HRM Investigation in Pret Manger

The paper explores Pret a Manger’s organizational strategy, future goals, and HR strategies. It discusses the challenges faced by the company and provides recommendations for improvement. The focus is on resourcing issues and the impact of Brexit on recruitment.

Running head: HRM INVESTIGATION IN PRET MANGER
HRM investigation in Pret Manger
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Notes:

1HRM INVESTIGATION IN PRET MANGER
Executive Summary
The paper explores Pret a Manger’s organizational strategy that is where it is standing
now, future plans and which will be accomplished by the company. Apart from the goals of
expanding in UK it also has its future goals of expanding in abroad. The paper will focus in the
Human Resource strategies and it will align its research in the overall firm strategy. Pret a
Manger is growing entrepreneurial organization which has a very different culture to that which
is found in the present traditional organizations. Despite the problems with the different cultures
which it faces like with the present traditional organizations. The report will aim to find out the
present changes which can be implemented with a new information system. The paper will
therefore explore into the participative approach and factors which can be employed or
implemented by the organization. The paper will first describe the system development process
which will emphasis the contextual features which makes the Pret a Manger a different restaurant
from the present traditional large organizational firms. The paper will then try to understand the
reasons and the problems which has made the organization to undertake the present development
process. The later portion of the paper will provide a reflective critic on the way the process of
reaching the understanding and the use of the participation in the organization has achieved.The
paper will conclude with recommendation on the research methods which are used in
determining the internal as well as the external factors which are affecting the human resources
of Pret a Manger.

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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Discussion........................................................................................................................................4
Background on Pret a Manger.....................................................................................................4
HR Resourcing.............................................................................................................................6
Labour Trends..............................................................................................................................8
External and internal factors that affect the HR resourcing of Pret.............................................9
External competition................................................................................................................9
Effective workforce planning................................................................................................10
Strategic positioning of the companies..................................................................................10
Recommendations and Conclusion................................................................................................12
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................13

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Introduction
Pret a manger is a line of restaurants that offers various assortment of healthy food to the
market. The company provides fast and casual dining experiences to the guests and has
established it’s headquarter in London after it was founded by Jeffery Hyman in 1983 (Pret.com
2019). It has been identified that the products and services that are offered by the company are
perfectly aligned to the needs of the market that they are operating in. Furthermore, the services
that are offered by the company are flexible in nature as they serve to the customer in over four
hundred and fifty location across the country (Pret.com 2019). The array of casual services that
are provided by the company range from sandwiches, cookies, salads and other similar casual
snacks. Moreover, there global presence add up to the repertoire of the country. The company is
a subsidiary of the JAB holding company. The company is headed by the Clive Schlee the Chief
Executive officer of the company (Pret.com 2019). Even though the operations of the company
are perfectly aligned towards the achievement of competitive advantage in the market, certain
internal problem are found to be associated with the operations of the company. The external
relations of the company can be deemed to be favourable, however, there are problems that are
associated with the Human Resource department of the company. The Human Resource policies
that are established in the company are perfectly aligned towards the need of the employees.
Rewards, recognition, flexible working hours, multiculturalism and similar favourable policies
have been incorporated into the Human Resources of the company. Nonetheless, it has been
witnessed that the company is suffering with resourcing. It has been found out that the main
reason behind the problems associated with the failure of the company in attracting the
prospective British Candidates. It can be opined that the problems that are associated with the
recruitment of the British Candidates is the failure to implement HR planning post the Brexit

