Human Resource Management: Roles, Responsibilities, and Practices at Morrison plc

This report discusses the functions, roles, and responsibilities of Human Resource Management (HRM) at Morrison plc, a leading supermarket store in the UK. It examines the approaches followed by Morrison in workforce planning, recruitment and selection, development and training, performance management, and reward and recognition. The report also evaluates the effectiveness of employee relations and flexible practices in the organization. Additionally, it highlights the employment legislations that Morrison plc must comply with. Overall, the report provides insights into the strategic management of HRM at Morrison plc.

Human Resource
Management

Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
PART 1............................................................................................................................................1
Overview of the organisation.................................................................................................1
Functions of Human Resource Manager and key roles and responsibilities..........................2
Assessment and Evaluation of Approaches followed by Morrison........................................3
Effectiveness of Employee relations and Flexible practices in organisation.........................4
Employment legislations for Morrison plc.............................................................................6
PART 2............................................................................................................................................8
Design of a Job specification..................................................................................................8
Requirements of Curriculum vitae.........................................................................................8
Interview process....................................................................................................................9
Explaining process of recruitment........................................................................................10
Evaluating process of Recruitment.......................................................................................10
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................12
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................13
Books and Journals...............................................................................................................13

INTRODUCTION
Human resource management is considered as a strategic approach of managing employees
in the company. Human resource management is inclusive of all functions pertaining to
employees from hiring and selecting them to ensure their motivations and continuous
engagement in organisational goals and vision. Also it focuses over maximizing employees’
performance to desired needs in organisation (Binyamin and Carmeli, 2017).
The report has attempted discussion over different factors and dimensions involved in
Human resource management. Starting with roles and responsibilities of Human resource
manager, it has discussed approaches to roles as well. Approaches towards employee
engagement and evaluation of employees relations is also made. Report have also identified key
legislations of compliance related to employee management. For this, purpose report has taken
stance of an acknowledged supermarket store Morrison plc of United Kingdom. Further, for
getting more clarity over role of HR and how it aligns with other department and vision of
organisation, a recruitment process is devised and tested for Morrison plc.
PART 1
Overview of the organisation
Morrison plc is one of the largest supermarket store of the United Kingdom. Putting more
clearly, company is the fifth largest supermarket operator in the country. Morrison have its main
competitor in the market as many big supermarket giants like Tesco, Sainsburry, Asda and many
more. Morrison is largely left behind them in remaining at fifth largest position in the market
because of the fact that Morrison have largely focused over regional and country side operations
for its business. It never targeted much on bringing up scales in business in advanced areas of
market where its every other competitor consolidated huge scales. Considering main
consolidated areas of company, Morrison have it in Northern England. Although it was tried and
tested by company to establish its footholds in Southern England as well, however gains were
not that rich for company (Chin and et.al., 2017). Taking, considerations of wideness of
operations that Morrison have in business, it is noted that company currently operates more than
107 stores all over the country. Range of variety of products in these stores is wide, ranging from
grocery products to operational gasoline stations as well. Also, Morrison have collaborated with
Midland bank and operate some of the branches of this bank as well. In the supermarkets of
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company, product availability is more than of 20000 items. Efficiency is also noted from the fact
that, in the items which company sales under its private labels accounts more than half of the
sales of Morrison supermarkets.
Functions of Human Resource Manager and key roles and responsibilities
Functions
Human resource department is one of the key department in Morrison plc, just like every
other organisations. Key functions that this department performs are mostly related with hiring,
retaining, managing and compensating employees needed in company to perform various tasks
ranging from highly specialised works to basic labour and technical jobs. However, for basic
jobs some powers are delegated to lower managerial levels as well. Key functions performed by
HR manager can be divided in two categories:
Directly related to employees- These functions are basic functions. As evident from the name
that Human resource manager deals with human resources in the organisation. Functions related
directly with employees includes identifying jobs required in organisations, making job profile,
making job descriptions, setting job roles, noting recruitment sources, taking interviews, making
appointments, induction, training and compensation (Delery and Roumpi, 2017).
Associated functions- These are functions that come in line for HR manager of Morrison with the
basic functions. Functions of this nature includes maintaining employer-employee relations,
handling grievances of employee, maintaining work culture in organisation, complying with
employment legislations etc.
Assessing these functions, their importance in Morrison plc cannot be avoided. Dealing
with human and human psychology is one of the most tedious task in business and HR manager
is specialised in that. Also they take note of various external and internal factors to develop
employees as per dynamics of business environment.
