Business organizations cannot achieve their goals and objectives if the employees and the management do not dedicate their efforts into achieving these objectives (Heal, 2008). It is the responsibility of every business organization to come up with incentives to motivate both the management and the employees to dedicate their efforts in achieving the goals and objectives. For instance, incentives should make employees to work harder, more effectively and ensure that the demands of the customers are met. This way, an organization can be able to achieve its goals and objectives. In order to highlight how a business organization’s employee incentive relate to the organization’s goals and objectives, this paper analysis the case of Walmart. Walmart is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of large discount department stores and warehouses in the US and other parts of the world. According to Forbes Global 2000, the corporation is the world’s 18th largest corporation ranked by revenue and also the largest private employer (Canak, 2006).
For the last few decades, Walmart has been facing criticism that gives false promises to its employees. According to Canak (2006), the organization promised its employees’ reasonable benefits but it ended up releasing low benefits to its employee. However, for the last few years the company has dedicated itself in ensuring that its employees are satisfied and are well motivated to work more for the organization. The main goal of Walmart is to become the leading global retailer by ensuring that it has more stores in all countries in the world. The company also aims to improve customer satisfactions in all its stores in order to remain competitive and ahead of its competitors. The company also intends to achieve this by ensuring that its employees are committed to their responsibilities in all stores and remain innovative in order to come up with new strategies that can be used in marketing and in improving the quality of their products. Generally, Walmart intends to use its expanding workforce to achieve its organizational goals and objectives (Canak, 2006).
Walmart incentives are in terms of rewards and benefits which are divided into two groups namely financial benefits and health and wellness benefits. All these incentives are aimed into motivating the organization’s employees to dedicate their efforts in achieving the objectives of the company. When it comes to financial incentives, Walmart employees are entitled to paid time-offs regardless of the reason for being a time-off (Canak, 2006). The employees are paid even when on vacation and holidays. When shopping at Walmart, employees are allowed a 10% discount. Employees are also entitled to performance based bonuses in every branch store. Additionally, employees with long service to the company (over 20 years) get considerable salary increment. Walmart employees also get discounts for travelling and entertainment. More importantly, the organization offers retirement benefits to its employees (Canak, 2006).
In terms of health and wellness related incentives, Walmart has several programs that it aims to use to motivate its employees into working hard and remain dedicated to the activities of the organization. For instance, employees working at the corporation’s retail stores are entitled to 100 percent cover for preventive care. Employee dependants under 26 years old are also covered by the health benefit plans offered by Walmart. Additionally, the walmart employee health benefit plans offer over 50 ways in which the company employees can personalize their health benefits. Still in terms of health incentive, Walmart offers its employees with generic heart diseases and diabetes drugs and prescriptions at very low cost. Other health related incentives used by Walmart to motivate its employees include dental insurance cover, accident insurance, sick time protection, company paid life insurance, short term and long term disability coverage and critical illness cover among others (Canak, 2006).
Generally, the company has developed several incentive programs to ensure that its employees are motivated into working towards achieving the objectives of the organization. It is very clear that the corporation is doing everything possible to ensure that it remains the leading retail corporation in the US and also extend its services to the rest of the world. All the incentives used by Walmart are objective oriented and the company has succeeded in using these incentives to ensure that its employees remain focused to the company objectives. Through its numerous employee incentives, Walmart has been able to retain its experienced employees and this has enabled it to continue to expand its business by opening more stores in other parts of the world (Heal, 2008).
The organization has freed its employees from worries by providing them with both financial and health related benefit plans. This way, the company has ensured that its employees concentrate on achieving the goals of the organization with little or no personal and social disturbances. When employees are assured of their health and financial welfare and that of their dependants, they normally dedicate their time to their responsibility in their respective places of work (Heal, 2008). Although Walmart does not have incentives that are directly related to its goals and objectives, its incentives are indirectly related to its objectives since they motivate and enable its employees to work hand to achieve the goals and objectives of the corporation. It is evident that Walmart has used several incentives to motivate its employees to help it achieve its organizational objectives.
References
Canak, N. (2006). WalMart Business Case Study. Ravensburg, Germany: GRIN Verlag.
Heal, G. M. (2008). When Principles Pay: Corporate Social Responsibility and the Bottom Line. New York, NY: Columbia University Press.