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phase. The remuneration offered by the company have been made based on the national average
wages standards of the country. Even though such policies are available in the framework of the
company, the unavailability of proper marketing diagnostics in the market has resulted in the
discontent that has been generated by the British Candidates. It has been found that, the working
policies that are instated in a company, along with the incidence of planning in terms of HR
planning, recruitment, selection and retention in the company (Chang 2014). Incorporation of the
current Human Resourcing Strategies of the company with the resourcing practices of the
company, the strategies that have been adopted by the company to attract potential candidates,
hire and recruit them along with the trends in the market determine the ultimate reason behind
viability of the sustainability of the company (Shier, Butler and Lewis 2015). The aim of the
paper is to critically evaluate the nature of the labour market in the United Kingdom, determine
the policies that the company must undertake in order to mitigate the current resourcing issues
that are faced by the company.
Discussion
Background on Pret a Manger
Pret a Manger has been described as a successful fast casual dining restaurant selling
fresh handmade sandwiches, salads, soups, baked goods and hot drinks (Celentano, 2018). The
first Pret a Manger store was opened in 1986 in London Victoria street by college friends Jullian
Metcallfe and Sinclair Beecham. Alongside having stores within London Pret a Manger also has
stores in New York, Hong Kong, Paris, Shanghai, Dubai and Singapore (Pret.co.uk, 2019).
The organisational and HRM strategy of Pret a Manger is to firstly grow their workforce to the
extent where they are able to recruit British workers as the current workforce within Pret a

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Manger is predominantly consisting of EU citizens, secondly the organisation wants to expand
their chain outside central London as currently it is very much unrepresented outside of central
London (Sullivan, 2017).
Perhaps one of the biggest political factors which will affect Pret a Manger is Brexit. if
Britain exists out of the European union then it means Pret a Manger will find itself in a
catastrophe. As the fast food casual dining restaurant mentioned in 2017 that one in 50 of their
application received was from a British national (Sullivan, 2017). Evidently it has been identified
that Pret a Manger has heavily relied on recruiting EU citizens and perhaps didn’t have a solid
HR planning in place prior to Brexit and the uncertainty it has now created.
Despite the fast food chain offering above the national living wage it is still failing to
attract British workers one of the reasons given was because it may be seen as an undesirable
place to work in (Rodionova, 2017). Since the fast food chain is offering above the national
living wage, they should perhaps consider investing money into attracting the younger
demographic 16 to 24-year olds as within this demographic unemployment levels are higher
(Trust for London, 2019). As mentioned above the pay offered by Pret a Manger is above the
national living wage which is another reason why Pret a Manger should invest in this
demographic as it will be a way to draw them in. one of the ways Pret a Manger can do this is by
investing in advertising on social media platforms. In the year 2017 chief executive of Pret a
Manger, Clive Schlee mentioned that they started using social media to advertise their jobs and
also the jobcentre to attract British candidates (RECRUITING TIMES, 2017). However, in order
to make it more effective in attracting British candidates Pret a Manger should make sure they
are using the right social media platforms to attract 16 to 24-year olds they should advertise on
social media platforms such as Youtube, Snapchat and Facebook. The younger demographic is

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more likely to be using these social media platforms and therefore Pret a Manger will be able to
reach out to them vastly.
Another reason this demographic should be considered is because this demographic is more
likely to be still in education thus, they are more likely to be looking for part time job
opportunities whist studying. Numerical flexibility will not only be an advantage to the young
demographic hired but it will also be an advantage for Pret a Manger as they will able to then
significantly reduce labour costs.
HR Resourcing
Resourcing and talent planning is a critical function for Pret a Manger as because it
involves the coordination from the recruitment team and business in various aspects like the
analysis on the forecast which is required. Networking as well as selecting proper hiring
channels, delivery of resources on schedule, and maintain a talent pool for the future recruitment
of the people in the organization. These functions will ensure the organization and thus it will be
able to identify and attract the key talents from the market. This will help the capability a
competitive advantage and help the organization in achieving the short term and long term goals.
The key strategies which are required by Pret a Manger in adopting the resources and talent
planning (Bowie, Brookes and Mariussen 2016).
HR Planning – The human resource planning is a process for identifying and developing the
internal people with the potential to fill the leadership positions of the company. The human
resource planning which is proposed by Pret will help the company to increase the availability of
the experienced and capability of the employees, who are prepared to assume the roles which are
available (Kim and Mauborgne, 2017). With the help of human resource planning Pret will be

