Human Resource Management Report: Aldi's HRM Practices and Analysis

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Human Resource Management (HRM) principles and practices, focusing on their application within the context of Aldi, a global discount supermarket chain. The report begins by outlining the core functions of HRM, including job analysis, recruitment and selection, and employee orientation, emphasizing their importance in achieving organizational goals and fostering a productive workforce. It then explores different approaches to HRM, such as Hard HRM and Soft HRM, evaluating their respective strengths and weaknesses. The report further examines the crucial role of recruitment and selection, analyzing both internal and external sources, and assessing the benefits of various HRM practices for both employers and employees, including performance appraisal, compensation, and benefits. It also highlights the significance of employee relations and key elements of employee legislation, concluding with an overview of HRM practices in an enterprise and their practical application. The report underscores the importance of a dedicated and motivated workforce in achieving business success, with a focus on Aldi's strategies for employee satisfaction and performance.

Human Resource
Management

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................3
P1 HRM Purpose and Functions ...........................................................................................3
M1...........................................................................................................................................5
P2 Strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to recruitment and selection..............5
M2...........................................................................................................................................6
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................7
P3 Benefits of different HRM practices for both the employer and employee......................7
P4 Effectiveness of HRM practices........................................................................................8
M3...........................................................................................................................................9
D2...........................................................................................................................................9
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................9
P5 Importance of employee relations.....................................................................................9
M4.........................................................................................................................................10
D3.........................................................................................................................................10
P6 Key elements of employee legislation and its impact on HRM decision making...........10
TASK 4..........................................................................................................................................11
P7 HRM practices in an enterprise and its application.........................................................11
M5.........................................................................................................................................13
CONCLUSION .............................................................................................................................14
REFERENCES .............................................................................................................................14

INTRODUCTION
Human Resource Management (HRM) forms the backbone of any business organisation
as it is responsible for ensuring that organisation's objectives are achieved within specific time
with maximum output. HRM provides an organisation with dedicated and proficient workforce
who gives their best efforts in one direction to attain firm's goals and satisfy the customer. Thus,
HRM keeps its valuable resources – its employees in the centre of focus in formulating policies
and procedures so as to make sure that their efforts are recognised through proper compensation
and benefit schemes to enhance their performance by motivating. Aldi is one of the leading
brands in discount supermarket chain across the world with its base in Germany. It was founded
in 1913 and currently manages its operations in more than 10,000 stores in 20 countries across
the world. This project report studies the core functions of Human resource management along
with its various approaches, strength and weakness that the management applies for enhancing
its relationship with employees. Moreover it will also evaluate the importance of employee
relations for the success of the business and will brief about various labour laws that are formed
by the government to safeguard the rights of the employees (Hendry, 2012).
TASK 1
P1 HRM Purpose and Functions
HRM being the core function of an enterprise is bestowed with the responsibility of
converting the limited available resources of the company into maximum level of output by
maintaining proper coordination and alignment between the organisational and personal goals of
the employees. HRM becomes crucial for business growth as it helps business to develop cordial
relations with its workforce. Aldi being one of the world's topmost supermarket brands manages
a large team of over 30,000 employees to cater the needs of its customers. HRM manager of Aldi
by applying certain employee benefits and compensation schemes ensures that in addition to
accomplishing organisation objectives, an employee is also attaining his personal goals for career
growth (Bamberger , Meshoulam and Biron, 2014).
Mentioned below are some of the important functions which Aldi has undertaken for developing
an efficient and satisfied workforce:-

Job analysis: - It is a process of identifying and determining responsibilities and roles of
a particular job that are requisite for performing a task . It includes a series of activities to ensure
that a proficient candidate is hired so that the company doesn’t suffer any loss caused by misfits.
 Recruitment and selection: Recruitment and selection are the core functions of HRM as
which supports the enterprise in managing right person at right job at right time working
with full dedication in one direction with the best of their abilities for achieving the set
targets. They include a series of processes such as job specifications, screening
applications and then choosing the most appropriate candidate for a particular post to
enhance the level productivity and efficiency of business operations (Laurent, 1986).
 Orientation: Orientation is the program specifically organised for the new joiners to
introduce them to their colleagues and to familiarize with the procedures, policies and
about the expected roles and responsibilities in the firm so as to help them to adjust
themselves in the company.
 Managing employee relations: Employees being the most important and crucial
resources of a firm needs to be taken care of. HRM through its various team building
activities tries to enhance and maintain coordination and mutual understanding between
the employers and employees. It is one of the most important functions of HRM as it
helps in maintaining proper coordination, understanding and mutual respect between the
management and its workforce (Crook and et al, 2011).
Thus, the major responsibility of HRM is to see to that company achieves its pre-determined
targets with efficiency within the specific time.
There is variety of approaches to manage HR in a business. Two main approaches are:
 Hard HRM- This is mainly concerned about getting work done and meeting the
deadlines. It treats employees as machines and follows autocratic leadership style
maintaining minimum communication with the employees.
 Soft HRM: This approach gives main emphasis on employees and considers them as the
most valuable assets. It follows democratic style and involves employees in decision
making process so as to motivate them and increase their performance level.

