HRM: Employee Engagement, Voice, and Development - ARU Report

This report delves into Human Resource Management (HRM) strategies, focusing on Unilever's approach to enhancing employee engagement, voice, and development. It outlines strategies such as recognizing top performers, promoting transparency, and prioritizing employee well-being to foster engagement, while also addressing potential disadvantages like biases and burnout. The report explores communication approaches, including transmission, ritual, publicity, and reception, to amplify employee voice and improve employer-employee relationships. It also examines training and development considerations to empower managers and employees, emphasizing the importance of skill enhancement for organizational growth. The analysis highlights the advantages and disadvantages of these strategies, providing a comprehensive overview of HRM practices within Unilever.

Human Resource
Management

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
Outline the development of strategies and the use of techniques that can be used to enhance
employee involvement and engagement. Underline the theories and analysis of these
recommendations including advantages and disadvantages of the strategies selected..........1
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................4
Various communication approaches that will help in greater employee voice. Advantages for
employees and employers of these theories so that it will help in problem solving..............4
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................6
Training and development considerations to enhance the roles and responsibilities of
managers and employees using relevant theories and practices.............................................6
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9
Books and Journals.................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
Human resource management focuses on the operations of human capital in an effective and
efficient way so that company can achieve prescribed organisational goals. It helps in
enhancement of employee’s performance so that organisation can obtain competitive advantages.
It involves various functions such as selecting, recruiting, hiring, training, motivating, providing
appraisals, compensating and many more (Stone, Cox, and Gavin, 2020). It manages
communication, psychology, sociology and economics of an organisation. This report is based on
Unilever which is a multinational consumer company. It was established on 1929, 2 September
and headquartered in London, United Kingdom. Unilever offers various quality products
including health care, personal care, hygiene and nutrition care products. This report will include
development strategies that can be use to improve employee engagement and performance
including their advantages and disadvantages. Communication approach is proposed that will
help in greater employee voice along with the benefits of employees and employers’ theories.
This report also includes training and development theories so that it can help in understanding
the roles and responsibilities of both managers and employees.
MAIN BODY
TASK 1
Outline the development of strategies and the use of techniques that can be used to enhance
employee involvement and engagement. Underline the theories and analysis of these
recommendations including advantages and disadvantages of the strategies selected
Employee engagement and involvement justifies the relationship between employees and
organisation. Human resource management plays important role in engaging employees in in
organisation so that they can achieve competitive advantages (Macke and Genari 2019). Human
resource managers of Unilever focus on employee’s well being so that they can satisfy the
demands of their employees at work place. It is very important to engage and involve employees
in an organisation so that they can contribute their positive efforts which help organisation in
achieving success. They try to establish emotional attachment with their employees which
increase likelihood in an organisation. Employee engagement help Unilever in reduction of
employee absenteeism and turnover which save lot of time and capital. Various strategies are
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used by Unilever for the enhancement of employee engagement and involvement which are
mentioned below:
Recognize top performers: It helps in engaging more employees because employees
feel that managers give respect and value to their efforts. When managers appreciate employees
for contributing best efforts in operations, then employee feel motivated and prepare themselves
to achieve long term goals. Unilever always give rewards to their employees on their
achievements like day off, cash prizes, shopping vouchers, lunch parties, etc. This makes
employees happier and more satisfied which increase the emotional and mental attachment
towards organisation. This strategy helps a lot to managers of Unilever because this also
improves the performance of employees. Recognizing top performers also created healthy
competition in an organisation as all the employees contribute their efforts in order to become
best performer which increase the sales of an organisation.
Promote transparency: Managers of an organisation focus on being transparent with
each other so that they understand the behaviour and attitude of each other. Clarity in thoughts
and mind results in effective e operations (Gigauri, 2020). This eliminates confusion and stress
which help employees in engaging themselves more in an organisation. Managers of Unilever
communicate each and every employee on regular basis so that they can create transparency. It
reduces the feeling of left out and increase involvement of employees which motivate them to
work hard. Transparency helps in free flow of communication which allow employees in sharing
their thoughts and ideas with each other.
Focus on employee’s well-being and benefits: When organisation focus more on
employee benefits and their well being then employee involve more themselves in the
organisation. Unilever provides safety, security and other health benefits which make their
employees happy and more engaged. Some of the benefits like equity packages, gym
memberships, education coverages and other commuter benefits are provided by Unilever. This
strategy results in higher involvement and engagement along with the increased performance of
employees. This results in longer retention of employees which help in achievement of goals and
objectives.