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able to recruit superior employees, develop their knowledge, skills and abilities and prepare them
for the advancement or the promotion into more challenging roles.
Recruiting the right employees – If a relationship can be established with the potential candidates
before recruiting them with the human resource of the company, then a very good amount of
potential employees can be hired at the time of hiring employees for the company. Therefore if
Pret a Manger can implement these human resource factors, it will be able to create a good pool
of candidates who are looking for a job recruitment. An introduction program is also very
important at the time of recruitment. This will provide the new employees an introduction to Pret
a Manger to get an idea of the working environment which will the employees in building a
setup within the organization. Good induction programs in Pret a Manger will help the company
to increase the productivity and also reduce the short term turnover of the staffs in the company.
Selection of the employees – The pre selection of the candidates saves the time of the
interviewing procedures of the company and selection committee. According to Yoder (2017) a
candidate cannot be judged only by looking into his paper. The selection process mainly deals
with five steps. The preliminary interview is a short duration interaction with the candidate. This
stage aims in order to get the basic information of the candidate and to check if whether he can
possess the required skill which is required in the company. After this process the person can be
either promoted to the next phase of the selection process or can also be rejected from the present
stage. The written and online test, which takes place in the company, are conducted in order to
evaluate the candidate. The score of the tests helps the company to know how well the company
to know how well the candidate can perform the job with the related tasks. The final interview is
taken by the Human Resource Manager in a single panel interview. There are also two types of
interview which takes place in Pert a Manger namely the behavioural interview and stress level

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interview. The skills and capacities which are required by the company are measured against the
specific job requirements in the interview process. Therefore, it can be said that the company
follows a two way communication as because it is the only process where the candidate will be
able to ask questions about the job as well as the company. In the process of reference check the
company asks the candidate to include the contact details of the employees and any two person
who are not in a relation with the company. Therefore, the selection process ends with the
decision in selection based on the performance of the candidate. If the chosen candidate has
performed well in the above mentioned processes then he might create a chance of getting
selected. In the last process the employer issues an offer letter with all the relevant details like
the designation, salary, structure of the team where he is employed (Bridges 2016).
Retention Procedures – Clive Schlee points out that the staff retention rate is improving in Pret a
Manger. In the last six years the average annual employee turnover has dripped from 90% to
60% where she claims that it is an advantage to the industry. The factors, which helps the
company in retention of the employees are with the weekly pay and bonus, free food as well as
50% discount in festivals, cash rewards in online payments (Sand, 2017). The CEO of the
company also discusses that the company does not only check the CV of the candidate but only
they asks for a confirmation of the three core values of the company which are passion, team
working and clear talking (Vikström, 2018).
Labour Trends
People in UK who are above the age of 16 are mostly either unemployed or economically
inactive. The employment statuses estimates includes all the people who are in paid work wich
includes both the part time work and full time work. Jobless people are not looking for work are
also unable to find out work because they are classed from the economically inactive

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background. Unpaid family workers are those people who are able to work in a family business
who are unable to receive a formal salary or wage but also benfits from the profits generated by
the business enterprise (Ritzer, 2017).
There are also various government-supported trainings and an employment program an series hic
does not includes all these types of programs. It only includes people who are engaging in any
form of work experience or work related trainings which does not includes in the employees or
self-employed series.
External and internal factors that affect the HR resourcing of Pret
External competition
UK is considered one of the most competitive markets in the world (Dunning 2015). Companies
are implementing policies, marketing tactics and innovative business models in order to succeed
in the market. The aim of each and every company in the market is to gain competitive
advantage over each other through which they will be able to satisfy their stakeholders and thus
achieve corporate governance (Noe et al. 2017). The aim of the companies in the competitive
marketing environment is to provide services and product in the market that satisfy the ultimate
consumers (Brunswick 2014). Furthermore, the stake is raised higher when one is dealing with
the food and beverages industry. Even if the companies are aligned perfectly towards the
achievement of the ultimate goals that is consumer satisfaction and revenue generation, the fail
to pay due attention to the needs of the employees. Thus the importance for favourable Human
Resource policies is evident in the market that is considered to be dynamic in nature. The
companies that are able to identify the needs of the employable population of the market. Thus,

