HR Planning: Literature Review, Company Analysis, and Improvements

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of human resource planning, beginning with a literature review that explores definitions, influences, and methods of HR planning, including staff and diversity planning. The report then focuses on K K Supermarket, a Malaysian supermarket, applying the concepts from the literature review to assess and suggest improvements for the company's HR practices. Furthermore, the report analyzes two other well-known companies, examining their forecasting methods, staff planning, and diversity initiatives. Finally, the report evaluates the current HR planning at K K Supermarket and proposes recommendations for enhancement, drawing on the insights from the literature review and the case studies of the other organizations. The analysis encompasses various recruitment methods, environmental factors, and strategic considerations for effective HR management.

RECRUITMENT

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
A. Conduct a literature review on definition, influences, methods, staff and diversity planning
of human resource planning...................................................................................................3
B. Select a company and provide a description of the company. Based on the literature review
conducted, apply those concepts in order to improve the human resource planning for the
company.................................................................................................................................8
C. Analyse and discuss TWO other well-known companies which have been exemplary in
their human resource planning initiatives. Focus on their forecasting methods and staff and
diversity planning.................................................................................................................12
D. Evaluate the human resource planning carried out by the selected organization and propose
the relevant improvements required in the organisations.....................................................15
CONCLUSION .............................................................................................................................19
REFRENCE...................................................................................................................................19

INTRODUCTION
Human resource planning is a continuous process of systematic planning which is very
useful in an organisation to accomplish organisations most valuable assets that is workforce.
This is a very useful tool because it helps the management of the organisation in meeting the
future demand of the organisation (Noe and et. al., 2017). Recruitment is the process of finding
and hiring the best qualified personnel for a vacant job within a specified time period and cost
effective manner. It is the method of future human resource requirements of the organisation.
Organisation undertaken in this report is K K Supermarket which is a Malaysian based
supermarket. This report will explain the various definitions, influences, methods, staff and
diversity planning or human resources. It will also explain the various concepts which will
improve the human resource planning in the company. This part will explain the various
forecasting methods and diversity planning for the other two organisations. The later part of the
report will evaluate the human resource planning carried out by the organisation. It will also
focus on improvements referred to the two organisations.
A. Conduct a literature review on definition, influences, methods, staff and diversity planning of
human resource planning.
Literature review on definitions
According to Leon C. Megginson -Human resource planning is referred as an integrated
approach to performing the planning aspect of the personal function in order to have a sufficient
supply of adequately developed and executed people. Who have the ability to perform different
duties assigned to them in an efficient and effective manner (Armstrong and Taylor, 2014). It
also focusses on satisfying needs and goals of individuals member in order to motivate them for
achieving the already set goals of organisation.
According to Edwin B. Geisler- Human resource planning is the process by which a firm
ensures that it has the right number of people , at the right places. If a organisation is having the
required number of manpower but it is not able to utilise it in the right place then it will not be

able to use its manpower to optimum level (Cascio, 2015). Thus, not only having manpower but
also putting it into right place is very important for organisation in order to work smoothly.
According to William B. Werther and Keith Davis – Recruitment is a discovering of
potential applicant for actual and anticipated organizational vacancies. It can be understood as an
linking process which is focussed on bringing together those people who are looking for
potential employees and those who are looking for job. Organisation have the responsibility of
fulfilling their vacant job position with sustainable and suitable candidates and recruitment helps
them to identity these suitable candidates.
According to yoder- Recruitment is a process to discover the sources of manpower to
meet the requirement of the staffing schedule (Purce, 2014). It is a process which includes
attracting manpower in such a way that the section process have adequate number to choose
from. Due to availability of choices organisation will be able to choose effective work force.
Which will help the organisation to increase their level of performance and also it will help the
organisation to fulfil the vacant seats with appropriate candidates.
According to Heinz Weihrich and Harold Koontz- Selection is the process of choosing
from the candidate, from within the organisation, or from outside. The selection is done in order
to find the most appropriate and suitable candidate to fulfil the current vacancy or it can be done
in order to fulfil any future position. Selection is a very important part of the workforce planning
process and organisation needs to select efficient workforce which can contribute to overall
organisational goal achievement.
According to M. Ataur Rahman- Selection is the screening and filtering process of job
applicants. It includes inviting applicant for the job profile and then analysing them on different
criteria such as on academic profile, communication skills and experience. After complete
analysis of the profile of the candidate finale candidate is being selected out of the other
applicants which suits best for the profile. Selecting appropriate candidate is very important as
they are the people who will be responsible for carrying different organisational activities
assigned to them and if they are not able to carry their job properly it is going to harm overall
organisational performance.
Human resource planning is a systematized process of forecasting the manpower demand
and supply within the organisation. Despite growing unemployment, there has been shortage of

