Managing HRM Strategy and Development
Introduction
The Company
Activision Blizzard (AB) is the largest international publisher of entertainment software. (Activision Blizzard 2009)
Activision Blizzard has a mixed portfolio of products in a wide range of categories and markets, these products are used on a variety of different hardware platforms and operating systems. AB has created, licensed, or acquired a group of highly recognizable brands that are marketed to a growing variety of customers. Genres include action/adventure, action sports, racing, role-playing, simulation, first-person action and strategy games (Activision Blizzard 2009). Some of the most popular franchises include: Call of Duty, Guitar Hero and Tony Hawk.
The company has over 7,000 employees who are based in 20 countries around the world. These employees represent developers, sales, marketing, shared services and supply chain. In addition, AB has 21 studios that focus on the development of various titles in their own specialty areas. (Activision Blizzard 2009).
For this report the Strategy for Activision Blizzard will be used alongside the Global HR Strategy that has been adapted and analysed for use at Centresoft. Centresoft is a subsidiary of Activision Blizzard. Centresoft and it’s sister company PDQ Distribution form the largest and most successful specialist distributor of computer and video games in the UK and have approximately 200 staff over three sites. These employees are split into the following departments made up of a sales, accounts, customer service and warehouse team.
Strengths and weakness of human resources
Holbeche (2001) asserts that by linking the HR strategy to the business strategy employees will be managed more effectively, organisational performance will improve therefore business success will follow. Therefore, HR practitioners need to take on a more ‘Emerging Strategic Role’ (Cobb, Samuels and Sexton 1998). This can be done by playing an important role in the formation of strategy, being able to support business strategies and initiatives, helping the organisation to develop the necessary capabilities and in the implementation of change management. (Lawler and Mohram xxxx). This is one of the key strengths of Human Resources within Activision, as the Chief People Officer is part of the leadership team. This means that when the corporate strategy is implemented HR are involved in the process. This in turn helps HR to understand the business needs and build a strategy to support these objectives.
Another key strength of Human Resources is that the HR strategy is built on the Balance Scorecard approach. The Balanced Scorecard (BSC) approach allows the HR department to communicate it’s strategy to everyone in the organisation, which helps to engage staff and external stakeholders. However a weakness of this approach is the language used on the HR BSC and the business BSC do not match, therefore creating difficulty down the line on how they both link.
Although the HR Strategy does not all together match the business strategy, in terms of matching strategy to strategy it is linked to the main overall Objective “We are the fastest growing global video game publisher with record industry margins” (Activision 2009). The main focus for HR is to ensure that this main objective is continued and provide added value by building internal capabilities to help the organisation reach business success (Luoma 2000).
A global HR strategy (Appendix B) has been produced, from this it is the responsibility of all Senior HR Managers to adapt this strategy to add value for their own business unit. For this report the HR strategy has been set for the AB subsidiary company Combined Distribution Holdings (CDH) (Appendix C).
HR Plan
For this report a HR plan (Appendix x) has been constructed using the Balanced Score Card approach (Kaplan and Norton 1992).
1.0 Excellence in Recruitment
CDH is part of a fast moving industry with a lot of competition. It is therefore vital for the organisation to find the best talent in the industry. The first section to this scorecard is Excellence in Recruitment which is linked to the 4th and 5th business strategy (Appendix X) and section 1 of the global HR Strategy.
According to Holbeche (2001) and Ulrich and Brockbank (2005) attracting new talent is a key task of human resources. To build on capabilities, skills and experience that will help the organisation reach competitive success, it is more than just finding someone to fill a role as discussed by Taylor (2005). Therefore the HR department need to be able to adapt to different recruitment styles to attract the best candidates. Before this strategy can be put into practice HR need to look internally and understand where the business is heading, do a “stock take of current staff” (Holbeche 2001:168) assess where there are gaps in current skills, how many new employees are needed to fulfil the business strategy, build retention strategies and looking externally by recruiting new people into the business (Taylor 2005 and Holbeche 2001).
Added Value
From selecting the right recruitment method for the company HR can add value by hiring the right people for the company (Ulrich and Brockbank 2005), who in turn can help the organisation reach objectives and sustain competitive advantage.
Excellent recruitment processes also add value, because if performed correctly through the correct method, costs can be saved and turnover can be decreased. Taylor (2005) asserts value can be added by having better recruitment campaigns which leads to improved selections decisions being made. According to Raynor and Adam-Smith (2005) effective recruitment methods can reduce high staff turnover, perofmance issues and dissatisfied customers low employee morale.
Meeting stakeholder needs
According to Ulrich and Brockbank (2005:98) “people practices add value to all stakeholders”. This strategy therefore meets the needs of the key stakeholders who are acknowledge as Directors, parent company and customers (appendix x) by employing the right people for the vacant roles who can contribute to the success of the organisation. By having the right people in place, customer needs will also be met as relationships are built
Current Recruitment Practice at CDH
At present all Line managers are responsible for their own recruitment and all use recruitment agencies. Although agencies are currently used, this process can also be very expensive due to fees charged (Taylor 2005), especially if there is a high turnover of staff.
