Concerns Over Private Care Firms by Mark Daly - Case Study Example

Case analysis: HRM in the media: “Concerns over private care firms” by Mark Daly BBC Scotland investigations correspondent Analysis Introduction The human resource management practice is concerned with all aspects of employment and management of people in an organization (Pavlov and Bourne, 2011; Weightman, 2008). HRM is defined as a strategic, integrated and coherent approach to employment, development and well being of employees of a firm (Pate and Scullion, 2010). HRM ensures that a firm gains competitive advantage via its human resources. It refers to practices, policies and systems that influence the behaviour, attitudes and performance of employees (Soderquist, Papalexandris, Ioannou, and Prastacos, 2010). It aims to increase effectiveness and capability of a firm to attain its goals by making the best use of the available resources. HRM systems act as the source of the capabilities of a firm that enable it to learn and capitalize on new opportunities (Kreitner, 2006). HRM also plays an ethical role by being concerned with the rights and needs of people in organizations via the exercise of social responsibility. HRM is divided into hard and soft versions. The hard version emphasizes that people are vital resources via which firms attain competitive advantage. It requires that these resources be acquired, developed and deployed in ways that can benefit the firm (Armstrong, Brown and Reilly, 2011). It lays focus on the quantitative, calculative and business strategic aspects of managing people in a rational way similar to other economic factor. The soft version is devoted to human interests and it views people as responsible and progressive beings. Pavlov and Bourne (2011) state that it must treat employees as valued assets, a source of competitive advantage through their commitment, adaptability and high quality. Thus employees are seen as means instead of objects. The soft approach to HRM emphasizes the need of gaining commitment of employees via involvement, leadership, communication and other ways of developing a high commitment and high trust firm (Reiss, 2004). The two firms in the case study seem to employ hard version of HRM. The two firms seem to visualize employees as organization expenses which ought to be as minimum as possible to increase profitability. The shortages of employees reported in the article imply that the firms lay focus on the quantitative, calculative and business strategic aspects of managing people in a rational way similar to other economic factor. This is done at the expense of clients who receive inadequate attention due to shortages. This can be said to be an indication of poor HRM systems at the two firms mentioned in the case. In this analysis we use the Harvard model to analyze HRM in the two firms mentioned in the case. The Harvard model This model acts as a strategic map to guide managers in their relations with employees and concentrates on the human or soft aspect of HRM. It was proposed by Beer in 1984. It lays emphasis on employee commitment and not control. It is also based on the premise that employees ought to be congruent, competent and cost effective (Aggarwal and Bhargava, 2009). The Harvard model has several sections which are interrelated. They include situational factors, stakeholder’s interests, HRM policy choices, HRM outcomes and long term consequences. Situational factors These factors influence the HR strategy chosen by the management. This model incorporates characteristics of workforce, the philosophy of the management, regulations in the labour markets, societal values and patterns of unionization and suggests a meshing of both socio-cultural logics and product market. The employment relationship entails a blending of business and societal expectations. Contrary to this the two firms in the case, Domiciliary Care and HRM Homecare, seems to be interested in business expectation and even violates the rights of the patients. From the case it is cited that some ex-workers accused the firms for putting profits before people’s welfare. Even though the two firms deny the allegation one of the former workers of HRM homecare, Carol Walkinshaw, says that the firm charged the council for the work whether or not it was carried out. Thus the firm went against the expectation of the society. The two firms do not seem to blend their business decisions with the expectation of the society. The society expects them to deliver the promised services to their customers. Instead of providing services for half an hour they ended up only providing it for just ten minutes. The society expects that the firms be well staffed to serve the needs of its clients. However, from the case, the two firms seem to be understaffed and hence service provision is wanting. Stakeholder interests Stakeholders under the Harvard model include shareholders, management, employee groups, government and community unions. Under this model stakeholder interest recognize the need for trade off which can either be explicitly or implicitly between the owners’ interests and the interests of employees and their organizations and the unions. One of the expectations of employees is to be engaged in the running of the firm (Soderquist et al. 2010). This involves motivation of employees. According to Pate and Scullion (2010), different employees are motivated differently within an organization. The way executive leaders of the firm are motivated is not the same way a firm will motivate its frontline workers (Reiss, 2000). Thus, there is a variation in how employees are engaged within a firm. This helps in increasing the level of enthusiasm, confidence, motivation and satisfaction of employees and the contribution of the employees in terms of their skills and talent to the attainment of business goals and objectives. Firms engage employees at different levels differently in order to help in retaining