Strategic Human Resource Management Analysis: 3M Case Study Report

This report presents a comprehensive analysis of the strategic human resource management (SHRM) practices at 3M, focusing on the case study of its struggle between efficiency and creativity. It explores how 3M implemented various HRM initiatives, such as the New Venture Team, to foster innovation and support its strategic goals. The report examines the impact of cultural change management, highlighting the critical role of HR in supporting organizational transformations. It delves into the challenges faced by 3M in balancing Lean management, Six Sigma, and innovation, and provides recommendations for improving employee engagement, fostering a value-based work culture, and reinvigorating creativity. The analysis covers both internal and external strategic HRM aspects, including radical decentralized business structures and the implementation of programs like Six Sigma. The report underscores the importance of aligning HR strategies with overall business objectives to achieve sustainable success, offering insights into how 3M can regain its innovative edge and maintain a competitive advantage.

Running Head: STRATEGIC HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT
Topic- Research on Strategic Human Resource Management: Case study analysis
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Assignment answers
Short answer questions
1. The development of the new venture team is one of the fundamental Human resource
initiatives that have made a significant contribution to strategic success of the
organization mentioned in ‘3M: Case I’. The development of the team provided full-time
member support for all strategic business units of manufacturing, sales, marketing, and
finance (Canato and Ravasi 2015). As most the team members are recruited on volunteer
basis their specified skills and knowledge areas are used up appropriately in their relevant
area of association and thus there is considerable rise in productivity.
2. In ‘Monomaniac with a mission’ when a thing is being accomplished it is done
afterwards (Canato, Ravasi and Phillips 2013). This strategic goal supports the notion that
commitment is the reflection of fair product development and this leads to ultimate
satisfaction of the whole workforce and the organization at large (Coster 2017). The
employees related to functions of product development, new product innovation, product
promotion and mass production of the product take part in management as if it is their
own business and under this strategic decision, they are provided full potential to act on
their own and have minimum interference from above management (Delery and Roumpi
2017).
3. The formation of the New Venture team helped in having a full-time member support
which is easier for duplication and when the price for the same is provided commitment
automatically is achieved. It is to be noted that full-time commitment engagement leads
to increased commitment (Jackson, Schuler and Jiang 2014). Moreover, venture team
autonomy and power support team cohesion. The robust value system and cultural

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support help in maintaining product innovation and creativity at the same time (Kramar
2014). Moreover, projects are not limited to market size and market potentiality which
results in improved creative dimensions of the product.
4. One example of internal Strategic HRM related to 3M: Case I is radical decentralized
business structure which results in increased employee autonomy. Increased divisional
work reduces the volume of overall sales and lead to ultimate success through product
differentiation and spinning off (Lengnick-Hall, Lengnick-Hall and Rigsbee 2013). One
example of external strategic HRM support from 3M: Case II is Six Sigma program
implementation that includes a number of management techniques to decrease defects in
production and thereby increase efficiency of both workforce and production process.
Long answer questions
5. A)
It is true that cultural change management in an organization is the function of strategic
management level but the role or HR in supporting the cultural changes is indispensable
in this regard. When the organizational culture is based on strong strategy support and
structural base three things are supported effectively, employees knowing exactly what
top management requires, believe in their creditability and thus responds rightly and they
know that they will be rewarded for fair organizational value demonstration of theirs
(Marler and Fisher 2013). HR plays one of the most crucial roles in perpetuating strong
organizational culture starting from its primary function of recruitment and selection
followed by orientation, training and development and performance management
(Nagesh 2016). Organizational culture is strongly shaped by imbibed values, hierarchy,
urgency degree, people orientation, task orientation and functional orientation and other