M1
HRM practices need to be effective and efficient enough so as to give the company advantage
of creative and innovative team proficient in their work which enables an enterprise to increase
its profitability and productivity Thus, it is the responsibility of the management to give due
importance to the most valuable assets of the firm, its employees and formulate various
compensation and benefit schema to recognise their efforts so that they feel motivated and
encouraged to give their best of abilities in performing their task as and achieving their targets.
This will lead to develop an amicable relationship between organisation and its people.
According to Hukkinen, (2012), in case of particular vacancy, a company should use internal
strategies along with external ones for identifying the best suitable candidate. The organisation
should first source the required talent for the job internally through formal and informal methods.
The external source should be opted in case the job position required highly professional or an
expert candidate.
P2 Strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to recruitment and selection.
Recruitment and selection forms the foundation of the HRM functions. This is because it
involves the most crucial task of hiring and selecting the most appropriate person for a job
opening (Barney, Ketchen Jr., and Wright, 2011). It is done by analysing the job requirements,
attracting applicants, short listing suitable from among the various candidates and then
appointing the most appropriate person for the job opening. Selecting on the other hand involves
evaluating skills and knowledge possessed by a person through various aptitude tests so as to
match its suitability in reference to job vacancy.
There are two main recruitment sources and are mentioned as follows: Internal sources: Internal recruitment deals with recruiting people from within the
company by motivating them to apply for job vacancy. It includes transfer, promotions,
present employees, retired employees etc.
 Advantages  Disadvantages
 It increases employee motivation as
they work hard to get promotion and
 It provided limited choice of talent to the
organisation as it reduces chance of entry

increase their satisfaction level leading
to less turnover. The employees and
increasing their job satisfaction level.
 It serves as cost effective method and
reduces efforts of management that
they put in recruiting, selecting and
orientation process (Albrech, 2011).
of fresh blood.
 It is generally accused as a biased and
based on favouritism.
 It leads to same monotonous working
style as employee work with same idea
which he started as an initial level.
 External sources: It is the process of recruiting a suitable, more proficient and talented
candidate from outside an organisation. It includes recruiting through campus interview,
placement agencies, walk in interviews, employment exchange and competitors by
poaching.
Advantages Disadvantages
It leads to company hiring the most
appropriate employee according to job
profile.
It encourages the existing staff to be
competitive by enhancing their performance
level
It gives wider range of talented candidate that
can be considered for job vacancy
It generally happens that the new candidate
doesn’t get cooperation and support from the
existing staff which results in conflicts and
disputes.
Recruiting from external sources is a lengthy,
expensive and time consuming process.
The new candidate might not be able to get
accustomed with company's work culture,
policies and procedures
M2
Recruitment and selection forms the vital part of HRM practices. They are the basic functions of
HRM on which the success and growth of entire firm depends (Bowen, 1986). Therefore,
recruitment process must be carefully undertaken by evaluating the effectiveness of both its

external and internal sources to ensure that vacant job position is filled by the most appropriate
candidate.
TASK 2
P3 Benefits of different HRM practices for both the employer and employee.
HRM practices support a manager in formulating various schemes and policies that can
be effective in increasing the performance of an employee thereby making it easy for a firm to
accomplish it goals efficiently. HRM make sure that all these policies and procedure should have
a two way beneficiary effect so that both employer and employees don't resist themselves in
following them. An effective HRM practice will benefit the firm by identifying and avoiding
unwanted risks that can adversely affect the organisation's productivity level (Daley, 2012).
HRM practices for employer are:
Hiring of candidates: Hiring is one of the major and most crucial function of an employer which
has a direct relation with the productivity and success of a firm as any misfit or unqualified
candidate at wrong job profile is likely to hamper the performance and output level of a
company. There are various sources which an enterprise can consider to hire right person for
right job.
Benefits of hiring candidates are:
1. It provides opportunity for a firm to have advantage of new and innovative ideas.
2. It enables company to get edge over its business rivals.3. It leads to achievement of pre-set objectives within specific time.
Performance appraisal system: It is the process of monitoring, documenting and evaluating the
work efficiency and performance of an employee by comparing his actual performance with
expected level of performance based on pre-set standards. This reveals areas where an employee
is lacking for which a manager has to design a suitable training and development program so that
loopholes can be managed to improve proficiency of work (Oechsler, 2011).
Benefits of performance appraisal:
 It motivates and makes employees more loyal and dedicated as appraisal system is the
indicator of firms concern about training and developing each individual too make them
competitive.

