Human Resource Management Practices in Kingfisher plc

This assignment delves into the multifaceted world of Human Resource Management (HRM) within the context of Kingfisher plc, a prominent retail firm. It explores the purpose and functions of HRM, analyzing its application in workforce planning and resourcing. The strengths and weaknesses of different recruitment and selection approaches employed by Kingfisher are examined, highlighting the benefits of various HRM practices for both employers and employees. The significance of employee relations in influencing HRM decision-making is analyzed, along with the key elements of employment legislation and their impact on HRM practices. The assignment concludes with practical illustrations of HRM practices in a work-related context, using specific examples such as job specifications, CVs, interview notes, and a job offer.

MARKETING HUMAN RESOURCES MANAGEMENT
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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
1.1 Explain the purpose and the functions of HRM, applicable to workforce planning and
resourcing in Kingfisher..................................................................................................................4
1.2 Explain the strengths and weaknesses of different approaches of recruitment and selection
used by Kingfisher...........................................................................................................................7
2.1 Explain the benefits of different HRM practices within Kingfisher for both the employer and
employee..........................................................................................................................................9
3.1 Analyse the importance of employee relations in Kingfisher with respect to influencing HRM
decision-making.............................................................................................................................13
3.2 Identify the key elements of employment legislation and the impact it has upon HRM
decision-making.............................................................................................................................14
Task 4.............................................................................................................................................16
4.1 Illustrate the application of HRM practices in a work-related context, using specific examples
.......................................................................................................................................................16
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................22
Reference List................................................................................................................................22
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Introduction
Human Resource Management plays an important role in a business organization, which
provides various benefits to the employees. The HR department is responsible for drafting rules
and regulations for the employees working in the organization. Staffing and recruiting is a
another vital role which is played by the department of human resource management. The
productivity and profit margins are also increased if the human resource department works
efficiently. This assignment focuses on the various aspects of human resource management. The
roles and responsibilities of the HR are discussed in this project. The other aspects of human
resource management such as strengths and weaknesses of the different tasks of hr, the
effectiveness of different hr practices have also been discussed in the assignment.
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Task 1:
Overview of the company
Kingfisher plc is one of the largest retail store firms in the world, whose main headquarters is in
London, UK. It mainly deals in the housing products and is only stands three places behind the
other three firms. It has its branches all over the world mainly Asia, china, Ireland.
1.1 Explain the purpose and the functions of HRM, applicable to workforce planning and
resourcing in Kingfisher
The kingfisher being one of the largest retail firms has quite a few competitors in the market and
for the company to be highly successful and sustain competition has to keep its workforce its
asset by maintaining proper workplace environment and having an enthusiastic output oriented
employees at its disposal(Sylvester et al., 2015).
The purpose of HRM in Kingfisher:
The main purpose of the HR of Kingfisher plc is to provide with the best organization
environment and unveil their true potential so as to reach new heights in their career. The HR
team is responsible to connect the technology and customer awareness and ensure performance
from the employees. Their main function is making the business of the company align with the
technology which includes the software services (De Bruecker et al., 2015). They are also
provided with the supervision to bring in new candidates and recruit people who are good
enough for the job profile.
This task falls under the role of the HRM who has to make sure that the organization meets its
objectives and that there is a positive vibe from the employees towards the functioning of the
company. The HRM department at Kingfisher plc maintains cohesion among the employees and
uses the best fit approach as well as the best practice approach depending on the situation of the
organization and the demands of it. The market demands and the competition from the other
companies compels the HR department to perform their responsibilities and use the best fit
strategy, which suggests the company to have reward system for the employees so as to bring the
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out of them and implement it in their business strategy. This will enhance their efficiency and
enable the organization to have a competitive advantage over its competitors through their
employees who are goal oriented following the reward system.
The best practice approach is used by the organizational HRM in order to create a core group of
employees who are well trained and well developed and their productivity is increased. The
HRM here aims to visualize for the long term goal of the company and invest on the employee
training and development so that they can be an asset for the company in the near future (Opalek,
and Greenberg, 2017). This approach is not reward oriented and performance based but aims to
assist the company with better and well skilled employees.
