Issues of B.R. Richardson Timber Products Corporation
Jack Lawler has two tasks to be done in a week. He has to meet the president B.R. Richardson of B.R. Richardson Timber Products and Corporation. The other task was meeting with industrial relations officer, Richard Bowman so that presentations can be made on the findings and suggests recommendations on what is required to be done. Bowman was looking for training and development course and he had heard about the management of Lawler. Bowman was looking for motivation course to the boost the morale of the employees as there was fatality among the blue-collar employees in the lamination plant. The plant manager was authoritative in nature and this has been the major reason for the fatality in the plant. The condition of the plant was not good. Lawler did not have much information about the plant or the situation that was prevailing there. The information related to the situation was needed so that Lawler can make a motivation program. He also did not have the information whether the program was appropriate or not. B.R. Richardson does not want to spend much but still wants the consultation of Lawler. The main issue can be identified in the organization is the behavior of plant manager. He is often authoritative in nature. Finding out the exact reason behind the problem was in itself a big problem. In order to find out the issue, Lawler had to give the task to two of his management student Mike and Mitch. Even Jack also went to the plant in Papose to find out the main issue that surrounds the problem in the plant. When the three, Lawler and his two students Mike and Mitch went to the plant they had made certain notes regarding the issues. Lawler found that from the interview that the turnover rate in the organization is high around 72 to 76 percent. The rate of turnover is further increased within the organization. Other problems also came to light the problems were in the human resource management that cause dissatisfaction amongst the employees. The organization did not provide any pension plan to the employees. The reward system of the organization is also not good. The organization does not have a pension plan. There are few conflicts between the employees when asked by employees about the other employees it was found that there were some conflicts between the employees. Rich that was previously done by divisional managers do the hiring of the employees. Rich focuses a lot on the background of the applicants rather than focusing on their skills. Differences can be seen among the employees.
Interventions required in B.R. Richardson timber productions
The impacts of these issues are as follows:
- The cost of timber cutting is increasing. The turnover of the plant has also decreased from last year. The communication channel within the organization is not good.
- The employee turnover in the plant is increasing as the people are not satisfied with the work environment and the human resource policies of the organization
- There is also a significant downfall of the production in the plant as the people who are recruited by the organization lack in skill
- Overall the profitability and production of the organization is impacted by the issues that are identified
The main issues identified in the Papoose lamination plant are mainly related to human resource management and organizational behavior. There are several other problems, as well that B.R. Richardson needs to pay attention. B.R. Richardson needs to have better human resource management so that the increased rate of turnovers can be reduced and more effective policies can be formulated for the staff members. He needs to counsel the plant manager and instruct him to be less aggressive or he has to take some steps where the manager can be changed. The authoritative behavior of the plant manager has been contributing to turnover as it impacts the work culture of the organization, the manager should understand that he cannot behave the way he does even if the person he is speaking with is his subordinate. Richardson needs to conduct a session an motivate and boost the morale of the employees. Encouragement from the management end will surely help with the production. Richardson should understand that being the president of the organization it his duty to look over the matter and stop the redundancies. The plant needs a strong HR department that will manage the employee related issues. The plant does not have any HR department that could motivate the employees and resolve other issues. In the a, the division managers recruit new employees not based on their skills but their background which needs to be changed. The hiring of employees should be done in more systematic and appropriate way. Richardson should hire an HR manager who cantake care of the plans for recruitment and selection of the employees. An important intervention here would be if B.R. Richardson personally meets the employees of the Papose plant to know about the issues faced by the employees and the reason behind the low motivation level of the employees (Goetsch and Davis 2014).
Looking at the reward system of the plant from the notes of Bowman there is no pension plan for the employees. Thisreward system needs to be modified. Employees should be given incentives for their performance and they need to be rewarded so that they remain motivated (Evans et al. 2014). A proper human resource plan is required to be made so that it would include a number of activities aiming at improving the efficiency of the employees as well as motivating them. Training session’s needs to be conducted for the employees, this would increase the efficiency of the employees. The president of the organization needs to improve the communication process that is prevalent within the organization so that the employees interact among themselves. Research needs to be conducted to find out the reason behind the increasing cost in the cutting of the timber. In order to reduce the overall cost of the cutting some unnecessary costs are required to be reduced (Marchington et al. 2016). Every week a session needs to be arranged,where the employees will get a chance to communicate and share their week’s experiences. This will help the employees to know their colleagues in a better way (Goetsch and Davis 2014).
