Organizational Development Issue Walmarts Culture - Research Paper Example

Organizational Development Issue – Walmart’s Culture Introduction Walmart, the biggest company in the world by revenue and number of employees, has 11,526 stores that are spread across 28 countries (Persky & Merriman, 2012). This company is in the retail business with stores that sell consumer products that range from vegetables to hardware items. Walmart has 2.2 million and has worked under a successful culture of good customer service and efficiency in the provision of customer-demanded products. Ever since it was founded in 1962 by Sam Walton, Walmart has been on a continuous growth path that has seen it hold top rankings among successful global businesses (Roberts & Berg, 2012). However, despite the fact that Walmart has been a successful retailer, there exists a variety of issues that affect its organizational development. The growth of the organization and its stores has been filled with ethical issues related to cultural misses that are geared towards increasing profitability and reducing expenditure. This paper discusses a key issue in the culture of overworking employees and failing to compensate them for the extra hours worked. It identifies this issue as an organizational development issue, elaborates on it and gives recommendations of how to intervene in this issue. It uses relevant examples to explain the outlined facts. The OD Issue - Cultural Malpractices Walmart has had issues with its culture ever since the business started to make extremely high profits. The culture of the company is customer-focused and ensures that all customers are well taken care of. Such a culture faces the risk of neglecting its employees and failing to note the efforts they put in to ensure that the business continues to be successful and makes huge profits (Cheung-Judge & Holbeche, 2015). Methodology The identification of the issue of culture in Walmart was done by the use of surveys conducted in the various stores in a busy locality in the United States of America. Surveys were sent out via emails to various known shoppers and store attendants of Walmart to get their views and observations on the working environment and time of Walmart employees. A one-week observation was also done on one store to identify the opening and closing times, and the hours that a particular employee took working in the store per day. Discussion of the Collected Data From the one week observation, it was noted that the sample employee usually entered the store at 8 am and left for the night at 8 pm, with only a one-hour break at midday. This observation compliments the results of the surveys that employees work for up to 15 hours a day, with only a one-hour lunch break that is usually not enough for them to rest. Therefore, it is evident that Walmart employees work for more hours than is required or permitted by the law. They are required to get an overtime pay for the extra hours worked since the company only requires an attendant to put in 40 hours of work per week. The rest of the time spent working there is usually considered as overtime as per the employment contracts. Surveys indicate that the attendants at the stores do not clock in as soon as they enter the stores. A good example is that of an attendant who was asked to get to work immediately they got into the store, and clocked in 4 hours into their shift. Therefore, they ended up working for four extra hours that would not be accounted for in their payroll. The surveys show that this practice is common in many stores and works towards ensuring that employees do not get paid for the extra hours they work. The top-level management does not facilitate the payment of overtime and store managers have to trick employees into working extra hours so as to facilitate customers. Other employees added to the surveys and stated that the store doors were usually locked in the evenings. They noted that the managers usually said that the locking of doors was meant to lock out thieves and burglars, as well as shoplifters who took advantage of the night to still from shelves. However, the employees indicated that they were made to work for extra hours after the doors were locked, and the locking of the exits was meant to keep them from leaving before they could fulfill all the customer needs. To add to the suffering of employees, the store managers usually made the attendants clock out as soon as the store doors were locked in the evening. However, the locking of doors did not necessarily mean that work was done. The store attendants still had to go on with their duties and to serve the remaining clients. The amount of time spent at work after the doors were locked would even reach to four hours a day and more than 20 hours a week for a given attendant. These extra hours were not counted as part of the employee’s work hours and could therefore not be reflected in their payroll. Tore managers that showed compassion to their employees usually had a hard time when facing the top management. Employees of one store reported that their former store manager was laid off unceremoniously for having paid the store attendants an overtime wage. Intervention Walmart should focus on improving its culture so as to favor the existence and growth of its business. This company highly relies on store attendant to achieve its goals and targets. It should, therefore, treat them with the highest form of esteem so as to motivate them and increase their productivity (Schein, 2010). One recommendation towards the achievement of a favorable culture would be to plan its expansion well and strategically. Walmart should realize that as it grows in other regions, it will have to increase the number of store attendants. Therefore, it should plan for their pay and fair compensation. Secondly, Walmart should introduce overtime payments for each attendant who works beyond the weekly hours agreed upon in the employment contract. The employees should clock in and out of the stores as soon as they physically get in or out to ensure a fair calculation of their pay. Store managers should be given the authority to pay the overtime wages of their employees and ensure that each one of them is productive enough within the appropriate work hours. Conclusion In as much as an organization seeks to grow its profitability, it is important to note issues that could hinder the organizational development of the company. A failure in guiding the organizational development properly could lead to wrong priorities and failure in business (Yaeger & Sorensen, 2009). It is important to note the crucial aspect of a good working culture in an organization. All staff members should be able to balance their work and lives for their growth. This balance gives them the motivation to work hard. References Cheung-Judge, M.-Y., & Holbeche, L. (2015). Organization development: A practitioner's guide for OD and HR. Persky, J., & Merriman, D. (2012). Focus Issue: WalMart. Economic Development Quarterly, 283-284. Roberts, B. R., & Berg, N. (2012). Walmart: Key insights and practical lessons from the world's largest retailer. London: Kogan Page. Schein, E. H. (2010). Organizational culture and leadership. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Yaeger, T. F., & Sorensen, P. F. (2009). Strategic organization development: Managing change for success. Charlotte, N.C: Information Age Pub. Read More