Make working environment more creative: Working environment plays vital role in
engaging employees in an organisation. Managers should focus on making environment more
creative and unique so that employees enjoy their work. Unilever organise activities like office
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games, theme days, celebrates birthdays and achievements of employees so that they can involve
more and more employees. This strategy focus on reducing boredom and enhance engagement
by increasing socialising at workplace. Employees feel more enthusiastic and engaged due to
creative events which provides benefits to an organisation.
Advantages of the selected strategies.
There are various advantages of employee engagement and involvement of employees in
relation to Unilever which are as follows:
 With the recognition of top performers, Unilever can improve the productivity of
employees (Jia and et.al., 2018). It helps in shaping employee’s behaviour in positive
manner so that they can strongly contribute towards the goals and missions of an
organisation.
 Transparency at work place results in higher growth and promotion of employees as well
as organisation. It reduces duplication of operations and eliminates miss understanding
and confusions among employees.
 Safety and security of employees lower down the rates of employee turnover and
increases their productivity. Managers of Unilever enjoys higher employee retention
with the help of this strategy.
 Strategies like creative work environment help in employee satisfaction which is very
essential for the achievement of goals of an organisation. It increases the loyalty and
trust towards Unilever.
Disadvantages of selected strategies
Employee engagement is very beneficial part of human resource management but there
are some disadvantages of the strategies which are used for employee engagement. These can be
discussed as follows:
 Rewards and recognitions sometime create partialities and biases among the employees.
Managers of Unilever sometime miss interpret the performance and appreciate wrong
employees which results in negative performance.
 Due to high transparency, miss leading information and rumours can be spread in an
organisation with high speed which affect the operations.
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 Strategies like safety, securities and benefits can create negative impact on the mind of
employees because of their higher expectations. Employees of Unilever increase their
demands and expectations which results in lower down of performances.
 Encouraging employees sometimes turn into employee burnouts as it affects their mind
(Oehlhorn and et.al., 2020). More involvement results in decreased flexibilities and
employee can not focus on their personal life.
TASK 2
Various communication approaches that will help in greater employee voice. Advantages for
employees and employers of these theories so that it will help in problem solving.
Employee voice refers to concerns, expressing ideas and explaining their perspectives
without any fear of workplace factors and consequences. This helps employees in taking
decisions for their operations in an organisation with the help of their feedbacks (Liu and et.al.,
2021). Unilever follows open communication format so that employees can fearlessly share their
thoughts and view. This helps in building strong relationship between employer and employee
which can lead to organisational success. Improvement of communication results in healthy and
positive work environment which reduces conflicts and issues in the operations. Employee voice
in Unilever matters a lot because employees are asset for an organisation and they contribute
their efforts in the success of Unilever. There are various communication approaches which will
help in greater employee voice in Unilever which are discussed below:
Communication as transmission: This is the important approach of communication
because it is the source from where communication started. It can be defined with several words
like sending, imparting, giving information and transmitting. Employees of Unilever who start
conversation or communication are very beneficial because they share thoughts and ideas
without any fear. This model is also refer as engineering model of communication as it initiates
the process by transmitting of thoughts.
Communication as ritual: This approach define communication as association, sharing,
participation and possession of common mindset and thoughts. This is expressive model as it
plays central role in communication model. Employees and employers both involve in this
process as both participate in transferring of ideas and thoughts. It enhance the productivity
because of increased coordination among the employees.
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Communication as publicity: Focusing on getting attention of others by influencing
their behaviour with the help of communication. This approach can be defined as display
attention approach. Audience plays important role in the process of communication as they
involved in listening. Audience can judge the participants on the basis of their faiths and
mindsets and can be results in manipulative.
Communication as reception: During the communication between employee and
employer, receiver of message plays important role because they give shape and meaning to
thoughts (Stewart and Brown, 2019). Members of Unilever who involved in encoding and
decoding of messages should considered very crucial in communication. Sometimes miss
understanding can takes place between employer and employee because same message can be
interpreted by other member in different manner.
