ICON College HRM Report: Evaluating HRM at The Body Shop (Unit 3)

This report, prepared for a BTEC HND in Business (RQF) Unit 3 Human Resource Management assignment, provides a comprehensive analysis of HRM practices at The Body Shop. As the newly appointed HR manager, the report begins with an executive summary, outlining the need for restructuring the HR department and evaluating its efficiency. It covers the purpose and scope of HRM, key functions (including managerial and operational roles), recruitment and selection processes, and the importance of training and development. The report also evaluates the effectiveness of various HRM methods, including job and workplace design, flexible working options, and training programs. Furthermore, it analyzes internal and external factors influencing HRM decision-making, including employment legislation and employee relations. Finally, the report applies HRM practices in a work-related context, including job analysis, selection processes, and job offers. The report emphasizes the importance of aligning HRM strategies with business objectives to ensure organizational success.

Student Name: Student Number:
ICON COLLEGE OF TECHNOLOGY AND MANAGEMENT
Pearson BTEC HND in Business (RQF)
Unit 3 Human Resource Management
Student Name:
Student Number:
Assessment Number:
Assessment Due Date:
Word Count:
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Human Resource Management
Executive Summary
As the newly appointed HR manager , for the organisation termed as the body shop, it is
significant that the restructuring of the division is performed as an element of organisational
change. There is a need for restructuring the HR department as per the report where in the
efficiency of Human Resource role is reviewed for the body shop with the study of the scope
as well as responsibility of human resources. In this report the key HR functions of the body
shop are evaluated.
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Table of Contents
Executive Summary...............................................................................................................................2
Introduction.......................................................................................................................................4
Overview of the organization............................................................................................................4
LO1: Explain the purpose and scope of Human Resource Management in terms of resourcing in your
chosen organisation with talent and skills appropriate to fulfil business objectives.............................5
Purpose and functions of HRM.........................................................................................................5
Key roles and responsibilities of HR function...................................................................................5
The functions of HRM provide talent and skills to fulfil the business objectives..............................7
Strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to recruitment and selection................................7
LO 2: Evaluate the effectiveness of the key elements of Human Resource Management in an
organisation...........................................................................................................................................8
Evaluating the effectiveness of different methods used in HRM practices........................................9
LO3: Analyse internal and external factors that affect Human Resource Management decision-
making, including employment legislation..........................................................................................11
Analysis of the importance of employee relations in respect to influencing HRM decision- making
.........................................................................................................................................................11
Key elements of employment legislation and the impact it has upon HRM decision- making........12
TASK 4 (LO 4): Apply Human Resource Management practices in a work-related context.................13
Job analysis.....................................................................................................................................14
Selection Process.............................................................................................................................14
Job Offer..........................................................................................................................................15
References...........................................................................................................................................17
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Introduction
The leadership is the principal strategy applied by lots of business. It is one of the key
strategies which is utilised for managing the staff members. The system of leadership also
increases the support for workers concerning acquiring knowledge regarding but they are
working upon. And organisational success is reliant upon the performance of the workforce
and recruitment together with the process of training which is provided by the HRdepartment.
Recruitment and selection procedures are carried out by the HR division when the
appointment and selection of effective staff members is done (Perrewé, 2011). By the
competitive labour market, there are many benefits achieved by the organisation. In this
report the case study of the body shop has been considered and as a HR manager, the testing
of new recruitment and selection procedure has been carried out. There has been restructuring
of the department and therefore the review of efficiency of HR function has to be done on the
basis of the job and scope of HR and reassessment of the key HR functions in the chosen
organisation.
Overview of the organization
The selected organisation is the Body Shop which is situated in the United Kingdom. It began
in Brighton, England in the year 1976 with founder Anita Roddick utilising the vision as a
Pioneer to the fair trade in beauty segment (Our Heritage, 2019). There are suppliers situated
in over 20 countries all over the world which source the best drawing gradients and
traditional skills from all over the world. Urbanisation is all about the beauty goods and it
sells the products used for makeup, hair, face products, fragrances and different other items.
