HRM Practices For The New Brand Tim And Kate in TK Ceramics Company

Question: Discuss about the HRM Practices For The New Brand Tim And Kate in TK Ceramics Company. Answer: Introduction TK Ceramics is an Australian company that imports tiles from Europe. The company operates from Melbourne and has a workforce of 70 employees. The company was started by Tim Bortolli and Kate Johnson after the two left their university and are not the joint owners of TK Ceramics. On one of her motorcycle tours in Jakarta Raya, Kate came across a small tile factory that was owned by Alatas and was a producer of plain standard tile. Kate found it an excellent business opportunity as the tiles were plain and cost effective, which would appeal to building companies, hospitals, commercial installers and shopping centres in Australia as they paid less importance to design as compared to price and functionality. Kate thought that starting up a new business venture to sell these tiles will help her in expanding her business because the designer European tiles, which TK Ceramics was importing, were relatively costlier and appealed to a limited portion of the Melbourne market. Therefore, Kate a nd Tim decided to start a new business venture of importing tiles from Indonesia under a new brand name and hired Renee as the HRP for the new firm. This report is prepared to gain a deeper insight into the human resource management practices for the new brand that Tim and Kate are planning to launch and to make some recommendations that will help Renee in planning the human resources for the new brand. Redesigning internal facing and customer facing jobs Internally facing jobs or business facing jobs are those jobs that include job duties and responsibilities that are concerned with the internal business operations, such as planning and budgeting. On the other hand, a customer facing job is the one that include job duties and responsibilities that are directly linked to customer dealing, such as sales and marketing (Markgraf, n.d.). The criteria for designing the two types of jobs is same but the contents of job design for an internally facing and a customer facing job will differ significantly. First of all, the new human resource planner should prepare a list of all those job positions that will be available in the new brand and then classify each of the job position as customer facing or business facing. Once all the job positions are clearly identified, the management should then analyse the jobs individually and prepare job descriptions and specifications for each job profile. A major difference between the designing of two types of jobs will exist in the preparation of job description and job specifications. For a candidate applying for an internal facing job, it is important to have knowledge about the core functions and responsibilities that he or she will be required to perform. For example, a person applying for a quality checker position will be required to have knowledge about the material being used in the tiles and the permissible quality standards so that he can perform his duties properly. On the other hand, a person who is applying for a customer facing job must have knowledge about all the internal facing jobs and should be an expert in marketing and sales. In order to perform his or her duties properly, it is essential that a person applying for a customer facing job must be an expert in all business processes and in marketing and sales because he or she will have to face the customers and will also have to solve their queries related to products, material, manufacturing process, usability, etc. The management can use the following approach to design its internal and customer facing jobs. First of all, prepare a list of all available job positions. Secondly, collect data and information to prepare job description and job specifications for each the job post. Thirdly, design compensation and benefits plans for each job post by looking into the market trends. Lastly, prepare performance objectives for each job post. To ensure a best job design for various job posts, the skills should be clearly defined, the task assigned should be interesting and meaningful, the power vested in a job holder should be clearly defined and there must be a clearly defined performance management plan for each job post (Oldham Fried, 2016). Pros and cons of drawing some of the shop workers from existing staff When arranging for human resources to fulfil an organisations demand, there are two different methods to recruit employees i.e. internal recruitment and external recruitment. Internal recruitment is a process in which an organisation looks to fulfil job vacancies from within the existing employees whereas external recruitment is a process where an organisation tries to fill up job vacancies by hiring new candidates from outside the workplace (DeVaro, 2016). As Tim and Kate have decided to start expanding their business by importing tiles from Indonesia and selling them under a new brand name, recruiting employees for their new brand from within the organisation can have the following benefits: First of all, the employees already working in TK Ceramics will have complete knowledge of the tile business and the company. Their knowledge about the company and the products will prove to be beneficial for the new brand. Secondly, internal recruitment will provide growth opportunities to the employees that are already working in TK Ceramics and will help in boosting up their morale and motivation levels. Thirdly, recruiting employees for the new brand from within the organisation will also allow the company to reduce its operational costs, which it would otherwise have to incur because of frequent recruitment and selection programs. Fourthly, recruiting employees from within the organisation will foster a competitive environment and will have a direct impact on the performance level of the employees (III, n.d.). Fifthly, internal recruitment for TK Ceramics can prove to be time saving as the company will not have to waste time in hunting employees from outside the organisation. Si xthly, the employees already working in TK ceramics will have a greater knowledge of the companys corporate culture and will prove to be a better fit in the new brand that the company is planning to start. Further, existing employees will also help the company in fostering a similar corporate culture in the new brand. Lastly, drawing some of the shop worker form the existing workforce will help the organisation in avoiding certain mistakes that the recruiters can commit during a recruitment process (Peterson, n.d.). Drawing some of the shop workers form the existing staff members can also have certain disadvantages for the company, which are discussed below: First of all, looking to fulfil human resource demand for the new demand from within the organisation or existing workforce reduces the choice that an organisation can enjoy in a recruitment process. The management will have to