Acknowledgement

I would like to express the deepest appreciation to my Prof. Mr David Snell who really guided
me in a way that I could manage to put all my efforts and knowledge into this assignment, the
substance of a genius: he continually and convincingly conveyed a spirit of adventure in regard
to research and human Resources, and an excitement in regard to teaching. Without his guidance
and persistent help this assignment would not have been possible.

I would like to thank Mr Ahmed Khwaja (Manger Operations Icon Marketing) and Ms Sehrish
Naeem (Human Resource Manager Icon marketing) They really guided me in a way that I could
understand their implemented strategies also in their company.

Executive Summary:
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The main objective of each and every organization is to get success in business and this could be
achieved by the role which every employee plays in their respective work field. It is the
contribution of each employees and the management that can help the organization to prosper
and this success can be achieved through Positive employee relations, performance management
and Reward System.

The role of Human Resource within the development of business plans and strategies is very
vital. As the basic role of HR is to maintain the relationship of company and employee and to
develop such strategies which are both in favor of company and employee in order to get the win
win situation So when Human Resource will adopt such strategies which will be in favor of the
employee it will automatically force the employee to be more productive for company in order to
get the benefits.

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 1- Human Resource Management and Employee Relation: Human Resource management
is basically the process of acquiring, training, appraising
and compensating employees, and of attending to their labour relations, health
and safety, and fairness concerns. An employment relation takes place whenever work is
exchanged for some reward. This is an employee works under a contract of employment.
Employee relations are defined by Laurie J Mullins as being the relationship between the
policies and practices of the organisation and its staff and the behaviour of work groups.
This relationship between employees and employers will be affected by a variety of factors
like the strategies implemented by HR that these should be balanced as in terms that
company and employee both feel comfortable and try to give their best. So Human Resource
strategies are tend to be the most important one in a company as they directly effect the
employee and employee directly effect the productivity so we can say Human Resource
Strategies indirectly effect the output and productivity of the company.
2- Performance Management: Within any organisation performance management can play a
major part towards the achievement of business goals whilst maximising the input of
employees. The use of suitable performance appraisal systems within a performance
management can offer a great deal of assistance in supervising and developing staff. A
large numbers of organisations have installed performance management systems and this
has been illustrated through a survey conducted by the IPD in 1987 were “it was discovered
that 97 per cent of organisations utilised such a system.” Different authors give different
definitions of Performance management. According to Armstrong and Baron
“Performance Management is a strategic and an integrated approach to increasing the
effectiveness of organizations by improving the performance of the people who work in
them by developing the capabilities of teams and individual contributors”

According to Maybe & Salaman “Like any heap of ideas, the body of performance
management methods and folklore will contain things of value and things of doubtful origin
and usefulness Some of the remedies and prescriptions will be based on rigorous research and
sound theory such as expectancy theory and goal setting theory”.1

According to Marching ton & Wilkinson “High performance work practices can satisfy the
‘ability’ criteria as they focus on developing employees through self management and

1
Maybe & Salaman, 1995, p190
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decentralized decision making, this gives the employees a chance to gain the ability to gain
knowledge and skills”.2

Performance management processes define individual performance, and contribution

expectations, assess performance against those expectations, provide for regular constructive
feedback and result in agreed plans for performance improvement, learning and personal
development. They are a means of providing non-financial motivation and may also inform
contingent pay decisions.

3. 1 Strategies For People Recruitment, Retention and Training In hiring of people the
process starts from application receiving,

Initial screenig,

Testing,

Interviews,

Background checks

And then finally hiring

All these steps are the essential part of the hiring according to the position for which hiring is
going to take place, after hiring of people the orintation stage comes in which all the rules,
regulations, background and familiarity of the company in been told to the new employees. After
hirirng the stage comes as trining on regular intervals to keep the employee update about
everything of company or his job which is essential for him to know as a part of company, in this
case the employee really refresh his information his job taks and feels himslef as the integral part
of company, aftr training now the point of retention of employee comes as its very easy to hire
the person like wise when the employee gets all the training information and when the employee
is at stage wen he can give hi maximum productivity to company at this point its difficult to
retain the staff as he can leave the company for any other better offer, so there should always be
something vey catchy and attractive for him in the company that compel him to stay, and this is
bascially the learning stage which keeps on moving for both company and the employee. So this
really keep the employee motivated and incourage for the development of the company and its
productivity.
2
Marchington & Wilkinson (2005) p.90)
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 3- Reward System Performance is also link with Reward system because employees perform
well if they get reward. Most employees felt their development needs were ignored. The
reward levels were too small to motivate employees.