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LO1
Purpose and functions of HRM
Human resource management (HRM) is the function within the business which lays stress on
recruitment former management and training of the manpower (Thacker, 2012). In this
organisation the key functions of HRM involve HR Research, Development of Human
Resource, benefits and reimbursement from setting up relation between the staff and
organisation development of HR as well as safety and health. In the Body Shop the HR task
is regarding the management of issues which are related to the employees of the organisation
in terms of health benefits, compensation, hiring promise safety, performance from
motivation and training (Lucas and Grant, 2018). The HRM has a role of helping the staff to
have valuable contribution to the overall accomplishment of the business objectives.
Key roles and responsibilities of HR function
The major functions of the HRM are given below
Managerial functions.
 Workforce planning: it is the significant element of HRM where the organisation will
have the capacity of finding out the number of staff required along with the skills needed
(Beer, 2017). For every job there is a need for forecasting the demand and supply for the
specific time period. Therefore in the Body Shop the inadequacy or excess of the skills
for the specific job category is reviewed and then a plan is created for dealing with such
shortages of workers (Thebodyshopcareers.com, 2019).
 Organisation: in this role the HRM has to develop and determine the structure of the
business.
 Direction: HRM has a role to inspire and direct the staff members for accomplishment of
business goals (Juul Andersen and Minbaeva, 2013). For this the management has to
make proper plans for the career of workers, motivational methods and there has to be
maintenance of friendly relationship with the staff.
 Controlling: It is a function which includes evaluation of activities as per the plans laid
area. The HR manager has to evaluate the outcome attained as per the plans laid earlier.
Operative functions
 Recruitment: It is one of the highly challenging jobs for the HR manager. There is a
need of lot of resources as well as dedication to draw, employ and recruit the capable
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staff. For this function, there is a use of huge attempts like creation of a job depiction,
publishing of the job post, contacting the potential candidates, interviewing, negotiation
of the compensation and providing the job offer (Glassdoor.com, 2019).
 Training and development: The HR division has to provide constant trainings to the
existing staff members as well as the new hires. By training the new hires can be made
aware of the goal of the body shop and roll into the organisation. By training the workers
are made aware of the key procedures and there get assistance in performing their jobs.
 Professional development: HRmanager has to assist the staff in growth and development
through the arrangement of seminars, trade shows for corporate trainings (O’Brien and
Jones, 2014). Finally this would make the staff feel that they are significant part of the
business and the management takes good care of them.
 Performance appraisal: The performance of the staff is evaluated by the HR team. This
helps The Body Shop to understand whether the workers which are hired by the
organisation are focused towards the business objectives of not. By performance
appraisal, the clarity regarding the needs of improvement is also achieved for every staff
member.
 Compensation and benefits: The HR managers plan the compensation part along with
different benefits. This would keep the staff contented and motivated. The Body Shop can
provide with various benefits such as Insurance, working hours flexibility, educational
support, paternal leaves and similar other benefits.
 Following of the legal guidelines: The HR manager has to make sure that the
organisation operates on the policies which are created in integration with the
employment laws. This would involve overtime, working conditions, health and safety of
staff, minimum wages, working hours, tax allowance, and various other employment
laws.
Advisory functions
 Departmental head advice: The HR division has to assist the departmental heads in
terms of Designing the job, describing the job, appraisal, recruiting and selecting (Ko and
Ma, 2017).
 Top management advice: The HR Manager provides advice to the top management with
respect to two processes and policies to be created. The management can also get
assistance from the HR department in terms of appraisal methods.