their talented workforce. This is because some of the highly talented core employees of the firm are crucial to future survival of the firm. From the case the firms are interested in profitability but not the welfare of their employees. The firm’s inability to hire enough staff implies that the employees are not valued by the firms but rather are seen as expenses to the business. The frontline employees are forced to cram many clients in a short time as possible irrespective of how long they have been allocated since they are understaffed (Pate and Scullion, 2010). The HRM staff is also involved directly in this malpractice of cramming clients even though they know it is not right. This evidenced from the documents obtained by the BBC investigator who compiled the article. The employees at the two firms also seem not to be motivated and engaged. This is witnessed in the underperformance of the two firms and information from former employees. The fact that some employees have left this firms imply that there is high employee turnover even though we are not told directly. The major causes of employee turnover are lack of involvement and employee engagement. The two firms seem not to motivate their employees since they are overworked and some even skip provision of services to some of their clients. The employees were ferried by drivers around and they were not allowed to complete their duties before being called by the drivers. The council is the major stakeholder for the two firms’ business. It is responsible for awarding the contracts for provision of the services. This implies that the council is the main customer of the two firms. The underperformance of the two firms based on the complaints by clients served by the firms may end up losing their contracts. Another stakeholder in the article is the regulatory body, The Care Commission. The body is reported to have received 18 complaints about Domiciliary Care and twelve of which have been upheld. The increased monitoring implies that the firm is under pressure to deliver. If they do not comply with the regulations, the firm may lose its license which could be detrimental to the firm. HR managers are expected to be involved in provision of assistance in strategic business decision making and matching competencies of the firm’s human resources with the organization’s mission. The HR managers in particular are expected to offer assistance to executives in matters relating to recruitment, discipline and conduct, performance and evaluation and benefits of employees. The HR managers in the two firms seem to violate their responsibilities. Instead of playing a role of advising the executives on the need to match human resources with the firm’s mission, they are involved in cramming of clients due to understaffing. This is contrary to HRM practices which require that the management be involved actively in decision making process. It is reported that managers were involved in cramming activities. The HRM is expected to advice the executive to increase the staff based on the increased needs. By participating in illegal activity the HR violates their duties of ensuring that there are enough staff to attain the firm’s needs. Human resource management policy choices This element of Harvard model emphasises that the decisions of the management and actions of in the management of HR ought to be appreciated fully only if it is recognized that they result from an interaction between constraints and choices (Pavlov and Bourne, 2011). Under this model management is depicted as a real actor which is capable of making at least some degree of unique contribution within environmental and organizational parameters and of influencing those parameters itself over time (Pate and Scullion, 2010). Human resource management policy choices include employee influence, human resource flow, reward systems and work systems. Employee influence is dependent on their expectation and the ability of the firm to retain human resource talents (Osman, Ho, and Galang, 2011). Most employees work in order to earn a good living within self-imposed constraints, which include the level of responsibility or working hours. However, employees also look at the risks, rewards and job satisfaction associated with the expected duties to be performed. Thus, firms need to build HR strategy, which improves employment relationship by managing the expectations of employs positively. Contrary to this, the two firms in the case seem not to offer job satisfaction to its employees. Employees of the two firms are not granted enough time to serve their clients to their satisfaction. This is evidenced from what one of the former employee of Domiciliary Care say that employees are dropped off at a client’s house and he or she is expected to be out of the house within 10 or 15 minutes. The employee is expected to be out of the house even if he/she were in the middle of feeding an elderly person. The two firms do not seem to be interested in developing formidable employee relationship. Firms are able to attract and retain best talents in the market if their HR strategy involves training and development programs for its employees. We are not told whether the firms train and develop their employees but given that some of its former employees complain the way they are treated and understaffing, this implies there is no time for employee to undertake training and development. Human resource flow entails recruitment, selection, promotion, lateral career moves, resignation, retirement, redundancy and human resource planning. The human resources flow decision making ought to satisfy the present and the future needs of the firm and at the same time ought to put into consideration the individual target and life of employees. Contrary to this, the human resources flow decision making at the two firms do not satisfy the present needs of the firm. The flow decisions at the two firms do not satisfy the needs