The problems at the Burger Boy store
The problem at the Burger Boy refers to the senior business management failure to create attractive conditions for workers and motivate them. According to Heizer and Render (2011), effective operational performance directly depends on the employer’s ability to create values for their workers that would be able to motivate them and encourage being loyal to the company and devoted to the working process. The majority of workers, including the shift supervisor, crew members, cooks, drive-thru window workers, and sandwich assembles are not exempt. Therefore, they have no factors motivating them to be loyal to the company. Their salary is also quite small compared to the salary rates offered by similar businesses. Moreover, the employees are pushed to work extra hours without prior notification. Based on the situation that Marge has faced, a conclusion is suggested that the senior management of this Burger Boy does not care about their employees and neglects employee-motivational programs development opportunities.
The problems that could be explained by compensation issues
The majority of the problems mentioned above are directly or indirectly related to the compensation issues. The workers’ salary does not correspond to the industry standards. Besides, the work is highly stressful because of heavy workloads. Therefore, employees need to have a competitive salary compared to the ones offered by other market players (Heizer & Render, 2011). Also, the assistant store manager does not get paid for the extra hours he has to work. This circumstance is an outrageous violation of the legislative norms. Other problems are related to poor operational management. For example, such a common problem in the fast-food restaurant industry as the employee sick leave creating emergencies is not foreseen and not addressed with the prevention strategy.
The problems that could be addressed with other rewards
All other problems could be lessened with diligent use of rewards rather than pay. Rewards such as the offer of a flexible schedule, professional growth opportunities, extra days to the period of vacation for the best-performing workers, and many more could motivate employees to become more loyal to the company and work with more efforts and dedication (Lee, Peris-Ortiz, & Fernández-Guerrero, 2011).
The use of working schedules as a reward
Hours of work are a reward. According to Crawshaw, Budhwar, and Davis, (2014), hours of work are considered one of the most effective employee-motivational factors after financial compensation. A similar idea is expressed by Heizer and Render (2011), who has stated that hours of work are the factor that plays a key role in the motivation of the majority of employees. This is especially the case for single mothers, students, people with specific health conditions requiring special working and medication-taking regimens, and people working many jobs (Heizer & Render, 2011).
The author’s satisfaction with his working schedule and his colleague’s dissatisfaction could be explained by the peculiarities of their circumstances. Each employee has a unique situation in life as well as unique issues requiring attention. Therefore, a clear-sighted employer who wants to motivate one’s workers needs to implement an individual approach to each particular person. This method will help a company create exclusive benefits that might attract certain categories of job candidates better than financial compensation (Crawshaw et al., 2014).
Based on evaluating the author’s situation and his colleague’s situation, a conclusion can be made that schedules might be a full-fledged reward. The value created by a convenient and flexible schedule is seen by the growing number of employees as the major factor impacting their job placement decisions (Crawshaw et al., 2014).
References
Crawshaw, J.R., Budhwar, P.S., & Davis, A. (2014). Human Resource Management: Strategic and international perspectives. London: Sage.
Heizer, J., & Render, B. (2011). Operations management (10th ed.). London: Pearson.
Lee, S. M., Peris-Ortiz, M., & Fernández-Guerrero, R. (2011). Corporate entrepreneurship and human resource management: Theoretical background and a case study. International Journal of Manpower, 32(1), 48-67.