human resources which have appropriate skills, knowledge and experience to carry out the tasks.
Therefore, it increases the needs for effective planning so that right persons are assigned to
perform the right tasks (Choi and Ruona, 2011). Also, many people die, retire, leave the
organisation because of the physical or mental ailments which are required to be replaced by the
new employees and raises the need for human resource planning. It also plays a very crucial role
in the expansion and diversifications programs of the organisation. This also motivates and
provides multiple benefits to the employees in form of promotions, transfers, etc. These planning
further assures the transparency in the business operations. They plan for legal aspects of the
business operations which provides the workforce with safety and healthy working environment
by assuring that no illegal activity will take place in the premises and even if this happens than
serious actions will be taken (Pournader, Tabassi and Baloh, 2015). Effective planning in the
human resources department leaves the managers in a place to stress on accomplishing goals that
are accountable for impulsive revenue rather than spending time dealing with administrative
issues and employee paperwork.
Influences
Human resource planning is particularly important for emerging rapid growth and high
tech businesses. The business which is mature enough will need new products, markets,
acquisitions, diversities, etc. will make plans for identifying, attracting and relocating the talent
required for revitalisation and increasing competition (Khera and Gulati, 2012). There are
various factors which will be taken into consideration by the K K supermarket which influences
the human resource planning in the organisation and they are discussed below :
 Type of organisation : This determines the production process and number of
employees needed. Manufacturing organisation will have a more complex structure as
compared to the service organisation. Therefore, human resource planning differs in
different organisations depending on the type.
 Strategy of the organisation : The human resource needs of the organisation depends
on the strategic plan adopted by it. For instance, the growth of the business increases the
need for hiring the additional labour while mergers will need a plan for lay off.
 Environmental uncertainties : The business environment is highly dynamic and so is
the uncertainties pertaining to the businesses. There are various environmental factors
which have a direct or indirect influences on the organisations human resources and

these factors can be political, economic, social, technological, environmental or legal in
nature (Werner and DeSimone, 2011). Balanced execution is adopted in the system
through succession planning, promotion mechanisms, flexible time, job sharing, etc. For
instance, people don’t have as much funds which can be spend in an economic downturn
and tend to be much more selective in what they buy or services they use. This means
some industries, such as those producing luxury items or non-essential services, sell less
and may even have to lay off some staff. This, in turn, makes the local economy even
more difficult. Building economic factors into the human resources plan helps to predict
how many employees will be required and how much the company can pay to them.
 Time period : This is another factor which affects the human resource planning. In this,
there are two types of plan, short term plans are made for up to 6 months while long term
plans are made for 2 to 3 years. The perfect time span depends on degree of certainty
prevailing in an organisation environment. When the uncertainty is greater, the time span
will be shorter and vice versa (DeCenzo, Robbins and Verhulst, 2016).
Methods of human resource planning
It is is important for the human resource department to understand the proper tools and
methods which will be used by the organisations to assure that the business is operating in a best
possible way. There are various methods which are used by K K supermarket for effective
human resource planning and these methods are discussed below :
Recruitment : It refers to the means by which an organisations reaches to the potential
job seekers. They are the manner through which contacts can be maintained with potential
candidates. For every company, this is very important because they need efficient workforce to
complete the task and accomplish business goals and objectives. There are various methods of
recruitment and they are discussed below :
 External recruitment methods : External recruitment is defined as the means for hiring
or recruiting people from outside the organisation. This helps in attracting large number
of candidates from which a qualified personnel can be selected. This is concerned with
generating a pool of qualified candidates through external sources. They are very
advantageous for the organisation because it gives an ease of selection from large number
of candidates and bring in the fresh talent who poses innovative and critical thinking in

