Challenges Faced by HRM at Unitel Telecommunication Company

Questions:

• Explain the role of HRM in executing the business strategy at Unitel.

• Identify key issues relating to the introduction of the new corporate strategy by Unitel senior management.

• Propose some potential solutions to the problems relating to the introduction of the new corporate strategy at Unitel.

• Discuss how Unitel may benefit from using four (4) human resource management practices (covered throughout the BUSM3201 course) to improve organisational performance at Unitel.

The effectiveness of the human resource management increases the productivity for the company. Policies for human management includes better pay, incentive plans, and providing better work culture to the employees of the company.  The process to hire or fire employees for the company has to be simplified as this will help in improving the production activities for the management. In this process, it is essential to analyse some of the determinant factors that can directly affect the performance of the policies drafted by the HRM. The rules include analysing the risk factors, determining the level of competition, ownership, and implementing the right type of regulations. The production and the performance of the company depend upon the methods that have been chosen by the management. In order to simplify the process, it is essential to collect the relevant data and analyse the same. This will help in determining the best possible option that will cater the needs of the company.

This report has been prepared on Unitel Telecommunication Company. The company renders quality services to most of the Asia Pacific regions. It was privatised in the year 1990. Since then, the management of the company has constantly faced tough competition from national and international service providers. Despite of tough competition, the company continues to earn lucrative income from the clients. The management of the company has proposed to introduce “Vision 2020” which aims towards increasing the production activities for the clients. However, the involvement of the staffs of the company has been considered to be a challenge. The staffs of the company are not in the favour of accepting changes, especially the ones that has been proposed through “Vision 2020”.

The role of the HRM for the company has been redefined, so as to find its importance in the development of the company. At present the staffs of Unitel are unhappy with the working hours and the pay structure that has been followed by the company. Many opine that the employees have to work for longer hours, and aren’t provided with enough benefits that would motivate the staffs.  The relevance of better pay and incentives has been discussed as this would help in developing long term positive relationship with the staffs.  The challenge involved with the process of introducing new corporate strategy has been analysed to find the issues faced by the management and the staffs of the company. This report also contains the analysis of the human resource practices that would help in determining the success of the corporate strategy that has been adopted by the company (Alonso,  Wouter,  and Matouschek, 2008). 

Recommendations for Improving HRM Policies

To execute the business strategy at Unitel, human resource management should emerge the discipline of strategies properly. The HRM should be responsible for work force management in Unitel and should hire the right people for the right skills for the job and to develop the corporate goals and objectives. HRM should closely align with the mission and vision of the organization and the HR policies should remain effective to meet the employee’s requirements and to accomplish the goals successfully. They should meet the demands and get the sufficient opportunities to get trained and grow with the company.

HRM will have to increase the real and perceived value. The role of HRM evolves with time and it has been the major importance to contribute to business decisions. The success of business depends upon the ability to meet the exact requirements and the credibility of the organization. The HR can offer high values to know the important factors that influence the business and responsiveness is the major changing needs of the organization. It should adopt the unique approach towards recruitment and should try to introduce retention strategy for business growth. There should have empowerment that involves objectives to meet all kinds of development.

This will increase the contribution to business strategies and value that is composed to bring to the organization. HRM should capitalize the people through encouragement of learning and increasing skills to meet the goals. It will satisfy the customers to develop the intellectual capital. (Chauhan, 2013)  

With the evolution of HRM, Unitel can increase its competitive advantage. It aligns the strategies to become the essential part of the competitive advantage. People management is the primary asset that inspires an HR to become more effective with programs development. They can make contributions to strategy and strategic planning in different ways. Thus it implements the strategic plan of organization. The human resources will require the new paradigm for managing human resources in an organization. (Cooke, 2009)

HR professionals need to encourage the competitive advantage to offer tools and techniques that improve the effectiveness through regular learning offers and opportunities. It supports the strategies that coordinate all functions and supports the strategies by attracting and retaining the employees. (Bal, 2011)

The HR should evaluate and manage the environment of the climate and it should maintain the employee relationships. They should offer the relevant values in the organization and should offer the compensation in the organization. They should fully integrate the plans and policies and it analyzes the strategy to increase the competitive advantage. The aim of human resource is concerned in management with respect to strategic formulation process. It is important for organizational performance and for the skills of employees by managers and the involvement of human resource management to deal with organizational performance.

It coordinates the HR activities to support the overall strategy and the major goal is to deal with superior work force to accomplish the task. HR should know the interest of the employees also and should implement the reasons to motivate them. They should develop benefits and skills to implement the programs. To control the successful large business involves developing, maintaining the broad range of assets. The proper establishment requires good workforce and HRM is the business function that focuses on people characteristics of the organization. It is responsible to ensure that the organization has right people to handle its overall business plan.

Conclusion

Human resource is apprehensive with organizing and dealing with people in terms of work. With the day to day requirements, the training and development will assess staff presentation. The major part of HRM is staff planning and it contains the right people for the right position at the right time.

Unitel Telecommunication Company has proposed to introduce a new strategy, which has been named as “Vision 2020.” The strategy aims to improve the quality of services that has been rendered to the clients. This would help in improving relationship with the clients, as it is expected to help the management to overpower the challenges that exists in the industry. Through this process, the company aims to improve upon the product delivery system that has been followed by the management until now. The proposed changes in terms of prompt services, reliable services, better information about the services, and others would improve the brand image of Unitel. For this, the management of the company has proposed to develop action and change teams for the organization. The teams would work towards developing possibility thinking, where the customers’ needs and preferences would be handled on a timely manner. The changes were accepted by the senior managers of the company, but many staffs were not happy with the proposal (Aw et al, 2008).