Different authors give different definitions of reward system. According to Bratton and Gold
“the mix of extrinsic and intrinsic rewards provided by the employer... it also consists of the
integrated policies, processes, practices and administrative procedures for implementing the
system within the framework of the human resources (HR) strategy and the total organizational
system. The reward may be monetary or non monetary. The forms of non monetary rewards or
incentives that Organization can use could be through aspects of the work environment that serve
to enhance a workers sense of self-respect and esteem" 3

Reward is an appreciation of employee to give better performance or it is a method adopted by

organizations to get better performance from employees. Reward may be a monetary or non
monetary, monetary reward includes bonuses and non monetary reward includes self respect of
employees, or to give employees good reference of job experience when they leave the job.

4- Performance Management and HR Performance Management is the process to manage

the performance of employees. The key question asked is, “How well is an employee
applying his or her current skills, and to what extent is he or she achieving the outcomes
desired?” Performance of employees is associated with business needs, individual
objectives should be derived from the organisation’s strategy and, where appropriate, the
departmental strategy.
5-
6- Reward and benefits in COMPANY Rewarding employees consists of base pay,
individual performance-related pay, bonuses, incentives, commission and allowances
depends on their contributions to organisations. All the rewards and benefits varies from
company to company but usually the procedure is attracts, motivates and retains the best
people by rewarding and treating fairly. Its reward system is to get the balance between
promoting teamwork and rewarding individual achievement. It also offers greater incentives
for personally achieving superior results. It includes;

(i) Fixed pay, i.e. a basic salary plus an extra amount for personal performance

3
Bratton and Gold 2003
5
(ii) Variable pays i.e. a sliding scale of pay based entirely on business and personal performance

(iii) Benefits, i.e it can include medical facilities, old age benefits, shopping discounts, pick n
drop facilities, preferential loan rates from company etc.

7- HR Strategies

6.1- Respect and Recognition: Every employee is consistently treated with dignity
and respect. All employees are valued and recognized for their contribution to the
organization.
6.2- Values and Leadership Behaviors: Every employee is a leader who listens and
communicates openly and honestly and every employee acts in the interest of all
other people who contribute to the success of the business, including customers,
owner, and suppliers.
6.3- Total Compensation: To recognize people part in business success, Pay and
Rewards program follows a Pay-for-Performance philosophy, the better results
produced by employees, the greater pay opportunities.
6.4- Learning, Development and Personal Growth: Employees have the
opportunity to advance in skill, contribution and career level through high-quality
training, coaching and feedback.
6.5- Resources to Get the Job Done: It is ensured that a comfortable place to work
with access to the materials, equipment and information has been provided to do
the job.

8- Recruitment and Selection Strategies: In HR recruitment process can be centralized or de

centralized vary form company to company or also matter according to the size of the
company.

7.1- Internal Recruitment: The company select candidates from inside by considering
their past performance. HR publicize their open jobs on their website where their
employees could apply for the job they also publicize it in their stores on Notice Boards.
So that the working employees could be informed from the vacant position for the
executive posts and then HR follow a succession planning technique where they recruit
their managers or senior employees to executive level on the basis of their performance.

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 7.2- External recruitment: External recruitment of any company involves:

• Recruiting via internet. Usually companies keep their own websites where they publicize
for the jobs and offer people to send their CV’s through online process and often recruit
employees from their online system.
• COMPANY approaches the Newspaper or a magazine adds mostly to invite employees
for jobs.
The selection process of COMPANY involves the following factors:

• Initial screening

• Testing

• Interviewing

• Background investigation

7.3- Initial screening: In initial screening COMPANY collects the application forms of

candidates from their Website online and also by Mail or Fax and then they choose

those applications which are according to their job requirements and call those

candidates for further process.

