Employee Relations Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

Employee Relations - Essay Example BCL has been operating since its origins with this structure with little or no changes made, the new managing director, however, is young and highly educated, and having worked his way through the business, wants to implement changes to the structure and make the business more modern in its approach to all the major functions mentioned above. The writer of this report has been appointed as the new HR Director, whilst a new operations manager, who also happens to be the new managing director’s colleague in university, has been appointed to replace the outgoing manager. Through a consensus, the three senior managers have come to an agreement that major structural changes need to made, by reducing the management hierarchy, and by forming a strategic partnership with a leading high street grocery retailer, Cost-Savers, in a bid to see the business streamlined and cost effective. The new partnership is expected to cut costs down in terms of premises rentals, as BCL will have their shops within Cost-Savers shops. Another key factor is that Cost-Saver and BCL will share a distribution depot while one of the smaller of BCL’s depots will be shut, and where Cost-Savers and BCL are in the same location, the BCL shop will be closed whilst core and flexible staff of that BCL shop will be offered positions at the Cost-Savers shop, and the rest made redundant. Also certain low profit stores of BCL will be shut altogether. The main changes in the management structure include: Reduction of the number of districts from 16 to 12 District managers will be given expanded responsibilities for product placement, identifying new opportunities and increasing sales within their district Each regional manager will be given the added responsibility of providing development opportunities for store and district managers Each store manager will be given autonomy to recruit staff, promote products, stock products on own discretion, and have more direct contact with head office. All managers will be coached to become leaders and not merely managers for their sectors. Staff would be given the added incentive of a profit based six monthly bonus to boost their sense of belonging to the organisation. The main task given to the writer as HR Director is to come up with a plan to make sure the above changes have a positive effect on staff, and that an employment relationship culture of teamwork is brought about through the changes. This would mean engaging the staff in matters related to key decision making, and change the existing non-directional management of individual stores to align with corporate directions. Key Literature Review: From the above introduction, it can be inferred that BCL has decided to go from a hierarchical, and centralised organisational structure to a horizontal and decentralised structure. It is therefore important to understand these terms before delving any deeper. Organisational Structure: The term ‘organisational structureâ€⠄¢ simply refers to the way in which job tasks are formally divided, grouped, and coordinated. It involves the processes of work specialisation, where tasks in the organisation are subdivided into separate jobs; departmentalisation, where the subdivided jobs are grouped together; chain of command, which