Identifying And Addressing The Problems Of Employee Turnover In Woolworths Supermarkets: An Essay.

Overview of Woolworths Supermarkets

Question:

Discuss about the Commitment Profiles and Employee Turnover.

The human resource of an organisation refers to the various members of the workforce that has been serving the concerned company. The various organisations that have been operating in the global markets might face problems that stem from the various conditions like the increase in the number of the complains that are received from the clients of the concerned company, the loss of the contracts that the company might have been a part of  the decrease in the market share of the company, the high amount of the staff turnover, the loss in the profit that is earned by the company and the lack of the needed funding for the smooth functioning of the company (Bratton & Gold, 2017). The following report deals with the identification of one such problem in the widely known company of Woolworths Supermarkets. The report opens with a brief overview of the company and then proceeds to identify the problem that is faced by the company. The report then proceeds to provide with a recommendation on the ways that the company might implement in order to get rid of the concerned problem that the company has been facing.

The Woolworths Group is one of the major business organisations in Australia that has been operating in the retail market in Australia and New Zealand (Woolworthsgroup.com.au., 2018). The company is known to be a huge retail magnet and owns the second rank within the Australian retail market in terms of the revenue that the company earns, the first rank holder being Wesfarmers. Woolworths Supermarket is a grocery store and supermarket that has been operative in the Australian market and is managed by Woolworths Limited (Woolworthslimited.com.au., 2018). The supermarket majorly deals with the marketing of the various items of groceries, household products, baby and pet supplies, beauty and other health products as well as the various stationery products. However, in recent times, the retail magnet has been facing issues that pertain to the huge turnover rate of the staff and the loss of the contracts that the company might have aimed at investing in. The company in the recent times has also been facing a huge loss of $1.235 billion, the highest loss that has been incurred by the company over the large span of the past 20 years (Woolworthslimited.com.au., 2018). The employees of the organisation have been reported to be demotivated in the matters that pertain to serving the organisation. The demotivation could have resulted from the lack of the engagement of the employees of the company towards the various matters that pertain to the growth of the organisation. The huge turnover of the employees of the organisation might result due to the poor quality of the management that is observed within the organisation. The concerned workforce of the organisation has been facing a lack in the motivation in their assigned work due to the fact that there had been an observed lack in the clarity of the communication that had been taking place within the organisation (Stanley et al., 2013). This resulted in the half-hearted work on the part of the employees of the concern that further resulted in the conditions that related to the loss of the contracts of the company (Tews, Michel & Stafford, 2013). The concerned workforce had further reported that they have not been receiving the correct amount of the recognition from the company on the basis of the service that they have been offering to the concerned company (Mowday, Porter & Steers, 2013). The rewards that are extended to the concerned members of the workforce are reported to be meagre in comparison to the amount of the work and dedication that are expected of them (Park & Shaw, 2013). This has further led to the loss of the engagement of the concerned employees to the company, thereby leading to a decline in the overall performance of the company.

Identified Issues and Causes

One of the major issues being identified is the high rate of employee turnover. With the emergence of this issue, attrition rate for Woolworths is increasing, which is causing in loss of competitive advantages for the organization (Hausknecht & Holwerda, 2013). This is due to the reason that with the exit of the employees, the skill sets of them enhanced with training and development program are also lost (Hancock et al., 2013). In addition, it also increased the cost for the organization due to the reason that added cost is involved in recruiting and selecting the new employees. However, the issue is being aroused due to the ineffective style of leadership in the organization. This is because; authoritative style of leadership is followed in Woolworths, which is having little space for the employees to share their feedback and opinion in the organizational processes (Herman, Huang & Lam, 2013). According to the authoritative style of leadership, the decision making process involves only the upper level management and without determining the need and requirement of the employees.

In the case of Woolworths, authoritative style of leadership is initiated and employees are less involved. This is leading to the demoralization of the employees in the organization. Moreover, due to the fact that the requirements and the need of the employees are not being determined, grievances with the employees are more in Woolworths. This is also leading to the high level of turnover of the employees. Having authoritative style of leadership in place is causing hindrances in flexible workplace environment for the employees (Iqbal, Anwar & Haider, 2015).

Another issue being identified is the increase in the customer complaints. This is the secondary impact of the previous identified issue of demoralized employees. The more de-motivated will be the employees, the less will be the quality of the customer service. According to the Hertzberg’s two factor theory, there are two elements or factors need to be determined by the organizations in order to have high level of job satisfaction among the employees. However, in the case of Woolworths, hygiene factors are not well initiated. It is identified that the employees are having issues with their salaries and work environment. This is leading to have disengaged employees in place. Thus having disengaged employees is causing negative impact on the quality of the customer service and rise in the customer complaints (Pantouvakis & Bouranta, 2013). Due to the demoralization of the employees, the complaints of the customers are also not being effectively resolved. This is further increasing the issues with the customers.