9- COMPANY Test:

8.1- COMPANY testing factors:

COMPANY conduct tests to know the following factors:

• Motor& physical skills (motion and movement skills)

• Personality ( attitude test)

• Cognitive abilities (Aptitude and Intelligence test)

8.2- COMPANY test methods:

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 COMPANY took following tests of employees according there policy or requirement:

8.2.1- Test of Cognitive Abilities:

These kind of tests include IQ tests, general and intellectual abilities, verbal fluency,

vocabulary etc. These tests are generally conducted while recruiting executives and
supervisors.

8.2.2- Motor and Physical Ability Tests:

These tests include checking the performance of the employee usually working on the
floor in operation department to check their reflexes and while working at their work
place.

8.2.3- Measuring Personality Interests:

Involves taking into consideration the personal interests and motivations of the person in
his field.

10- Interview: Paneled interviews are taken from the candidates and the panel consists of the
HR manager and the head of the particular department for the interview is being conducted.
If an interview for an important post has to be done for a function head then the .All
candidates after formal testing are called for the final interview. This is where the final and
overall assessment of the candidate takes place and selection decisions are made.
COMPANY employ Structured or Directive Interview content; the managers first make a
set of proper Questionnaires related to job and also predetermine their answers and ask
those questions from applicants in a structured order. Here questionnaires are prepared
according to the job requirements. COMPANY has a set interview content known as
Situational Interview, they ask situational questions from their employees like give them a
situation and ask their opinion that what would they do in that situation but the situations are
job-related. The interview is taken from the employees in two ways i.e.

• Top level interviews

• Low-level interviews.

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In top-level interviews the General and Division Manager of COMPANY takes the interview of
candidates for the Executive post. In low-level interviews the Heads of the departments takes the
interviews of candidates for the Associate heads, officers, managers, and assistant manager’s
posts. After the selection is made the General Manager approves the candidates.

11- Background Investigation: Once an employee is appointed the investigations and

reference checks are done by the HR manager. In COMPANY, reference checking is
referred to as revising the ‘Job History’ which contains
• Job applied for i.e. the experience of the employee for the job.
• Relevant qualifications.
• Salary
12- Training and Development Strategies

11.1- Training: COMPANY follow a highly structured training process. Employees in

COMPANY are trained at all levels. They are trained to work on floor base area to back
area.

COMPANY employee training programs are based on the company's core principles such
as:

• Quality

• Service

• Cleanliness

• Value

The most used training methods that COMPANY follows are given as:

• Lectures

• On-The-Job Training

• Job Rotation

• courses

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 These training methods are often practiced by entry-level workers or crew members
basically for the new employees.

11.2- Lectures: The first stage of training is at the Welcome Meetings. These are usually
arranged in a Training Centre or Room. These lectures set out the company's standards
and expectations for the new employees. Where, employees are introduced with a
complete description about the job, and a guideline that how to work and what are the job
requirements and procedures. A verbal outline is given to the employees

11.3- On the job training: The majority of training is floor based, or "On-The-Job"
training because people learn more and are more likely to retain information if they are
able to practice as they learn. All new employees have an initial training period. Here
they are shown the basics and allowed to develop their skills to a level where they are
competent in each area within the restaurant.

11.4- Job rotation: COMPANY also uses the most known type of on the job training
“Job Rotation”. It is done within the specific department so that the employee becomes
familiar with all level of jobs.

12- Courses:

Some companies offer different kinds of courses to their employees according to the
requirement of their job,

13- Retention Strategy at COMPANY: COMPANY uses Broad banding trend of

compensation, in this trend wide range of jobs and salary levels are represented by Bands thi also
again depends upon the criteria of the company. So the employee, whose job falls on one

Of these grades, gives the pay range listed on that grade and determines his or her salary.
COMPANY has this system of compensation because, broad banding allows for flexibility in
terms of pay, growth and movement.

