About Business Expert
Discuss about the Independent Consumer Service Company Operating.
’The business expert’ is a Danish independent consumer service company operating as a nonprofit organization. The company delivers a wide range of services to its members, which includes both private and corporate customers both in Denmark and internationally. For the private customers, the main focus is reviews and tests of new products, as well as individual advice and guidance. For corporate customers, the Business Expert provides consulting services to companies on product development, customer involvement, CSR responsibility and compliance, focus group surveys, and more. The company is funded primarily through membership subscriptions to its magazine and its internet site. Business customers pay a membership fee according to their size and needs. The business expert employs approx. 300 people across two sites; headquarters in Copenhagen and a contact center in Aarhus. The company’s employees include researchers, editorial staff, PR and lobby specialists, marketers and customer service staff. As there is a large variation in the functions and tasks of employees in the organization, employees’ expectations for work also vary considerably across working groups. At the same time, a large number of newly trained staff have recruited over the past five years across the company’s functions. Therefore, two groups have been formed in the employee force; the young group, consisting of newly trained staff with limited experience and the other group; The experienced employees who have an average employment period of about 15 years and some experience gained through a long career. In addition, the company has a tradition of recruiting internationally and therefore has a high degree of diversity in the employee composition. With around 300 employees in the Business Experts and the great diversity among these, the company often experiences major challenges when it comes to formulating HR practices and strategy.
The diversity of company employees posed the biggest challenge for the HRM department as they began the development of a new strategy to align (align’e) reward, innovation and performance processes to reflect the organizational values the company wishes to promote, namely; hope, courage, flexibility, teamwork and personal responsibility. Historically, ’The business expert’ practice for payroll and reward systems had gradually evolved and more or less ad hoc, resulting in an unmanageable number of different payroll and wage increases (over 100 across the company’s two placements) and further there was a considerable variation in awarding performance-related bonuses to managers.
Services Offered
In ’The business expert’ there were fundamentally different views on the role of the reward in the organization; how it should be controlled and how it was conneted same with performance. For most managers and employees in the organization, the reward is considered only in economic terms and some parts of the organization strongly believed that step-by-step / seniority-based
(incremental / seniority-based) salary was the only fair way to manage pay. The disagreement about the content and design of the reward system led to several challenges in the organization. Therefore, the HRM Department initiated a study where they, using data collected through interviews, surveys and performance metrics, convinced the senior management that changes in
The reward system would lead to increased returns for the organization. With the support of the senior management team, the HRM team launched a long-term consultation and communication process to explain the changes, collect employee perspectives and get feedback on the process and decisions.
The result of this process was that the Reward Process for ’The business expert’ now rests on a strong ‘total reward’ system based on pay, perks and learning and development. The salary is linked to performance and there are specific expectations for all job levels clearly identified in a transparent framework designed to reflect the individual workgroups within the organization. The payroll performance system is generous and focuses on individual development and recognition. Reward is harmonized across the organization and includes a pension scheme, personal health scheme and flexible work practices. Career progression is linked to a range of learning opportunities and development interventions designed to provide equal opportunities for all members of the diverse workforce. These learning and developmental intentions focus primarily on skills development across all job types. This included, among other things, training in the latest administrative systems and latest methods of survey collection through external consultants and experts.
The most innovative feature of ’the Business Expert’s’ new reward strategy is the way in which the organization has linked the reward framework to its five key organizational values hope, courage, flexibility, teamwork and personal responsibility.
All four tasks are weighted the same and therefore count 25% of the grade each. Therefore, it is important that you answer all the tasks to the best of their ability
The three forms of rewards that might be in organisations are seniority based reward, total- reward and performance based reward. The senioity based reward system is the system in which the employees who have given a long period of service to the company. In other words, the seniorty based reward is based on the length of service of the employees. In this system, the organisations reward the employees through assigning some of the most desirable activities as well as privileges to the workers who have worked in the firm for the longest period of time. The performance based reward system considers the performance of the individuals as the primary reuqirement for giving rewards. This system is basically known for its effectiveness in increasing the performance of the employees and for its potential to change the climate in which all the employees are working hard for achieving high performance. Furthermore, the total rewards is a concept which describes every tools that are present to an employer which might be used for attracting, motivating and retaining the employees. The different types of context that we usually take into account when we work with rewards in organizations are fixed action rewards, sudden rewards, rolling rewards (lottery) and social treasure. In fixed action rewards the employees are engaged through building their loyalty and rewarding frequent action. Rolling rewards are the rewards that are given to specific number of winners by chance after they take certain actions. Price pacing are the rewards which are given out a small peice at time. In this the employees need to gather all the pieces for earning the reward.