Apart from this the HRM department at Kingfisher plc uses a different approach which focuses
on treating employees with short term goals of the organization and focuses on the business
which involves recruitment and selection. This approach is based on the performance of the
employees who work at kingfisher.
The Hr department at kingfisher also uses a different approach in which employees are
considered as the important resource of the company and are regarded as an asset. Here the main
focus is to look into the development of the employees (Kesti, and Syväjärvi, 2015). This
approach focuses on the future of the employees and is performance related for the employees of
Kingfisher.
Training and development
Kingfisher plc runs a large number of programmes to develop the employees at the company and
implements a programme for the improvement opportunities. The HRM department of kingfisher
aims to implement a scheme that will boost the knowledge of the employees and upgrade on the
services that is provided to the customers
Recruitment selection
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Kingfisher plc implements a very cost effective system to recruit employees which align with the
business strategy of the company and emphasizes on new recruitment system which involves
recruiting new candidates rather than training old employees, which involves a lot of time of
money (John. and Björkman, 2015). The HR team places special emphasis on the recruitment
and selection system as it involves a lot of risks, which involves the employees switching
companies.
Advertisement
Kingfisher plc does its segmentation and sorts out its targets audience and based on that it
attracts its target audience by using advertisements that leads towards the persuasion of
customers and the target audience can be increased (Cristiani and Peiró, 2015). The
advertisement plan that is used by kingfisher plc is based on the revenue allocated and the
distinguishing the target audience.
The company uses coordinated ads and independent ads that include print media, digital media
and social media as well to reach out to its customers and target audience. Other resources are
also used to promote and advertise the company.
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1.2 Explain the strengths and weaknesses of different approaches of recruitment and
selection used by Kingfisher
The different methods of recruitment of kingfisher plc are internal and external recruitment:
Internal recruitment
The internal recruitment at Kingfisher plc is done by HRM department, who recruit employees
from within the organization. There are various advantages and disadvantages of the internal
recruitment:
Advantages Disadvantages
The main advantage of the process is that not
too much capital is invested on the company
and is less time consuming. As, the process
includes the involvement of hiring someone
through referrals from within the company.
By this process, the new idea and creativity of
the company gets confined as no new
candidates are being recruited from outside.
The process is also quite trustworthy as the
recruitment involves someone who is known to
the organization(Goodman et al., 2015).
The promotion within the company leads to the
creation of another vacancy in the company.
This process makes the employee motivated to
work for the company as they get promoted for
the company.
This process demoralizes the organization
atmosphere as someone within the company
gets promoted through referral.
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External recruitment
The HRM of the kingfisher plc uses this process to hire people externally by posting ads and
seeking help from agencies.
The main advantages and disadvantages of External recruitment are:
Advantages Disadvantages
This process used by the HRM helps in
bringing in new people from outside who can
be asset to the company and bring in new
ideas.
This process undergoes with lot of time as it
involves a whole implementation of selection
process.
Another advantage of this method enables the
HRM department to choose from a large pool
of candidates and make them implement the
best selection from it.
As the process involves posting ads both online
and offline and taking help of agencies, so a lot
of capital is invested in the process, hence is
considered costly (Arulrajah et al., 2015).
This helps to bring in new candidates for the
job who can be vastly experienced and good
level of expertise on the selected profile.
This process is not efficient enough for the
selection of ideal candidate for the job as the
process involves people who are unknown to
the company and they might not be suitable for
the job.
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Task2: (750)
2.1 Explain the benefits of different HRM practices within Kingfisher for both the
employer and employee.
HRM practices in Kingfisher aids a lot to both employee and employers as both are getting job
satisfaction which increases the overall productivity and helps in reaching the company to reach
the desired level.
Training & development: It is the effort made by any organization in order to progress the
present and future performance of an employee through different learning procedures and
helping the employees in enhancing their skills and concepts as well as changing their attitude.