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favourable working conditions are in high demand as result of the requirements and the needs of
the prospective candidates (Barnay 2016). The aim of the companies to attract the most suitable
clients result in competition among the companies who operate in similar markets.
It has been found out that the Europeans were starting to grow discontent towards Britain even
before the latter left the European Union (Bloomberg.com 2019). Pret a Manger, operates in
many place in Europe. Hence, the requirement of suitable labour for the company is evident. The
retrenchment of the people of the country are resulting in problems related to resourcing in the
company. This, it has been recognised as one of the main problems associated with the
operations of the company.
Effective workforce planning
Planning is one of the most important stages in management (Goodman, French and Battaglio
2015). Thus, the companies have to incorporate the same while implementation of the plans that
are required for hiring the most suitable employees for the company. The ultimate aim of the HR
department of a company is to provide favourable experiences to employee while trying to
derives and motivate performances from the latter. Effective workforce planning involves
identifying the needs of a particular role that is associated with the company (Goodman, French
and Battaglio 2015). The remuneration of the employees, the number of employees required for
smooth functioning of the company, the delegation that are to be made in the company to ensure
smooth nature of operations in the company and this also determines the achievement of the
strategic goals of the company in the long run.
Strategic positioning of the companies
The nature of positioning of the companies determine how they are perceived in the labour
market. Strategic positioning is considered the gateway to receiving approval and appreciation

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from the prospective employee of the market (Zerfass, Verčič and Wiesenberg 2016). It
determines, the outlook that the companies have created in the minds of the customer.
Positioning determines the place that the company has occupied in the minds of the customers
(Zerfass, Verčič and Wiesenberg 2016). The policies that are incorporated into the business plan
of the company and the advantages and the favourable working conditions that the employees are
subject to determine the success or failure of the strategic positioning that has been created by
the companies. This determines the employer branding that determines the response of the
candidate toward a particular company.
The recruitment techniques that are used by companies are different and it depends on the nature
of the services or the nature of requirement of the job. Some employers look to hire individual
who need to exude confidence in what they are doing. Some need the employees to be physically
able to carry out certain tasks. Different styles of selection determine the final nature of selection
of the employee. The strengths and requirements of the recruitment processes are determined by
the nature of requirements of the employees.
Following are two effective ways of retaining the employees in a company;
 Proper selection: Proper selection of the employees can help in determining the ultimate
needs of the employees. Thus, long term goal identification will help in retaining the
employees.
 Identifying motivators: The theory of needs has been propounded by Abraham Maslow.
The same helps companies in locating the needs of the employees that according to which
the management must implement plan that will help in motivation in the employee, thus,
resulting in negative appreciation from the candidates of British origins. In spite of the
favourable policies in the company, the labour trends in the industry make the company

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subject to unfavourable reception. Thus, they have been suffering in terms of recruitment.
It has been witnessed that effective workforce planning and strategic positioning helps in
positioning of company which would help in mitigating the prevalent issues.
Recommendations and Conclusion
In terms of selection of the employees in the division of Britain, it has been witnessed that the
company have failed as a result of the unavailability of the policies that
Following can be recommended to mitigate the issues:
 Incorporation of marketing activities in terms of employment opportunities.
 Implementation of policies that benefit the British, which shows the alignment of the
company to the needs of the employees.
 Identify the needs of the candidates and carry out recruitment on the basis of the same.
 Inclusion of rewards in the business plan.
 Carry out CSR activities that can strengthen the relations of the company.

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