Depending on the role, an agency can charge up to 25% �2,500 fee per new starter, although according to the CIPD (2008) the cost of filling a vacancy is �4667. Therefore the cost implications of using agencies are very high (PIlbream and Corbridge 2006). On the other hand agencies do all the groundwork for pre selecting candidates for interview which saves time for line managers (Taylor 2005).
Proposed Recruitment Process for CDH
As part of the recruitment strategy the HR department to be able to support line managers in this recruitment process by looking at different ways of attracting talented candidates. On way of doing this is through using online CV databank websites for example, Monster.co.uk or Total Jobs.
The advantage to this method according to Galanki (2002) is the low cost involved, for a standard job advertisement of one month on Total jobs the cost if �350 (Total jobs 2010), on Monster.co.uk the cost for a one month advertisement is �270 (monster.co.uk 2010). Therefore the costs are dramatically decreased compared to using recruitment agencies and
However, using this method would mean that as stated by Pilbream and Corbridge (2006) that the volume of CV’s of applicants may not be high quality or unsuitable. This in itself will be time consuming for Line managers to sift through these cv’s to find suitable candidates, although as the CIPD (2009) assert using this method gives access to a wider pool of candidates and speeds up the time of the recruitment process CIPD 2009).
2.0 Excellence in Reward
According to Marchington and Wilkinson (2005) Reward management is a key aspect of HR strategy. Not only is it a strategic plan that can affect organisational performance but also has an influence on values and beliefs (Armstrong 2002). As asserted by Marchington and Wilkinson (2005) HR need to be able to fit reward strategies to organisational strategies to be effective.
There have been many theories about reward being a motivational tool for employees as discussed by Martin (1996) for example F.W.Taylor viewed that employees were only motivated by money. Although Dyer (1997) asserts that the Hawthorne Experiments proved that non monetary rewards can motivate more than high wages.
Lawler (2000) states that rewards can influence a number of HR processes that can have value and therefore make an impact on organisational performance, these include the influence on recruitment and selection, a good reward system can attract the best candidiates, which could reduce turnover. It can also have an impact on the culture of the organisation for example, if employees are rewarded for long service, it is likely to increase loyalty.
Rewards at Centresoft
At present Centresoft offer a reward including profit related pay, stakeholder pension scheme, Life assurance and performance bonus schemes.
Therefore the strategy proposed for reward is to undertake a salary benchmarking project along with developing a pay structure (Job Evaluation) for all job roles levels within the organisation. Although this can be a lengthy complicated process as asserted by Marchington and Wilkinson (2005) and as discussed by Egan (2004) time will be a requirement to ensure this process if planned and conducted effectively, the use of outside consultancies although could ease the pressure from HR prove to be too costly. Although, there are online software packages that can support the process (Northgate Arinso Rewards Solutions 2010).
Egan (2004) also states that overall job evaluation ensures that all pay job roles are fair and equitable, but also pay can be benchmarked against other organisations and can therefore make adjustments.
Armstrong and Murlis (1998) state that an advantage of a job evaluation is that it ensures that it meets the requirements of equal pay legislation, so businesses are at less risk of grievances.
3.0 Excellence in Training, Learning and Development
This strategy is linked specifically linked to the 5th Business strategy, however all aspects of the business strategy will be benefit from training, learning and development. The key aspects of this strategy will be to focus on Leadership Development, Succession Planning, and Management Training on the short term and long term undertaking Training and Learning skills analysis on the whole workforce.
Added Value
Harrison (2005) states that developing the skills of key employees will help support the organisation on reaching objectives, generate earnings and but also enables them to be able to respond to strategic change (CIPD 2009).
HR can add value by developing their employees because as they develop their employees in line with company objectives not only are they increasing the employees skills there is also the intrinsic advantages of having a motivated workforce that the company has taken time or money in developing them. Adding the skills of the workforce can gain confidence in individuals and also
The use of coaching does give HR the opportunity to add value to the organisation, this can be done at the outset by forming objectives by linking development to individual and organisation needs as discussed by IRS (2006). Improving quality of customer service, high performance working, improving skills
Leadership development
Most potential managers have some aspects of good innate leadership skills (CIPD 2009), but require training. The key for HR will be to identify the key members of staff who have this leadership capability and develop their skills.
There are many ways of developing people in a leadership role or future leaders.