Recommendation for Change Management using Lewin's Model

Identified issues can be solved only with the help of implementing an effective change in the organization. However, initiation of the change management should be done with the help of accurate theories.

In this case, Lewin’s model of change management will be used. According to this theory, the first step in the change management is the unfreezing the existing processes (Shirey, 2013). In this step, it is important for Woolworths to review the current situation in their business operation. They should consult with the employees in this case and should identify the issues and challenges faced by them. This will help in identifying the areas for improvement in the organization and the areas that should be considered in the change management process. The more employees will be consulted in the process, the fewer will be the chances in having resistance in the process.

The next step is implementing the change. In this step, Woolworths should implement the change according to the factors identified in the previous step. The most important area where the change management should be implemented is the leadership approach of Woolworths. This is due to the reason that in the above section of identification of the issues, it was identified that major issues of the Woolworths are originating from the ineffectiveness of the leadership in the organization. Thus, from the feedback from the employees, a new leadership approach or style should be implemented in the organization. This will help in effective resolution of the issues with the employees.

The last step is the refreezing of the organizational processes. This step is also important due to the reason that with the initiation of the change in the organization, the existing process and cultures got disturbed. In this step, those organizational processes should be rearranged. Another important factor to be considered by Woolworths in this step is the evaluation of the effectiveness of the implemented change. Continuous mechanism of gathering feedback from the associated stakeholders should be initiated in order to determine their effectiveness and productivity before and after the implementation of the change. Effective evaluation of the change management process will help in identifying the shortcomings and modifying them accordingly. This will ensure a quality process of implementation of change in the organization.

Conclusion

Thus, from the above discussion, it might be concluded that the company has been facing issues due to the high amount of the employee turnover and the loss of the contracts of the company. The company might find the implementation of the various leadership theories in order to help reset the various problems that it had been facing in the recent times.

References

Bratton, J., & Gold, J. (2017). Human resource management: theory and practice. Palgrave.

Hancock, J. I., Allen, D. G., Bosco, F. A., McDaniel, K. R., & Pierce, C. A. (2013). Meta-analytic review of employee turnover as a predictor of firm performance. Journal of Management, 39(3), 573-603.

Hausknecht, J. P., & Holwerda, J. A. (2013). When does employee turnover matter? Dynamic member configurations, productive capacity, and collective performance. Organization Science, 24(1), 210-225.

Herman, H. M., Huang, X., & Lam, W. (2013). Why does transformational leadership matter for employee turnover? A multi-foci social exchange perspective. The Leadership Quarterly, 24(5), 763-776.

Iqbal, N., Anwar, S., & Haider, N. (2015). Effect of leadership style on employee performance. Arabian Journal of Business and Management Review, 5(5).

Mowday, R. T., Porter, L. W., & Steers, R. M. (2013). Employee—organization linkages: The psychology of commitment, absenteeism, and turnover. Academic press.

Pantouvakis, A., & Bouranta, N. (2013). The interrelationship between service features, job satisfaction and customer satisfaction: Evidence from the transport sector. The TQM Journal, 25(2), 186-201.

Park, T. Y., & Shaw, J. D. (2013). Turnover rates and organizational performance: A  meta-analysis. Journal of applied psychology, 98(2), 268.

Shirey, M. R. (2013). Lewin’s theory of planned change as a strategic resource. Journal of Nursing Administration, 43(2), 69-72.

Stanley, L., Vandenberghe, C., Vandenberg, R., & Bentein, K. (2013). Commitment profiles and employee turnover. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 82(3), 176-187.

Tews, M. J., Michel, J. W., & Stafford, K. (2013). Does fun pay? The impact of workplace fun on employee turnover and performance. Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, 54(4), 370-382.

Woolworthsgroup.com.au. (2018). Woolworths Group: Quality Brands and Trusted Retailing. Woolworthsgroup.com.au. Retrieved 2 April 2018, from https://www.woolworthsgroup.com.au/

Woolworthslimited.com.au. (2018). Woolworths Group: Quality Brands and Trusted Retailing. Woolworthslimited.com.au. Retrieved 2 April 2018, from https://www.woolworthslimited.com.au/icms_docs/182381_Annual_Report_2015.pdf

Woolworthslimited.com.au. (2018). Woolworths Supermarkets - Woolworths Group. Woolworthslimited.com.au. Retrieved 2 April 2018, from https://www.woolworthslimited.com.au/page/Who_We_Are/Our_Brands/Supermarkets/Woolworths/