Rakon: Labour Relations Policy And Retention Strategies

Rakon is a global high technology company which was founded in 1967 by Warren Robinson. Rakon designs and manufactures advanced frequency control and timing solutions. The company has four manufacturing plants, including two joint ventures plants, located in New Zealand, France, India and China and five research and development (R&D) centres. Customer support centres are located in ten offices worldwide. The company's focus is on enabling next generation technologies in the telecommunications, global positioning and space & defence markets.

Rakon designs and manufactures advanced frequency control and timing solutions for telecommunications, global positioning and space and defence applications. Rakon products are found at the forefront of communications where speed and/or reliability are paramount. The company's products provide extremely accurate clocking signals, which are then used to generate precise electrical, radio or optical signals in networks and systems around the globe. Additionally Rakon offers a broad product portfolio to meet its customers timing and frequency control requirements. Whether it be within wired, wireless and fibre telecommunications networks, navigation devices, or satellites in space.

Assume that you are an expert Human Resource Management consultant brought in by the Rakon board of directors to advise on their Labour relations policy. Carefully investigate the information above and conduct a thorough research from the company website to identify the labour relations policy for this organisation. And prepare a formal report for the board of directors outlining their take for manging relationship with various stakeholders involved.

You report should encompass the following points:

1. Evaluate Rakon as a growing organisation with a global scope in terms of their human capital management practices and recommend fivestrategies that manages key issues such as relationship with trade unions.

2. Conduct a further investigation in to the company’s retention strategies and comment on the importance of retention strategies in the current global competitive environment for human capital recruitment. Recommend two strategies for Rakon

Human resource management is mainly concerned with the management of the human capital of the organisation where the company needs to focus on its policies and systems for providing best to the employees. The main purpose of this report is to go through the company Rakon which is a global high technology company initiated its operations in 1967 and to prepare the formal report for the Board of directors for advising the management of relationship of trade unions with the management. The important issues like employee’s retention and its strategies will be discussed in order to manage better human capital in the company. The company need to face global competition for which effective capital recruitment is necessary. The report will throw a light on such issues and strategies to face the global competitive environment.

Rakon claims itself as a fast paced and dynamic company which tries to deliver innovative solutions to its customers. The company follows a matrix structure in which the teams work together and gain from the synergies created. This is the reason behind the success of Rakon. The company has people from diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds which work closely to meet the objectives of the company. As per the company’s website, it is committed to a sustainability policy for labour and human rights. The company also referred the standards of the international organisations such as International Labour Organisation to clarify its standards (Rakon, 2016).

The company is committed to protect the rights of the employees so that they can be entitled to respect and dignity. The company follows certain labour standards.  These labour standards include Freely Chosen employment for the people. The company strictly avoid child labour. The working hours of the employees are fixed and do not exceed the maximum hours of work set up by the government regulations. The wages and benefits are as per the minimum legal requirements and the company does not make any discrimination and provide equal opportunities to all irrespective of gender, age, background, religion, etc. (Muya & Simotwo, 2013).

The Relationship between employers and employees is adversarial and the unions can ensure the gain for the employees. The main aim of the labour unions is to improve the performance of the organisation and bring sustainability between the relationship of employers and employees. Trade unions in the 21^st century have political influence on the employers. Unions play an important role in the corporate world of Australia of 21^st century. It takes care of raising the living standard of the workers and to get them social justice. There is an Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) which has dominant position in making the conditions easier for the workers in the organisations (Armstrong & Taylor, 2014). The role of the trade unions have changed over the years in the organisations and with the growing competition, the challenges for the trade unions have also increased. The coming years will be more challenged for these unions. In 21^st century, the union density decreased. The Employment Relations Act 1999 shows more favourable legal growth and development for the unions and more voluntary recognition was developed (Edwards, 2009). 

Labour Relations Policy at Rakon

The legal reforms and economic changes have much larger impact on the decline of the membership in trade unions over the time. So, the power of union weakened and a rise in the lower paid workers was seen which prompted government to intervene in between. Trade unions have used strategies of collective bargaining and collective agreements for making the employers agree with their demands (Aidt & Tzannatos, 2008).  The Employment Contracts Act 1991 came into force in 1991 ended the legal status and the monopoly of the unions which gave rise to collective bargaining. Rakon gives a complete right to the employees so that they can work freely and good relationship can be maintained with the management.  The employees have full right to join the unions or not. They are also free to bargain collectively in respect to the local laws of the government (Gumbrell-McCormick & Hyman, 2013).  The employees are made free to communicate freely with the management and share their issues or opinions with respect to the working conditions or surroundings (Neves & Eisenberger, 2012). For this purpose the company frame various strategies like providing expert support to the union and employees by the management, Recognition can be provided to the unions, Negotiation can be made with good intention and other industrial actions can be taken by looking into all the matters (Kelly & Heery, 2009). 

