Introduction
The recommendations made to Warbings Office Systems should lead to increased profitability of the firm as a result of improved employee commitment. In summary, the recommendations include conducting an employee satisfaction survey and introducing a performance appraisal for all the staffs. They also include the development of SMART objectives for all the employees to align with the company’s objectives. Training of managers is also a recommended intervention that should equip them with objective setting skills and allow them to handle staff appraisals adequately (Sudar, O’Sullivan & Lister 2013). This paper intends to advise the board on the benefits of the above proposals on the company and their underlying reasons, as well as their direct impact on the current operations of Warbings.
The reasons for the proposed changes and course of action
The reason for advocating an employee survey is informed by research findings showing that businesses have to measure workforce attitudes to remain competitive. The present condition of the business environment should not affect this imperative. After drawing upon real world examples and data on the concept of employee engagement, Rooy et al. (2011) show that a short-sighted view of the business that dismisses employee satisfaction surveys exposes the business to serious long-term repercussions, such as poor operations systems and loss of talent. Already, Warbings is facing an issue of high employee turnover in some of its divisions. The business has to get to the bottom of the matter as soon as possible. The employee satisfaction survey is the best solution to acquire adequate information to influence future strategic decisions on the best way to run the company.
The stakeholder theory explains that no stakeholder in a company stands alone in value creation. Instead, each stakeholder has multifaceted stakes that inherently connect to each other. For example, when management is not paying attention to the welfare of employees, then the board cannot expect favourable returns because the management will be incurring additional costs of handling high employee turnover and poor job commitment effects, such as neglect of property and mishandling of customer relations. Therefore, the stakeholder theory advises executives to shift the perspective on the firm’s strategic goals (Freeman et al. 2010).
The new question asked should be: How can Warbings be sure that its employees are healthy and happy, and well as capable of working creatively so that Warbings can capture the benefits of the new information technology solutions that it is implementing? This question will attach the employee welfare issue to the performance of the firm and the expected impact of the new computer systems that Warbings acquired.
In addition to the employee satisfaction survey, the establishment of the SMART employee objectives should serve as a management’s guide on rewards at Warbings. The proposed rewards by the management of the firm are commendable, but they are not reflective of what the employees want. Therefore, they are easily dismissed as additional gimmicks by the management to make workers do more than their fair share of work and not earn recognition.
Employees need to feel appreciated as equal and important members of the organization because they are the ones who commit time and personal resources to perform their jobs well and deliver the business value to customers of Warbings. Treating employees well is one of the strategies that allow businesses to retain a competitive advantage over their rivals. Employees need to perform exceptionally for a business to thrive, but they also need guidance in their performance; this is where SMART goals come in.
The business will have appropriate targets for the measures it takes using specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-based (SMART) goals for all employees. Jensen, McMullen, and Stark (2007) indicated that an organization like Warbings will be taking a realistic position for dealing with its employees by following this advice. It will also retain its challenging goals. The difference here between Warbings and other companies will be that its new goals will be realistic and achievable.
The company has to rely on employee SMART goals to understand its highly capable talent and initiate compensation measures that allow its most gifted employees in different areas to work optimally in delivering services to the business. The alignment of the employee SMART objectives and the overall organization objectives will ensure that there is a top-down and a bottom-up understanding of what the company is going to achieve. It will also ensure that employees know what they have to do in their individual capacity to contribute to the achievement of the business’ goal. In addition, personal objectives will increase employee job commitment because they will align with personal career advancement goals and give highly productive and ambitious employees a reason to stay at Warbings.
Managers have to perform their supervisory duties and offer coaching assistance to employees. Warbings will benefit more when its management staffs are former subordinate employees being promoted because they understand its traditions fully. At the same time, managers need professional training to allow them to have a competitive edge when tackling the performance and human resource related issues at work.
Managers need training in communication skills because it is necessary for their coaching tasks. As a result, they become better in face-to-face communication with superiors and subordinates alike. With adequate interpersonal skills, managers will indicate respect for the employees, they will have the immediacy of issues, and they will be objective. For example, managers will focus on the present and deal with problems as they manifest. They will emphasize on factual information and plan adequately.
Moreover, interpersonal skills encourage affirming, consistency of behaviour, building trust, and demonstration of integrity. The above characteristics are critical to effective human resource management as they will allow the management staffs at all levels to participate in strategic positioning of the firm, instead of just being stamping centres for executive orders. Evidence for this recommendation comes from Werner and DeSimone (2012, p. 344), where firms reported strong financial results after providing extensive coaching workshops to managers and supervisors. In another case, accidents reduced dramatically, while training of managers at the Mayo Clinic led to reduced employee turnover.
Conclusion
The employee satisfaction surveys, SMART objectives, performance appeals, and managers’ training are all recommendations that Warbings should implement because they will lead to increased employee commitment to the organization. The recommendations will lead to recognition and matching of personal motivation and organizational compensation framework. At the same time, the organization will enjoy targeted outcomes, while its managers will embrace a humane and coaching approach to their work, which will lead to better human resource management outcomes. The basis of the recommendations is the stakeholder theory and human resource management best practices.
In the end, Warbings should incur substantial upfront costs in implementing the changes, but it will easily recover the costs in terms of reduced employee turnover, increased performance at all levels, and better handling of its other business parameters, such as customer relationships. In the end, it will lead to increased profitability.
Reference List
Freeman, RE, Harrison, JS, Wicks, AC, Parmar, BL & Colle, SD 2010, Stakeholder theory: The state of the art, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Web.
Jensen, D, McMullen, T & Stark, M 2007, The manager’s guide to rewards: What you need to know to get the best for – and from – your employees, AMACOM, New York. Web.
Rooy, D, Whitman, D, Hart, D & Caleo, S 2011, ‘Measuring employee engagement during financial downturn: Business imperative or nuisance?’, Journal of Business and Psychology, vol 26, no. 2, pp. 147-152. Web.
Sudar, P, O’Sullivan, N & Lister, J 2013, Financial and human resource management in organisations: Custom textbook for the University of Westminster, 2nd edn, McGraw Hill Education, London. Web.
Werner, J & DeSimone, R 2012, Human resource development, 6th edn, Southwest Cengage Learning, Mason, OH. Web.