 Manager gets an advantage of tracking down work performance of each employee and to
notify them about any deviations from the expected work performance.
HRM practices for employee are:
Compensation and benefits: Compensation and benefits aims at recognizing the efforts of an
employee by giving them rewards in return for their services to organisation. It helps in
encouraging them and building their morale lading to less turnovers and more retentions. It
includes both monetary value like pay increment, bonus, etc. and non – monetary value like
promotion, award etc.
P4 Effectiveness of HRM practices
A dedicated, proficient and motivated workforce is a key factor that enables a firm to
attain its mission, goals and objectives. It is therefore essential for employer to retain its talented
people as no one can substitute a proficient and loyal employee. Aldi follows the principle of
satisfying its people- consumers and employees (Flamholtz, 2011). And thus give due
consideration to their efforts as it is their talent, skills and dedication that company utilizes to get
maximum output and to satisfy its consumers. Mentioned below are some practices that can be
considered:-
Flexible working hours: Flexibility helps in reducing employee's stress level and
enables to maintain balance between professional and personal life. Application of this will
increase the morale and dedication of Aldi’s staff which will lead to cordial employer, employee
relations besides increasing performance level of them.
Measuring performance: Measuring work efficiency and performance level of an
employee becomes essential to check the effectiveness of training and development program
conducted by the firm. Aldi managers along with employees review and evaluate their
performance so that any deviations could be overcome and an employee can easily successfully
achieve both organisational and personal goals.
Training and development: It helps an employee to gain technique, knowledge and skills
that are requisite for carrying out their present as well as future job efficiently. Aldi get
advantage of T & D as it makes employees confident to take big challenges and higher
responsibilities making them future leaders.

M3
Recruitment and selection are the foremost functions of an enterprise as it is with talented and
dedicated staff that an organisation can achieve its vision. The manager has to specifically match
job requirement with personal specification at the time of hiring the most appropriate candidate
(Hendry, 2012).
D2
HRM practices assist the manager in completing the routine tasks of an organisation that
contributes in timely and successful achievement of company's goals and objectives. It is the
responsibility of a manager to form strategies that results in development of knowledge and skills
of employees to make them competitive in their work.
TASK 3
P5 Importance of employee relations
In this competitive environment it is an employee that serves a source of innovation,
knowledge and ideas for a firm to maintain an edge over its business rivals. Thus, it’s crucial for
a firm to maintain good employer employee relations having mutual cooperation trust for each
other. Managers of Aldi give due attention to encourage and involve its employees in decision
making process by welcoming their ideas and feedbacks related to any issue. Importance of
employee relations is evidence from below mentioned points:-
Discourage Conflicts & Fights: Proper coordination and mutual trust among people
makes them to be adjustable and ignorant to each other faults. This results in reduction in
conflicts and disputes as people become dedicated towards their work rather than indulging
themselves in arguments (Drucker, 2012).
Timely achievement of set objectives: A well-coordinated proficient team assists the
manger in taking efficient and quick decisions even on matters that are critical to evaluate solely
by manger himself. Thus by involving employees in decision making process a firm can
enhance the efficiency of its business related decisions.
Leads to increase in productivity: A firm providing good working environment,
cooperative fellow colleagues and a management which is supportive and encouraging will
motivate an individual to be proactive and works with best of its abilities. This will lead to