Training and development in long run helps the employees in achieving the goals of the
individual and also the organizational goal by making the employees upgraded so that they can
perform at their best during any challenge that may come up in the working environment of the
company.Beside from just working for earning money, training and development motivates the
employee to discover their own hidden skill. By providing high quality and cost effective
training and development processes, Kishfisher retains right individuals and can grow profits
through increased sale volumes.Through this practice employee can get proper engagement to
the work and perform better.
Job and workplace design
A good workplace is very important for both employer and employee for the growth and
development, also for their maximum involvement. A noise free environment in the workplace
helps them to concentrate well. Privacy in a workplace helps in increasing the productivity of
both employer and employee as individual spaces to work are present. They should also get
chance of controlling their own environment in order to feel more comfortable and acquire job
satisfaction. For example: kingfisher retail provides excellent working environment for the
employers and employees which help them to work more efficiently and thus organizational goal
also gets fulfilled.
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Flexible Organization
Flexibility in an organization is essential so that organization can adapt the different changes that
happens within an company. There are different kinds of flexibility like functional and
numerical. Functional flexibility is when the employee do jobs apart from the specific jobs that
they are supposed to do in order to become a multitasker so that they perform any task whenever
required. Numerical flexibility is when an organization can bring in labour or take labour out
according to the demand of the product. For example: Kishfisher is a flexible organization so it is
successful in providing great service delivery to their customers.
Reward system
Rewards are usually given when an individual perform their level best in order to achieve a
certain goal. Giving rewards motivates the employee to maintain their working level avoiding the
chance of degrading the performance.There are different types of rewards like intrinsic reward
and extrinsic rewards.Extrinic reward are the solid rewards that the employee receive like bonus,
raise in salary,gifts and promotion. Intrinsic rewards are the rewards that make the employee feel
good within the organization like base pay, incentives and other benefits. In an organization like
kingfisher they frequently reward their employees for motivating them and keep up their good
work.( Albrecht et al.,2015)
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2.2 Evaluate the effectiveness of different HRM practices in terms of raising Kingfisher plc
profit and productivity.
Kingfisher has been a successful retail firm as the different HRM practices highly contribute to
the profitability of the firm .Kingfisher believes in giving job satisfaction to the workers as a
result they work well for achieving the company goals. Different HRM practices helps
Kingfisher achieving profit & productivity are:
Proper training and development: Training is an integral part which is performed for nurturing
the skills of the workers, when an employee is given sufficient training with right tools they
perform their tasks more effectively. A good and cost effective training helps kingfisher in
retaining the right employees and increase productivity (Tzabbar et al., 2015).
Reduced turnover: This practice helps in selecting top employees who has both hard and soft
skills that is desirable for the job. The practice also helps to find loyal employees who are really
interested to the job and will stick to the job for longer time. Reducing turnover is very essential
as it is very costly to replace employees. This practice helps Kingfisher in raising productivity.
Threat of legal action: Sometimes dissatisfied employees don’t think twice before taking any
legal action against any employer as they may feel that the employer has done wrong to them
that may raise an ugly fight which can be very costly. Even if the company wins, it will degrade
the reputation of the company. So such HR practices should be performed where employee
issues must be taken care in the sake of protecting the reputation of the organization. This HRM
practice boosts the profitability of the business (Sani and Maharani, 2015).
Flexibility: This HRM practice is incredibly admired by the employees based on working hours
or compensation like letting the employees to keep track of their own attendance, it will improve
their performance. Flexible organizations are capable of responding to any changes in the outer
environment for gaining benefit and maintain their competitiveness. This practice keeps the
employees happy, so they work effectively and meet their goal, which increase productivity.
Being a flexible organization, kingfisher is concerned about the employee so they are successful
in earning profits (Bratton and Gold, 2015).
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Employee-employer relationship: It is very important to maintain good relation between
employer and employee as it maintains the transparency level between them which will also
reduce conflicts and so they perform better in their task and increase the company revenue of
Kingfisher.