The company can make efforts to deal with the highly competitive global market. The company have to do this in order to manage the strong and talented pool of employees. It is the duty of the organisation to nurture their talent at all levels of organisation. This is how the company can manage their good relationships with the Trade unions (David & Barbara, 2009).

Rakon need to develop effective retention strategies so that its talented and effective workforce can be retained for providing better services. Retaining employees is very important for the company in the current global competitive environment (Kumar, 2013). It is very important for the company to develop retention plans and strategies in order to meet the long term goals and success for the organisation (Das & Baruah, 2013).  The retention strategies by Rakon include:

Job security: Rakon need to promote the feeling of security within employees to retain the right people for the job and meeting the goals and objectives of the company. It is a motivational factor for the employees. It offers career stability to the employees and motivates them to give their best to the organisation.  The company should make the employee valued and should have believe in the contributions they make. For providing the security, the employees need to perform well and show their determination for the company (Volper, 2012).

Retention Strategies for Rakon

Effective compensation package: This is also one of the main reasons why employees leave the organisations. Better compensation packages are required to be paid to the employees so that they feel motivate to work for the company (Schuler & Jackson, 2008).  Rakon pay compensation to the employees which is applicable as per the wage laws and they provide the legally mandate benefits to the employees. It has been found that most of the employees leave the company because they get higher compensation in another company. Rakon should keep its salary competitive and well-rounded benefits should be provided in order to retain the talented employees and their experience with the company for a longer period of time (Dharshini, 2017).

Better and peaceful work environment: Rakon have working hours as per the employment laws of the country. The company give humane treatment to all the employees and take care that no employee goes through the activities like sexual harassment, abuse, mental or physical coercion and any kind of verbal abuse. The disciplinary requirements are communicated to the employees. The company respect the cultural differences among the employees and provide equal treatment to all which provides a good environment to the employees to work (Vijayalakshmi & Balanagagurunaathan, 2012).

These retention strategies are adopted by Rakon in order to keep its best talent for a longer period of time. It helps the business in managing the high demand and low supply of technical labour and also in managing the costs of the management incurred on the employees and their training and development. The company tries to set up an environment where the employee gets developed at every stage. It will ultimately benefit the company in achieving its long term goals (Shanghvi, 2012).

Conclusion

Being a Human Resource management consultant appointed by Rakon, after going through the relationships of trade unions with the management and the retention strategies followed by the company, it is advised that the company should focus more on managing the relationship between the trade unions and management. It is recommended that the company should run the motivation and training programs which will make the employees feel valued in the organisation. The company should use reward the high performers and should develop the ones who have capability to reach the level. Genuine feedbacks of employees should be taken and considered to increase motivation and loyalty among the employees. Failing to this, the company could have impact on its sales and delivery of its products and on its reputation as well.

References

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Armstrong, M & Taylor, S (2014). Armstrong's handbook of human resource management practice. Kogan Page Publishers.

Das, B L & Baruah, M (2013). Employee retention: a review of literature. Journal of Business and Management, 14(2), 8-16.

David, P & Barbara, P (2009). An analysis of workplace representatives, union power and democracy in Australia. British Journal of Industrial Relations. 

Dharshini, P (2017). Employee Retention Strategies. Retrieved from https://www.bodhih.com/employee-retention-strategies/.

Edwards, P (Ed.). (2009). Industrial relations: theory and practice. John Wiley & Sons.

Gumbrell-McCormick, R & Hyman, R (2013). Trade unions in Western Europe: hard times, hard choices. Oxford University Press.

Kelly, J & Heery, E (2009). Working for the union: British trade union officers (Vol. 22). Cambridge University Press.

Kumar, S (2013). The impact of employee benefits as retention strategy in a concept dining restaurant chain in India. Masters in Arts in Human Resource Management.

Muya, J & Simotwo, P C (2013). Role of Trade Unions in the Enhancement of Peaceful Work Relations for Efficient Conflict Management in Public Universities in Kenya. International Journal of Science and Research (IJSR).

Neves, P & Eisenberger, R (2012). Management communication and employee performance: The contribution of perceived organizational support. Human Performance, 25(5), 452-464.

Rakon (2016). Business Code of Conduct. Retrieved from https://www.rakon.com/corporate/careers/careers-nz/careers-culture.

Schuler, R S & Jackson, S E (2008). Strategic human resource management. John Wiley & Sons.

Shanghvi, I (2012). Retaining Immigrants in Rural Communities Employee Retention Strategies. Rural Development Institute.

Vijayalakshmi, V & Balanagagurunaathan, K (2012). Employee retention – key for organizational success. Journal of Exclusive Management Science. Vol 1 Issue 3.

Volper, R (2012). 7 Compensation Tactics To Help Retain Employees. CNBC.