clothes in competitive pricing. This will increase the competitive edge of Next Plc in the UK based fashion industry. Next Plc is operating through different set ups. The trading chain is distributed among 500 stores that are serving the customers of the UK and Ireland. In addition, Next Plc is offering their products in the global segment with the help of more than 200 stores that are spread over near about 45 countries all around the world. Fashion garments and accessories is one of the most emerging industries in the UK. Next Plc is having huge employee base of more than 55000 to prepare clothes. Next Plc need to manage the employees as per their skills and efficiency (Nextplc.co.uk, 2015). Next Plc is facing the challenge from Marks and Spenser’s, and Debenhams in the UK and global based fashion clothing industry (Nextplc.co.uk, 2015). Next Plc is employing innovative strategies to meet the objectives of sustainable development of market share. Employees and management needs to be careful in maintaining operational strategies. Financial objectives are one of most important one for NEXT group. Strategic direction will be aiming to achieve feasible returns of the investments made by the shareholders. Moreover, Next Plc is seeking for development of earnings per share. Dividends must be paid out in more proper manner so that stakeholders are justified more feasibly. Next Plc is adopting continuous process for achieving each objective. Production of different fashion wear ranges are developing in terms of achieving more success. Next Plc is aiming to evaluate their sales figure for performance indicators in the UK and global segment (Nextplc.co.uk, 2015). Fashion retail industry is facing huge competition. Therefore, pricing is one of the most crucial strategic attribute that Next Plc must consider before developing the plans. Market analysts or marketing level experts are recruited and trained as per the skill requisites (Alagaraja, 2013). Next Plc is aiming to promote store based appraisals for the employees to increase store based performance. Financial objectives of earning of Next Plc are making certain criteria that are correlated with the investment. Profitability of the firm is regulating input of money investment and return achieved on capital employed. Next Plc’s revenue generation is vastly depending on directory based customers. On the other hand, spending of the clients are depending on the service or the customer expectation meeting ability of the Next Plc employees (Nextplc.co.uk, 2015). Task 4 Requirements of the strategic HRM policies in Next Plc operations: Next Plc is having wide spread operational practises. They are collecting orders of customers from Next Plc Directory products. Next Plc is maintaining catalogue of retailing fashion products. Along with that, Next Plc is offering seasonal variety of the clothes. Segmentation of fashion statements are distributed in spring, summer, autumn and Manson collection. During the year 2014, Next Plc is developing collections for different segment of the customers. Tailoring products for men, women, and children employees needs to be skilful and they have the ability to use latest technologies or tailoring and stitching (Kaufman, 2001). On the contrary, technology changes impacted process of transaction or commerce. Next Plc is also using online shopping process. Online commerce option of the Next Plc started from the year 1999. Employees must be comfortable with the online shopping websites. Internet is one of the most important mediums of promotion and customer orientation. Next Plc is aiming to increase domestic fashion shopping actions in the UK (Alagaraja, 2013). Next Plc is also operating globally therefore serving global customers in almost 75 countries in the global segment. Employees must have the skills for linguistic exchange, cross cultural exchange and tailoring requirements. Next Plc is concentrating to penetrate in different areas of Asia and Africa. China, Hong Kong, and India are one of major south East Asian economically developing countries (Kramar, 2013). UK is famous for the fashion appraisals in addition, Next Plc is famous for innovative and stylists design. Proper HRM process will be developing the sourcing of raw materials as well as implementing marketing policy and quality control of fashion garments products. Therefore, strategic HRM will aid Next Plc in terms of increasing the feasibility of recruitment of new people, training them for organisational fit and developing skills and knowledge of employees. Proper period and resource are provided to new employees to increase the ability of them. Engagement of employees will increase motivational factors (Kramar, 2013). Next Plc is increasing value addition for the employees. Rewards and appraisals are putting higher impact on career development process. Next Plc are employing loyalty process to retain skilled and experienced employees (Armstrong and Armstrong, 2011). Quality management of garment products can be maintained with the help of experienced employees along with that on store and post sales service for customers will increase gradually. Progress of employee’s career in Next Plc is more effective as they implemented strategic HRM policy (Mahoney, 2000). Training and development policy of the Next Plc are modified with the help of the strategic HRM policy. Management of the organisation is delegating job roles as per the skills set and knowledge of the employees. In addition, training process is modified as per changing technical consideration. Operational policy of Next Plc changed as the process of tailoring of garments and machines are developed (Armstrong and Armstrong, 2011). Employee’s skills are increased with contemporary training policies. On job and off job class room trainings are provided to the new and existing employees. Training policy has been designed as per individual requirement. Business requirements are other important factors that are designing training schedules. Next Plc training process is also concentrating on the occupational health and safety in the operations. Employees are also trained to provide first aid treatment for the injured co-employees (Martin, 2009). Next Plc is prompting proper coordination policy among employees. Effective feedback management system of the Next Plc is helping the management in collecting various requirements of the exiting employees or newly recruited employees (Kramar, 2013). Organisational structure of Next Plc is empowering sound communication strategy that ensures discussion of problems faced in the workplace. Managers are involved in making feasible decisions by contrasting organisational condition and employees requirements. Listening to the employees is helping Next Plc in developing business success potentials. Next Plc is empowering various business strategies by disseminating the information among employees (Mathis and Jackson, 2003). Next Plc have started a unique policy that recruits employee representatives. Mainly it is a modified term of trade union. A non political employee representative can express the requirements of colleagues without any biasness (Minbaeva, 2013). Moreover, employee forums are created by Next Plc that constituted with one representative for every 50 employees working for Next plc. Representatives are elected by the employees only and they are having the power to attend conference along with senior management and Board Directors. They are able to express the requirements twice in each year (Mello, 2002). Two way communications is used by Next Plc for making the sound consultation of the employee’s requirements. Discussion of the key operational issues will increase the potential outcomes of Next plc. Working environment of Next Plc gradually increases with the help of strategic HRM policy. Strategic human resource policies of Next Plc are increasing the empowerment of employee’s stakes (Mondy et al.2005). Conclusion and recommendation From the above study it is observed that Next Plc is able to encourage employees to achieve successful business outcomes. Working environment of Next Plc is attracting potential candidates with better career opportunities. Employees are valued and loyalty of experienced and skilled employees is used as an asset for Next plc. Working environment of Next Plc is developed well as per the employees requirements and complete prospective. Professional and personal development in Next Plc is outlined in the strategic HR policy. Certain recommendation can be provided to Next Plc for developing HR policy Next Plc must support new employees and innovative ideas of experienced employees. Next Plc must show certain respect for loyal employees. 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