Improving Productivity At Wantitall.co.za: Strategies And Implementation

The Present State of Productivity at Wantitall.co.za

Discuss about the Productivity in South African Retail Company.

Wantitall.co.za is an online retail shop based in Johannesburg, South Africa. The online retail store has presence in South Africa and Brazil. The state of productivity of Wantillall.co.za is not satisfactory owing its limited presence within the two countries. The productivity of the online retail company is further demeaned by limited opportunities to expand into the neighbouring countries owing to the low economic growth of Africa. This present state of productivity of Wantitall.co.za has necessitated creation of awareness of productivity and the need to increase it (Domenech, Rizov and Vecchi 2015).

The employees of Wantitall.co.za would be made aware of the need to attain high level of productivity. The employees of the company would be invited to a meeting to discuss the present productivity level. One would also consider the present market position of the company as far as the global ecommerce market is concerned. As one can point out compared to the ecommerce companies of other emerging markets like Alibaba of China, Wantitall.co.za has limited market presence (aliexpress.com 2018). This is limiting its revenue generation and increasing its chance of being acquired by the bigger ecommerce companies from other countries. The employees would be involved to form strategies on how the ecommerce company can improve its productivity. The team leaders or the departmental heads while assigning target to individual employee would take into account factors like experience and qualifications. The senior employees would have to take higher targets and as assist the junior employees with achievement of the target. This way the employees of Wantitall.co.za can be involved in setting the target and fulfilling of the same, thus improving the productivity of the company as a whole (Jena and Panda 2017).

Individual productivity is the first factor which would impact productivity in Wantitall.co.za. Higher the productivity of individual employees, higher will be the productivity of the company as a whole.

The productivity of the teams would play determining role in productivity of the company. High productivity of the team would automatically contribute towards high productivity. All the members of the teams would have to contribute towards the productivity of the teams (Segarra et al. 2016).

Number of orders received online from customers for goods would play a significant role in improving productivity at Wantitall.co.za. Higher number of orders received would provide more opportunities for the employees of the company serve higher number of clients and improve their performances. For example, if 100 orders are received, the employees of the company get opportunities serve more customers and improve their performances (Saeed et al. 2017).

Factors That Impact Productivity in Wantitall.co.za

Efficient inventory management would enhance productivity in Wantitall.co.za. Efficient inventory management would result in smoother conversion of stock to cash. This would result in higher liquidity of resources and enable the management to acquire more stock of finished goods.

Higher revenue generation would enable Wantitall.co.za allocate more resources towards acquiring more finished goods and process more orders received online. This would boost productivity in the South African ecommerce company (Christopher 2016).

Motivation would encourage employees in the South African ecommerce company to serve more number of customers. This would lead to higher productivity in the company.

Organisational culture would play a pivotal role in deciding the productivity at Wantitall.co.za. A more employee centric organisational culture would encourage the employees perform higher while a hostile environment would erode their motivation to perform (Chang 2016).

The leadership style of the senior employees have important effect on the productivity of Wantitall.co.za. Participative leadership style would encourage employees to perform highly which would boost the productivity in the organisation. Authoritative leadership style on the contrary lead to lower productivity.

Ethical operations within the business organisation would create a more congenial environment which would encourage higher productivity. For example, if the managers at Wantitall.co.za follow ethical methods of operations like treating subordinates justly, this would encourage the subordinates to be more productive in their job performances. Unethical business practices on the contrary would insecurity among the employees and eat into their productivity (Schaltegger and Burritt 2018).

Work, health and safety conditions plays a significant role in boosting employee productivity at Wantitall.co.za. The company being an ecommerce company have to maintain bulk stock of finished goods to deliver them to customers. The workers have to handle these goods which are often very bulky. High level of work health and safety encourage the employees to be more productive while low level of WHS creates insecurity among them which has negative impact on productivity (Gahan et al. 2015).

An evaluation of the productivity level prevailing at Wantitall.co.za reveal the following strong and weak points:

The employees are capable of handling a variety of orders placed online:

The employees of Wantitall.co.za are capable of handling a variety of orders from the customers. Their expertise and customer management ensure high level of customer satisfaction which has earned the ecommerce company leadership in South African market.

The departmental heads practice participative leadership and encourage the subordinates to take place in the strategy making activities.

