HUMAN RESOURCE
Executive summary
The aim of this research is to determine the human resource strategies that can be employed by Crystal Waters Winery to acquire and maintain staffs that are qualified, trained and motivated in order to ensure that they are performing their duties effectively and efficiently. The research utilizes human resource planning and job analysis to determine the number of additional employees that are required to be hired per department. The research methods used include observation and conducting interviews about the company’s operations. The company intends to carry out expansion plan thus the owner Jacques wants to hire additional employees in the marketing, finance, human resource, operations and production departments.
The findings indicate that three staff members need to be hired for each department apart from production which requires seven more employees. The paper offers recommendation for acquiring employees to work in the growing company.
Introduction
It is important for any organization to maintain a well trained and efficient work force in order to meet its mission and vision. It is therefore important for a company to have a human resource plan and to conduct job analysis in order to detect changes in job requirements and identify the skills required. The scope of work done by the human resource management team entails hiring, recruiting, training and maintaining a link between the employees and management in order to promote a productive environment (Camilovic, 2009). Human capital is a valuable resource for many companies since manpower has to be competent and motivated in order to derive maximum returns on investment. Job analysis is a job examination to determine the activities involved and the skills required.
Our research is aimed at answering Jacques Terblanche who is the owner of an expanding Crystal Waters Winery concerning job analysis and recruitment process he needs to follow so as to hire the right personnel. The paper show how human resource planning can be used to evaluate how an organization can shift from current staffing to the desired staffing position. Human resource planning is a process that a company utilizes to determine future man power requirements in terms of numbers and skills. It also addresses the question of how job analysis can be used to develop specific jobs. It also provides how a systematic training procedure can be utilized to ensure that employees are able to perform their jobs effectively. It also offers recommendations on recruitment and selection process that the winery can use.
RESEARCH ON THE TOPICS
Human resource planning
It is described as the process through which the management determines how an organization can move from the current staffing position to the desired staffing position. The aim of human resource planning is to ensure that the work force matches the skills and knowledge required by the organization. Human resource plan helps an organization to overcome the challenges related to future staffing requirements, employee turnover rates and requirements in training that will enable the employees to meet the organization’s goals. Human resource planning is important in an organization since it determines the performance as recruiting incompetent employees can result in poor performance. Human resource plan aids the management to identify the human capital required in order to maintain and achieve the goals of the company. The ability of an organization to meet the objectives set out is dependent on human resource since human resource affects the organization’s economics of cost, ability to expand operations and the effectiveness of the operations (Boyd, 2008).
Human resource planning also involves setting objectives, creating and implementing systems such as appraisal and training systems that ensure that employees with required skills are available when and where required. HR planning may also involve development of programs that maintain high staff morale and motivation in order to promote high performance. The process should also collect data in order to determine the organization’s effectiveness and future staff requirements.
Human resource planning is advantageous to an organization because it facilitates the effective use of current manpower and to hire people with appropriate qualifications to meet the job requirements. Communication between the employees and the management is improved and through planning a company is able to manage appraisals and motivation programs that encourage better performance and worker loyalty. Human resource planning helps the management to identify any imbalances skills and job requirements available thus eliminating the costs due to the imbalances (Ulferts, 2009).
The human resource planning starts with answering questions such as what will be the volume of output in the next years, what is the rate of employee turnover and what are the skills requirements for the future jobs. At the beginning, it is important to evaluate the business plan by comparing the present status to the future objectives of the organization. It is integral that a company is able to determine the future hiring needs since it helps managers to predict the changes in work force and therefore saving on time and costs. The next step in planning is determining whether the hiring of new employees is feasible. After doing so, the company then evaluates the optimal working arrangements for both the company and the potential employee. The planning professionals analyze whether there are employees within the company that could fill the position or whether there is need to advertise or outsource employees required. It is also important to evaluate whether any form of training is necessary in order to equip the person to do the job efficiently. The next step in planning is to set the working hours for the job available.
Human resource planning is necessary to Crystal Waters Winery because the company is increasing in terms of production and the work load. It has to hire new people in order to ensure that work can be allocated to competent employees who are able to perform as per expectation. It is important for the winery to forecast on the human capital required and job specifications in order to operate efficiently and produce at maximum capacity. Planning will enable the company to identify hiring requirements in the management, financel, advertising, operations and production departments. Since the company is growing in terms of production and Jacques has decided to hire additional staff in order to have a suitable pool of skill for future growth, it is crucial that there is a human resource planning system that can be used to determine the skills required for hiring and determining the future manpower requirements. He plans to hire people in the management, marketing and human resource, thus one of the job requirements has to be knowledge in the respective areas.
The winery first needs to identify future business goals regarding production output and also determine the expected employee turnover in the organization. The number of employees required to meet production targets will increase proportionally to increase in the production. It is essential that Crystal winery conduct feasibility study to evaluate whether the profits will compensate for expenses incurred in hiring more employees. Planning on working schedules and training required is also important to ensure that induction into the organization is efficient.