As there are so many jobs and each job has its own description and value so by making bands of
similar jobs and assigning them the appropriate salaries will make easy for COMPANY to set the
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pays of employees. COMPANY don’t apply the Competency-Based Pay Method because in this
method pays are established as according to the performance of employee such as: If a crew
member is working according to the level of manager his performance is equivalent to manger so
their pays will be same.

But COMPANY pay their employees according to the job or level. Mangers own different higher
pays as compared to worker or Crew members. It is very difficult to set pay for any organization
without conducting pay rates. Pay rates are necessary to define because it is better for both
employer and employee. Employer sets salaries according to the market or could be more from
market and employer get knowledge about market. Similar nature of jobs categorized in groups
and employee feel secure that he is getting salary according to market rate or could be more.

14- Incentives program: COMPANY has developed under given People Philosophy for
compensating and motivating their employees and that are:

• Respect and recognition.

• Values and leadership behaviors’.
• Competitive pay and benefits.
• Learning development and personal growth.
• Resources to get the job done.
• Incentives for senior management.
• Long term incentives.

15- Benefits Program:

15.1- Health and protection:

Health and protection includes the following benefits:

• Medical Aid
• Pension or Provident Fund
• Disability Cover
• Funeral Cover
• Accidental death & dismemberment (AD&D)
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15.2- Work or life balance: COMPANY believe in work and life balance and they offer the
following programs to assist their employees:

• Annual Leave
• Leave of Absence
• Educational Assistance
• Employee Discount Card
• Staff Appreciation Days

15.3- Pay and rewards:

COMPANY pay and reward method is fair which is as given:

• Highly competitive salary packages

• Performance based bonus
• Employee of the Month program
• Annual employee recognition award

17- Explanation of each component with reference to COMPANY: The first step in business
planning of any organization is always the mission of the organization. Mission guides the
organization that what business they are in? What businesses should they be in? What do they do
best? What are the values/ethics of the firm? Mission defines business by need rather than
product.

19- Strategic objectives of COMPANY:

The main objectives of COMPANY is

1. To maximize sales

2. To grow and maintain the number Customers

3. Company wants to outshine their competitors and remain the market leader

4. The main aim of COMPANY is to maximize profit

5. To provide goods/services that is cheap and affordable to consumers or the public.

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20- Establishing Strategic Business Units: Company has chosen to pursue a strategic business
unit (SBU) across all of its business areas in order to maximize the degree of competitiveness
within the individual market areas. A The SBU would cover the strategic foundation, size and
scope of the operation, strategic thrust, the kinds of products or services sold and delivered,
service quality and image, product/service brand identification and image, breadth of the
product/service line, functions performed by the company; distribution outlets; customer market
served; geographic market served; ownership; and financial targets.4

COMPANY operates using four strategic business units – Core UK, which handles United
Kingdom grocery operations, International, which handles international holdings, Non-Food,
which handles sales of electronics, home goods and other non-food items sold in5.

22- Growth Strategies of COMPANY: growth of the company really relies upon different
factors which can be marketing, sales etc but HR is also the main factor which plays important
role in growth of the company, as HR role is entirely related with the employees and the
company as we can say it as the intermediary between the employees and company so that’s why
it plays an important role in growth of the company as if the HR policies will be that much
flexible that an employee will feel good and considering himself to be fully rewarded for the job
he has done, in return he will also put all his efforts to give his maximum input to the company
so the company may have maximum output.

23- Future Prospects and Challenges: In order for business development to continue to be
successful, it must be sustained. Currently, COMPANY has a number of business development
areas in which it could focus. The growth of the non-food business unit holds great promise, as it
could take advantage of the growing demand for these products. However, this business unit’s
effectiveness may be compromised by current economic conditions. Sales of non-food products
are largely driven by consumer confidence ratings, which are currently at a low6 . This means
that the sale of large durable goods and luxury items, in particular, may be considerably
depressed as consumers try not to make unnecessary purchases due to economic anxieties. Thus,
continued development in the non-food strategic business unit may be counterproductive until
the economic outlook improves. Before undergoing any further development in this area, a
careful risk assessment should be undertaken.