Training to Improve Productivity at Wantitall.co.za

The organisation has employees from different fields having diverse experiences which encourages innovation. This would allow the company to achieve expertise in different areas like marketing and product planning.

The high productive capacity of the employees ensure that Wantitall.co.za holds leading position in the ecommerce market in South Africa.

1. co.za is a comparatively new ecommerce company having presence in South Africa and Brazil. The company is a private limited company and not listed on any stock exchange. These factors prevents the ecommerce company from attracting highly experienced employees unlike its competitors like Amazon and ebay.
2. The official website of the company gives limited information which prevents job seekers from applying for job in the company. This limits its productivity.
3. The human resources of the ecommerce are less experienced owing to its limited market presence. They thus lack the experience and knowledge that is required to compete with market leaders like Amazon.com. This factor undoubtedly have bearing on the productivity which is evident from the low revenue generation in the company.

The employees of Wantitall.co.za would undergo training within the company. The aim of the internal training would be improvement of their skills and expertise to manage the present business operations of the ecommerce company. The internal training would consist of product training, making the employees aware about the present business situation, customer handling and communication skills (Kum, Cowden and Karodia 2014). The manager should set goals for the employees to be achieved within a specific time period. The improvement in the performance of the employee would show the level of improvement.

The external training would enrich the employees of Wantitall.co.za with knowledge about the operational methods of the competitor companies like Amazon.com. The external training would improve the competitive power of the employees. The management can hire a consultant or personnel from other ecommerce companies who would train the employees on how to operate on a more aggressive scale and be more efficient (Griffin 2016). The external training of the employees should consist of areas like sales generation, stock management and staff management. The  company should hold records of the counselling and trainings of the employees for future references.

The technological training would aim to increase the expertise of the employees to use technology to increase their productivity. The employees would receive training in fields like advanced inventory management, handling online queries of customers faster and communicating strategic business information using the formal channels of communication. The technological training would make the employees more productive and efficient (Batalla-Busquets and Martínez-Argüelles 2014).

The present state of productivity of Wantitall.co.za would be announced to the employees in two ways namely, in group and individually. The apex management would announce the present productivity level in meetings. The departmental heads would hold meetings with individual employees about their own productivity stands, points out the flaws and mentor them on ways to improve their productivity (Tracey et al. 2015).

The productivity improvement plan would be implemented with Wantitall.co.za. The employees of the company would undergo trainings in the three stages as mentioned above. Their performance post training would be assessed and they would be provided further training if required. The well performing employees would be awarded while the poorly performing employees would be provided further training. This would in fact motivate the poor and average performing employees to improve their performances.

Implementing a Productivity Improvement Plan

The employees would be given training to improve their productivity. One can assume that the average productivity of the employees would improve by 10 to 15 percent. For example, the number of customers an employee is able to deal before and after performance can be compared. The following table would outline the value of each criteria before and after training:

Viable parameters of accounting of productivity can be increase in profits and customer visit post training.

One can conclude from the discussion that the apex management of the Wantitall.co.za should emphasis on increasing the productivity of its employees to boost its own competitive advantage in the ecommerce market. The following are the recommendations which can be made to the management of the South African ecommerce company:

The ecommerce should expand its business into new markets especially the emerging markets of Asia. This would enable the employees gain expertise in handling more diverse business operations which would ultimately boost their productivity.

The apex management should concentrate on increasing the competence of the employees. It should offer them trainings to increase their productivity and motivate them to perform more highly.

The management should train the employees and measure their performance to diagnose any need of further training. The management should communicate the performance improvement plans to stakeholders concerned like top managers through mails and meetings.

References:

Aliexpress.com. 2018. Buy alibaba online shopping and get free shipping on AliExpress.com. [online] Available at: https://www.aliexpress.com/w/wholesale-alibaba-online-shopping.html [Accessed 22 May 2018]..

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Jena, A.B. and Panda, S., 2017. Role of Marketing Automation Software Tools in Improving or Boosting Sales. Splint International Journal of Professionals, 4(7), pp.30-35.

Kum, F.D., Cowden, R. and Karodia, A.M., 2014. The impact of training and development on employee performance: A case study of ESCON Consulting. Singaporean Journal of Business Economics and Management Studies, 3(3), pp.72-105.

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