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Task 3:
3.1 Analyse the importance of employee relations in Kingfisher with respect to influencing
HRM decision-making
It is very important to maintain proper employee relationship as it reduces conflicts in the
workplace and also helps to sustain a healthy environment during making of important business
decision in kingfisher.It is seen that organizations where employee relations are good the
productivity of the company increases automatically. Employee relations will also help
employees remain motivated. There would be more sharing of ideas and work without hesitation,
and also will enjoy doing the work. Strong employee relation reaps a lot of benefit in a business
organization like Kingfisher (Mishra et al., 2014).
Few benefits of improving employee relations in Kingfisher:
Rise in Productivity: A stable employee relationship has been always a key to improve business
productivity as it can create maximum engagement of the employees in the organization and also
motivates the employees to improve their productivity which directly contributes to the overall
business goals.Company like kingfisher has always invested in employee relation programs has
always experienced higher productivity and profitability in the business
Increase employee loyalty: Working environment in kingfisher has been created such a way that
employees who work find the environment very pleasant to work, which increase their loyalty to
the company and they do not find it profitable to leave the organization and so they try to stick to
the same company, which improves employee retention and saves high company cost of
recruiting, training and hiring (George, 2015).
Reduced Conflicts: Friendly working environment has been maintained in Kingfisher as
employees can concentrate and work more productively in a conflict free peaceful work place
and share their opinions and ideas while taking business decision (Anitha, 2014)
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3.2 Identify the key elements of employment legislation and the impact it has upon HRM
decision-making
Employment legislation is the law that has been developed to administrate employer-employee
relations and their rights in the place of work.
Key elements of employment legislation:
Equality Act: This act has been implemented to avoid partiality and provide equal rights to the
individuals and protect from unfair treatment and discrimination. This act has taken the place
earlier anti discrimination law with a single act for making the law easy to understand and
increasing protection in various situations in the business environment of Kingfisher (Foster,
2015)
Data protection act: This act is important to control personal information in the business by
holding personal data in an organization and protects people’s fundamental rights.The act
ensures secure and safe processing of data in Kingfisher in order to protect personal data of
individuals as this issues are sensitive and can be used in a biased way(Mushtaque et al.,2014)
Health and safety act: This act takes care of the health and safety purpose of the workers and
the owner in the workplace.This act also states that employers should be responsible enough to
take care of themselves and also others.The main motive of the act is to guard workers from
different health hazards on the job and also make assessments of risks for the purpose of health
and safety of the employees and also to act upon the identified risks by reducing them. This act
also involves appointing of competent persons to supervise the health and safety of the
workplace of Kingfisher.
Redundancy: Redundancy is usually done to reduce workforce from the organization.During
redundancy the employee has certain rights like redundancy payment, notice period, proper
consultation with employer, and option of switching to another job and a time period to find
another job. There are few exceptional cases where the act cannot be implemented when
selection is based upon the experience and capability of the employee.
Dismissal act: The act is for unfair dismissals, which may occur when the employee terminates
the employment contract with or without notice, as called as constructive dismissal.When the
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employer is dismissed from such condition, the employer can use this act against the
employer.The dismissal act may not save the employee from dismissal but gives the employee
the rights to question the reason behind such unfair dismissal after it happens.During such unfair
dismissals a employee may get the job back and placed to the same position or provided with
compensation for the loss which occurred during the dismissal.
Employment contracts act: It has been introduced for the sake of giving proper notice before
dismissal. This contract is also responsible for attributing responsibilities and rights between
employee and employers for bargaining. The chief elements of the employment contracts are
employment terms, responsibilities of employee, benefits of employee, absence of employment,
dispute resolution, nondisclosure of agreements, agreements of ownership, limitations of
agreement, clauses of assignment and grounds for termination.