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organizational sub-cultures. Having a strong organizational culture is vital for
organizational success where relationship between culture and leadership, employee
commitment, innovation and customer satisfaction are supported at large (Noe et al.
2017). Strong culture is not similar to fixed and rigid culture. When there is a shift in
organizational strategy and goals culture is to be changed accordingly. In this regard,
ownership in regard to cultural change is important that is who is actually responsible for
the change or who should initiate the change? Too often the answer is HR but it is not a
solo responsibility, instead it is a transactional process involving top strategic managers
and HR team support (Paille et al. 2014). Actually, to be more specified, the decision-
making of change remains in the hands of the senior executives and the HR team support
executes the change as per strategic instructions mentioned by the same. HR team leads
the change only. Thus, cultural change is no doubt a collaborative effort and the HR can
only execute the change by facilitating the research phase of change need, convincing
leaders that the cultural change is feasible, providing best suggestions and alternatives for
the change but decision making remains solely in the hands of the top management. HR
need to make this message clear to management so that there is no issue in change
‘ownership’. Though this is a hard challenge on the part of HR team as change is hard to
predict as based on the nature of change the management will decide upon which
approach to adopt among defensive or offensive style of change management (Park and
Hong 2019.). In adopting the change in culture HR leverage the opportunities in bringing
about the most effective change. Strategic managers only finalize the strategy for cultural
change in areas of new innovations, ideas, solutions or business growth prospects but HR
brings the change to the workplace. HR help its people to embrace business

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transformations that in turn boosts the market competition and thereby supports long-
term sustainability of the organization (Pongpearchan 2015). Thus, the major supporting
roles of HR in cultural change initiative is communication, change agenda establishment,
emotional roadblock anticipation, training and development and last but not the least
adopted solution proposal development and delivery to the top management. They
specifically, performs the role of a watch dog in the whole cultural change management
process, they rethink the new cultural shift and facilitate new process implementation by
the help of robust monitoring and guaranteeing cultural integrity of the new culture
(Pongpearchan 2015). Thus, they make sure that change processes are harmonious and
coherent with organizational structure and workforce management.
B) The current creative spark back faced by 3M is how to effectively manage in between
innovation and efficiency. There is no doubt that Lean management, Six Sigma and Total
Quality Management help in profitable shift in growth and innovation but it also has
several numbers of challenges (Canato, Ravasi and Phillips 2013). Process excellence on
one hand demands consistency, precision and repetition and on the other innovation
demands variation, serendipity and failure. That is, more the impact of TQM less will be
the opportunity for innovation. In this regard, it is worth mentioning that 3M did not did
not have a track of the kind of established matrices in projects. Researchers find it
difficult to cope up with the new system of Lean management and new work structure
and work culture has been difficult to adopt for them in the limited timeline (Canato,
Ravasi and Phillips 2013). In this regard, the issue of cultural ramification is to be
considered by the Vice-President and based on it, value-focus need to be improved

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instead of process-focused programs. The corporate culture should be such that employee
innovation and their initiative are supported at large. Delegation of authority here will
work successfully and employees will remain encouraged. Mistakes are obvious but this
will widen the learning process and the next stage of progress will be smoother. If
workforce engagement is robust then stagnation of lean management can be removed to a
great extent and innovation will be effective in-spite to Six Sigma implementation
(Delery and Roumpi 2017). Executive champion support through new venture team
development will support all functional areas in a more proficient manner. Coaching and
mentoring the employees will help them increase their efficiency and nurture new areas
of their skill development areas. Commitment will be improved as a result of team
autonomy and improved performance standards. Value-based work culture will support
smooth running of decentralized business structures holistically. Strong reward system in
this regard will support both team and individual effectiveness in a positive manner
(Kramar 2014). Promotion and career progress are an outcome of the successful venture
team and this will ultimately support sales and growth of the organization (Coster 2017).
Also, the strong support of the policy of Occupational Safety and Health Administration
(OSHA) will provide safe work culture to employees and researchers and as a result their
commitment to their job will increase manifold. Only bottom-line cannot serve the
success factor of the organization and employee support is one core attribute in the
sustainability of a business. A few of the said initiative recommendations when adopted
will help 3M to be back to success at large. The corporate culture will be shifted from
profitability and business discipline to growth and innovation and this will reinvigorate
the workers. This will finally help to brought back the spark of creativity in 3M.

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