Employee Retention in Barnies Burgers

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the issues faced by Barnies Burgers including a failure to retain employees and the value that Resourcing and Talent Management function adds to the Barnies and Burgers restaurant. The organisation is currently using online advertisements to fill in vacancies, and the firm has used agencies to recruit its employees and have barely succeeded. Therefore, to help solve these problems the paper discusses the job descriptions and HR planning activities that enhance employee retention. In addition, the paper outlines and discusses the various recruitment and selection methods that will help Barnies Burgers to assess candidates effectively and efficiently thus, enhancing employee retention. Performance management is a crucial aspect that helps in employee retention thus, factors such as induction, performance appraisals, and talent management are discussed together with their influences on employee retention.

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................................... 4

INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL LABOUR MARKET................................................................. 5

PRE-RECRUITMENT.................................................................................................................... 8

EMPLOYEE RECRUITMENT.................................................................................................... 10

EMPLOYEE SELECTION........................................................................................................... 12

PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT........................................................................................... 14

EMPLOYEE TURNOVER ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………….16

CONCLUSION ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….17

RECOMMENDATION TABLE………………………………………………………………………………………………………18

REFERENCES………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….19

Introduction

Purpose

Resourcing can be defined as the part of employees and development that focusses on the recruitment and retrenchment of individuals from an organisation (CIPD. 2017). Moreover, resourcing also encompasses the management of employee performance (Taylor, 2014). Talent management objectives can be incorporate in the company’s strategy of attaining its objectives, where the archived objectives lead to maximization of profits. Choosing employees is a very important aspect for any firm (Armstrong & Taylor, 2014) thus, Barnie’s Burgers benefits when the Human Resource incorporates an efficient and effective resourcing and talent management process. Moreover, Barnie’s Burgers (BB) the resourcing and talent management system adds value to the company by ensuring competent employees are hired. Secondly, it ensures that the restaurant builds its brand through customers who recommend and provide positive feedback due to customer satisfaction. Moreover, resourcing and talent management (R & TM) allows BB to retain the proficient and competent employees given that the market is competitive and other restaurants would want to employ our employees. R &TM has also spearheaded the firm into gaining a competitive advantage in the hospitality industry and helped in the formation of new chains across the country.

Despite the fact that the organisation has currently been facing various challenges, the human resource department can incorporate R&TM tools and processes to solve the problems being faced by the organisation. Therefore, all of the above aspects are some of the values that the Resourcing and Talent Management function currently adds to the organisation. In addition, the R & TM functions are used when hiring, retaining and retrenchment of employees thus, ensuring the organisation’s employees are accountable and responsible for their different roles in the organisation (Taylor, 2014). Therefore, the aim of this paper is to analyse how the R & TM function can add value to BB.

Background

Barnie’s Burgers is a mid-end, high street national restaurant chain of forty units. The restaurant faces challenges of a high rate of employee turnover and therefore want to understand what the value added to the company by the resourcing and talent management. The organisation is currently using online advertisements to fill in vacancies, and the firm has used agencies to recruit its employees and have barely succeeded. The internal employees use the company intranet to secure private posts within the restaurant. However, the firm has not fully exploited talents available in the firm as well as managing them, and thus, there is a little internal succession of employees. The managers have used non-structured interviews during employee’s recruitment while making references to an ad-hoc basis. Notably, recruiting of key talent has recently become crucial to organisations since there is a developing high demand for talent skills in the industry.

The internal and external labour market analysis

The internal labour markets

Internal labour markets depict the process through which an organisation investigates in their own organisation to identify an appropriate individual for a senior occupation, as an alternative of opting to hire someone from other places apart from those in the company (Fine, 2002). The internal labour market usually has a high level of trust and apparent investment by the employees and the organisation. Trust is mainly high as the employee has been part of the organisation and completely understands the organisation’s goals and objectives. Moreover, whenever an organisation chose to promote an individual to a higher post, they trust the promoted employee is better in continuing the set short-term and long-term objectives than a new employee who has to undergo orientation to familiarize themselves with the company’s goals and objectives. When a restaurant wishes to employ a new chef, it is important to consider internal labour markets because a new chef would have differences with another chef. The differences would arise in situations such as food preparation, cooking style, and food presentation (Wilkinson, 2013). Therefore, hiring a new chef from outside the organisation would cause significant changes that may even affect the customers. For example, people may be used to a certain food presentation and with a different chef, different food demonstration would be used thus, making customers dislike the new food appearance. Therefore, it is advisable for restaurants to practice promotions than hiring new chefs as the junior chef will have learned from the senior chef thus, continuing with the practices that the leaving chef had already established.

