Employee Involvement and Employee Engagement - Essay Example

HRM PRACTICES OF EMPLOYEE INVOLVEMENT AND EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT (WAL-MART INC By HRM Practices of Employee Involvement and Employee Engagement (Wal-Mart Inc.) Introduction Wal-Mart Inc. is a reputable retail store that has significantly grown, over years, to become a global giant in the retail chain stores business segment. The company was founded back in 1962 by the brothers J.L Walton and Samuel Walton with an objective of providing consumers with an alternative to purchasing cheaper household goods. It was from here that the company formulated its strategy of low pricing to enter the market in order to attract customers to its outlets (Dickson, 2011). In addition, Wal-Mart also realised how critical its human resources were and thus opted to use employment engagement to motivate the workers and retain them within the company (Walker, 2012). Employee engagement is a necessary tool for creating innovative, motivated, committed and high productive workers in Wal-Mart. Conversely, the Wal-Mart has adopted a lean strategy that has enabled it to enhance efficiency while minimising resource wastages, thus saving a significant amount of resources for the company. Currently, Wal-Mart operates approximately 8,900 outlets globally out of which 54% are located in America. In 2010, the firm reported revenues amounting to$ 408 billion, which was a 1% increase from the previous year. Arguably, Wal-Mart has been able to control the retail chain segment in the industry since it commands over 60% of revenues of the retail chain industry (Thomas, 2010). Wal-Mart is the preferred organisation for this study because of its long time success in the retail chain industry. The organisation recognises employee engagement as a crucial tool and mechanism for improving employee productivity and motivation. The organisation recognises employees as an imperative strategic resource through which it can deliver quality products to the customers and as a mechanism for achieving organisational goals and objectives. Thus, it is imperative to examine Wal-Mart in this study to find out how crucial employee engagement is to the organisations success. (Walker, 2012). Relevance of Topic to the Organisation Employee engagement and involvement is an emerging trend in the human resource department of organisations. It has become imperative that organisations should engage their organisations to ensure an organisation achieves its core objectives at the least cost possible. Wal-Mart over the years has invested heavily in its human resources through in-house training and engagement in key administration functions in which they are bestowed with immense responsibilities to enable them develop personally and gain self-drive in performing their assigned duties (Dickson, 2011). For instance, the drivers of Wal-Mart’s fleet have the responsibility of ensuring they utilise the shortest time possible in delivering stocks to various outlets from the company’s stores. Before the duties are assigned to the drivers, they are first taken through a training session to enhance their skills. They get introduced to the general and core objectives of the company to enable them realise how crucial and valuable they are to the success of the organisation. Notwithstanding Wal-Mart is one of the largest employers globally because of its extensive network. Thus, it is imperative to analyse the company to understand how it deals with its diverse human resources with different cultural backgrounds (Thomas, 2010). Literature Review Employee involvement and engagement are initiatives that are meant to drive performance in firms. It is prudent to note that engaged employees tend to be more productive compared to the unengaged employees. Studies indicate that engaged employees are 20% more productive compared to those that are engaged moderately (Macey et al., 2011). Engagement is creating opportunities that ensure all the workforce in a firm relate to their managers, colleagues and the entire organisation without any hierarchical restrictions. It transforms an organisation into a team of people with a common objective rather than a conservative structural chain of command that characterises most of the organisations (Dickson, 2011). Employee engagement is about creating an enabling environment that motivates the workers towards performance of their duties by including them in policy formulation. In essence, employee engagement ensures that workers are committed to the organisation’s goals and values. Motivating employees is the key to improved performance and productivity of employees. However, it is often difficult high performance since businesses are composed of employees with diverse personalities and cultures. Thus, this necessitates the management to devise the best motivational approaches that suits the interests of the workers and demonstrates how valuable they are to the organisation (Carbonara, 2013). According to Cook, (2008), employee involvement and engagement is the process that allows employees from various hierarchical ranks to participate freely in influencing the performance of the company. The process aims at creating a balance and the involvement of personnel in decision-making, sharing of crucial information as well as contributing towards the general performance of the firm. The rise of the human resource practices in the recent past was aimed at engaging and involving employees in the critical functions of the organisation because of the decline of the influence of trade unions. For this reason, management of firms, thus opted for a direct and personalized technique of managing their employees to understand their problems as well as interact with them freely to devise the best working relations. Kruse, (2012) argues that employee engagement and involvement originated from the economic efficiency gains approach that was based on the notion that with increased competition and technological advancement, organisational performance can only be sustained through a committed personnel. He concluded, thus that through this kind of strategy, the overall performance can be improved significantly as individual employees get more motivated and responsible in the performance of their duties. Conversely, Guest (2014), suggests that employee engagement influences positively on the levels of worker innovativeness, absenteeism, customer service delivery, retention, and turnover. Conclusion Ultimately, it is, therefore, employee engagement is a critical factor for the success of the organisation as it enables employees improve their efficiency, reduce wastage and improve productivity. Moreover, employee engagement reduces the rates of employment turnover by boosting the retention rate and thus, this enables organisations such as Wal-Mart to retain their skilled and talented employees in the workplace. Therefore, it is justifiable that employee engagement enabled Wal-Mart to achieve accelerated growth to become a giant retail chain store in the industry. Bibliography Albrecht, S. L., 2010. Handbook of employee engagement perspectives, issues, research, and practice. Cheltenham, Glos, UK: Edward Elgar. Available at: http://public.eblib.com/choice/publicfullrecord.aspx?p=583816. [Accessed on 18 Mar. 15] Carbonara, S., 2013. Managers guide to employee engagement. New York: McGraw-Hill. http://proquest.safaribooksonline.com/?fpi=9780071799508. [Accessed on 18 Mar. 15] Cook, S., 2008. The essential guide to employee engagement: better business performance through staff satisfaction. London, LA: Kogan Page. Cotton, J. L., 1993. Employee involvement: methods for improving performance and work attitudes. London, LA: Sage. Dickson, D. A., 2011. Fostering employee engagement: practical tools and best practice techniques. Amherst, MA: HRD Press. Guest, D., 2014. Employee engagement: a sceptical analysis. Journal of Organisational Effectiveness: People and Performance, 1(2), 141-156. Kruse, K., 2012. Employee engagement 2.0: how to motivate your team to high performance: a "real-world" guide for busy managers. [S.I.], Kevin Kruse. Macey, W. H., Schneider, B., Barbera, K. M., & Young, S. A., 2011. Employee Engagement Tools for Analysis, Practice, and Competitive Advantage. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons. Available at: http://public.eblib.com/choice/publicfullrecord.aspx?p=822673. [Accessed on 18 Mar. 15] Shuck, B., & Wollard, K., 2010. Employee engagement and HRD: A seminal review of the foundations. Human Resource Development Review, 9(1), 89-110. Thomas, K. W., 2010. Intrinsic motivation at work: what really drives employee engagement. San Francisco, Berrett-Koehler Publishers. Walker, S., 2012. Employee engagement and communication research: measurement, strategy, and action. Philadelphia, Pa: Kogan Page. Read More