BSBWRK411: Employee and Industrial Relations Procedures Report

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of employee and industrial relations procedures, focusing on the context of Coles Supermarkets. It begins by examining the Coles Supermarkets Enterprise Agreement 2017, detailing its provisions and the relevant legislation (Fair Work Act 2009). The rep...Read More

Running head: SUPPORT EMPLOYEE AND INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS PROCEDURES
Support employee and industrial relations procedures
Name of the student
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Table of Contents
1. Awards and Agreements........................................................................................................3
a) Type of award or agreement:.............................................................................................3
b) What legislation was the Award or Agreement made under?...........................................3
c) Provisions of award or agreement:.....................................................................................4
2. Employment Related Legislation...........................................................................................5
3. Organisation’s policy statement regarding Employee or Industrial Relations.......................9
a) How would you support the communication of this policy to staff?...............................10
b) What do you think that this policy suggests about the way the organisation approaches
its relationships with staff?...................................................................................................10
4. Procedures of an industrial or employee relations nature....................................................10
a) Difference between a policy and procedure:....................................................................11
b) Impact of each of the policies on employment relationships:.........................................11
c) Role of communication in the organisation:....................................................................12
5. Enhancement of Employee relationship...............................................................................13
a) Strategy to promote ER/IR policies and procedures:.......................................................13
b) How does the organisation provide for the dissemination of accurate industrial relations
advice to stakeholders?........................................................................................................13
c) Ways of ensuring appropriate discussions about ER/IR issues:......................................13
References:...............................................................................................................................14
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1. Awards and Agreements
Managing employee relationship plays a major role in improving organisational
productivity by keeping the staffs loyal and satisfied (Koch and Manzella 2019). Being one
of the largest supermarket in Australia, Coles is showing utmost commitment in the way of
strengthening employee relationship within their workplace. In order to promote fair work,
Coles has signed an agreement namely Coles Supermarkets Enterprise Agreement 2017
with some of their staffs (Sda.org.au. 2020).
Figure 1: Copy of the agreement
(Source: Vic.amieu.net. 2020)
a) Type of award or agreement:
This is a state agreement, which intends to promote fairness among the staffs
irrespective of their race, class and socio-economic background.
b) What legislation was the Award or Agreement made under?
This agreement has developed 172(5) of the Fair Work Act 2009 (Act), which is the
key of promoting fairness in the workplace. Coles can be considered as the bargaining
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representative of the agreement and applied unders.185 for the sake of approving the
agreement.
c) Provisions of award or agreement:
The major provisions of Coles Supermarkets Enterprise Agreement 2017 are as follows:
 Improving the penalty rate especially on weekend
 Protect the pay of each of the staffs
 Improved protection of roster
 Rise the pay structure for all of the staffs
Figure 2:4 different provisions of the agreement
(Source: SDA - SA & NT Branch. 2020)
Coles has included all of its members in the agreement. The company has implemented
2-step transitional arrangement in order to transfer the team members from getting multiple
pay rates to 2-step transitional arrangement to one set of uniformed pay and penalty structure,
which will be effective from 1st July, 2020. This is the way, through which the company has
ensured protection of pay and penalty rate for each of the people, without making any kind of
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discrimination. Roistering is one of the major aspects of the internal functionality of Coles.
According to roister, followed by Coles, each of the staff has to work for 9 hours for at least
two days in a week. This is the way, through which Coles is ensuring appropriate roister in
each of the week ends.
2. Employment Related Legislation
There are multiple federal state, and territory legislations in Australia related to
employment. These legislations must be followed by the firms in order to promote fairness in
their workplace. The legislations related to employment are as follows:
 Fair Work Act 2009
This is one of the major employment related legislations related to Australia. The
obligations or both employees and employers are outlined in this legislation. The
fundamental purpose of this legislation is to offer the organisations with a balanced
framework in order to develop productive workplace relation which can promote economic
prosperity and social inclusion for everybody. This act provides terms and conditions of
employment, set rules and regulations for employees, employers and organisations in order to
promote appropriate employment and create provisions for the compliance with the act. In
addition, this legislation also offers the organisation with the mode of administering the act
by developing fair work commission (Employsure. 2020). By implementing this acts, Coles
will be able to promote diversity in the workplace, which is the key of sustaining in the global
business environment.
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Figure 3: Summary of fair work act
(Source: Employsure. 2020)
 National Employment Standards (NES)
This act deals with the standard of employment, which must be followed by the firms in
terms of hiring staffs through a standardise process. The minimum entitlements of this
legislations are Maximum weekly hours, Requests for flexible working arrangements,
Parental leave and related entitlements, Annual leave, Personal/carer's leave, compassionate
leave and unpaid family and domestic violence leave, Community service leave, Long service
leave, Public holidays, Notice of termination and redundancy pay and Fair Work Information
Statement. According to this act, each of the staffs, must access all of the above opportunities
(Fair Work Ombudsman. 2020). Compliance with this legislation will help Coles to improve
their organisational productivity by keeping the staffs happy and satisfied.