Challenges Faced By HRM Department
The seniority based reward system mainly represents the largest part of the most pay chcks. In this system, an employee receives wither the same benefits and wages or there is an increase in the rewards along with the increase in their years of service in the organisation. It is also to mention that the seniority based reward system tend to attract many of the job applicants with the security needs and it indeed reduce their stress level. It is also sometimes considered as one of the major factors that improve the loyalty among the employees. Howevever, () in this context has also described the negative side of this system stating that this reward system do not directly motivate the employees to give better job performance, instead it discorages the poor performers from searching out work that better suits their abilities. It is only the good performers who are motivated and benefited through this reward system as because of the fact that in this system, the good performers are lured to the better paying jobs. On the other hand, the total reward system comprises of all the efforts that an employer could use in the process of motivating, recruting and keeping the employees for longer period of time (retaining) in the firm. For an employee, the very notion of the total-reawr inclused the perceived value as an outcome of the employement relationship. In contrast to the seniorty based reward system, the total reward system brings together all the investments that a firm makes in its workforce like that of the learning and development activities, pension system and pay, with everything that an employee value while working for a compnay such as career opportunities and flexible working.
The major challenges of the performance baseed reward system is that it is not that effective in imporving the performance of the employees. Although it is extensive, yet it is contradictory as well. It has been argued that the performance based reward are likely to cause the employees to focus more on the quantity rather than the quality of their assigned task that could ultimately result in the detoriaration of the latter. With the same, where there is rewarded based on the performance of the employees, there is likely to have shortage of team work. The employees who are working for reaching their personal goals and targets sometimes are less willingly work as a team players. They sometimes also hesitate to assist their team mates who are struggling as to their view-point, doing so would be wasting their time which they better used to enhance and increase their own productivity. In this way, implementing the performance oriented reward system would influnece the employees working in an organisation. Furthermore, despite having many advanatges of the incentive schemes, there are many negative aspects of it as well. It has been identified by several studies that incentive system results in jealousy among the workers. There are always some workers in the workplace who are more productive than the other. It assists them in earning more than them and when the earning capacity among the workers start to differ, it finally result in jealousy. Also, like in case of performance based reward system, the incentive based reward system too led the employees to sacrifice their quality of work for the sake of quantity, which led to the production of poor or sub-standard products.
New Reward System of The Business Expert
The different types of discrimination include that of age, diability, wage, harassment, genetic information, national origin and race. The age discrimination takes place when a worker is being unfairly treated as because of his age. Under the ADEA (Age Discrimination in Employ Act) however, only the employees who are over the age of 40 are protected but the act does not prohibits discrimination against the employees who are under 40 years. Although there are certain laws in many states that protects the younger employees as well. Secondly, the disability discrimination takes place when the emloyers treats the employees who are with a diability, unfavorable as because of his or her diableness. Thirdly, the wage disrimination is the type of discrimination where the minority groups are paid less than the majority ones. Often, the black men or women face this type of discrimination at their work places. Fourthly, the workplace harrrasment refers to the offensive conduct based on certain protected groups and which is so severe that it holds the potential to create an offensive working environment. It is a threatening behavior that is directed at the employees. Also, in case of genetic information discrimination, some of the employees in their workplaces are discriminated based on their own individual genetic tests or that of his family member. Furthermore, in national origin discrimination, the workers are discriminated based on their country of origin, enthnicity, accent and appearance. Lastly comes the racial descrimination which is familiar to many people. It involves treating an employee unfairly based on his race or any characteristics related with it such as his skin color or facial features. In order to avoid the discrimination practices in the workplace in relation to their reward system, the business expert must implement the reward system keep in mind that the decisions is ethical, lawful and just. No one should be exempted from getting reward just because of his or her race, national origin, skin color, age, wage or disability etc.
The equal opportunities approach refers to the traditional model of EO. The main differences between the ‘Equal Opportunities’ approach and ‘Managing diversity’ approach is the driven force of implementation. The approach os Equal Opportunities is externally initiated and is driven by the legislation and the society ethnic such as justice, group parity, human right and fairness. On the other hand, the managing diversity approach is internally initiated and is driven by the needs of the businesses. The companies focus mainly in hiking the effectiveness through means of fully utilising the skill and potentials of the employees. The shortage or lack of recognition of such skills are usually considered as a discrimination that is very expensive. Hence, full recognition of these skills along with the diversity background represents equal opportunities and it is very important for the business to improve the effectiveness and provide the company with a competitive edge. The other differenec between these two approaches is that the main aim of the equal opportunities approach is to present correct errors, social justice and the human right which have been made previously for correcting the imbalance, mistake and injustice in the workplace. On the other hand, the aim of managing diversity is to treat all the employees equally and acknowledging the fact that every individual has his own unique needs and therefore, it is very obvious of them to need different kind of assistance for succeeding in the workplace.