of the clients either. Human resources flow is affected by many factors. One of this is environmental factor which entails the general society environmental factor and the environmental factor working concretely. The environmental factor entails the influence of policy, economy, technology, science, industrial construction change, education and culture on human resource flow. Lack of satisfaction among employees seem to drive employee turnover at the two firms since complains mainly emanate from unsatisfactory treatment of the employees. Recruitment is one of the functions of HRM. It refers to the process of attracting, screening and selecting qualified people for a job. The proper start to a recruitment effort is performance of job analysis. This helps to document the actual or intended requirement of the job to be performed. The information obtained is then captured in the job description and provides the recruitment effort with the boundaries and objectives of the search. Proper job analysis streamlines the recruitment process. The two firms seem to lack proper recruitment process. There is no evidence to show that the firms carry out job analysis. If this were so, then there could be no cases of understaffing that are reported from the case. The fact that the few employees available at the firms are under pressure imply that recruitment is not a priority for the HRM. In addition, the HRM at the two firms are involved cramming activities imply that the firms are not interested in increasing the number of their employees to serve the large number of their clients. Recruitment process also involves sourcing. This may involve advertisement and recruiting research (Aggarwal and Bhargava, 2009). Based on the fact that the firms have little number of employees in comparison to the work requirement and that HRM is involved in cramming activities this shows that they are not involved in sourcing for new talents. Screening and selection is another functions played by HRM. This involves assessment of suitability for a job in terms of communication, typing and computer skills. Testing process is also carried out during screening and selection process. Some firms have automated the testing process by use of business management software. After screening and selection, new employees undergo on-boarding. This entails helping new employees to become productive members of an organization. This process helps new employees to become integrated with the new company and environment. The inadequate numbers of workers in the two firms show that employees are not given the required orientation. This is because most of the workers who could help new employees are overworked and are under pressure to accomplish their duties. Reward systems need to be tied on the measurement of employee performance (Beaumont, 1993). If the measurement of performance is not tied to reward schemes, most employees find no reason to improve their performance. Development of an appropriate organizational reward system is one of the best motivational factors. This is because a reward system affects employee motivation and job satisfaction. Motivation is influenced by reward system through the perceived value of the rewards and their contingency on performance. On the other hand, job satisfaction is affected by reward system via making the employee contented and comfortable as a result of the rewards received (Beaumont, 1993). Thus if the reward system is not well designed employees may not be motivated or be satisfied with their job which can culminate in increased employee turnover at the firm. Given that employees at the firms are driven to clients and are not given little time to attend to the clients, measurement system may not be effective. Moreover, if a measurement system exists, then it would not be fair and hence employee motivation and satisfaction at the two firms is non-existence (Secord, 2003). Even though the article does not talk about a reward system at the two firms, there is little evidence for existence for such a system at the firms. This is because most of the former employees complain on how employees are treated. It would be next to impossible to have a reward system if the employees are not given sufficient time to complete their duties in accordance to the recommended time. A failure to evaluate pay and reward practices is a critical blind spot for many of those involved in the reward management (Sushil and Momaya, 2011). The evidence from the article indicates that Domiciliary Care and HRM Homecare have no system for evaluating reward. An effective evaluation can only be based on satisfaction of all the stakeholders of an organization are relatively satisfied. In this case the employees and the clients of the firm are not satisfied. This is because the employees are not well trained and in addition are not given enough time to serve the firm’s clients. Even though some elderly clients feel that the little care given to them is better than nothing most of them are not satisfied. Based on this evaluation system at Domiciliary Care and HRM Homecare is not effective it exists at all. HRM outcomes Under this model human resource outcomes are high employee commitment to the goals of the firm and high individual performance which results in cost effective products or services. It is assumed that employees have talents that are rarely fully utilised at work who desire to experience growth via work (Sanders, 2005). The two firms seem to be based on cost effectiveness. This is the basis of the firms employing few employees who can not effectively serve the vast number of the clients. Thus the HRM model assumes that firms should be designed on the basis of assumptions which are inherent in the McGregor’s theory Y. This is not the case at the two firms. It seems they employ McGregor’s theory X which assumes that an average employ does not like work unless forced to do so. This is seen in the way the