The functions of HRM provide talent and skills to fulfil the business objectives
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At The Body Shop the major concern of the HR managers is to make sure appropriate
stuffing therefore all of the above functions focused on provision of skill and talent to
accomplish the business goals. This would include design of the business structure and
defining different contracts on basis of which the staff will operate. It is important to recruit
and develop the right individuals and HRM makes sure that the best staffs are recruited. For
improving the performance, appropriate level of motivation is provided to the staff along with
suitable training (Johnson, 2016). The HR manager also needs to Keep Up the talented and
skilled workers therefore for retaining them it can utilise different tools such as promotion,
salary increase for flexible benefit (Stone and Coussons-Read, 2011) s. In case the skills or
talent is not applied appropriately then it is reflected by the business performance going
down. In this case the HR manager can make use of disciplinary strategies
Strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to recruitment and selection
In terms of the body shop, it is imperative that the applicants fill the application form where
in they are also informed about the job title, grade, key rules, reporting lines and key
activities. With the recruitment form available on the Internet, the applicants can send their
resume in email to the HR department along with the completed form. The HR department
post through all the applications and then and all the candidates you seem to be suitable for
the vacant position are called further for the selection process (Müller, 2012) . This means all
the applications which are not suitable get rejected on the basis of their resume. This is a
complex and time consuming process.
In this recruitment process, the strength is the cost effectiveness and saving of energy in the
next stages. The selection process of the body shop also possesses the benefit that every new
recruit is provided training into three phases. Each phase is one step additional for the career
of the worker. However there is a weakness to this selection process because there are
possibilities that the HR department results and suitable candidate. Yet in the body shop there
is a robust selection process because the past experience of the workers is also considered to
understand their skills and talent.
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LO 2:
The HRM is a tool which is used by the staff as well as employer of the body shop to control
the business activities and enhance its performance. The common performance done at The
Body Shop are hiring, compensating, training, dealing with staff benefits as well as firing.
 The effectiveness of job and workplace design in addition to reward system
The job and workplace design along with the reward system at the body shop would help in:
- Enhancing the productivity,
- improving the attendance,
- improving employee retention,
- improving employee morale (Schermerhorn, 2011).
 Efficacy of flexible working options and flexible organisation
The newly applied flexible working system at the body shop has helped in strengthening the
dedication of staff members along with motivating them to deal with situation which might
be unsafe for the organisation. This means the flexibility in the organisation has motivated
the staff members of the body shop.
 The effectiveness of training and its requirements
The development and training are important aspects which are necessary for Supreme
functioning of the HR (McLean, 2015). Training and development act as the integral
activities for The Body Shop. These involve:
- induction training,
- apprenticeship training,
- on-the-job training,
- vestibule training,
- Refresher training.
The training at Body Shop is one of the cheif elements which help the staff in improving the
level of competency. The staff efficiency is enhanced with additional benefit of keeping them
focused on their jobs. At the body shop, accountability is assured by evaluating the staff
members post their training. The feedback is taken for the trainer, burns the procedure of
training is complete. The cost competence of the training programs is monitored regularly
Evaluating the effectiveness of different methods used in HRM practices
Handy Shamrock’s management theory indicates that the primary leaf shows multi-skilled
team involving managers, technicians and experts who would basically be carrying out the
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trae effectively. The subsequent leaf is the contractual perimeter as non-central actions would
get contracted to those businesses like the body shop which focuses on efficient
communication (Aniset al. 2013). The 3rd leaf is the flexible staff that would include the
seasonal, impermanent and part time employees. The image has been provided below:
Handy Flexibility Model Atkinson’s Flexibility Model
Source: (Lidwell, Butler and Holden, 2015) Source: (Abdulkader and Laugharne, 2016)
As per the given two models, the HRM has been useful for Body Shop as it was capable of
raising the organizational profits and efficiency. Once the HRM was implemented in the
business, the organisational profits have improved with respect to:
 Innovation and high performance staff: Organisation’s HRM practices support the
innovation and staff is motivated in using better facilities. This brings more productivity
and enhancement of profits (Williams, Abbott and Heery, 2010).
 Successful direction and implementation: The Body Shop in recruitment of capable
management which can add to the productivity of the organisation.