4
Mockler (2002: 49),
5
www.company.com, 2010.(17/03/10)
6
Cohen, N. 2008. UK consumer confidence hits all time low. Financial Times (6 February).

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CONCLUSION:

International Human Resource Strategy refers to the process of developing practices, programs
and policies that help achieve organizational objectives. What is essential is that these programs,
policies and practices need to be aligned with organizational strategies. Elaborating further,
strategic human resource management considers the implications of business strategy for all HR
systems within the firm by translating company objectives into specific people management
systems. The specific approach and process utilized will vary from organization to organization,
but the key concept is consistent, that is, essentially all HR programs and policies are integrated
within a larger framework helping achieve the firm’s objectives.

As discussed above we can conclude that in order to get the maximum productivity from the
employee it’s really important first of all to hire the right person for the right place. And after
that the proper training and learning process should be followed and after getting the proper
trained employee the process doesn’t stop here after wards retention of the employee also matters
a lot and this can be achieved by different rewards system, some attractions for the employee,
and with good positive relation with the employee. So this HR strategy will impact on the over
all corporate strategy in order to get the maximum productivity out form the workers.

In order to lead customer-oriented retailer, they watch customer’s ever-changing needs and
wants, competitors’ activities, stakeholders’ expectations and environmental factors. All the
companies should prepare its strategies according to findings of those factors. HR needs to learn
from the previous losses and design the strategies. They need to integrate its HR strategy with its
corporate strategy to achieve the best synergetic effect. The company should create HR mission,
vision and strategic goals which reflect the organisation’s corporate direction. To achieve
competitive advantage over competitors, they train employees to be multi-skilled employees to
perform different tasks. HR department should conduct customer’ survey, followed by action and
change it should design HR strategies which satisfy its product markets and organisational
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structure. They strategies should be flexible for different situations in different regions. They
should have contingency plans for emergency issues.

Bibliography :

Pilbeam Stephen, Corbridge Marjorie. People Resourcing: HRM in Practice. 2nd Ed. England,
Financial Times/Prentice Hall, 2002.

Armstrong Michael. A Handbook of Human Resource Management Practice, London.1999.

Voleberghs Daniel. An original and data based approach to the work-life balance, Equal
Opportunities International, Barmarick Publication.2002.

Reid Anne Margaret, Barrington Harry. Training Interventions, 6th Ed, London.

Mullins L J. Management and Organisational Behaviour Prentice hall 2002

Cornelius, N Human Resource Management. Thomson learning 2001

Mabey C & Salaman G Strategic Human Resource Management, Oxford Blackwell 1995

Marchington M., Wilkinson, A. Human Resource Management at Work, CIPD 2005

Bratton, J., & Gold, J. Human Resource Management Theory and practice,
London, Palgrave, Macmillan 2003

REFRENCES:

Pilbeam Stephen, Corbridge Marjorie (2002), People Resourcing: HRM in Practice, Second
Edition, England, Financial Times/Prentice Hall.
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Armstrong Michael ( 1999 ), A Handbook of Human Resource Management Practice, Seventh
Edition, London.

Voleberghs Daniel ( 2002 ) , An original and data based approach to the work-life balance, Equal
Opportunities International, Vol 21, No.2, pp 25-57, Barmarick Publication.

Reid Anne Margaret, Barrington Harry (2001), Training Interventions, Sixth Edition, London.

Mullins L J (2002) Management and Organisational Behaviour

Cornelius, N. (2001) Human Resource Management, Second edition, London, Thomson learning

Mabey, C., & Salaman, G. (1995) Strategic Human Resource Management, Oxford Blackwell

Marchington, M., Wilkinson, A. (2005) Human Resource Management at Work. Third

Edition.London, CIPD.

Bratton, J., & Gold, J. (2003) Human Resource Management Theory and practice, 3rd edition,
London, Palgrave, Macmillan.

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