employees are harassed to complete attending to the clients within a shorter period other than the recommended time. As a consequence, employee commitment at the two firms is very low as seen in high employee turnover at the firms. HRM approach in the two firms There are two approaches of HRM: the hard HRM approach and the soft HRM approach. The hard HRM approach strives to align HRM practice with organizational strategic goals. It is more concerned with cost minimization and is part of the top management team and involves less investment in human resources. Domiciliary Care and HRM Homecare seem to follow this approach of HRM. This is because the two firms try to minimize the cost of running their firms by having few employees. In spite knowing that they have insufficient staff, the HRM in Domiciliary Care and HRM Homecare are not involved in recruiting new employees. instead the HRM are involved in cramming of clients (Pavlov and Bourne, 2011). HR managers employing hard approach strategy endeavour to create and maintain an organization which delivers the strategy of the business by making sure that the HR strategy is continually aligned to it. The hard HRM approach also requires that HR policies and practices ought to be linked to the formulation and implementation of a business strategy and be synchronized with the strategic HRM role of managers to ensure a tight fit between them. This is thought to help the firm to cope with external forces and circumstances which influence the mission and strategies of the firm. Despite this requirement, the HRM at Domiciliary Care and HRM Homecare are less interested in synchronizing the firms’ goals and HRM strategy. This is because the HRM strategy requires that a firm has enough staff to implement the goals of the firm. Contrary to this, Domiciliary Care and HRM Homecare have less staff which is expected to serve a large number of clients. It was proposed that the HR professionals can contribute to attainment of organization’s objective in four ways. The first way is via partnership between HR professionals and the senior and line managers in the execution of the strategy. The Hr managers are colluding with senior and line managers to ensure that no new employees are hired. This has resulted in underperformance in the two firms. The second way is by the HR professionals becoming experts in the way work is organized and executed in order to deliver administrative efficiency to allow cost reduction while maintaining quality. The Domiciliary Care and HRM Homecare HR are committed to deliver administrative efficiency to reduce costs of the firm. They are involved in cramming activities in order to ensure that expenses of labour are greatly reduced. The third way is via HR professionals becoming a champion for employees who represent employees’ concerns to senior management in order to increase the commitment of employees to the firm and their ability to deliver results. Contrary to this, the HR professionals at Domiciliary Care and HRM Homecare are not involved in championing for the employees’ rights. It is reported that the staff in the two firms are poorly trained and carers do not turn up. Absenteeism in these firms implies that employee involvement in the firms is lacking. The final way is by HR professionals becoming agents of continuous change to shape processes and culture which improves the capacity of a firm to change. No change seems to be undertaken in the two firms. Given that what is happening now in the firms is what former employees report to have been doing previously, the HRM does not embrace change. Low training of staff and low involvement and engagement cannot allow change to take place in the two firms. Based on the soft HRM approach, the effectiveness of HRM is dependent on employee motivation, commitment and development in addition to creation of favourable work environment for employee. Thus this approach is employee centred (Pate and Scullion, 2010). Under this approach training and development opportunities for employees ought to be provided and open and honest communication channels should be ensured to promote trust and fairness in the firm. This is thought to aid in attainment of competitive advantage based on human resources. The soft approach also embrace flexi-time programs and puts focus on more work life balance to better manage the resources of the firm in order to achieve its goals and accommodation of the employees. None of the soft HRM approach practice is being seen in the activities of Domiciliary Care and HRM Homecare. Other practices under the soft HRM approach is the drive towards achieving a win-win focus with a growth surge in coaching and mentoring, team building, leadership development, up skilling and personal development. The Domiciliary Care and HRM Homecare have no such practice since it is reported that employees in the two firms are poorly trained. The HRM practice is also being slowly invaded by advances in technology and increased outsourcing. The psychological contract requires that the employer understands the expectation of the employee in order to attain favourable outcomes for the firm (Pavlov and Bourne, 2011). Thus under the employment contract the employee owes the organization and also expects certain things in return from the firm (Jex and Britt, 2008). The changing business environment has had organizations introduce several financial controls (Pate and Scullion, 2010). For instance benefits in the traditional exchange relationship have been withdrawn. In the new employment scenario employees no longer gain secure jobs in return for offering loyalty but instead exchange flexibility and hard work for simply having a job (Aggarwal and Bhargava, 2009). Firms today require employees who go beyond specified role for the survival of the firm (Thomas, 2004). Even though the two firms seem to have embraced this mode of HRM, they seem not to be interested in what the employees expects