Benefit Plan of United Parcel Service - Research Paper Example

Select and Profile an Organization for the Benefit Plan Part Profile of the Company United Parcel Service (UPS) has been one of the biggest package delivery companies of the world. It is also considered to be one of the global pioneers in supply chain management. The company was formed in the year 1907 as one of the private messengers as well as delivery services in the United States. In the year 2010, the total revenue of the company was US $49.5 billion. The total employees of the company are about 400600 (United Parcel Services, 2010). Benefit Plan of UPS United Parcel Service (UPS) values its customers and therefore places great emphasis upon the benefit plan. This is evident from the expenses made by the company in relation to the employees as well as retirees health along with the pension benefits. The company seems to have been participating in the various benefit plans such as multi-employer pension and health as well as welfare plans which is essentially trustee-managed. The benefits are provided to the employees and are generally enclosed under collective bargaining agreement. There are various factors such as improper performance of the investment, modification in the demographic and enhanced benefits for the participants that make the company contribute to the plans. It is worthy of mentioning that the company provides single-employer defined benefit as well as post-retirement benefit plan. The company also provides its employees with UPS Excess Coordinating Benefit plan thus providing benefits to the ones who are participating in the UPS Retirement Plan (Homestead, n.d.). Part 2: Statement of Issue It can be mentioned that there are numerous benefit programs that the company tend to employ on a continuous basis for the purpose of retaining the talent in the organization for a longer period of time. It is through such benefit plans that the quality of the work lives of the employees are improved along with significant enhancement of the personal lives of the employees. In the above section, it has been found that UPS has been providing its employees with numerous benefits so that the talent can be retained with the organization and thus the goals of the organization can be achieved. However, it has been observed that despite various competitive employee benefit plan programs, the company has few lacunas in its benefit plans. It has been noticed that the UPS is unable to offer its employees with the same benefit that Central States used to offer. After the company has withdrawn from Central States, the employees are supposed to register in the 401K plan in order to ensure that they obtain enough retirement income. It has also been noted that those employees who provided their services in the previous years are not acknowledged by the company. Such kinds of issues tend to harm the employees’ morale to a great extent. One of the biggest issues as identified in the benefit plan of UPS is at assisting the employees to plan effectively for their retirement (Teamster, 2008). It can be mentioned that the issue that has been identified is the basic issue that might hamper the productivity and thus lower the morale of the employees. Good benefit plan tends help to retain the best performers in the organization for a longer period of time. Therefore, the main objective of this paper is to suggest for measures through which the company can resolve the issues faced and therefore enhance its benefit plan. It will also be the aim of the paper to both identify and recommend key measures that the organization i.e. UPS can take into account in order to manage the talents in the organization. Part 3: Literature Review Significance of Benefit Plan to the Organization The reliability and the accuracy of the benefit plan depend upon the two significant factors. The first factor depends upon the fact that benefit program must be capable of locating the needs of the employees thus achieving the goals of the organization. The benefit plan can be considered as good if the program is capable of effective management of such kinds of programs (Bohlander & Snell, 2009) One of the significant issues for the HR managers in the recent times has been to attract and retain the best employees in the organization. In order to do so, it becomes significant for the organization to execute several strategies along with the techniques so that the companies can cope up with human resource related issues. It has been observed that the top performing organizations surpasses their competitors by implementing attractive human resource strategies such as openness among the members of the organization, career opportunities, flexible timing, rewards, and pension funds among others. It is of the view that after the companies realize that effective human resource management determines the competitiveness of the organization, the companies prepare the above mentioned strategies (Hiltrop, 1999). Most of the organizations in the US are facing tremendous problems related to ageing workforce and also there is greater likelihood of facing this issue in the near future. In lieu of this fact, most of the US companies are trying to adopt several