 Effective reward orientation: In the organisation the monetary rewards are directly
linked to the performances and therefore workers get easily motivated and consider their
job in a serious manner.
 Sharing and collaboration: The HRM practices the organisation in collaborating with
outsiders and there is possibility of sharing innovative ideas. This leads to improvement
in productivity of the employees (Herholdt., 2012).
 Updation of skills of workers: Since there is lot of competition therefore the Body Shop
has to certify that the skills of workers that constantly updated find the manager has to
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recognise the improvement parameters amongst the purpose and help them in performing
to their optimal capacities.
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LO3:
Analysis of the importance of employee relations in respect to influencing HRM
decision- making
The employees working in the organisation have some relation with the Peer groups on the
managers. The healthy employee relation is to be maintained for the company to be
successful. In case the employee relations are strong then there would be high efficiency and
workers will be satisfied (Schalk, Timmerman and den Heuvel, 2013). The employee
relations are valuable to resolve the conflicting problems which might evolve amongst the
staff members. The great employee relations bring positivity amongst the staff members and
they like to be part of the organisation.
Therefore employee relation can be described as the approach in which the management
addresses, interacts and deals with every worker. Maintenance of a better relation will help in
reduction in any kind of conflicts at the workplace and the moral of the staff members will be
enhanced. At The Body Shop, various approaches utilised for improving the employee
relations are given below:
 Better communication: By maintaining correct hierarchy, the management ensure that
every employee has access to each level in order that we can have a feeling of preference
along with an important inside the organisation (Ivancevich and Konopaske, 2013).
 Career development: The Body Shop has applied various roles to enhance career
development of the workers and therefore it has also lead to decrease in the employee
turnover.
 Vision sharing: To make each worker feel special, the Body Shop shares its plan
regarding the organisation with all staff members.
These strategies utilised by the organisation in creating and enhancing employee relations as
well as engagement are:
 Utilising the survey which is appropriate to evaluate the employee engagement,
 Laying stress on the employee engagement at business and local levels,
 choice of the right managers (Yang and Ciou, 2010),
 training the managers and also holding them responsible for maintenance of staff
engagement,
 Defining the employee relation and engagement goals in daily terms.
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Key elements of employment legislation and the impact it has upon HRM decision-
making
The employment legislation is all the laws which are to be applied to any working place. The
laws have effect on unions, employee employer, and management of the organisation
(Kocherlakota, 2015). All these parties which are impacted by the employment law have to
abide by the terms and conditions. Some of the applicable laws in case of the body shop are:
 Workplace equality: At present the law was set up for the working conditions which
allow the employees to work in the environment which does not have any type of buyers
in itself (Wu and Cheng, 2016).
 Fair working hours and wages: This employment law has been applied for correction of
the working hour’s conditions and wages. At The Body Shop there has been application
of safer work conditions where all of the workers are given complete rights to show the
employer in case any unsafe conditions are observed.
 The law of purpose of employment: This law was implemented when industrialisation
was expanded globally. This term brought huge amendment to the countries. .
 The sex discrimination act of 1995 and 1997: As per this act men and women are equal
in terms of marital status, Gender and sex (Stranks, 2005). The organisations do not have
to discriminate on give any and fair treatment to any individual in comparison to other
individuals in the same situation. In case the organisation does any and fair treatment then
it is termed as discrimination. There are chances of sexual harassment taking place at the
workplace therefore the shop has to abide by this law to avoid such Problems.
 Employment rights act of 1996: This act makes sure that the organisations of the United
Kingdom provide right employment and the rights of the workers are fulfilled (Ngwena,
2007). In the year 1997 there was addition of flexible work timings.
 Equal pay Act 1970: As per this act the discrimination cannot be there in terms of
salaries. In case any two individuals work at the same position, at the same location and
are doing the same tasks at the body shop then there cannot be any discrimination among
them on terms of the salaries (Miles, 2015).
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