You are a manager in the HR department of an established multi-national manufacturing company EasiClean plc., which produces soaps and detergents. You report directly to the Head of HRM. The organisation has been in existence for almost 100 years and has seen significant change during this period. This has been in terms of the product range, the investment in research and technology and the diversification to paper based products such as tissues and baby wipes. In addition the company has embraced the sustainability agenda and managed global expansion so that it now operates in 15 countries. It has also acquired subsidiaries, which focus on beauty products.
This is a challenging business environment with keen competition from organisations such as Procter and Gamble and Unilever. In his letter to shareholders at the time of the last annual report, the CEO made it clear that the company needs to do better and will have to streamline and strengthen the product portfolio. Productivity will need to improve but with a focus on managing costs and operating to budgetary constraints. There needs to be a general raising of performance to consistently deliver balanced growth.
The Human Resources Department will play a key role in delivering this efficiency agenda and a strategic human resource management strategy will need to be created. Your line manager has called a meeting of the managers in the department to discuss the implications for this strategy. In preparation for the meeting he has allocated certain tasks to individual managers.
Task 1
You need to produce 2 discussion papers for the meeting which:
1. analyse the effect of the structure and culture of organisations on human resource management strategies
2. assess the importance of financial resources in the creation of a human resource management strategy.
• evaluates the factors affecting human resource management in a named organisation.
Task 2
The meeting was productive but one key omission was identified; namely the impact of government legislation on the future HR strategy. Produce a paper for circulation to colleagues which:
• analyses the impact of government legislation on human resource management strategies.