Job analysis
Job description provides the skills required for a particular job. Job analysis is a process to identify and determine in detail the particular job requirements and duties and the relevance of this duties to the performance of the job. Job analysis involves the process of gathering information relating to a specific job, analyzing the information gained and structuring the information in such a way that enables the components, requirements and characteristics of the job to be identified. Job analysis offers a description of the activities carried out by a worker, the skills required and the knowledge in order to perform the tasks required in a specific job. Through job analysis an employer is able to gain information that is important in writing a job description. Job analysis involves the collection of information regarding the activities carried out in the work. The analysis should provide insight on when, how and why an employee performs a specific activity. The analysis should also provide human requirements such as skills and knowledge required to do the job. It should specify the education and adequate experience required to perform the activities of the job. An analysis on a job should also provide information concerning the tools or machines, information on knowledge required and the services that are administered.
According to Safdar et al (2010) job analysis has great importance in determining performance of the employees. Job analysis process involves many steps that are important in identifying, collecting and interpreting data. The first step in job analysis is to determine the purpose of the analysis and identification of the jobs that will be included in the analysis. It is important to determine the purpose of the analysis since it will affect the type of data collected and the method of collection. The methods used to collect data during the analysis include observation, interview and the use of questionnaires. All these methods are centered on the employee since they aim at determining how he carries out the activities for a specific job. The next step is data collection and then conducting an analysis of the data (Meglich, 2009). Sources of data during the analysis include employees, supervisor and work force plans.
Job analysis is important to Crystal Waters Winery because the company is looking forward to hiring additional employees to assist Jacques and thus it has to come up with job descriptions for the various positions that are vacant. The winery will use the information to determine the activities that are undertaken in a specific job, the knowledge and skills required to perform the activities and operate machines. Analysis can be used in planning the work force and in the selection and recruitment of people who are qualified and capable of doing the job. The winery can use job analysis as a method to develop an organizational structure through classification of jobs. The results from the analysis conducted by the winery can be used in appraising performance and also in training. An analysis of a job will provide information on the training needs of an employee and the winery can use the information to develop a training program that will improve staff performance.
Job analysis can be applied in human resource, management, marketing and viticulture since these are the areas where the owner is considering hiring personnel to match the growing winery needs. Data in the winery operations can be collected by conducting interviews and observing. The data should be sufficiently analyzed and the activities and skills necessary to perform the jobs identified. The information derived from job analysis can be used to design job description in relevant fields.
Job description
Job title: Marketing manager
Reports to the managing director
Job objective: responsible for the creation of efficient marketing team and policies that will enhance the company goals.
Job responsibilities
- Develop marketing strategies that will enhance the company brand and increase sales volume and loyalty among customers.
- Conduct market research and analyze the information to develop a detailed insight into the market needs.
- Develop an effective strategy on how to segment and penetrate new markets.
- Work closely with the human resource department in order to determine the staffing requirements in the marketing team.
- To develop and manage the marketing department budget.
- Researching on partnerships with other players in the sector to enhance the distribution and market access of the products.
Job qualifications
A Masters degree in sales and marketing from a reputable institution
At least 6 years experience in a busy marketing organization
Ability to supervise and ensure work is done efficiently
Excellent understanding on market dynamics
Recruitment and selection process
As Askehave (2010) point out, recruitment process is very important in every organisation for it ensures that right people have been employed. The process is important in hiring personnel that are adequately trained and skilled to perform jobs within the company. Through recruitment it is possible to identify the applicant’s skills and experience while selection involves evaluating the applicants and determining the one that is most suited and qualified to perform the job (Kumari et al, 2010). When selecting the right person to do a specific job it is important to ensure that work is carried out efficiently. Recruitment and selection process thus refers to the process used to acquire workers that are most qualified for the job.
The winery can use the following steps in the recruitment and selection process. The first step is the analysis of the vacant position in order to identify the qualities of the person required and to evaluate whether current employees can fill the vacancy. The next step is to advertise the vacancy in the relevant media channel offering the description of the job, closing date of the applications and the method to be used to send the applications. The next step is to examine the applications and come up with a list of people that are qualified to fill the marketing, finance, operations and production vacancies available in the company. The company should then invite the shortlisted individuals to an interview in order to confirm their qualifications and determine the individuals that are more suited for the jobs using an order of merit to rank the individuals. The final steps in the recruitment process are offering an employment to the selected individuals and then induction into the winery once they accept the offer.
Strategic training process
Strategic training is a form of training that can be executed within a specific a model aiming to meet the needs of training while at the same time meeting the constraints due to several factors in the organization. It is a plan that incorporates the company’s goals and policies (Liao, 2009). The strategy is affected by factors such as finance, human and physical capital. Strategic training influences the extent to which training is customized to a specific job and the amount of training that is aimed at current and future job requirements. Strategic training is planned by the relevant departments and systematically administered. Training can either be formal, informal, on job or off job.
The strategic training process that I would recommend to the winery is first to evaluate the company’s values and objectives in order to determine which areas to focus on. The next step is to come up with strategic training and development initiatives such as to increase the rate of employee learning. Then carry out training and development activities to educate the employees on the knowledge that management wants to impact in the work force.
Conclusion
The research conducted on Crystal Waters Winery provides an insight on the human resource processes that are important in maintaining a work force that has adequate skills to do job. Human resource planning will assist the winery in predicting the future employee requirements thus ensuring that employees are available when required. From the job analysis we can conclude that all departments require three staff members, apart from production department which requires seven additional employees. The operations department can also be integrated together with the human resource department. Analysis shows that each department requires a head member to direct the operations of the department. The research offers a recruitment and selection process that can be used by the winery to acquire personnel that are skilled and also provides a training process to educate the employees.
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