Types of Rewards in Organizations
The Business Expert has the knowledge about the strategies with which his or her business could flourish in the ever-growing competitive market. One of the most important strategies especially in the contemporary setting is to focus on diversity. The contemporary business environment influenced by the phenomenon of globalization characterizes itself with the presence of a diverse workforce. Conducting business on a multinational level demands proper management of the diverse workforce. In addition to that, the Business Expert must also focus on the needs of a diverse customer base. The importance focusing on diversity can be realized when the business achieves success in countries where it has no cultural connection.
The Business Expert manages diversity by implementing certain practices like including diversity as a part of the company’s strategic plan, linking performance with the knowledge of diversity, diversity training and so on. These procedures have great benefits. Diversity brings with it, diverse talents and skills that helps the company prosper even in trying times. It ensures innovation by working alongside diverse people with unique ideas. Diversity improves the language skills of employees thus opening the doors for business to expand. Having a diverse workforce and maintaining it properly ensures the growth of the company’s talent pool. This also enhances employee retention. Employees’ performance also increases with proper management of diversity because they feel secure and comfortable in the workplace and give their best performance. This in turn benefits the business. Therefore, diversity management has unparallel benefits for the business and the Business Expert must utilize this aspect.
The Business Expert’s new Learning & Development (L & D) intervention would be characterised among attitude shifts, behavioral change, results, psychological capital, return on the investment, reaction to the training, skills improvement, satisfaction and knowledge acquisition. Under the attitude shift it is to assess whether the attitude or the opinions of the participants has changed or not. Under the Behavioral change, it is to assess whether the application and the process of completing the tasks of the employees has changed or not. Under the results section, it is to assess that whether the training had an influence on the effectiveness of the organisation. Under the section of psychological capital, whether the training has improved the external and internal image of the organisation is to be assessed. Under the return on investment section, it is to identify that whether the training has given back to the company more or less than its cost? Furthermore, under the section of skills improvement, it is to analyse whether the employee would do something new and improved. Also, the satisfaction section would determine the immediate reaction on the total logistics like the facilities, venues and the catering. The knowledge acquisition section would depict what and how much has the company earned? Lastly, the reaction to the training section would portray their sudden reaction after the completion of the training.
Primary Differences of Seniority-Based Reward
Learning effectiveness is considered to be a two fold assessment which evaluated the intervention’s quality itself as well as its influence on the net results of the business. The major impact of the L&D is that through this, the employees who would feel engaged would feel more empowered, valued, supported, involved, consulted and there would be the formation of a sense of belonging among them. The L&D intervention is one among the biggest drivers of the employee engagement and the foundation of a strong and powerful workplace culture. Providing the L&D opportunities to the employees depicts that the company is willing to invest on them as an indicual. Learning refers to the engagemnet tool in its own individual right and if it is good, it will for sure boot the performance of the employees to a great extent. However, the modern and the technology driven learning could also go to a long way. I would recommend the L&D intervention measured to put the values and barnd at the heart of what the employer do. They must pinpoint tehir desired learning culture as becasue of the fact that just adhering to the technology startegy withount taking into account the big picture could result in engagement backfire.
Yes, I would recommend this as because of the fact that increasing the focus and investment in the L & D would result in increased number of retention in the workplace. Providing an ongoing access to the workplace learning as well as professional development indeed makes a good business sense. According to many studies, the L & D opportunities are strongly related to the levels of employee engagement and the better rates of the employee retention. Also, candidated always desire to get hired by an organisation which would incrsae their prospects of job down the line. It is a known fact that the individual whose value in the workplace is bolstered through their firms could also expect a greater amount of personal chances for their financial success and growth. It is also to mention that providing better career pathways is very important for retaining the talented and skilfull workforce. The perceptions of the employees that they indeed have the opportunity for growing professionally might be as important to the firm as the actual upskiling. The employees who believes that those oportunities do exist in their company are more likely to understand that the leadership is almost ready for investing in the mutual success (the organisation and the employee).
The best practise approach claims of the fact that there are certain bundles of the Human Resource activities which universally support the companies in reaching competitive advantage notwithstanding of the industry or the organisational setting. The model of BEST PRACTISE implies a very close connection in between the organisational performance and the human resource practices and are also often linked with a high commitment management. On the other hand, the best fit model is regarded as an alternative of the precedent models of York, Michigan and Sparrow and is known to be the matching model for the Human Resource Management. This model is based on the development of the HRM policies as according to the business strategy. Those strategies involves the planning of the future activities, the performance objectives as well as the policies towards attaining corporate aims. However, this model has also undergone several criticism. Researchers have criticised that in this changing business environment, the companies and their strategies are subject to various alternating contingencies and it is very difficult to adjust with the entire HR systems to the new challenges so frequently. Furthermore the RBV ( resource based view) is a managerial framework that is used for determining the strategic resources with the potential for delivering comparative adavantage to a business. These resources could be exploited by the company for achieving sustainable competitive advantage.