The internal labour markets suggest that changing the jobs also maximizes the chance of an individual to increase their potential salaries thus, motivating them in following the previous works by the former employee (Wynarczyk, et al., 2016). However, the specificity of the job is one of the major reasons that lead to the creation of internal labour markets. For example, the BB organisation can consider promoting the assistant chef instead of hiring a new chef. However, stability and control of internal labour markets are expensive and corporates a great employer and employee relationship. There is little internal succession at BB which should not be the case as new chefs or assistance managers have different styles that may differ with the customer’s requirement. Moreover, employers in the restaurant industries do not rely on educational credentials and work experience as hiring principles (Wilkinson, 2013). They do, however, develop internal schemes that allow them to collect information and closely examine candidate’s job history data during recruitment. The little internal succession at BB may be part of the reason why the organisation is undergoing through different challenges regarding R & TM.

External labour market

External labour market is the system through which organisations search for a suitable person to take a senior job position outside the organisation (Berntson, Sverke & Marklund, 2006). Moreover, when organisations chose the external labour market, they do not consider promoting an individual at a lower position to a higher position. External labour markets promote free movement of individuals from organisations to other organisations since there is high competition for human capital between organisations in the same industry (Berntson, Sverke & Marklund, 2006). External labour market affects the human resource planning of an organisation due to the changing labour demand and supply. The various characteristics of the current demand for labour include skills and knowledge, level of education, experiences and training greatly affect external labour market than the internal labour market. Moreover, this type of labour market allows organisations in the hospitality industry and other industries to create job descriptions that meet their needs and may at times provide requirements that only a few people can meet thus, ensuring they acquire the best employee.

In the hospitality industry, there is fluidity in the external labour market where workers move from organisation to other organisations in search of better payments and work conditions. The current situation at BB where new starters leave the organisation within the first three months of employment and some of the employees leaving claim that the job, they are allocated is different from how it was described during the interview. Therefore, the external labour market can be utilized by R & TM to ensure the job descriptions during advertisement s matches the roles employees are provided after they are employed (Brown & Harvey, 2011). This will increase the retention rate of the organisation thus, adding value to the organisation by saving the amount of time and money required to hire new employees. Since the external labour market allows the mobility of workers (Kessler & Lülfesmann, 2006) the Resourcing and Talent Management function at BB will enable the organisation to have a backup plan in case one of the senior workers wants to leave the organisation. For example, when an assistant chef has acquired the requisite knowledge, they move to other restaurants and enter as the main chef. Therefore, human capital in the hospitality industry particularly in the mid-end restaurants in general, so movement into jobs even at high levels is considered natural (Aguinis, 2013). With this, it is evident that external labour markets distribute labour perfectly thus, showing there is no reason for permanent attachment to an organisation.

Pre-recruitment

Job analysis

Job analysis is the method through which the Human Resource department categorizes and outlines in detail the particular job roles and requirements (Singh, 2008). Moreover, it encompasses the relative significance of these roles for a particular job. Moreover, a job analysis means an analysis of the work itself and not the analysis of the personnel needed for the job. The main purpose of job analysis is to ensure the organisation establishes and document the employment procedures that relate with the job such as selection, training and performance appraisal. Moreover, the analysis will enable the organisation to assign the new and existing positions to a job family using the job analysis process (Noe, Hollenbeck, Gerhart & Wright, 2006). Therefore, in order for a job description to be written, it is recommended that organisations conduct a job analysis to ensure the job description matches the particular duties of the job. The R & TM function can add value to the organisation by ensuring an efficient and effective job analysis is conducted to enhance employee’s retention given that most of the workers at Barnies Burgers are leaving due to the allocation of a different job role from the one provided during the interview. Therefore, job analysis is important as it enhances both recruitment and retention of employees for Barnies Burgers.