Therefore, it can be assessed that Functions of HRM are really effective in providing
necessary skills and talents to organization, as they make effective recruitment of those
employees that falls aligned with goals and objectives of organization. Also, after recruiting and
selecting these employees, HRM is also involved in providing effective training to these
employees, so that their work performance get strictly aligned with organizational goals and
objectives.
Role and Responsibilities
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Functions that are performed HR manager also throws light over responsibilities of HR
manager in Morrison (Dhanpat and et.al., 2020). As functions of HR in associated with
employees and employment, roles and responsibilities of manager also relate with employment
policies and procedures, fulfilling company's objectives, employee rewards and recognitions etc.
Few of the important roles and responsibilities of HR manager in Morrison plc is listed as
follows:
 Making recruitment and follow recruitment process in such way that aligns with
company's policies, goals, aims and vision.
 Also, while making recruitments all the laws and legislations should be complied with
strict adherence and no faults.
 Determine different roles of employees required for each nature of work in company in
such way that is well organised and reduces wastage of resources and saves time of
company. In short there shall be utmost efficiency.
 Identifying suitable rewards and remuneration related to nature of work an individual
perform on job.
Roles and responsibilities performed by HR are very critical. In some roles there are
strictness to be followed like complying with legislations and achieving vision of organisation.
Whereas, in some responsibilities flexibility has to be used using own conscience and wits. And
that makes role of HR complicated but very necessary.
Assessment and Evaluation of Approaches followed by Morrison
Workforce planning- Workforce planning is the task where an organisation and its HR manager
go on planning for the requirement of Workforce that business is going to need in future for
carrying out operation with no disruptions. In the Morrison plc, management have been very
efficient in planning about workforce requirements and skills that are required in every set of job
clearly aligning with aims and objectives of company as a whole. Management here, plans about
quality of work and number of persons required to ensuring their active participation in
organisation as well (Guest, 2017).
Recruitment and Selection- Approach of HR manager in Morrison plc have been very straight
and clear about making recruitment and selection of employees in organisation. However, in this
issue, Morrison have set standards and guidelines for HR managers, currently working and of
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future as well, to adhere to these standards only. Standards pertaining to this work helps avoiding
any confusions and faults between HR itself and senior leaders in company. Also they increase
accountability of HR towards directors and shareholders.
Development and Training- Development and training of employees towards their current job
role and for the coming requirements of future is a very complicated task for HR manager in
Morrison plc. This work requires HR manager to be prudential and precise as well. Here,
manager not only make prediction of future requirements but also motivate employees in being
adaptive and flexible in work. Also, HR itself remain flexible in performing this task. And, under
this task, leadership role of HR manager in company gets increased.
Performance management- Performance management is that duty of HR manger where,
manager in Morrison plc is required to monitor the performance of each employees regarding its
job, and trying matching up their performance standards with requirements of company. Here,
manager also look at the communication, habits and behaviour of employees as well. Morrison
plc have been democratic in this role. Morrison have delegated power of performance
management of employees to all sorts of manager like sales, finance and accounts etc. Managers
in each department knows their employees, their nature of work and their limitations personally.
So it can be better managed by them (Junita, 2017). However, under this task, all these managers
are directly supervised by senior HR manager on Morrison.
Reward and Recognition- In reward and recognition to employees for their remarkable and
efficient performances, that helped company achieving new heights, Morrison plc have been
serious and sincere. It rewards its employees through monetary benefits and otherwise as well. In
major events employees they are awarded and on the magazine covers of company an
appreciation is also dedicated for these employees.
Effectiveness of Employee relations and Flexible practices in organisation
These are two important requirements in an organisation. After making recruitments of
employees and imparting them orientation regarding nature of job and their responsibilities, are
maintaining efficient relations with them and also keeping flexibility while dealing with them.
This raises efficiency of their performance together with gaining their utmost trust in Morrison
plc. An organisation of such scale like plc, is needed to take consideration of these requirements
in order to retain faith of employees and maintain its goodwill in market as well. Report have
discussed both these points separately to examine their distinctive importance.
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Employee relations- Employee relations are efforts of company and their management in
maintaining efficient understanding and communication between employer and employees.
Employer in Morrison plc are senior managers, leaders and higher authorities in organisation,
who manages and plans all sort of business operations and activities in alignment with long or
short term goals of organisation (Kavanagh and Johnson, Eds., 2020). Whereas, employees are
the one who directly perform and undertake these activities to realise these plans in actuality.
Thus, in order to derive optimum and desired results of these plans, there should be well
understanding and communication between these two. It also helps employers to ensure
continuous engagement of employees in targeted activities of Morrison plc. Through this
channel, employer and employees can perceive vision and thought process of each other in such
manner that increase level of performances of both.