employees been dedicated towards their work which will reduce the problem of absenteeism and
turnovers resulting in an increase in productivity of organisation.
M4
It is of utmost significance for a firm to have good employee -employer relations as it
directly impact the success and growth of a firm. Employees being pillars of foundation for an
enterprise and the ultimate source to achieve customer's satisfaction and higher sales should be
given due consideration by motivating and encouraging them through various HRM practices as
it will be result in getting higher productivity, more sales and higher profits (Choi, 2011).
D3
HRM practices assist a manager to be rational while taking important decisions pertaining to
organisation and its employees. It is most crucial task for manger to formulate such policy,
procedure and schemes that are abide by all the legislations imposed upon by the government for
employee protection and benefit.
P6 Key elements of employee legislation and its impact on HRM decision making
Laws and legislation at different various government levels serves as a determining factor
in various policies and procedures that an organisation formulates (Armstrong and Taylor, 2014).
The company is abide by the law to include all rights, provisions and other activities that are lay
down by law for the welfare of employees. Some of the most important employee protection
laws are as beneath: Health and safety act 1974: This act makes it responsibility of a business to provide
healthy and safe working environment to its employee which should be in accordance
with the legal standards as laid down in the act. The defaulter company is bound to be
penalised by government.
 The National Minimum Wage Act 1998: Under this act, it is mandatory for firm to
provide minimum wages according to their work effort as per the prevailing wage rate to
its employees. It will calculated on the basis of working hours in a day. Aldi HR
department ensures that the policies are effectively implemented at their workplace.

 Family and Medical Leave Act, 1993: It is an act which is formulated for the welfare of
families of employees working in an organisation. This act entitles an individual to take
take up to 12 weeks unpaid leaves for himself and his family for medical reasons. An
employer is abide to sanction its employees with job-protected & unpaid leaves for
permitted medical and family reasons (Briscoe, Tarique and Schuler, 2012).
TASK 4
P7 HRM practices in an enterprise and its application
HRM manager has to deal with a wide range of activities that initiates with conducting
an induction program for new joiners, to solve their disputes to ensure the smooth performance
of business operations as per the set standards. Below is an example of one of the activity
performed by HR manager. The illustration indicates the whole process of recruitment and
selection.
Hotel receptionist training
Workshop title/ Training practices Date- Time-
Location Instructor
Candidates
Activity Time of activity Process Equipment required
Induction of candidates
Training objectives
a)
b)
Warming up
Contents and necessary
points
Job advertisement
Instructor require

Qualification /Eligibility
MBA/BBA in Human Resource Management from any recognised institution
To apply:
You are required to upload your application with CV and latest photograph on our websites
latest by 31 March 2018.
Email-id: www.aldi.com
Contact no.: 00000XXXX
Job specification
Qualification Master's Degree in Human Resource
Management.
Bachelor's degree in business or related field.
Experience Should have 2 year experience in HRM.
Area of expertise Should be proficient with communication
skills and leadership skills.
Other qualities Good verbal and writing skills.
Basic computer skills.
Good interpersonal skills.
Interview Questions
 What are your strengths?
 What are your weaknesses?
 Have you ever participated in any co- curricular activities?
 What strategies will you adopt while working in the organisation?
 Your expectations from this organisation?
 Where do you want to see yourself in next 5 years?
Person specification
Particulars Required criteria Learning and outcomes

Qualification and training Communicate with new
employees
Able to perform whole
induction process.
Experience Providing the best services to
customer
Pressure handling ability
Must have performed certain
induction process in training
sessions in college days
Skills and knowledge Attentive and good
communication skills
Developing and generating
innovative ideas
Personal characteristics Proactive, leader, confident,
positive attitude
Team Builder
Developing certain skills
and traits to work in
organisational culture.
CV
Information of candidate
Name: Will Smith
Father's name: Tom Smith
Mother's name: Maggie Smith
Mobile no,: 6644456853
Email id: [e-mail]
Key skills: Creativity Well versed with concept Human Resources Management Have advanced knowledge of computer Working in team Having ability to learn and grasp
Experience:
 Goldman : Assistant to Retail Manager
 Schroedinger: Worked as a learn leader in retail store located at Durha

M5
HRM practices enable a firm to accomplish desired objectives within specific time frame. It is
therefore becomes beneficial as well as profitable for firm to apply these procedures and policies
as per government norms for smoothly running its business operations as well as to attain higher
productivity and profits (Brewster and Hegewisch, 2017).
CONCLUSION
The above project had concluded that HRM forms the major function of a business which
initiates with recruitment and selection of the best suitable candidate as per job profile and to
ensure that there is right person at right job at right time. Besides this, it aids in preparing those
policies that put employees into centre of focus and giving them due attention by recognising
their hard work and services given to the company. In addition, it is significant for manager to
develop practices that aims at maintaining cordial relationship between business and its
workforce. Moreover, the management is also enforced by government to comply with and
implement certain labour laws for protecting rights of employees that business has to follow and
implement.

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