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Figure 4: Summary of national employment standards
(Source: Fair Work Ombudsman. 2020)
 Privacy Act 1988
This act deals with the privacy of the staffs in an organisation. The fundamental objective
of this act is to promote privacy of individuals and recognise the fact that the protection of
privacy of the individual people is balanced with their interests (Jennings et al. 2017). One of
the major objectives of this act is to offer the basis of nationally consistent regulation of
privacy and handle the personal information of people (Legislation.gov.au. 2020).
Application of this legislation will help Coles to develop an effective credit reporting system,
which is the key of ensuring the fact that they respect the privacy of individuals. In addition,
by applying this law, Coles will also be able to maintain transparency and responsibility of
handling personal information and thereby facilitate free flow of information across the
organisation.
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Figure 5: Objectives of Privacy Act 1988
(Source: Legislation.gov.au. 2020)
 Workplace Gender Equality Act 2012
This is one of the major legislations related to employment, which intends to promote and
improve gender equality in the workplaces (Brewster 2019). This is the way of resolving
regulatory burden from the workplaces. The fundamental objective of this act is to promote
equal remuneration in between men and women and mitigate the obstruction in the way of
full participation of women in workplace. This legislation aims to lead the employers to
eliminate any kind of discrimination on the basis of gender (Legislation.gov.au. 2020).
Application of this legislation will help Coles to promote workplace consultation in between
the employers and employees regarding the issue of gender equality in workplaces. This is
the way, through which Coles will be able to improve their productivity and competitiveness
by advancing gender equality in workplaces.
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Figure 6: Summary of Workplace Gender Equality Act 2012
(Source: Legislation.gov.au. 2020)
3. Organisation’s policy statement regarding Employee or Industrial
Relations
Maintaining strong employee relationship is one of the major ways of attaining long
term success from business by keeping the staffs motivated. This is the key of developing
productive workforce free from any kind of conflict (McCabe 2019). Being one of the largest
supermarket chains in Australia, Coles is highly committed towards strengthening employee
relationship. The policy statement of employee relation of Coles is as follows:
 Respecting the rights of staffs in order to engage them in constructive negotiations.
 Offering competitive benefit which allow the staffs to meet their need in accordance
with local standard of living
 Implement corporate guideline about working time in order to assure safe and healthy
workplace and respectful working environment
 Treating the staffs with dignity and avoid any kind of discrimination from the
workplace.
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a) How would you support the communication of this policy to staff?
Effective communication with the staffs is one of the major factors in the way
of keeping the staffs happy and satisfied. However, in order to maintain healthy
communication with the staffs, it is important for the firms to invest effort (Curtin 2019). The
firms must also put stress on keeping the staffs informed about the policy statement. As Coles
is highly committed towards strengthening employee relation, it is important for them to
communicate the policy statement with them. It is important for the higher authority of Coles
to conduct meeting with the staffs for the sake of introducing the completed handbook,
reinforce its importance clarify the staffs regarding the way of using it.
In addition, the higher authority of Coles should also ask the staffs to review the
policy manual. It is important to distribute the completed handbook of policy either in hard
copy or guide them regarding the mode of accessing it through online. At the same time,
extensive and intensive training must be provided to the staffs for the sake of ensuring the
fact that every employee understand the same.
b) What do you think that this policy suggests about the way the organisation
approaches its relationships with staff?
Based on the policy statement of Coles, it can be said that the company is high
committed towards improving the employee relationship and thereby keep them committed.
The policy statement of Coles reflect that the firm is extremely willing towards respecting the
rights of staffs and offering them with competitive benefit, which can help them to meet the
required standard of living.
4. Procedures of an industrial or employee relations nature
Communication and consultation and Grievance resolution procedure are two of the
major procedures related to employment.
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a) Difference between a policy and procedure:
A policy is defined as the guiding principle, which is used in order to set direction of
an organisation. On the other hand, procedure is referred as the set of steps, which are to be
followed by the organisation as a repetitive approach for the sake of accomplishing end result
(Forret et al. 2018). Policies can change infrequently while procedure can change
continuously. In the same way, the policies are broad and general, contrary to which, the
procedures offer the organisations with detailed description of activities.
b) Impact of each of the policies on employment relationships:
Employment relationship plays a major role in improving the degree of productivity
of an organisation. This is the mode of accelerating employee retention and thereby reduce
the rate of employee absenteeism. Grievance resolution procedure is one of the major factors
of employee relation as it helps in resolving any kind of challenging situation from the
workplace. In addition, this process can help in maintaining harmonious industrial relations,
which is very much needed to improve organisational productivity. Being the largest
supermarket chain in Australia, Coles is extremely committed towards improving employee
relationship. By applying this process, Coles will be able to encourage the staffs to raise
concern without any kind of fear. In addition, effective grievance resolution procedure is the
major way of attaining fair mean of dealing with complaints. Thus, implementation of this
process will help Coles to resolve the issues of disagreement.