choose from a limited number of employees if it wants to recruits employees for the new brand from within the existing workforce. Secondly, the company will not be able to increase its competencies because recruiting internally will not add any fresh talent to the new brand. Lastly, selection employees for the new brand from within the existing workforce can also prove costly for the company because it would ultimately create a vacancy in the existing company and the management will have to conduct recruitment and selection process for fulfilling those vacancies (Chan, 2015). Preparing new job descriptions and person specifications The decision taken by Tim and Kate to start a new brand for selling the tiles that they are going to import from Indonesia will definitely create a demand for new human resources and job positions. There will also be demand for certain job positions that were earlier not there in TK Ceramics and will have to be included under the new brand. To prepare job specifications and person specifications for such jobs, the management can use the following methods: Observation methods observation method is a method that would allow the management of the new brand to prepare job description and person specification by observing an employee working at the same job post in some other company. The management can carefully observe an employee in some other company and pen down his routine, tasks, duties, responsibilities, etc. that he or she is preforming and can use the observed information to prepare their own job description and person specification. Interview method using an interview method, the management of the new brand can interview employees working at the same job post in some other company and can collect important information about his or her job roles, responsibilities, duties, task performed, etc. to prepare their own job description and person specification. To ensure greater accuracy, the management can interview multiple employees and tally their answers. (Brannick Levine, 2002). Questionnaire method in this method, the management of the new brand can prepare a questionnaire and can ask all the employees, managers, superiors and juniors to fill them up. The questionnaire should be prepared in such a way that it contains important questions regarding job duties and responsibilities for a particular job post so that all the important information required to prepare job description and person specification can be extracted from the feedback given by the employees (Managementstudyguide.com, n.d.). Secondary sources consulting secondary information sources, such as newspapers, online websites, magazines, job portals, etc. for job description and person specification information for a particular job post can also help the management of the new brand to prepare their own job description and person specification. Difference between skills and abilities of a sales representatives and other shop staff Job responsibilities and duties for two different job positions can never be the same, which also implies that the skills or abilities required to perform a sales job can never be the same to those that are required for any other job. The key skills and abilities of a sales representatives will never be similar to those of the shop staff because: First of all, the job post of a sales representative is higher than most of the shop staff jobs and requires more person specification. A person being selected for a sales representative job must have a degree in marketing and sales whereas a degree in sales and marketing is not necessary for any other shop staff job. Secondly, sales and marketing is a way more difficult task than managing the operations of the shop. A sales representative has to continuously analyse the market situation and conduct research to discover ways that can help in increasing the sales and the business of a company. The sale representatives also have to analyse the market trends so that they can identify market opportunities and can inform their seniors and help them in making a good use of the opportunities that are available to the company. On the other hand, the job duties and responsibilities of the shop staff are limited and do not require such high skills and abilities (Kokemuller, n.d.). Thirdly, employees working in the sales department also have to solve practical problems and deal with the customers directly. Solving market problems and dealing with the customers directly require a lot of skills and abilities, which the shop staff is not responsible for and can still carry out their job duties and responsibilities without these skills. Fourthly, sales representative also has to indulge in persuasive communication with their clients so that they can gather important feedback related to the products or services which they are selling. The sales representatives have to ask good and relevant questions and listen to the feedback of the customers attentively. Only a persuasive communicator can become a successful sales representative. On the other hand, people working as shop staff do not have to communicate with the customers or collect information about products or services from them, in order to make improvements. Lastly, management of information is another important skill or ability that every sales representative must possess. Information management is the ability of a person to collect, organise and use data and information using softwares and information systems so that it can be used to take better business related decisions. The sale representatives also have to maintain relations with customers and ensure strong Customer Relationship Management for maximising business efficiency and sales. On the other hand, any shop staff job does not require such complex and professional skills or abilities. Thus, the job of a shop staff is much easier than the job of a sales representative, which introduces some considerable differences between the skills and abilities required for the two jobs. Conclusion The decision of Kate and Tim to start selling the tiles being imported from Indonesia under a new brand name will require the management of the new brand to plan the human resources for the new business from scratch. The management will have a number of different options and techniques that it can use to plan its human resource management, but it is important for the management to carefully look into all of the methods and chose the best practices. Selecting the best practices out of all the available practices will help the company in maximising business efficiency and productivity of its old as well as of the new business. Bibliography Markgraf, B. (n.d.). Customer-Facing Vs. Business-Facin. Retrieved May 17, 2017, from smallbusiness.chron.com: https://smallbusiness.chron.com/customerfacing-vs-businessfacing-50329.html Oldham, G. R., Fried, Y. (2016, September). Job design research and theory: Past, present and future . 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