Essay: Change In Workplace - British Airways Case Study

The Publicis Loyalty call centre has collaborated with employees and the Australian Services Union (ASU) since 1996 to
improve working conditions in its Melbourne office. The result is a more efficient and competitive business, with lower costs and a higher standard of customer service.

The Publicis Loyalty call centre services QANTAS Club and Frequent Flyer Program members.In 1996, staff turnover and
absenteeism was high and productivity had slipped. Significant structural and operational changes were needed to achieve the quality and cost improvements required by Qantas.Publicis Loyalty call centre began building its relationships with employees and the ASU.

In 1998 it took a major step forward when it struck one of the industry's first union-negotiated Workplace Agreements determining employee wages and conditions.The Agreement replaced the former management's individual contract
system and marked the start of a partnership approach between employees and the ASU that continues today.

Partnership Approach A second Workplace Agreement followed in 2000 after lengthy consultation between management,employees and the ASU. It introduced significant cultural,structural and operational reforms,including pay rises of up to 10% over two years and better leave entitlements.Management and employees now regularly
meet to explore improving employee classification,job redesign, performance monitoring, assessment and rewards...
A Consultative Committee was formed following the 2000 agreement.

Management and employees now regularly meet to explore improving employee classification, job redesign,performance monitoring, assessment and rewards.Publicis Loyalty call centre has also formed partnerships with other industrial relations organisations. It was one of the first Australian call centres to sign the ACTU's Charter
for Call Centres, which sets out minimum employment standards for the industry. 

External and Internal Triggers

Change in Workplace is generally considered as change in organisational behaviour. The change in workplace is mainly initiated by the management for reconstructing organisational structure for adding value and profit towards organisation. In the essay the workplace is considered is British Airways and over here the change in workplace of this organisation is been discussed.

British Airways is considered as a leading airline company in airlines industry. The organisation is situated in United Kingdom. The airline industry is offering domestic as well as international service of airlines besides providing services to passenger. This organisation has an airline route, which is having 150 destinations in more than 75 countries.

Headquarter of organisation is in London. In recent times, the organisation is having 290 aircrafts and 40000 employees. Therefore, it is clearly visible that how much the change in organisation with respect to employee relations and development is required for sustaining growth of British Airways. In this essay a discussion is been emphasized on change in workplace of British Airways with respect to Heery model which reflects on employee relationship, employee training and development.

The organisational change is been initiated by factors like internal and external triggers. External triggers, which initiate workplace changes, are innovations, competitor’s activities, requirement and taste of customers, legislation and policies of government. Internal triggers incorporate new ideas as well as processing of products, innovative design of products and appointment of new management. British Airways also faced this triggers and therefore they needed to respond against it. The organisation introduced Privatisation program for responding against those triggers.

Privatisation programs transferred the ownership of the organisation from the government to private. It was done for enhancing the performance of the organisation as well as increasing the ability for competition. Good leadership and excellent organisational culture results in success of organisation. The effective changes introduced by management of the organisation will be having positive impact on organisational culture.

This will boost the organisational performance (Goetsch and Davis 2014). The change model of organisation stated by Lewin takes place in three different stages. The three different stages are unfreezing, movement and refreezing. This model states that the top management is responsible for identifying changes as well as identify issues raised regarding the process of decision-making and problem solving.

The initiative taken by British Airways for privatising the organisation had positive impact on the organisation. The process of privatisation also faced many resistances like lacking in financial support as the organisation faced a tremendous challenging position due to financial problem (Lange et al. 2015). The organisation was also having a debt of around 1billion pound in the market. The government was not ready to support the organisation for clearing this debt. The privatisation of organisation helped in boosting the performance of  organisation as privatisation of organisation helps in employee training, development, and maintaining the employee relationship, reconstructing the HR management and settling the conflicts due to diversity strategies (Storey 2014).

According to the change model of Heery, change in workplace took place in British Airways can be described with changes took place in Human resource and employee relationship and training. British Airways was considered as one of the large, inefficient and bureaucratic company before the privatisation took place. After the privatisation of organisation, there were certain changes in recruitment and policy of job placement (Harvey and Turnbull 2016). The organisation formulated methodology recruitment, which considers the competencies of candidates in the form of skill, communication, behaviour and knowledge. Interview based on competency assists the organisation in selecting  appropriate candidates that will suit them in the new organisational structure.

The Impact of Privatisation on British Airways

The organisation also led emphasis on strong qualities of leadership, skills like team working and customer service as well as motivating the employee largely. This changes was been incorporated after the organisation undergo privatisation. British Airways also introduces the new employees who are to be hired should go through interview, group exercises, psychometric test, role playing and finding the fact prior being recruited permanently for the organisation (Mills 2017).

British Airways after transferring to private sector implemented the strategy of service orientation, which incorporate training of employee and policy of promotion for employees. The organisation is mainly focused on effective service provided to customer, which is only possible with the help of training program provided to the employees. The program like Putting People First is been oriented for employees who are at the bottom line and program like Managing People First is been oriented for the employees of management level.

The program of Putting People First was been implemented to create employee awareness as well as enhancing teamwork within the employees. This also helps in enhancing the relationship within the employees and assists in employee development. Therefore, according to the model of Heery, the organisation has implemented changes, which helped employees and enhanced employee relationship within the organisation. The program of managing the People First assists management for realising the significant role played by feedback in regards to organisational performance (Williams, Abbott and Heery 2015).

