Introduction
The paper discusses the change management program to be initiated at Plastec. Paul, the Director of HR at the company has conducted a survey and several issues had come up. The paper first discusses these issues, analyses them, and then suggests the change in strategy to be adopted to increase motivation and employee satisfaction.
Analysis of Findings at Plastic
As per the given case, the survey results have yielded several issues. These are summarised as below:
Working Conditions: 75 % satisfaction – Acceptable
Workloads: 70 % Satisfaction – Acceptable
Safety: 55% satisfaction – Some What Acceptable
Salary and wage: 54% satisfaction – – Some What Acceptable
Performance and Pay: 26 % Satisfaction. No proper appraisal – – Not Acceptable
Skill Improvement: 11 % Satisfaction – – Not Acceptable
Promotion: 13 % Satisfaction – – Not Acceptable
As per the survey results, the responses can be grouped into three categories: Acceptable, Somewhat acceptable, and Not Acceptable. It is interesting to note that the factor of lesser salary and wages is not the major issue since 54 % of the people have responded as satisfied and 56% of people have responded as not satisfied. So by just increasing salary and wages, the other problems would not go away.
Issues related to the factor of Not Acceptable are: Performance and Pay Skill Improvement and Promotion. It is these three categories that need immediate attention and has to be given priority and by tackling the issues, the main causes of employee dissatisfaction would be mitigated.
Strategy to reduce dissatisfaction
As per the priority decided, the three areas that need immediate attention are: Performance and Pay Skill Improvement and Promotion. The second priority areas are: Each of these issues are Safety and Salary and wage. A strategic plan to tackle these issues is given in the next sections.
Priority 1 Issues
Priority 1 issues are analyzed and a strategy to tackle them are given as below:
Performance and Pay
Only 26 % of the people have expressed satisfaction that the pay and wages are satisfactory. A closer examination of the issues suggests that the appraisal method used is arbitrary and not fair and this seems to be the bigger issue than the actual wages and salary. According to Cawley (1998), appraisal cycles serve the purpose of “appraising the employee on his performance and how the management perceives his role”.
There is a gap between how the appraisal process is conducted and how the employees perceive it. According to the author, the appraisal process needs to be a one-to-one process between the employee and the manager and this is when the manager explains what was expected from the employee and what the employee has done. To infuse confidence in the process, the appraisal process should be transparent, just, and equitable and should not be a tool for the manager to get even.
Before the appraisal starts, proper feedback about the employee should be gathered by involving the supervisors, and parameters for judging the employee should be clearly explained. Once these become clear, the employee knows how he has performed and it gives him a chance to explain his side of the story, explain what his problems are and how these problems could be solved. The appraisal should be taken as an opportunity for bonding and as healing.
Recommendations: The company should introduce a yearly or half-yearly appraisal system with transparent and cleanly defined goals and these should be made clear to the employees at the beginning of the year. Pay revisions should be then graded as per different achievements such as exceptional and highly motivated, good, average, and below average. This would also ensure equitable payment based on performance.
Skill Improvement
This factor has caused immense dissatisfaction and only 11 % of the people are satisfied. There are not many opportunities for employees to develop new skills and as a result, the work becomes boring. Ranft (2000) argues that employee’s perceptions of the benefits they derive from the training they have undergone are not significantly correlated with the amount of training they have undertaken and the number of training methods. The author further argues that the extent to which the organization is perceived to be actively managing the training being undertaken is significantly correlated to the benefits derived from such training by the employees.
Recommendations: The Company should introduce training in different areas such as management, communication, team building, and personality development. Where possible technical training opportunities should also be given. The concept of job rotation should be introduced and people should be allowed to move out of their current roles and work profile after a couple of years. This keeps them fresh and motivated.
Promotion
The issue of promotion has received a score of only 11% people being satisfied and this is a serious issue as people feel that there is no opportunity for them to grow. Bishop (1987) has given details about a survey in which 150 HR employees ranging from executives to hourly employees from some of the nation’s 1,000 largest companies were surveyed to understand how the employees rate the work satisfaction.
In the survey, 47 percent said that recognition and praise were very important for job satisfaction. Next came promotions that ranked 26 percent and then came perks at 7 percent. The author concludes that employees are most worried about the recognition from the managers and praise for a job well done. There is some dispute about the concept of a job well done and employees may raise complaints about the partisan attitude of managers when it comes to recognizing performance.
Bishop again argues that this is particularly true in large teams where many people contribute to the success of a project and when a few are chosen for rewards, the majority of the team members feel betrayed and frustrated. Hence a proper evaluation of each person’s actual contribution is very important to ensure that the rewards and recognition scheme does not backfire and result in resignations.
Recommendations: While it is not possible to promote everyone, there need to be some levels of hierarchies introduced such as line manager, junior supervisor, and so on. Along with the appraisal process, people who qualify can be promoted to the next level. But this needs to be thought out more carefully as having too many hierarchies would create problems of accountability.
Priority 2 Issues
Two issues can be regarded as priority 2 issues and these are explained briefly.
Safety
About 55% of the people have expressed satisfaction while 45% have expressed dissatisfaction.. Daly (1985) has underscored the importance of making people secure at the workplace as this increases their confidence and motivation levels. Besides, as per the OSHO rules, organizations must keep the workplace safe. If there are any safety concerns or accidents, then the company can be sued for very heavy amounts.
Recommendations: The company should immediately call in external consultants to examine the safety issues and implement the recommended safety features.
Salary and wage
This factor has received 54% of satisfied replies. As explained earlier, with the proper appraisal cycles and systems, the basis for wages, promotion, rewards, and incentives would come in and salary and wage revisions can be done as per the findings. It should be made clear to the employees that wage parity with bigger companies would not be possible. On the other hand, by developing a caring and friendly culture, the company can increase satisfaction levels.
Recommendations: The company should revise the salary and wages as per the appraisal cycles.
Final Recommendations
The management should take efforts t improve the company culture, make the employees feel valued, and ensure that employees feel that they have achieved something worthwhile. Nonmonetary rewards and recognition methods should be introduced to increase the satisfaction levels.
Conclusions
The paper has discussed the case in detail and examined the causes for employee dissatisfaction. Issues have been given priority and examined in detail and recommendations made to ensure that the issues are resolved.
References
Bishop, John. 1987. The Recognition and Reward of Employee Performance. Journal of Labor Economics, Volume, 5. No. 4. pp: 36-56.
Cawley BD. 1998. Participation in the performance appraisal process and employee reactions : A meta-analytic review of field investigations. Journal of applied psychology. Volume 83. Number 4. pp: 615-633.
Daly, A. Wagner, K. 1985. Productivity, Machinery and Skills in a Sample of British and German Manufacturing Plants. National Institute Economic Review. Volume, 111. No. 1. pp: 48-61.
Ranft, A. Lord, M. 2000. Acquiring new knowledge: the role of retaining human capital in acquisitions of high-tech firms. The Journal of High Technology Management Research. Volume 11. Issue 2. pp: 24-30.
Robert l. Mathis and Jouh H. Jackson. 2007. Human Resource Management Twelfth Edition. South-Western College Publications.