Key aspects of employee relations management and its evaluation
 First f the basic need of maintaining good relations with employees, there is basic need of
giving equal treatment and preferences to all employees. The HRM in Morrison Plc must
take a note that Employees should not be discriminated on any grounds, and must e
treated based of their performances strictly. Any type of discrimination to employees can
downgrade image of organization at large.
 There is a huge value of free and open communication, because it the allows employees
to work freely in the organization without any hesitations and reluctances. Therefore, free
and open communication should be pervasive.
 The best practice of ensuring better, long term and continuous relations with employees is
to inspire them in such way where vision of employees at personal level get integrated
with vision of organization. This is the best way of ensuring good relations with
employees. However, effectiveness of developing this relation also depends over
effectiveness of Human resource manager and its leadership skills.
Flexible practices- Flexibility in practices of managers and senior authorities in Morrison plc is
reflective of their leadership role in organisation. Here, managers are required to understand
problems and situation of employees pertaining to their personal or professional life. For
example, if an employee is facing difficulties in adopting and understanding developments
required by advancements of business environment, then managers are required to be flexible in
making that employee adopt these developments. They should try understanding those
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difficulties and then motivate employee in same manner by properly conveying benefits of these
developments for organisation and employee itself. Here, managers should not be rigid and strict.
Rigidity can affect overall performance and morale of employees. This way, flexibility in
practices not only improves quality of performance for employees and ensure their continuous
engagement, but it also leads to betterment of employer-employee relations (Kianto, Sáenz and
Aramburu, 2017).
HR manger plays key role in improving employee’s relations to that of employer in
organisations. Though, for taking any decision in this consideration HR managers are required to
be flexible and understanding. HR manager provides employee an opportunity in bringing up
their effectiveness before departmental managers. Also, by intervening in case of any dispute
between employer and employee, HR ensures both to know each other well and develop good
terms.
Employment legislations for Morrison plc
Morrison plc have its core business operations in United Kingdom and thus company s
bound by the employment legislations of land. Employment legislations are those laws who
governs nature of employer-employee relations in the country basically. These laws are put forth
by government to check over exploitation of workers in organisations, based on geographical and
demographical structures of country, in major (Martínez‐Garcia, Sorribes and Celma, 2018).
Some key legislations that Morrison is required to comply in this order are discussed in report.
Employment Rights Act, 1996- This is update of labour laws in UK with requirements and
developments of modern times and business environment. The Act covers all the rights and
position to which employees are entitled to in an organisation, against tyrannical and unjust
decisions of employer. These relate to rights against untimely termination, low payments,
working hours, work culture, maternity leaves etc.
National Minimum Wages Act, 1998- This is a check by the UK government over salaries and
remunerations paid by organisation to its employees. The act requires payments to be made to
employees should be in compatibility with nature of work and responsibilities, together with
other factors like inflation and other economic developments.\
Equality Act, 2010- Equality Act is check and prohibition over any sort of discrimination that is
performed by management of any organisation while making recruitments on job or any further
treatment of employees in terms of payment, promotion, opportunities, rewards etc. Act requires
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organisations to devoid any discrimination on basis of race, ethnicity, sex, language or any other
parameter. It specifies characteristics that are protected for making any employment related
decision.
However, there also other important legislations in UK, which may not directly relate to
employment decisions. But they contain some features related to health, social right and well-
being of employees. Therefore, Morrison plc need to take consideration of them as well. Any
non-compliance or deliberated negligence of these legislation will not damage reputation of
Morrison plc, but can bring existence of organisation at stake itself.
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PART 2
Recruitment and selection process are complete set of activities and steps that an
organisation and HR manager itself designs and undertakes, before making any selection of a
candidate over particular job role. These activities are specified measures but differs between
different job roles in organisation. The report has attempted to check new selection process
adopted in Morrison plc. In this various criteria involved in the process are examined on the
basis of their efficiency and eligibility (Rana and Malik, 2017).
Design of a Job specification
Jo specification, also known as employee specification are a set of requirements and
eligibility criteria, which HR manager in Morrison plc have specified. These type of
specifications are important as they are first step of filtering out those candidates who are not
eligible for a particular job. As candidates would be reading requirements pertaining to
qualification and experience, that Morrison plc is looking in a candidate as basic need of
eligibility, and any particular candidate who do not possess these eligibilities can automatically
run out one self and would not apply for the job. In this way HR manager helps saving time and
resources of organisation and manager itself. This is also important to fast-track process of
selection.