Strategies
The company does not have a HR department so that process of recruitment can be carried out in the most effective manner in the organization. The HR department carries out a number of activities. They manage the human resources of an organization. One of the most important activities done by HR department is the recruitment of the staff members in the organization (Daley 2012). Earlier the divisional managers but the recruitment did the recruitment and Jack who mostly looks the background of the employees rather the skills does selection process of the employees (Storey 2014). If there will be a HR department proper measures of recruitment and selection would be carried out so that skillful workforce can be introduced to the organization. Lack of skills causes too many errors in the process of production but if there are skilled employees operational, efficiency of the employees can be improved. If operational efficiency will increase the problems, time and cost can be saved (Beardwell and Thompson 2014). Human resource department also ensures that the employees get the required training and development. Training and development is what the organization needs since the employees carry out many technical activities. It is not possible that the employees will be efficient in performing the complex tasks like cutting and framing of the timber. In order to improve the operational efficiency of the employees, training is required. It might be hectic for the plant manager to plan and organize training sessions for the employees. Therefore HR manager is required who would organize training sessions for the employees to improve their efficiency. Effective leadership is required in the organization. HR manager in the plant is required to take the role of motivator (Budhwar and Debrah 2013). They also help in improving the communication channel in the organization, which is the demand of the present scenario. The reason proper communication is required is to reduce the conflicts and differences between the employees in the middle and the upper management. Therefore, improving the communication channel is one of the strategies that would be effective for the organization. Communication is very important for an organization lot of errors occur in the organizations because of communication problem. Communication also helps the employees to maintain a healthy relationship with the organization. The type of organization does not provide enough scope for the employees to interact among themselves (Austin and Pinkleton 2015). Interactive programs are what the organization requires so that the workers of the plant communicate with their colleagues and managers. If the communication channel is proper than coordination can be maintained in the organization which would result Vertical communication is very important because it will let the employees open up to their managers and share their problems. Methods used for communicating with the employees should be effective. Employees are required to be motivated so that they perform the tasks effectively. Having a Human resource department can help in reduce the number of issues in the organization. HR department helps to maintain the coordination between the various departments of the organization (Kramar 2014).
For the implementation of the strategies, firstly the organization needs to have a human resource department. The head of the department will be the human resource manager. The human resource manager will be responsible for recruitment and selection of the employees. For recruitment and selection of the staffs, the standard procedure followed in the industry is required to. The applicants should be invited through advertisements. The would be the method of external recruitment (Kramar 2014). For internal recruitment, methods like promotion and transfer could be used. Candidates will be selected based on their skills rather than just their background. Candidates with experience will be reducing a higher position in the plant. For motivation of the employees’ pension plans needs to be introduced. Pension plan would be given only to those employees who have worked in the organization for minimum five years. More incentive plans for the employees should be introduced to keep the employees motivated so that they work with full efficiency (Goetsch and Davis 2014). Incentive plans can include trips for the employees. Incentives should also include monetary benefits to the employees. For motivational sessions, experts from the same industry should be invited to share their experiences with the employees. Training and development session should also be conducted for the employees so that they can be more efficient. For training, first of all, a proper planning is required. The human resource manager can make the plan for training and development with the help of the managers. The planning of the training program must include venue, date, and timings in other words schedule of the planning and development session. The planning should also include a detailed program of the training in terms of the topics that would be included in the training session of the employees (Goetsch and Davis 2014). Training team required should include an expert from the industry and a senior manager of the organization who have adequate experience in the organization. Another important thing that needs to be improved is the communication channel in the organization, which could be done by the HR manager. For improving the communication, channel the managers are required to be effective. The HR manager of the company should conduct interactive sessions for the employees so that they know each other in a better way (Kramar 2014). The sessions should be conducted once in a week. Some cultural and sports events are required to be conducted. Sports and cultural events help the employees to interact in the leisure time. Formal communication should be used and oral communication needs to be reduced. Written communication serves a record for future. Therefore, written communication needs to be promoted more (Kramar 2014). For carrying out the various activities, the Human resource manager is also required to cooperate with the finance department regarding the funds required for all the activities carried out under the action plan.
References
Austin, E.W. and Pinkleton, B.E., 2015. Strategic public relations management: Planning and managing effective communication campaigns (Vol. 10). Routledge.
Beardwell, J. and Thompson, A., 2014. Human resource management: a contemporary approach. Pearson Education.
Budhwar, P.S. and Debrah, Y.A. eds., 2013. Human resource management in developing countries. Routledge.
Daley, D.M., 2012. Strategic human resources management. Public Personnel Management, pp.120-125.
Evans, D.R., Hearn, M.T., Uhlemann, M.R. and Ivey, A.E., 2017. Essential interviewing: A programmed approach to effective communication. Nelson Education.
Goetsch, D.L. and Davis, S.B., 2014. Quality management for organizational excellence. Upper Saddle River, NJ: pearson.
Kramar, R., 2014. Beyond strategic human resource management: is sustainable human resource management the next approach?. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 25(8), pp.1069-1089.
Marchington, M., Wilkinson, A., Donnelly, R. and Kynighou, A., 2016. Human resource management at work. Kogan Page Publishers.
Storey, J., 2014. New Perspectives on Human Resource Management (Routledge Revivals). Routledge.
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