Company Profiles of Cadbury and Nestle - Assignment Example

? MANAGEMENT Identify and compare examples of motivation techniques used within Cadbury's and Nestle ………………………….. College ……………………………… of submission ……………….. Words count: 1506 Introduction Human capital represents the most powerful assets in an organization and therefore strategically managing human resources is critically important and an economic imperative to help the firm achieve competitive advantage. Motivating people, developing a strategic vision, establishing positive organizational structure and culture and selective hiring and recruiting are critically important to managing human resources. This piece of paper compares and contrasts organizational practices of motivation and other strategic HR practices between two multinational companies- Cadbury and Nestle. Company profiles of Cadbury and Nestle Cadbury limited, founded in 1824 and headquartered in London, is one of the world’s largest candy makers to share 10 percent of the market. It produces and sells confectionary products offering chocolate bags, boxes and tins and chocolate bars and drinks. It is world’s second largest chewing gum makers and has merged to be a multi-million multinational company (Bloomberg Business Week, 2013). Nestle, a food and beverage multinational company headquartered in Vevey, Switzerland, is world’s No-1 food and Drink Company in terms of sales and world’s leader in coffee market. It is world’s top bottled water maker and biggest frozen pizza maker and is one of the most reputed brands name across the world (Hoovers.com, 2013). Objectives and Vision A business organization needs to describe the purpose and major objectives for which the organization exists. Objectives of an organization provide information, direction and inspiration to explicitly outline the future of the firm. The vision of a firm consists of practical ideals that offer certain goals to be accomplished in terms that can be evaluated (Hitt, Ireland and Hoskisson, 2011, p. 18). For Cadbury, quality is its promise as its reputation has been built upon quality and it promises to ensure quality in its six products line- confectionary, candy, desserts, gums, snacks and beverages. Its objectives include delivering superior shareholder returns, managing resources efficiently to ensure growth and achieve high performance. With its vision “to be the biggest and the best confectionery company in the world”, Cadbury always attempts to deliver supreme values and quality so as to become the best and biggest confectionary company in the world (Bloomberg.com, 2013). Nestle promises ‘Good Food, Good Life’ to provide best tasting, fresh and nutritious choices in a different segments of food and beverage to its targeted markets. Nestle’s objective is to become the leader in nutrition, health and wellness trusted by all its stakeholders (Nestle, 2012). Its vision is to ‘be a leading, competitive, nutrition, health and wellness company that delivers improved shareholder value’ (Nestle.co.za, 2013). Organizational Culture and Structure Organizational structure in a firm designates formal relationship including number of levels in the management hierarchy and grouping together of individuals in to departments to ensure effective communication, coordination and integration of efforts among departments (Daft, 2010, p. 90). Organizational culture is a system of shared values, beliefs and assumptions that are established in an organization so as to influence and motivate people towards achieving the desired goals. Cadbury employs more than 4500 employees in over six countries. In 2009, the company has eliminated the regional structure to operate seven business units and leverage the category leadership across its markets. At Cadbury, the board of directors plays vital roles and responsibilities for overall management and performance and for the approval of long-term objectives. As shown in the diagram, the span of control and communication is spread among different departments. The main responsibility of managing overall business matters is entertained with the CEO and higher positions of board of directors (Bloomberg.com, 2013). Certain shared values and beliefs and strong reinforcements for organizational commitment have always strengthened a positive culture in Cadbury. Certain aspects to managing human capital such as reward system, talent management and organizational learning etc have established a dynamic culture in Cadbury. The company has proud history based on strong social responsibility that has also become part of its culture. At Cadbury, its people are motivated to take ownership of Cadbury’s social responsibility roles. The social responsibility standards have helped Cadbury to establish good relationship with its people and thus to motivate them for better performance (Zaman, 2013, p. 4). With over 339,000 employees (Forbes, 2013) across 80 countries worldwide, Nestle holds very strong organizational culture and a dynamic organizational structure, both in a way to motivate and influence its people positively. Nestle’s board of directors include 14 members and they are led by its Chairman Peter Brabeck-Letmathe. Nestle holds a hierarchical model of organizational structure in which communication and directions are passed from the senior managers to the lower levels. Nestle (2012, p. 14) stressed that its culture, which binds its people all over the world to get together with a shared set of values to a single way of carrying out the business, is its greatest strength. Nestle’s culture combines a long-term mindset with short-term action and that encompasses a passion for quality in major aspects such as relationship, in products and in very thing the company does. A