In Morrison plc, while preparing job specification HR manager sought consultations from
departmental managers as well. This was an initiative to avoid any future misunderstanding
regarding employee selection and its qualities. In this Sales manager have clearly specified
minimal five years’ experience and post-doctorate for job of Assistant Sales manager. Because,
Morrison is fast growing company and challenges ahead requires healthy management of Sales
in company. Also, senior Sales manager was thinking of delegating some powers totally for new
Assistant manager (Stewart and Brown, 2019). Hence, experience was must.
Requirements of Curriculum vitae
Curriculum vitae is profile description of a candidate or applicant. In this an applicant
mention different details of oneself, like name, contact, email, qualifications of different levels,
job experience, additional skills, personal interests, other achievements and certificates etc.
Here, Sales manager specified that it would be really helpful that any candidate, besides
fulfilling basic requirements of post-doctorate in Sales and marketing and five years’ job
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experience in same, should be having sports achievements as well. Reason as specified was,
sportsman is very efficient in performing leadership roles. A manager at different situations is
required to perform these roles precisely. Therefore, considering size and scale of Morrison,
sports achievements were taken at priority for Assistant Sales manager.
Interview process
Interview is the most efficient selection method of a candidate for any job profile.
Interview requires face to face interaction of candidates with managers and other senior
authorities. It vis important so that management can have look at the overall personality, skills
and communication efficiency of candidate. As management have already judged a person in test
and preliminary levels of selection process with regard to its knowledge. Interview is step of
making judgements regarding competency of personality, skills and fluency of a person against
the job profile one has to be selected.
Interviewers in Morrison plc have adopted to go flexible this time in interview process.
However, a prescribed set of questionnaire was followed by interviewers along with checking
validity of documents and qualifications. Interviewers this time went on checking overall
awareness of candidates as well pertaining to political and economic developments globally.
However, they were not really strict in this matter and approach was general and flexible.
Related to requirements under interview of Assistant Sales manager, on the basis of
consultation with Senior sales manager and senior directors, they were fixed by HR manager as:
Documents-
 Academic Transcripts and certificates, like university transcripts and post-doctorate
transcripts in marketing.
 Portfolio. Where visual or video portfolios were permissible to showcase abilities.
 Identity proofs and address proof.
 Certificate of Job experiences.
 Certificates related to other achievements, where sports achievements were prioritised.
 Letter of appreciations from previous organisation, if any.
In midst of numerous applicants, three were selected for respective job profile.
Individuals those who qualified for Assistant managers in Sales department for Morrison plc,
were fulfilling all requirements that management was looking for. Besides, post-doctorate in
marketing they were well qualified in economics as well. Experience limit was five years, but
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many of them were having more than that. As sports achievements were prioritised. They also
had substantial communication and presentation skills. All three candidates had good exposure to
global developments in multiple regards.
Explaining process of recruitment
Recruitments is the prime and core function of Human Resource management which is
primarily concerned with finding and attracting large pool of candidates through potential
resources for filling up the vacant position in an organisation. Recruitment process and team can
be small or large depending upon the nature, size and scope of the organisation. Morrison PLC
recruitment process involves everything from indentifying, attracting, screening, short listing,
interviewing, selecting, and on boarding employees along with induction and training
programmes (Thompson, 2017).
Recruitment process conducted by Morrison Plc is mentioned below:
Figure 1 STEPS FOR A SYSTEMATIC RECRUITMENT PROCESS, 2019
Source: (STEPS FOR A SYSTEMATIC RECRUITMENT PROCESS, 2019) Identifying the hiring needs: Recruitment process starts with the identifying the needs to
fill the vacant job position in the organisation followed by defining job specifications,
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knowledge, skills and experience required. This process starts with the identification of
job needs along with necessary skills, qualifications, proficiencies and abilities to
perform a job duty. There are few factors which have to keep in mind such as size of the
organisations, work culture, salary structure etc. Preparing the job description: Once the need is determined to fill the vacant job position
along with knowledge, skills, and experience the next step is to define the job duties and
responsibilities to be performed by the potential candidate. Well designed job description
includes job title, qualification, skills, location, duties and responsibilities, compensation
and perks benefits. Talent search: The next step in recruitment process for Morrison Plc is to looks for a
suitable candidate through numerous sources, internally or externally. Morrison Plc
makes use of internal sources for selecting ideal candidates such as promotion, transfers,
employee referrals etc. Screening and short listing: Further step after attracting and finding a talent pool of
candidates is screening and short listing. Candidates are selected on the basis of their
qualification, skills and competencies to perform job roles and responsibilities. The main
aim of this step is to extract all the candidates who matches the minimum criteria for
selection. Interviewing: Shortlisted candidates are called for face to face interview to be able to
know the organisation, employer and job duties and responsibilities before receiving a
job letter for the selection. There are several types of interviews such as face to face,
online or video interview, psychometric tests etc., to find a ideal candidate for the job
role. Morrison Plc conducts psychometric test and face to face interview for this process. Evaluation and offer of employment: After selecting a candidate in interview process,
Morrison Plc conducts several paper and formalities to welcome on board new recruiters.