Job description

The job description at Barnies Burgers is poorly crafted thus, the reason to why many employees are leaving the organisation during the first three months of employment. It is important that a job description is written in accordance with the job analysis as this will ensure the job description does not change at any given time (Snell, Morris & Bohlander, 2015). During interviews at the Barnies Burgers, the candidates are given a job description that workers say it changes immediately they are employed that is, the duties allocated to them are not the ones they wanted. Therefore, Barnies Burgers should formulate a job description for the employees since employees love to know their work expectation. The job description clearly states the necessary skills required such as training and the education level for the candidate to fill in the post. Moreover, a job description indicates the responsibilities and the tasks for a specific job. The job description also states the attributes of the job, the organisation’s reporting structure, evaluation criteria for the employees, the compensation approaches to be applied (Avery & McKay, 2006) as well as the physical location of the enterprise.

The restaurant management should have a summary statement in the job description indicating whom the new employees should receive orders from to prevent authority conflict in the firm (Boella & Goss-Turner, 2013). In addition, an efficient job description will prevent conflict of roles in the organisation and avoid employee turnover (Schippmann, 2013). Therefore, well-stated job functions will prevent employers from allocating different jobs from the ones mentioned during the interview, which is the leading cause of employees leaving the firm.

Human Resource planning activities

The HR should have an effective and efficient plan for redundancy in case it is required. Barnies Burgers should formulate a policy that enhances fair retirement and redundancy plans for the restaurant (Belcourt & McBey, 2016). For example, the restaurant’s management should ensure a policy about redundancy that states employees should be notified within a given period of time is incorporated in the dismissal policies. Moreover, the organisations should ensure the organisation’s redundancy and retirement policies strictly follow the employment regulations provided by the United Kingdom government. Moreover, since redundancy is caused by the closure of an organisation, downsizing and employees services are no longer required it is important for the organisation to make an agreement with the employees on the redundancy procedures and discuss possible compensation (Baum, 2016). Moreover, it is the responsibility of the employer to show why redundancy is required by providing the employees with a valid and credible reason.

Employee Recruitment

Barnies Burgers has a problem in recruitment since the employees are leaving the organisation due to an inefficient recruitment process (Zaharie & Osoian, 2013). However, the restaurant should consider revising their recruitment process to make it effective such that the employees do not leave the organisation. Recruitment depicts the process through which an organisation finds and hires a candidate that meets their required qualification for a work opening, in an appropriate and cost-effective manner. Moreover, the enrolment can be from within or outside an organisation (Woźniak, 2014). The recruitment process encompasses a job requirements analysis, attracting employees to that job and integrating new employees to the organisation. There are various recruitment tools which include online advertisements, recruitment agencies and the use of intranet services.

To begin with, there are numerous online platforms that are used to advertise vacancies. These platforms are basically websites that act as intermediaries between organisations and potential employees (Woźniak, 2014). The website incorporates organisations from different industries thus, all types of jobs can be accessed. The websites only require an individual to register stating their preferred industry so that they can be notified whenever an advertisement matches their qualifications. However, registration is not a must since most of the websites are generally free, although some of the services such as advertisements attract payment from the organisation for an advertisement to be put up on the website. On the other hand, individuals searching for employment can log in to the website and search for the type of job they are looking for (Woźniak, 2014). These online websites include Gumtree and Indeed and provide the services for the local people and organisations. To enhance recruitment through these services the Human Resource can formulate a job description that outlines all qualification requirements. This ensures only qualified people apply for the job thus, eliminating any individuals that might not meet the required qualifications.

The organisation also uses recruitment agencies to find and hire potential candidates for different job roles in the restaurant. However, the organisation has been using a recruiting agency that has not been efficient and shows limited success from its history. Therefore, Barnies Burgers should consider approaching a recruiting agency that is reputable through its success in finding proficient and prominent candidates for different organisations. Moreover, it is advisable that Barnies Burgers searches for a recruiting agency that has specialized in the hospitality industry an aspect that will provide better potential employees (Zaharie & Osoian, 2013). Therefore, the R & TM function of the organisation will add value to the organisation since it will be accountable for approaching the best recruitment agency. In addition, when a recruiting agency is proficient in its work Barnies Burgers will have access to the best quality of human capital.