Working relationships can be improved in many ways with the help of communication
approaches in Unilever. Employee voice helps in building strong relationships between
employee and employers in following manner which is mentioned below:
Spending time with individual employee: Employers should spend their time on regular
basis with every employee as it gives opportunity of understanding their mind set. It can be face
to face meetings, voice call or video conferencing which can be used for communication.
Employers of Unilever arrange meetings on regular basis which help them in clarifying of
thoughts and ideas in best possible manner.
Apologize for the mistakes: Being a human being, there is a possibility of committing
mistakes. Employers can also apologize for their mistakes so that employee feel more satisfied at
workplace and vice versa. Employees can also apologize to their colleagues and employers so
that it can reduce grudges and guilts. This results in strong relationship in Unilever without any
miss understandings and miss communications.
Employee voice have various advantages in terms of problem solving of both employees
and employers in an organisation. Better and clear communication in Unilever helps in reduction
of duplication in data. It results in engaging more employees towards the organisational
operations. Lack of understanding results in serious problems and issues which can be eliminated
with the help of employee voice. Employees of Unilever become more honest and loyal because
they can communicate easily with their employers without any obstacles and barriers. They can
give feedbacks and suggestions on regular basis so that operations can be up graded in an
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organisation (Zhang and et.al., 2021). It helps in decision making process and strategic planning
about important functions in Unilever which helps in future growth and success. Positive work
environment can be created with these strategies of employee voice which satisfy the needs and
demands of employee in Unilever. Workforce becomes more skilful and talented when they get
right to share their thoughts and views with their employers. It can solve various problems in day
to day operations which help in generation of more profits.
TASK 3
Training and development considerations to enhance the roles and responsibilities of managers
and employees using relevant theories and practices.
In today’s time, every organisation focuses on enhancing the skills and abilities of their
employees by providing them training and development programs. It helps in nurturing of talents
of employees which results in better growth of an organisation. Employees who are trained,
contribute positive efforts towards the organisational success (Adla, Gallego-Roquelaur and
Calamel, 2019). Human resource management of Unilever arrange various sessions and
programs so that their employees can up grade their required skills. Training and development
enhance the employee engagement and involvement along with the increased productivity which
help Unilever in obtaining various competitive advantages. Organisation’s work culture depends
on the training and development because it creates positive environment which is beneficial for
both employees and organisation. Trained employees become asset for organisation who perform
their duties and responsibilities in effective and efficient manner. It satisfies the needs and
requirements of employees including their appraisals and promotions which are necessary for
future growth. Unilever provides training because it assists managers and employees in
understanding their roles and responsibilities in better manner. There are various theories of
training and development which are mentioned below:
Goal setting theory: This theory was developed in order to set the goals earlier so that
employees can perform in particular direction to achieve them. Challenging and specific gaols
results in improved performance of employees. some of the managers use this theory of training
and development in order to train their employees for achievement of prescribed goals. It
evaluates proper roles for each and employees and manager in Unilever so that they can perform
activities according to that. There are various types of goals which managers can set including
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measurable, realistic, time bound, specific and aggressive goals. This results in higher
profitability in an organisation because it reduces chaos and burden from operations.
Behavioural learning theory: Under this theory, employees and mangers behave
according to their respective environment. They react according to the interactions with people
around them (Steffensen Jr and et.al., 2019). Mangers of Unilever appraise their top performers
and gives them rewards so that other employees learn from them. Managers try to create positive
work environment so that it can motivate the work force to perform in better manner. Praising
and award giving activities results in better understanding of roles and responsibilities and help
work force in completing their tasks prior to deadlines. It is more personalize and unique theory
of learning which results in achievement of behavioural goals.
Microlearning theory: Employees tend to learn better when short trainings and lessons
are provides to them. Their catching power works more on the modules and sessions which are
micro and concise in nature. Bit size formats improve focus of employees along with longer
retention. Managers of Unilever focus on the key elements and skills which are required by the
situation immediately. It enhance the performance by train employees in individual and separate
concepts. It reduces time consumption and cut down excessive costs due to short lessons and
programs. It is the responsibility of managers to evaluate the need of individual so that they
provide training according to that.
Constructive learning theory: In this theory of training and development, employees
learn better when they experience something by themselves in practical manner. Theoretical
lectures do not work for them as employee follow constructive learning (Agarwal, 2021).