from them. They tend to be interested in the profitability of their firms instead of employee satisfaction. Conclusion The human resource management practice is concerned with all aspects of employment and management of people in an organization. This report has analyzed the HRM at Domiciliary Care and HRM Homecare. The Harvard model was used to analyze the HRM at the two firms. From the analysis the HRM of two firms are involved in a malpractice of cramming clients. They also do not offer training to its employees. The reward system at the firms is also wanting. In addition, employees recruited at the firms seem to be less qualified since it is reported that they are poorly trained. Moreover, the two firms are not involved in needs analysis. This has resulted in imbalance between the number of employees and clients served by the firms. This is evidenced from the case which reports that employees are under pressure and time allocated to clients is less than the normal required time. Furthermore, cramming of clients reported imply that the employees in the firms are under staffed. Therefore, media is essential in pointing out shortcomings in the HRM system of a firm. Firms which can use such reports can effectively develop a HRM system which can serve to satisfy the needs of all stakeholders in a firm. This can result in profitability and stability of the firms in terms of human resources. References Aggarwal, U., and Bhargava, S. 2009. Reviewing the relationship between human resource practices and psychological contract and their impact on employee attitude and behaviours: A conceptual model. Journal of European Industrial Training, vol. 33, no. 1, pp. 4-31 Armstrong, M., Brown, D., and Reilly, P. 2011. Increasing the effectiveness of reward management: An evidence-based approach. Employee Relations, vol. 33, no. 2, pp. 106-120 Beaumont, P. 1993. Human resource management: Key concepts and skills. New York: SAGE Jex, S., and Britt, T. 2008. Organizational psychology: A scientist-practitioner approach, 2nd Ed. New York: John Wiley and Sons. Kreitner, R. 2006. Management, 10th Ed. London: Cengage Learning Osman, I., Ho, T., and Galang M. 2011. 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The story is available at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/7455711.stm Domiciliary Care and HRM Homecare provide almost 15,000 hours of care per week to the most vulnerable sections of Scottish society. Ex-workers accused them of putting profits before people's welfare. Both companies denied the allegations but HRM has promised to investigate fully the BBC's claims. Private sector More than 70,000 elderly and disabled Scots have carers coming into their homes, allowing them to retain some independence. About a third of these services, which are paid for by local authorities, are now delivered by the private sector. The allegations, which are broadcast on BBC Radio Scotland's The Investigation on Monday morning, include: "cramming" - which means fitting in as many clients in as short a time as possible, irrespective of how long they have been allocated poorly-trained staff carers not turning up companies falsely charging local authorities for work that is not being done. The two companies investigated won contracts totalling about £4m last November in South Lanarkshire. The contracts were awarded after a controversial reverse e-auction where the lowest bidder stood the best chance of winning. HRM homecare, whose head office is in Prestwick, Ayrshire, also has contracts all over South West Scotland. Until recently Carol Walkinshaw, 29, worked in the Lanark office and was in charge of coordinating the workers' rotas. She said the company charged the council for the work whether or not it was carried out. Ms Walkinshaw said: "We'd be so short-staffed that we'd have to try and cram everybody in." She added: "Ten minutes for a half hour visit was normal. The BBC has seen internal documents which showed that managers in HRM were not only aware that cramming was going on but were complicit in the practice. Cramming in Domiciliary Care was also common practice, according to a former employee who asked not to be named. She said: "You would be lucky if you got 15 minutes per visit, even if the clients were allocated an hour.”The company used drivers to ferry the workers around. "They'd drop you off at a client's house and would be peeping the horn after 10 or 15 minutes to hurry you up and you might be doing something like cleaning up vomit or trying to feed an elderly person." But she said the elderly clients rarely complained. They were just thankful for what they got. Karin Fair's father Robert Anderson, 98, from Rutherglen, South Lanarkshire, is a WWII veteran. She said Domiciliary Care failed to look after him properly and that they replaced the company. There was no continuity of care workers, which upset her father. She said: "The people were not even doing the basic things, like changing a wet bed.”Sometimes he would even be put into a wet bed at night." Mrs Fair said the staff seemed to be under enormous pressure to rush, would rarely stay for the allocated time and sometimes did not turn up at all. Regulatory body The Care Commission has received 18 complaints about Domiciliary Care, 12 of which have been upheld or partially upheld. The company has twice been put on "enhanced monitoring" by council bosses at North Lanarkshire Council over concerns about performance. Officials increased their monitoring of the company between May and December 2006 and between March and July last year, to address performance issues. Domiciliary Care categorically denies allegations of poor performance. A spokesman for HRM said that it had never had a complaint in South Lanarkshire. He added: "Nonetheless, the issues raised by the BBC will be fully investigated by us and the independent regulatory authority in an effort to further improve the standard of care we provide." Read More