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Communication and consultation are another major factor of employee relationship.
This is the mode of improving decision making process and managerial activities (Poon
2019). Communication and consultation plays a major role in making the staffs feel valuable
by taking part in the decision making process. This is the way, through which Coles will be
able to deal with the changes in working practices and procedures.
c) Role of communication in the organisation:
As the largest supermarket chain, Coles always prioritises employee satisfaction as
the key factor of attaining long term success from business. The higher authority of Coles
used to communicate both the procedures to the staffs. The inclusion of strong
communication channel is helping Coles to keep the staffs informed about the procedures of
industrial relation.
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5. Enhancement of Employee relationship
a) Strategy to promote ER/IR policies and procedures:
Employee recognition is one of the major strategies of promoting ER (Employee
Relation) procedure. This is the way, through which Coles will be able to offer the staffs with
suitable reward and encourage them to work as per the expectation of management.
b) How does the organisation provide for the dissemination of accurate industrial
relations advice to stakeholders?
Communication of the workplace policies is order to help both the internal and
external stakeholders to know about organisational policies and let them work according.
Conduction of regular meeting is one of the major ways, through which advice about
employee relation can be given to the stakeholders. This is the way of updating them
regularly about the strategy, growth and direction of the firm (Muhammad 2019). In addition,
the higher authority of Coles should also sent mass e-mail to the stakeholders regarding the
organisational polices. This is the way, through which the staffs can have an idea regarding
organisational policies and procedures.
c) Ways of ensuring appropriate discussions about ER/IR issues:
Appropriate staffing and development of unionised workforce is one of the major
ways, through which Coles can ensure that they are following effective employee relation
procedure. Regular meeting with the staffs is one of the major ways of making discussion
about the issues of employment (Ugoani 2020).
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References:
Brewster, C., 2019. Comparative Employee Relations: An Overview of Contemporary
Developments and Scholarship. In International Comparative Employee Relations. Edward
Elgar Publishing.
Curtin, P.A., 2019. How Employee Relations Shaped And Maintained Us Corporate Welfare.
Public Relations, Society and the Generative Power of History.
Employsure. (2020). What is the Fair Work Act? | Australia Legislation | Employsure
Guides. [online] Available at: https://employsure.com.au/guides/fair-work-australia/what-is-
the-fair-work-act/#section-2 [Accessed 13 Feb. 2020].
Fair Work Ombudsman. (2020). Welcome to the Fair Work Ombudsman website. [online]
Available at: https://www.fairwork.gov.au/employee-entitlements/national-employment-
standards [Accessed 13 Feb. 2020].
Forret, M., Balachandra, L. and Anand, S., 2018. Labor relations, employee relations and
negotiation. In Teaching Human Resource Management. Edward Elgar Publishing.
Jennings, C., McCarthy, W.E.J. and Undy, R., 2017. Employee Relations Audits. Routledge.
Koch, K. and Manzella, P., 2019. Introduction: The Language and Culture Perspective in
Employee Relations. In International Comparative Employee Relations. Edward Elgar
Publishing.
Legislation.gov.au. (2020). Privacy Act 1988. [online] Available at:
https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2014C00076 [Accessed 14 Feb. 2020].
Legislation.gov.au. (2020). Workplace Gender Equality Act 2012. [online] Available at:
https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2016C00895 [Accessed 14 Feb. 2020].
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McCabe, D.M., 2019. Contemporary Trends in Employee Relations and the Employment
Relationship: A Competitiveness Perspective. In Competition Forum (Vol. 17, No. 2, pp.
248-251). American Society for Competitiveness.
Muhammad, L., 2019. Do service firm employee and customer relations matter for customer
forgiveness in service recovery?. Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics.
Poon, T.S.C., 2019. Independent workers: Growth trends, categories, and employee relations
implications in the emerging gig economy. Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal,
31(1), pp.63-69.
SDA - SA & NT Branch. (2020). Coles and SDA Union Agreement 2017. [online] Available
at: https://www.sda.com.au/coles/ [Accessed 13 Feb. 2020].
Sda.org.au. (2020). COLES SUPERMARKETS ENTERPRISE AGREEMENT 2017. [online]
Available at: https://www.sda.org.au/download/enterprise-agreements/COLES-
SUPERMARKETS-ENTERPRISE-AGREEMENT-2017-inc.-Bi-Lo.pdf [Accessed 13 Feb.
2020].
Ugoani, J.N.N., 2020. Managing Employee Relations and its Effect on Organizational
Success. International Journal of Social Sciences Perspectives, 6(1), pp.1-10.
Vic.amieu.net. (2020). COLES SUPERMARKETS MEAT ENTERPRISE AGREEMENT 2018.
[online] Available at: http://vic.amieu.net/files/Coles_Meat_EA_2019.pdf [Accessed 13 Feb.
2020].
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