Employees of Unilever interact with each other at work place which results in enhancement of
skills, abilities and knowledge in collaborative manner. Department of functional managers in
Unilever provide training and development sessions in their respective fields so that employees
can gain higher knowledge. Employees under constructive learning theory self reflect themselves
so that they can personally experience growth and success by learning new things.
Gamification theory: Game like elements and sessions become more convenient for
some employees during training and development programs. It increases interest and engages
more employees by attracting them towards the way of learning. Unilever introduced many
activities which are fun related but provide some realistic lessons which help them in
enhancement of their skills and abilities. It utilises advanced technologies at work place to train
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employees in effective manner. Various gadgets and smartphones are used by Unilever so that
employees feel more responsible and contribute their efforts in learning something new which is
beneficial for both including individuals and organisation. Multiple games are arranged by
managers to improve the knowledge including memory games, multiple choice, next in order and
jeopardy games.
Story telling learning theory: To transfer knowledge from one person to another, story
telling plays important role. Managers share their live and practical experiences with their
employees which enhance their abilities in required manner. Employees can grasp things in short
period of time through story telling because graphs, tables and training modules take lot of time
and efforts. Managers Unilever try to present their thoughts and views in format of case study
which attracts the attention of employees in effective manner.
It is evaluated training and development is very essential part of human resource mangers
which help employees in understanding their roles, responsibilities and duties in effective
manner (Zaid Jaaron and Bon 2018) . Employees work consistently at work place and
contribute their efforts in positive direction so that organisation can achieve success. It boosts
morale and job satisfaction by increasing the interest of employees and managers towards
achievement of goals. It reduces risks of mistakes and grab opportunities and advantages which
are needed for continuous operations. Unilever sometimes hire people who can train entire work
force so that they can become more responsible towards their duties and operation. Trained
employees increase the reputation of whole organisation by taking the business on the next level.
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CONCLUSION
Human resource management focus on the human capital which is very essential for the
growth and success of an organisation. It is a strategic approach which help managers in
improving performances of employees in effective and efficient manner. It formulates strategies
and policies which help in obtaining various competitive advantages and increase profitability of
an organisation. Human resource management train and develop employees according to the
requirement of organisation. It ensures the workplace safety, hiring, recruitment and
compensation to the employees. this report included strategies and techniques which improve the
employee engagement at work place along with their advantages and disadvantages. It also
includes various approaches of communication which help in employee voice with their benefits.
Various training and development theories are mentioned in order to improve role and
responsibilities of managers and employees are also discussed in this report.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Adla, L., Gallego-Roquelaure, V. and Calamel, L., 2019. Human resource management and
innovation in SMEs. Personnel Review.
Agarwal, P., 2021. Shattered but smiling: Human resource management and the wellbeing of
hotel employees during COVID-19. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 93,
p.102765.
Gigauri, I., 2020. Influence of Covid-19 crisis on human resource management and companies’
response: the expert study. International Journal of Management Science and Business
Administration, 6(6), pp.15-24.
Jia and et.al., 2018, June. A conceptual artificial intelligence application framework in human
resource management. In Proceedings of the international conference on electronic
business (pp. 106-114).
Liu and et.al., 2021. Enterprise human resource management platform based on FPGA and data
mining. Microprocessors and Microsystems, 80, p.103330.
Macke, J. and Genari, D., 2019. Systematic literature review on sustainable human resource
management. Journal of cleaner production, 208, pp.806-815.
Oehlhorn and et.al., 2020. Human resource management and its impact on strategic business-IT
alignment: A literature review and avenues for future research. The Journal of Strategic
Information Systems, 29(4), p.101641.
Steffensen Jr and et.al., 2019. Putting the “management” back in human resource management:
A review and agenda for future research. Journal of Management, 45(6), pp.2387-2418.
Stewart, G.L. and Brown, K.G., 2019. Human resource management. John Wiley & Sons.
Stone, R.J., Cox, A. and Gavin, M., 2020. Human resource management. John Wiley & Sons.
Zaid, A.A., Jaaron, A.A. and Bon, A.T., 2018. The impact of green human resource management
and green supply chain management practices on sustainable performance: An empirical
study. Journal of cleaner production, 204, pp.965-979.
Zhang and et.al., 2021. Big data and human resource management research: An integrative
review and new directions for future research. Journal of Business Research, 133, pp.34-
50.
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