The organisation also implemented rewarding the employees who plays significant role for growth of the organisation. This method acts like a tool of motivating the employees for performing excellently. The organisation also implemented awards of Excellency, bonuses and promotions, which acts as a tool for motivating employees in performing well. Innovative thinking of the employees are been encouraged by the management. Therefore, this changes are been implemented by the organisation which can be regarded as change of model according to Heery.

The organisation also brought changes in method of negotiation. Negotiation is often been applied by them for dealing with organisational conflicts. British Airways implemented different types of negotiation techniques in the field of business. The organisation prefers using integrative bargaining when they are in win-win situation (Abdullateef et al. 2014). However, the organisation might not attain the situation of win-win as it is based on the collection of information and taking decision according to collected information. The process of decision-making is based on vote. The decision is been passed and granted after it has been approved by three fourth part of the majority. This change was new and been implemented by the organisation after it undergone privatisation.

In the recent scenario labour market is not been under the control of employers. The control of labour market was already been taken by employees. Therefore, the organisation also shifted the power of balance towards employees. British Airways also utilised business diversity in their organisation (Gooberman, Haupmeier and Heery 2017). It will help them to attract new graduates towards their organisation, as the organisation will provide development skills and competitive environment for fresh candidates. This change implemented by them also helped them to get skilled employees who can ensure excellent customer services.

Changes in Recruitment and Job Placement Policy

Recruitment of the candidates is not been restricted to age, race, sex, religion, status and disability (Mills 2017). The organisation started recruiting talented people who are capable to do excellent performance for organisation. Therefore, by implementing this change British Airways became confident that they could integrate all the skilful and talented people within their organisation who have capability to bring positive impact for their organisation. Issues regarding employability relationships such as conflicts within employees exist, so employee’s relation is not an exception in this change management.

Therefore, there exist conflicts within the employees. This issue is been solved by manager who is liable to maintain relationship in between employer and employees. The manager resolves these type of issues prior to anything as it can affect productivity. The change brought by organisation in this field is that issues are been solved with priority as it is been linked with organisational productivity (Gittell et al. 2015).

The conflicts present within the organisation are because of the organisational diversity and therefore the occurrence of disagreement is frequent within the organisation. Workplace conflicts yields in loss of valuable time and thus affect productivity of organisation. The result of conflict can be job resignation and weakening of employee relation. The changed management of British Airways efficiently handle these types of situation and regulate this situation in a short span of time.

It is been seen that conflicts always does not add negative impact for organisation. Conflicts also help in relationship strengthening among employees. It helps in improving performance, productivity, interpersonal skills, creativity and skills for decision making. Conflict aroused could be classified as task conflicts, relationship conflicts and process conflicts. It mainly aroused due to disagreements on decisions, ideas and actions regarding business. Task and process conflicts are been easily solved by the managers of British Airways but solving the relationship conflicts is the main challenge for the management (Goetsch and Davis 2014).

The previous management of British Airways was not efficient in solving the relationship conflicts and thus the productivity of organisation was low before it undergoes privatisation. The new change management is efficient enough for solving the relationship conflicts, which is the main threat for the organisation. Thus, the new change management was efficient enough to follow Heery’s model of change management.

British Airways is having diverse organisation, as there are diverse employees present in this organisation. The conflicts aroused due to age, gender, race, bullying, religion and disability. The organisation for maintaining positive relationships among the employees has challenged every sort of stereotypes as well as suppositions. The organisation started giving quality training to their disabled employees so that their potentiality can be maximised. The organisation also started thinking about employees by introducing flexible options of working so that they can balance the work pressure and personal life. Numerous female employees were been recruited by the organisation and they provide full security to them (Helem Mills and Mills 2017).

The organisation made sure that every employee is well knowledge about the policy of the organisation on the field of harassment as well as bullying. Dignity was been given to the employees as the management gives priority to the ideas of racial minorities. The organisation also provides inclusive environment of working for the employees, which is one of the significant change implemented by the organisation. British Airways joined various organisations for raising the concern against racial minorities, bullying, disabled, harassment and cultural diversities (Bamber 2013). Therefore, the organisation adapted this change in strategy for maintain the employee relationships.

Leadership and Employee Training Programs

The organisation adapted safe strategies against cultural diversity. The initiated taken by them for development staff and resolve the issues of cultural diversity by the program of Putting People First was successful. This helped in solving issues related to cultural clash and united the employees among themselves and with the management. This strategy also solved the aroused conflict due to work place change.

The strategy of diversity also assisted the organisation in getting talented employees from all over the world. Therefore, the change management of British Airways assisted the organisation in regaining its lost status (Pearson 2016). Employees are always motivated for working with team as they are been given respect and been provided with benefits. The conflicts stages are also been resolved at a first rate, which helps the organisation to maintain its productivity.  

British Airways is a significant airline company in airline industry, which has a decent history when it comes to about workplace change. The association's turn to embrace the market-drove approach was a critical move to guarantee it turns into an aggressive worldwide aircraft. In any case, while the change procedure was imperative it was essential for the organization to think of a powerful way to deal with help encourage the change procedure and manage the imperviousness to change. The utilization of the policy of HR to encourage the process of change was not considered one of the best strategy as it can yields to the rise in conflict in between employees (Eaton 2017).

It is in this manner that various choices for change are presented and investigated, and the most suitable is chosen. A successful change process is grounded on great and straightforward correspondence, the change is in accordance with the association's procedures, and most imperative, the administration plays the lead part of executing change. Besides, the achievement of an association is grounded on its way of life.

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