Employers checks background of family criminal records, authenticity of documents and
experience before confirming the selection of candidate and handling offer letter for job.
Evaluating process of Recruitment
Recruitment process in Morrison can thus be considered as precise and flexible both at
the same time. Inviting applications for different jobs to preliminary screening and filtering best
out of them, reflected clear intention of management is choosing those candidates only who fits
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to stature and position of company in market. Besides, verification of documents was must to
avoid any faulty recruitments at first stance only. For the profile of Assistant Sales manager,
preference to sportsman for delivering efficient leadership roles, is reflective of responsible
management spirit. As, management in Morrison is aware, what sort of role and responsibilities
one would be rendering in later years.
Strengths
In a recruitment process, whatever steps are necessarily taken by a manager, the strengths
of proving the results of process to be effective depends on effectiveness of Human resource
manager. Even though, for achieving quality results and many specific results of recruitment
process, understanding of goals and objectives of organization is really important. In getting
employees strict to requirements of departmental manager in organization, HRM can allow one
round of interview with departmental manager as well.
Weaknesses
Although Human resource managers are seen having really good knowledge, in
accordance with their learned experiences and practical plus theoretical knowledge, but any sort
of recklessness can give many striking negative impacts. The most obvious recklessness lies in
aking quick hiring of employees, when organization is in need. Also, the short listing of
candidates can give many options of recklessness to occur, therefore, care has to given in this
context also. The presence of corruption within organization and among senior most employees
is potent of giving many negative impacts.
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CONCLUSION
Therefore, from above discussion it can be concluded that, Human resource management
is a very crucial function of management in organisation. Its significance is derived from fact
that, its role has got everything to do with most important resources of organisation. HRM
enables organisation to hire most productive employees for different job roles in organisation,
and by ensuring their motivation and continue engagement it also help employees to gain best
productivity. By the time, HRM function have evolved and secured new dimension as well.
Now, this role is expected to provide strategic directions to company.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Binyamin, G. and Carmeli, A., 2017. Fostering members’ creativity in teams: The role of
structuring of human resource management processes. Psychology of Aesthetics,
Creativity, and the Arts. 11(1). p.18.
Chin, T. L. and et.al., 2017. Ability, Motivation, Opportunity Enhancing Human Resource
Management and Corporate Environmental Citizenship: What's the Connection?. Global
Business & Management Research. 9.
Delery, J. E. and Roumpi, D., 2017. Strategic human resource management, human capital and
competitive advantage: is the field going in circles?. Human Resource Management
Journal, 27(1), pp.1-21.
Dhanpat, N. and et.al., 2020. Industry 4.0: The role of human resource professionals. SA Journal
of Human Resource Management. 18. p.11.
Guest, D. E., 2017. Human resource management and employee well‐being: Towards a new
analytic framework. Human resource management journal, 27(1). pp.22-38.
Junita, A., 2017. The interaction between human and organizational capital in strategic human
resource management. International Research Journal of Business Studies. 9(1).
Kavanagh, M. J. and Johnson, R. D. Eds., 2020. Human resource information systems. SAGE
Publications, Incorporated.
Kianto, A., Sáenz, J. and Aramburu, N., 2017. Knowledge-based human resource management
practices, intellectual capital and innovation. Journal of Business Research. 81. pp.11-
20.
Martínez‐Garcia, E., Sorribes, J. and Celma, D., 2018. Sustainable development through CSR in
human resource management practices: The effects of the economic crisis on job
quality. Corporate social responsibility and environmental Management. 25(4). pp.441-
456.
Rana, M. H. and Malik, M. S., 2017. Impact of human resource (HR) practices on organizational
performance. International Journal of Islamic and Middle Eastern Finance and
Management.
Stewart, G. L. and Brown, K. G., 2019. Human resource management. John Wiley & Sons.
Thompson, J. R., 2017. Value shifts in public sector human resource management: A
congressional perspective. Review of Public Personnel Administration. 37(4). pp.375-
404.
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