Barnies Burgers owns an intranet where it advertises for vacancies. An intranet is a website that can only be accessed by the employees and the stakeholders of an organisation. Therefore, as the Human Resource Manager, I will encourage employees to make use of the intranet due to the little internal succession. Therefore, to boost internal succession, the employees should be encouraged to view advertisements and use their experience to compete for different posts in the organisation (Zaharie & Osoian, 2013). The management of the company ought to ensure they retain the hired employees. Employee motivation is possible through appreciating employees in writing as an assurance of their job security and to make the new staffs feel that they are important to the organisation.

Employee Selection

Selection depicts the action of carefully choosing someone as being the best or most suitable (Zaharie & Osoian, 2013). Therefore, a selection process is the process through which organisations carefully chose a suitable candidate for a particular type of job. Every organisation must decide what selection tools to use when recruiting new employees. The tools are used to analyse whether the potential candidates have the required skills and knowledge for a particular job in the organisation. Moreover, the tools examine the skills and competencies of an individual against the job descriptions. The candidate is also assessed on their abilities to take up the job since some people may have the required educational level but lacks the skills required by the job. One of the selection tools is an interview, an interview is an oral conversation between a job applicant and an employer which is undertaken to examine whether the interviewee should be hired.

An interview allows employers to assess the personality and interpersonal skills of an individual. The stress of the situation benefits the employer since it reveals how the candidate handles pressure. Secondly, interviews allow the employer to learn the characteristics of a candidate by examining other cues such as body language and facial expressions apart from the spoken words (Woźniak, 2014). Another advantage of interviews is that it allows the employer to see the real intention of the individual to eliminate candidates that are only interested in employment or money from those with other interest that add value to the organisation.

However, the disadvantages of interviews include bias where some of the people in the interviewing panel discriminate some candidates due to their age, race, and gender. Secondly, a candidate can do well in an interview due to their strong communication skills and yet be a weak fit for the organisation’s needs.

Other selection methods include application forms, online screening, psychometric testing, and personality profiling. Application forms encompass writing of an application form and submitting it to the relevant organisation. Online screening depicts the use of an Applicant Tracking System where applications are fed into databases which employers search for potential applicants. Personality profiling encompasses the evaluation of an individual’s personality. Lastly, assessment centres involve the evaluation of a group of candidates at the same time and place by an organisation. Barnies Burgers can incorporate personality profiling in their selection method as it shows an individual’s personality which at a time greatly enhances the performance of an individual. Assessment centres are also effective as they ensure an organisation gets the best from the group (Woźniak, 2014). However, assessment centres are at times expensive and given that Barnies Burgers is a mid-end restaurant it may be considered uneconomical to the organisation.

Moreover, Barnie’s Burgers being a national restaurant should adopt competency-based interviews rather than unstructured interviews as they do allow efficient and effective evaluation of a candidate. Improving the selection methods of the organisation enhances retention thus, employees will not leave the organisation. Therefore, a selection method can affect the performance of an organisation due to the quality of candidates each selection method provides.

Performance management

Performance management entails the planning, monitoring, developing, rating and rewarding (Mone & London, 2018). The supervisors should create performance plans with the employees. Both the employer and the employee should set expectations and set measurable goals. The supervisor should explain the importance of the employee’s efforts and contribution to achieving the set goals. Monitoring of work progress helps in identification of errors at an early stage as well as giving the employees assurance that they are making progress. Managers should also develop the employee’s capacity to perform the assigned duties (Aguinis, 2013). Development includes formal employee training, informal training based online, coaching employees and mentoring them, a variety of assignments which gives the workers exposure to new skills through the details attached to the additional tasks.

Induction

Induction is a general process used within an organisation to welcome new employees to the organisations and prepare them for the new role they will be playing in the organisation (Bach, 2013). Improvement of the induction process will be done by refining the induction checklist and encouraging the team to be involved with the induction process. Make new employees feel welcomed and comfortable by inviting them to social activities that involve the whole team. Therefore, Barnies Burgers management should train their employees on how to treat new employees so that they can settle quickly.

