Casualisation and its impact on customer satisfaction in Coles Supermarket Australia Pty Ltd

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Business report
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1BUSINESS REPORT
Introduction
Organisations sustain competiveness in the market based on the employees’ talent and
skills. Ensuring customer satisfaction is the major talent of the employees in any organisation.
However, in many organisations the problems with the customer satisfaction is emerging in
various ways. It is mainly found to be associated with the frontline staff. There is growing
concern related to the casualisation in Australia (Page et al., 2013). In this report the
casualisation related to the Australian based retail company and consumer service chain, “Cole’s
supermarket Australia Pty Ltd”. It is trading as Coles and is headquartering in Melbourne (Keith
2012). The report deals with the issue in the organisation related to the increasing level of
casualisation since last five years. It has been profoundly noted among the frontline staff and the
frontline supervision. It is suspected to be the root cause of the problem. The report is addressed
to CEO of the organisation, discussing the positive and the not-so positive impacts of casualising
the employment conditions of people at the customer interface (face-to-face, call centre, online
and support staff). It appears that the rationale for casualisation is the limited career
opportunities and talent enhancement training. On the other hand it has been observed that there
are some extremely talented people in the ranks of the casuals. The report aims to reflect on the
issues among others and identify the solutions to recommend the same to overcome the target
issue. The report provides recommendations to strengthen the frontline performance of
employees in Coles.

2BUSINESS REPORT
Discussion
The issue of casualisation
Casualisation in retail industry is the growing concern in Australia. It is the shifting of the
permanent or full time employees to the contract and casual positions. These employees end up
in long sick leaves or annual leaves. Most are recruited for pay on hourly basis. Casualisation
rate in Australia is found to be 35% (Mortimer and Ingersoll 2015). In Australia, retail is the
largest industry in terms of employment. This industry contains 13% of the Australian
workforces. The employee type varies significantly in this industry starting from frontline
employees, support staff, employee in the back office and in call centre. There are high job
opportunities. However, there are many employees working in this sector casually (Price 2016).
The rate of casualisation has been found to increase since five years in Coles.
Considering the issue of Coles, the casualisation of employees is mainly attributed to the
extension of retail trading hours and lack of growth opportunities. Although it is in alignment
with the state government rules, it led to casualisation (AO 2012). There is an increasing need of
the part time and the casual employment in the Cole stores. It is due to the increasing trend of
late night shopping. Full time employees in retail have 5 day working week. The full time
employees and the permanent employees cannot staff the stores, for the duration of the opening
hours of the stores. It is increasing the rate of the part time and casualisation. In the areas like
New South Wales and Victoria, the trading hours are extended. The stores are open on Saturday
and Sunday afternoons. This enhances the casualisation as the full time employees cannot cope
up with the stretching of the hop hours (Page et al. 2013). Retrospectively, it is still in doubt if
the union’s success in making the voluntary participation of the employee on Saturday afternoon,

3BUSINESS REPORT
exacerbated the casualisation. With the Sunday trading these issues further got exacerbated
(Heino 2015). In addition the casualisation in Coles may be due to lack of talent management
opportunities and scope of career development. The opinion that the casualisation of employees
is mainly attributed to the limited career opportunities is supported by Schermerhorn et al.
(2014). Casualisation according to this study is due to flexibility needs, and for opportunities to
learn new skills. It implies for the need of training and flexibility for the young workers to give
them career and income security.
Lack of training prevents front staff to fulfil frontline employee’s role as they are not
aware of the customer needs and tactics to engage them. It leads to poor follow up of the
protocols and workplace rules. It results in employee turnover and customer dissatisfaction.
Without training and learning opportunities the employees fail to give high productivity. The
skilled employees end up meeting the needs of the unskilled workers. The unskilled employees
always seek guidance from the seniors and supervisors. Consequently the customer care is at
stake (Nankervis et al. 2013). Employees at call centre too ineffectively mange the client issues
and leads to poor satisfaction among customers. Consequently, the incompetent employees lose
enthusiasm and motivation to work. The same is supported by Mortimer and Ingersoll (2015)
and it highlights that it is unattractive for many employees to work in retail job and leads to
casualisation. Younger employees are found with greater percentage of casualisation than the
older employees. The young employees are frustrated with the perceived lack of career
progression in retail store jobs. They look for alternate jobs and opportunities such as freelancers
or any other. The employee remain absent from work for longer period, which is increasing the
rate of casualisation (Ivancheva and O’Flynn 2016).