The corporate strategy has been developed by the management of the Unitel to implement single innovative idea for the successful business conduct. Thus, it is essential to develop effective strategies through which the factors that can directly impact the strategy plan for the business can be analysed. In order to execute the plan, it is necessary to include the staffs into the decision making process.  This will improve the quality of tasks that has been intended to be performed by the management of the company. At present the management has proposed to make the best use of the technology that would help in providing the best information to the clients. However, the involvement of staffs in the process to execute the proposed planned is quite an important factor. With the help of the qualified and efficient staffs, it is possible for the company to introduce deregulation policies that would be quite helpful in handling the financial markets. New corporate strategies are introduced with an intention of implementing flexible plan that would be useful in improving the business performance for the company. The managers along with the staffs of the company would be able to handle the tactical issues that can impact the performance of the employees (Bloom, Sadun, and Reenen, 2009).

Some of the key issues that can impact the implementation of the better corporate strategy include –

• Involvement of the staffs for performing better in the company
• Analysing the challenges faced by the employees for executing the new plan
• Introducing better incentive pay structure that would encourage the staffs to improve the quality of performance for the company
• Describing the job, as this will help in recruiting new members.
• Encouraging team efforts (Bloom, Sadun, and Reenen, 2009).

Such factors have to be analysed prior to introducing new plans for improving the quality of performance by the company.

The introduction of the new strategy needs to be done after analysing the challenges involved in the same. The company can adopt matrix arrangement through which the economic factors related to the cost and quality would be maintained, by introducing flexible product line services. In this case, the delays and the differences that can impact the introduction of the project need to be analysed. The staffs of the company are not willing to adopt the changes, which are considered to be essential for the successful business implications. Such a factor can actually delay the process of implementing the changes that has been proposed to introduce for increasing the performance. The problem that existed with the company for introducing the task were –

• Inability to accept the changes
• Follow single minded ability to perform tasks for performing different tasks (Bryson and Freeman, 2009).
• Not willing to share the views and challenges that were faced by the members

References

In this case, it is essential to analyse the challenges that would impact the multiple process that was meant to be introduced by the company. So as to solve the problem, the company can adopt participative style of leadership. Through this method, it is possible to approach staffs from different departments. In order to encourage the employees to work better, the management can encourage the staffs to participate in the decision making process. Through this method it would be possible to analyse the challenges and work towards an effective solution.

Motivation is another factor that impacts the performance of the staffs. It has been noted that the staffs of Unitel telecommunication are not happy with the working hours and the pay structure. Such factors can negatively impact the performance of the new strategy that has been drafted by the management. The better pay structure includes lucrative incentive plan to the best working employees and providing more benefits in terms of leaves and other perks. Recognising the best performing staffs also encourages others to improve the performance (Fenwick and Bierema,  2008).

At present the strategic change has been viewed negatively by the company. In order to encourage the employees to accept the change, it is essential to communicate the relevance of the changes that has been proposed to be introduced by the company. Apart from this, the challenges that are expected to be faced by the members have to be discussed, as this will help in implementing the best changes that will benefit the company.

Before introducing the changes, it is recommended to analyse the below mentioned factors –

• Analyse the value of the services that has been rendered by the company
• Evaluate if there exists any bias system that can affect the performance
• Introduce changes that would provide customer driven services
• Develop and implement strategic driven management (Foster, Haltiwanger, and Syverson, 2009).

The task associated with strategy adoption for increasing the performance of the staffs of the company to achieve the set task is quite challenging. In this process, the managers of the HR department are expected to implement effective strategies through which the challenges can be overpowered.

The managers are expected to introduce better pay structures, as this will encourage the members to work better at the workplace. It also includes providing better incentives to the employees. Apart from the incentives, the company can also introduce perks that would benefit the staffs. It includes medical assistance, retirement benefits, and leave facilities (Griffith and Neely,  2009).

Issue resolution methods have to be prompt and helpful to the staffs. This will help in improving the performance that is expected from the members. Problem associated with the pay, internal disputes, and overtime work can be effectively resolved by the managers.

Change in the strategy for business performance will also include expectations setting. This is one of the most important factors, and the new rules can be discussed with the members. Such a step would help in winning the confidence of the staffs for the company. The expectations have to be set forth in writing as this will help the staffs in understanding the rules in the best possible manner (Guadalupe and Cunat, 2009). 

Involvement of the management in the problem solving method would encourage the staffs to discuss the issue promptly. Every issue regardless of the nature needs to be handled in the right manner. This will help in improving the performance of the staffs.

The changes expected by the management after analysing the below mentioned recommendations –

1. Introduce effective communication method with the staffs
2. Analyse the severity of the problem that is associated with the introduction of the plan
3. Draft positive plans for the staffs, as this will encourage in adopting the changes
4. Implement the changes after analysing the challenges that can directly impact the business performance
5. Analyse the reasons for introducing the changes

Conclusion

Change management is quite important for the successful business performance. It is important to analyse the factors that can directly impact the performance of the company. The changes have to be introduced after consulting with the staffs of the company. This will help in improving the quality of performance that has been planned to be introduced by the management. It is necessary to include the staffs into the decision making process. This will help in increasing the performance and help the management to yield the expected results. The changes have to be introduced after analysing the challenges that can impact the performance of the company. Introducing new strategies can directly impact the business performance. This is one of the reasons, it is recommended to adopt the best strategies through which the changes can be implemented within the company. The role of the human resource department cannot be overlooked for a fact that the managers encourage the staffs to accept the changes and improve the quality of the performance for the company. (King & Marks, 2008)

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