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Task 4
4.1 Illustrate the application of HRM practices in a work-related context, using specific
examples
1. The design of a job specification for one of a number of given positions in the organization
Job specification contains information regarding the required qualification for the job role,
experience the candidate has, training the candidate has gone through, the skills and
responsibilities. The design of the job specification for the role of human resource manager in
Kingfisher, UK is as follows:
Qualification: the candidate must have an MBA degree in human resource management
from reputed business school
Experience: the candidate must have a minimum experience of 4 years in working a
reputed organization in UK as the human resource executive
Training: Candidate must have hands-on training about the key functioning of a human
resource manager
Skill: the candidate applying the role of a human resource manager should have the
expertise to manage internal as well as external communication. The candidate must be
able to handle emotional crisis among the employees. the candidates must be able to
handle the recruitment process in the correct manner
Responsibilities of a Human Resource Manager: there are many responsibilities of a
human resource manager in a organization. The candidate who is selected for the position
of the human resource manager in Kingfisher, UK should be able to recruit, select, orient
and train employees. Good conduct should be implemented between the employees by
the human resource manager.
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2. A CV for each student, tailored to apply for one of the positions advertised by another team
CV for James Rodrigues
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Objective:
Want to join as a human resource manager in a organization and share my experiences
that I have gathered in Human Resource Management like staffing, recruiting, training,
and development for the benefit of the organization
Personal Information:
James Rodrigues
8-10 Regent St, Nottingham,
Centennial,
NG10 1JX
Phone Number:01642 476156
[e-mail]
Date of Birth: May 4, 1989
Place of Birth: London
Citizenship: British
Gender: Male
Profile Summary:
performance management of the employees, computer skill such as Adobe, Photoshop,
MS Word and MS Excel, brilliant interpersonal skills, strong written and oral
communication skills, benefits and compensation programs.
Education
MBA in Human Resource Management, 2011
London Business School, London

CV for Olivia Green
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Skills:
Experience in Development and training
Competent knowledge about various human resource activities
Vast knowledge about staffing and recruiting
Hobbies:
Singing, Reading Books and Cycling
Objective:
Want to join the organization as a human resource manager so that I can share my
experiences that I have gathered in my professional life. I have gathered extensive
knowledge on staffing and recruitement
Personal Information:
Olivia Green
2 Frobisher Close,
Redcar, TS11 7EG
Phone Number: 0115 973 6008
[e-mail]
Date of Birth: June 12, 19898
Place of Birth: London
Citizenship: British

3. Documentation of preparatory notes for interviews, interview notes based on selection criteria
and a justified decision of the candidate selected
Prepatory Notes
Candidate 1:
Candidate Name : James Rodrigues
Skills of the Candidate: development and training, knowledge about human resource activities,
staffing and recruiting
Performance: 9/10
Candidate 2
Candidate Name: Olivia Green
Skills of the Candidate: crisis management, interpersonal skills, oral and written communication
Performance: 7/10
James has been selected for the role of a human resource manager in KingFisher, UK. James has
vast knowledge about the activities of a human resource manager. Thus, the selection of James is
justified.
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4. A set of interview Questions
The set of questions required to choose a suitable candidate for the role of a human resource
manager are as follow:
What is your style of managing the employees?
How will you drive to results as a HR Manager?
What is the one thing you dislike in the role regarding a HR Manager?
What according to you should be an ideal work place?
What do you think about job elimination?
How do you deal with crisis management among the employees?
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5. A job offer to the selected candidate
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KingFisher, United Kingdom
99 Harrogate Road, RYLSTONE, BD23 4BL
June 6, 2018
Subject: Job Offer
Dear James,
I will be happy to let you know that you have been selected for the role of Human Resource
Manager in out esteemed organization. You will be required to join the organization on 10th
of June this month itself. All the details regarding job hours, job roles and your remuneration
has been discussed in this letter. In case of any clarification do feel free to reach us anytime.
Welcome Abroad,
Hope You have an enriching experience working with us.
Thank You

Conclusion
In this assignment, in-depth discussions have been done on the various aspects of human
resource management. Kingfisher, UK has been taken into account for discussing the various
approaches of human resource management. All the rules and regulations that a company should
follow to have effective and efficient employees have been focused up on. The assignment has
also shed light on the strength and weaknesses of the different approaches of human resource
management. At the end of this assignment, it can be concluded that effective human resource
management is mandatory for smooth running of an organization.
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