Performance appraisal

Performance appraisal is an orderly valuation of worker performance and comprehension of the abilities of an employee for supplementary progress and change (Jeston, 2014). Barnies Burgers should consider using a performance appraisal system which is conducted every six months. The appraisal will basically countercheck an individual performance against their set goals. On the other hand, the performance objective is set according to the skills and ability of an employee. In addition, after the appraisal, the employees who show great improvements and achievement should be motivated by being rewarded an aspect that motivates other employees to do theory best so that they can be rewarded as well. Barnies Burgers should consider putting in place these rewards so as to increase retention.

Talent management

Talent management can be defined as the systematized desirability, identification, expansion, retaining, and positioning of people with a lot of potential with a particular worth to a company. Moreover, it can also be defined as the method through by employers foresee and attain their necessities for human capital (Swailes, Downs & Orr, 2014). The core aim of talent managing is to guarantee organisations employ personnel that will make a significant transformation to the current and upcoming performance of a company. Moreover, an employee with talent is constantly dedicated to finishing their tasks. Additionally, the main goal of talent management is to ensure an organisation achieves its objectives (Berger & Berger, 2011). Barnies Burgers should ensure their employs are trained and their talent is managed to increase their value for the organisation. Talent management is also used for retaining employees as employees would not leave an organisation that develops their talent and skills. Therefore, Barnies Burgers should invest in talent management to improve their turnover.

Employee Turnover

Employee turnover at Barnies Burgers is extremely high (circa 80%) with many new starters leaving within the first three months of employment. The main reason is that the job they are employed for is different to how it was described in the interview. Moreover, the employees are unhappy about the long working hours they are expected to work. Therefore, the management will resolve these issues by involving employees in decision making that may affect the employees. The following recommendations if implemented will reduce employee turnover at Barnies Burgers:

Barnies Burgers can ensure they hire the right employees by ensuring they incorporate the recruitment and selection methods discussed above.

Since the employees are complaining about the working hours the management can change their working schedule and make them flexible such that employees will be comfortable.

Barnies Burgers can endure they make the working environment suitable for the employees by supporting new employees during their first few months till they understand the routine operations of the organisation.

Employees can be rewarded each and every month to ensure they are motivated towards achieving the restaurant’s goals.

Salaries are also a factor that could affect turnover. Therefore, employees should be well paid and the management can consider adding them bonuses according to the performance of the restaurant.

Since most employees want to increase their knowledge and skills it is recommended that they are shown a career path which shows how they can develop and advance to high positions from their current ones.

Employee recognition is also an important factor and the restaurant can create a policy that clearly states how employees who achieve their goals are praised and recognized by the restaurant’s management.

Conclusion

It is important for an organisation to retain their employees to enhance their position since the more the organisation loses employees the more, they use resources in search of other employees. Barnies Burgers should incorporate the carious recommendation discussed above so that they can achieve employee retention which is their major problem. Therefore, Barnies Burgers should assess their internal and external labour market and amend their job descriptions so that it matches the same job employees are allocated to when employed. The Recruitment and selection methods should allow the organisation to evaluate the skills and potential of candidates together with hiring employees with high qualities. Moreover, Barnies Burgers should invest in talent management an aspect that will increase and enhance the skills of the employees. Moreover, talent management will enhance retention of employees thus, solving the organisation’s major problem.

Recommendation table summary

RECOMMENDATIONS

IMPLEMENTER

TIMESCALE

COST £

Barnies Burgers should ensure they enhance their internal labour market so as to increase internal successions.

Management

1-3 years

N/A

Barnies Burgers should make use of their website by upgrading it and promoting it to ensure it is recognized by advertising it in social media.

Information Technology manager

1 year

£ 500

Barnies Burgers should amend their recruitment and selection methods by incorporating the most effective methods according to the HR.

Human Resource Manager

1 year

N/A

Increase employee retention by enhancing induction, performance appraisals and talent management

Human Resource Manager

1-2 years

£3000/yr.

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