system of relationship and shared value at Nestle is a strong technique to motivate its people across its units worldwide. Recruitment and Selection Recruitment and selection are perhaps the most critical function in the HRM because finding and hiring the most talented, skillful, knowledgeable and experienced candidates can largely impact the productivity and performance of the employees and success of the firm. Recruitment is the process of searching candidates for a job and stimulating them to apply for that job. It involves interviewing the candidates by considering certain criteria such as personality, professional background and qualification. Selection is the process of picking u right candidates through a processing of interviewing, testing and aptitude analysis and then proving initial training to help him start the job. Almost all the companies have shifted from the traditional recruitment system of manual documents handling and direct interviewing to the recent and technology-assisted methods such as telephonic interviewing, online interviewing and online testing etc. Cadbury, for instance, now recruits people for 2004 vacancies of Front of House seasonal vacancies. Cadbury Schweppes, for instance, has significantly improved the speed and efficiency of the management and graduate recruitment process with help online verbal and numerical reasoning tests. Nestle has strong vision about who and how the people it recruits should be. It expects its employees to be honest, creative, transparent, and proactive and result oriented. When it gathers information from candidates CVs and analyze the expected or desired qualification and experience to select the best-fit candidates for vacancies, the HR department at Nestle is very keen to assess and find out how honest, creative and result oriented the candidates are. Nestle uses Global e-Recruiting Solution to find out people for opportunities in more than 48 countries and the solution itself gives an analysis of CVs against the opportunities. Once the HR department shortlisted some CVs, the HR department contacts those candidates whose VCs are shortlisted for attending interview and other tests. Candidates have to undergo individual interviews either by phone, online or face-to-face interviews. One of the most important aspect and a much desired quality that the HR management looks at candidates is how they potentially fit with organizational culture. At Nestle, the HR team uses competency based interviewing technique to draw on candidates experiences, expertise, knowledge, skills and talents required for carrying out a desired job. Both Cadbury and Nestle provide certain methods of initial training and workshops for the candidates who are selected for a specific job. Apart from on-the-job training, workshop and other training programs are found to help employees improve further. Both Cadbury and Nestle are committed to ensure continuous learning and development programs to encourage and motivate employees become high-performance workers and improve further. Nestle facilitated a ‘testimonial’ page in its website providing amazing, excellent and rewarding experiences of its people to have excelled in career after they joined Nestle. Cedric and Ellen says that they have been motivated to become high-profile professionals in the company after they joined Nestle. Evaluative Conclusion This piece of work has presented a brief research about two companies- Nestle and Cadbury- to compare and contrast some of the critical aspects to organizational behavior and management such as vision, culture, structure, recruitment and selection. Both Cadbury and Nestle hold superior vision and they both have established strong organizational structure and culture. Their culture, objectives, vision, structure and training and development programs are found to help employees get motivated to working for high-achievement. Organizations that follow democratic leadership style are found to influence its people more than autocratic and other forms as people in the firms feel highly-involved. Since democratic style of leadership and span-of control in the management structure enhances trust, cooperation, collaboration, consultation and participation, this style of management can impact motivation and thence productivity more positively. Both Cadbury and Nestle ensured a democratic system of leadership. This paper concludes that democratic leadership style that both Cadbury and Nestle followed so far might have helped its employees get inspired and motivated to become high-performance workers and therefore democratic model of management is more appropriate for both these companies. References Bloomberg.com, 2013, Cadbury PLC, Annual Financial Report, Bloomberg, Retrieved from http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=a8INWHHv0dw4 Bloomberg Business Week, 2013, Company Overview of Cadbury Limited, Bloomberg Business Week, Retrieved from http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=171885 Daft, R.L. 2010, Organization Theory and Design, Cengage Learning Forbes, 2013, Nestle, Forbes, Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/companies/nestle/ Hitt, M.A., Ireland, R.D & Hoskisson, R.E. 2011, Strategic Management: Competitiveness and Globalization: Competitiveness & Globalization : Concepts, Cengage Learning Hoovers.com, 2013, Nestle S.A. Company Information, Hoovers. A D&B Company, Retrieved from http://www.hoovers.com/company-information/cs/company-profile.Nestl%C3%A9_SA.6a719827106be6ff.html Nestle, 2012, Annual Report 2012, Nestle Nestle.co.za, 2013, Our vision and Values, Nestle, Retrieved from http://www.nestle.co.za/aboutus/missionvision Zaman, N.U, 2013, Cadbury's Employee Relationship Management, GRIN Verlag Read More