Firstly future leaders will need to be identified. According to the IRS employment review (2008) the easiest route is to gain line managers opinions the employees who show the leadership characteristics. Once these potential leaders have been identified a development plan can be put together. The use of 3600 feedback is a comprehensive way of doing this as it gives feedback on skills, knowledge and working relationships of the individual (CIPD 2009) to be able to compile a development plan. Although, Luthans and Peterson (2003) state that using this method produces a large amount of information that will need analysing. However, The CIPD (2009) assert that 3600 feedback can be administered online, although at a cost, which according to Appraisal 360.co.uk the cost per person is approximately �97.00, using this method online cuts down the cost of analysing information and have reports readily available (CIPD 2009).
Marchington and Wilkinson (2005) affirm another advantage of using this method would help open communications within the organisation with regard to feedback, in contrast the CIPD (2008) state that if the organisation it not used to this level of feedback it will create mistrust.
To work alongside the 3600 another method to use for leadership development is Coaching, although this is only a short term option. As discussed by McGurk (2008) coaching is not just a platform for developing an individual but also makes an impact on organisational development. Marchington and Wilkinson (2005:254) agree that coaching can have an” impact on the bottom line and increase the organisations intangible benefits.” Although McGurk (2008) argues that is difficult to determine if it does have an impact on the bottom line. Perfornmance appraisal and Personal development plan
For this strategic plan external coaching sources will be used. Using external coaching sources over internal sources can be costly, nonetheless the added advantage of external coaches according to Hall, Otazo and Hollenbeck (1999) is that they have experience in many organisations, so can bring their expertise into the organisation. External coaches are also able to provide sensitive feedback if needed which internal coaches may find difficult to do. On the other hand Hall, Otazo and Hollenbeck argue that internal coaches know the environment and therefore can focus coaching on the organisations highest priorities, using this method will also be less expensive as asserted by McGurk (2008).
Notably, McGurk (2008) gives further examples of other advantages of coaching these include communication skills, increased productivity. In addition Hall et al (1999) lists improved people management skills, increased on objectives as being advantages.
Succession Planning
It is vital for the organisation to have employees who will be able to step up into leadership positions this enables the organisation to protect itself should key staff leave the organisation. Although Murphy (argues) argues without this process, the organisation will have to look for key replacements externally which will take time, and increase recruitment costs. To ensure this happens a succession planning process needs to be put into place.
As the organisation has over 200 employees the focus will be kept mainly on the key members of staff in the short term. The CIPD (2009) state that by doing this the plan to be more manageable. However, Murphy (2009) argues that identifying key talent for succession does pose a threat to equal opportunities and diversity, therefore the CIPD (2009) suggest that HR will need to ensure that the process is transparent and fair.
Before succession planning can begin HR need to be able to link the plan to the business plan and understand the future of the business. Although, Murphy (2009) asserts that if employees are groomed for roles now, these roles may be not be relevant in the future and has no guarantee of success.
One issue with succession planning is the ability of HR to spot potential talent. According to the CIPD (2009) for effective succession planning the process should the responsibility of line managers with HR supporting and facilitating the process, as line managers are able to spot any potential talent and are placed to assess performance this is supported by Holbech (2001). On the other hand Murphy (2009) states that this effectiveness will depend on the relationship of the manager and their team and on the skills of the line manager.
One of these key issues associated with implementing succession planning will be the amount of resources available. As succession planning takes a great deal of time for HR.
4.0 Excellence in Employee Relations
CDH is part of a very competitive fast paced industry therefore, it is important to acknowledge the impact employees can have on organisational success but to also encourage employees to go the extra mile when contributing to the organisation.
The HR plan for excellence in employee relations focuses on employee involvement, the company already have an upward communication practice of ICE forum that meet regularly and have recently implemented an employee survey in which Hr are awaiting the results before any action can take place.
Employee Involvement Strategy
The strategy proposed is to introduce a downward communication practice of staff social page/newsletter to the organisation as asserted by Marchington (1992). This page will include company information, financial performance, strategy and values alongside health and wellbeing, employee blogs based on a “day in the life” announcements and competitons. Ulrich (2005) argues that communicating values, strategy, information and financial performance needs to be simple enough for employees to understand.
Gennard and Judge (2005) state that using this approach, will increase employee commitment, loyalty. Although, Kushell (2001) argues that it is difficult to measure these results.
There is another disadvantage to this approach and that is the time it will take to implement and manage. HR will need to gather information for the page on a regular basis and will need to ensure that the page is updated regularly to keep employees interested. HR will also need to rely on the I.T. department for support in designing the social page on the intranet again this could take time to implement if having to rely on other teams and their workload.
The added value this approach can have in the organisation are described by Gennard and Judge (2001), these are they can improve employee morale, generate commitment, build trust, Holbeche (2001) adds that employees have a better understanding of the company strategy and reasons for why they do the job the way they do, can improve quality and productivity, employees are more interested in their job role.
his strategy meets the needs of the employees and customers. As communication improves and employees become more involved, they will begin to believe and build trust in the company they work for as discussed by Gennard and Judge (2005)