approaches. The key contributors to the workers participation rate of the older people of America are enhanced health services, alteration towards a knowledge based health services, income as well as health insurance coverage and advancement in technology. It is because of this reason most of the companies are showing their concern in relation to the ageing population and therefore are undertaking numerous programs for the purpose of retaining the best talents in the organization. However, most of the organizations have focused upon the flexible working related timings, pre-retirement planning, flexible and/or special benefits of certain interest to the ageing workforce, career counseling, creation and promotion of the culture towards promoting the generational diversity, workplace restructuring so that the best employees can be retained in the organization (Arnone, 2006). Part 4: Issue Analysis It has been identified that there are two main issues that the company is confronting. One of them is that since the company has withdrawn from Central States, UPS is unable to provide its employees with the same sort of benefits that Central States was offering. In this context, it can be mentioned that such activities of the company will push the employees towards the competitors. The employees in the present day context try to look for benefits that provide them changes to grow with the company. They always consider the options that are available with them in case their present organization fails to meet their expectations. The other issues have been related to the recognition of the staffs. It can be analyzed that employees in the organization tend to be motivated if their self esteem needs are fulfilled. They tend to perform well with the organization thereby demonstrating their loyalty with the organization. The turnover rate tends to be minimized if such needs of the employees are taken care of by the employers. Therefore, it is significant for the UPS to amend its benefit plan programme according to the changing needs of the organization. Part 5: Issue Solution From the above section, it can be analyzed that both the issues are quite riskier for the organization. If the organization wants to beat the competition and therefore retain the best talents, changes in the benefit plan of UPS is necessary. The employees’ need to be acknowledged for whatever positive services is provided by them towards the fulfillment of the organizational goals. By doing so, the employees will feel that they are valued by the organization. Since most of the employees are focusing upon 401K plan. Therefore, in lieu of this fact, UPS can focus upon the hybrid plans or cash balance. It combines defined contributions as well as defined benefits. Although hybrid plans are controlled by the companies, UPS can make transition to a defined contribution or 401K plan only. This will assist in solving the issue that the company is facing in relation to the benefit plan. Training and education regarding the pension plans can be of greater significance to the employees. The company needs to communicate regarding the changes in the pension plans to the employees so that they are aware of the amendments and can put their views regarding such changes. When such interactions are made, the companies can actually understand the kind of retirement plans desired by the employees. The professional trainers can be hired possessing experience on training the de-motivated staffs of the organization. It can be mentioned that if the company understands the requirement of the employees and therefore the employees are satisfied with the approaches that UPS has adopted, then the performance of the organization can be improved. It is worthy of stating that since there is rise in the ageing population, it is worthwhile for the employers to consider these ageing population and design their benefit programme accordingly. The issues must be identified at the right time so that they can be prevented from occurring or becoming out of control in the near future. Low absenteeism rates, low turnover of the employees, high employee satisfaction and increased productivity are a few of the benefits that UPS will receive by improving its benefit plan. References Arnone, W. J. (2006). Are employers prepared for the ageing of the U.S. workforce. Retrieved from http://homepages.uwp.edu/crooker/786-SHRM/articles/trend-age-bq-2006.pdf Bohlander, G., & Snell, S. (2009). Managing Human Resources. United Kingdom: Cengage Learning. Hiltrop, J. (1999). The quest for the best: human resource practices to attract and retain talent. European Management Journal 17(4) pp. 422- 430. Homestead. (n.d.). UPS/IBT full-time employee pension plan and central states pension fund retirement processing request form. Retrieved from http://ups20.homestead.com/Microsoft_Word_-_Locked_TEAMSTER_PENSION_PLAN_RETIREMENT_PROCESSING_FORM_.pdf Teamster. (2008). Transition Of ups members to ups/ibt full-time employee pension plan. Retrieved from http://www.teamsters413.com/transition%20to%20ups%20pension%20plan.pdf United Parcel Services. (2010). Overview. Retrieved from http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1090727/000119312511049356/d10k.htm Read More