Reference no: EM133039896
Question:
As an HR consultant, you have been called into Melting Moments to help Caroline. Drawing on the information given in the above case study, you are asked to address the following issues:
- How would you describe the current attraction strategy and what action/s would you recommend HR undertake for its improvement?
- Are the current recruitment and selection processes appropriate for the organisation? What, if anything would you recommend for its improvement?
- Is the current performance appraisal process utilised by HR at Melting Moments Ltd appropriate? If not, what would you recommend for its improvement?
- How would you describe the current retention strategy of the employees at Melting Moments Ltd? What strategies would you recommend for its improvement?
CASE STUDY
Life isn't a box of chocolates at Melting Moments.
'This is driving me crazy', said Caroline Dawson, Head of HR at Melting Moments Ltd., a chocolate manufacturer located in Broadmeadows in the northern suburbs of Melbourne.
'What's the problem', asked Dan Rogers, the HR Business partner.
'Where do I start...,' Caroline sighed.
Caroline had just finished her report on the yearly HR balanced scorecard, which is used to measure HR outputs on a yearly basis to give to the CEO. The results were less than impressive.
The Broadmeadows factory employs 200 people. Thirty employees work in the office for sales, marketing, and administration. Twenty work in transport. There are 150 food processing workers who undertake mundane, repetitive tasks, ranging from mixing materials, to packing chocolates into cute little boxes that have made the company successful in a competitive market. Of the 150 food processing workers, 138 are women who are from Non-English backgrounds; predominantly from Vietnam and India, with a smaller Chinese cohort.
Annual employee turnover is a major problem, yet times are tough in Melbourne, with unemployment being high. Employees are paid according to a modern award, with the majority on hourly wage rates that are only just above the minimum. In particular, the food processing employees are covered by the Food Processing Award. Under this award, employees are paid a wage rate of $21.05 per hour, which is only slightly above the National Minimum Wage of $20.33 per hour (or $772.60 per 38 hour week, before tax). The wage rate of $21.05 per hour paid to these workers is in fact below the hourly wage rate paid to hospitality and retail workers, even cleaners, within the local district.
The combination of these circumstances has seen Caroline spend an inordinate amount of time advertising for process workers in main local newspaper, The Broad-ly Weekly, as well as in local community newspapers published specifically for Vietnamese, Indian and Chinese readers.
As part of this recruitment process, Caroline invite job applicants to come to the factory and talk to the team leaders. The team leaders ask the candidates a series of questions, after which they provide a list of preferred candidates to the Human Resource Department.
Every year for the past five years, Caroline has had to hire around 60 to 70 new employees; so there is a very high turnover at the factory. She believes the main reason for this high turnover is the better wages offered by other local factories. But this is not the only reason. There is an annual survey of employees that seeks to ascertain their attitudes and morale. It is run by the Human Resource Department and involves an anonymous questionnaire that is given to team leaders for distribution to team members. The survey question ask employees about the work they perform, the extent of satisfaction they hold towards pay, access to training and safety, as well as other issues pertaining to workplace harassment, discrimination, and so on. Recent survey results suggest that process workers in particular are very happy with their jobs. Indeed so much so that their responses to various survey questions recorded near perfect scores.
This seemed odd to Caroline, given the high turnover rate amongst these workers. She suspected the staller scores may be the product of supervisors and team leaders helping process workers fill in the survey. Most of the latter, she thought, may have difficulty understanding the language used in the survey, so perhaps the scores did not genuinely reflect the views held towards their job roles.
These suspicions were recently confirmed in a conversation Caroline found herself in when she decided to treat herself to some dumplings at the Happy Dumplings Café at a local shopping centre near the factory.
As Caroline waited for her food a woman approached her smiling. 'Hi Caroline', said the woman in broken English.
Caroline returned the greeting, and realised it was Mai, a former employee of the factory who had left a few months earlier.
'Hi Mai... smiled Caroline. How are you? What have you been up to these days? ... Have you found a new job?'.
As Mai began to reply, a tear began to run down her cheek. 'It's been hard...no work...no money... but... but...' Indeed Mai began sobbing... 'I couldn't work for the company anymore because my doctor told me it was bad for my brain... and my health.'
Caroline looked on puzzled and a little distressed, 'What... What do you mean?'.
Over the next hour Caroline listened to Mai's story. The dumplings she had so looked forward to eating went cold as she took in the full measure of Mai's experience at Melting Moments.
Mai's story: 'The factory is a horrible place to work. There are so many problems there. Everyone in Broadmeadows knows that it is a bad place to work and only people who are really desperate and can't get a job at Georges Biscuits (which pays really well and has good conditions) apply for this work. The work is boring and repetitive and to make it worse it is dangerous. The speed on the machinery is too fast. The supervisors always turn the speed of the machines up so that we work faster even though they know that it will injure us. Hoa Nguyen, Thai Trung and the Indian girl called Dinithi had to leave the factory because they hurt their arms. They couldn't complain and get the workers compensation because they were scared, they would never work again. I hurt my shoulder and my doctor put me on strong medication to help the pain, but it got worse. I couldn't do anything at home like cleaning or cooking and the pain made me always angry at the kids and my husband. But even worse than the pain from the machinery was the bullying from the team leaders. They scream at us all the time. The team leader screams at us in Vietnamese and the Indian team leader in her own language. If we are sick, they call us at home and scream at us. They aren't good people.
Most of the ladies can't speak English or speak it poorly so they rely on the team leader for too much information about when to work, how to do the work and who does the work.
Sometimes we must stay at work for an hour without pay because we haven't met the targets that they gave us for the day. If we want to get any overtime which we all want because the wages are so low then we have to give gifts to the team leader or give them 20% of our overtime pay. They usually give the overtime to their favourites. Miss Hoa the team leader gives most of the overtime to her friends.
There are many other problems, but nobody dares to complain because nobody will listen. The men who work in the transport area of the factory, the Australians always call us racist names or try to ask the younger women on dates. We tell them to go away but they don't listen.
When we do those measures ... called performance appraisals the team leader just gives us a score without even telling us and threatens to make us look bad with the bosses if we complain. It is the same with the survey that you give us every year. The team leaders fill them out pretending that we are all happy and give them back to Human resources That makes all of us upset that we don't really get a say about how we feel... but If we were to complain about it we would be fired.
I'm sorry but it makes me upset just thinking about it. I know that there is a new car parts factory opening in Craigieburn soon and the advertisements in the Vietnamese newspapers say that it is great pay and flexible hours and most of the ladies still in the factory have already put in applications for jobs so I think soon you will have big problems getting people. Anyway, I have to go now I have a doctor's appointment about my shoulder. You take care.
'Mai, I am so, so sorry for you, and to learn of your experience at the factory. Please give me your mobile number I will call back later in the week.'
Mai left the café.
Later that day Caroline sat at her desk back at the factory. She stared at her computer screen. The title of the report she was writing read, HR Response to HR Scorecard, but the screen was blank.