their nature. There are various sources of external recruitment and they are discussed
below :
Direct recruitment : This method of hiring a perspective candidate is concerned with
placing a notice of vacancy in an organisations notice board (Buller and McEvoy, 2012). It is
useful method for blue collar, white collar and technical workers. This method is appropriate
when there is high supply of human resources in the market.
Advertisements : This method of recruitment is used for skilled workforce, employees
and higher staff. In this, advertisements are placed in newspaper and professional journals. These
advertisements attract applicants in large number of highly variable quality.
Job boards : It is online method of recruitment in which the advertisement includes a
detailed description of the job. This includes the skills and qualities which are required for the
particular jobs. It considers consolidation with the websites and applicant tracking system which
helps in recognising the applicants or candidates who are applying through the job boards.
Social media : This is the most important and ongoing trends for recruitment in the
current business scenario (Monk and Wagner, 2012). Social media like Facebook, LinkedIn,
Instagram, etc. are used by majority of the people and taps the large amount of people. This is a
very economic method of placing job requirements for the company as it charges little or no
money. This also forms relations with the candidate and recruiters of the company.
Websites : It includes various job recruiting agencies or websites which advertises
various job vacancies on their websites. These are chargeable and also the applicant can pots
their curriculum vitae on the websites which helps the companies in short-listing and directly
contacting the applied candidates.
Referrals : Organisations gives value and importance to the words of their employees
working in the organisation. Therefore, friends, relatives are the good and efficient sources for
generating employment opportunities and helping recruiters.
Campus recruitment : Under this methods of external recruitment, educational
institution such as school, colleges, higher universities, etc. offers an opportunities for recruiting
fresh candidates. It is generally happens in those institutions which provides placement services
to their students.
 Internal recruitment : It is the process of filling the job vacancies within a business
from its existing workforce. In this, employees are recruited internally, so it reduces the

cost of training. This also boost and motivates the morale of the individual who is
recruited internally in the organisation (Døving and Nordhaug, 2010). This further
minimise the chances of employee turnover and save time, money. When business is
involved in recruiting internally, then it reassigns the existing employee to the new higher
position in the same company which also develops the relationship and organisational
goals are accomplished effectively and efficiently. There are various internal sources of
the recruitment and they are discussed below :
Promotion : It is the most widely used form of internal recruitment in which the
candidate is recruited internally through promotion which means that the person is promoted to
the next higher level within the organisation (Lengnick-Hall, Beck and Lengnick-Hall, 2011).
Transfer : This method of internal recruitment, transfers a candidate from one level to
another geographic location.
Temporary to permanent : In this kind of internal recruitment the person is made
permanent employee within an organisation which avails them with several benefits offered to
the permanent candidates like pension schemes, retirements, etc.
Staff and diversity planning
Diversity means accepting, understanding and valuing differences among individuals.
Organisations adopt diversity planning because to embrace employees with a wide variety of
skills and knowledge of any gender, from all cultures and backgrounds with all the relevant
abilities (Laslo, 2010). This is very important in the organisations where people are working in
teams and it includes individuals with different traits, strength and capabilities. This begins with
setting a diversity policies with an aim to develop the workforce and train the employees so that
organisational goals can be accomplished effectively and efficiently. It is required that the
company must regularly update and communicate the diversity policies.
B. Select a company and provide a description of the company. Based on the literature review
conducted, apply those concepts in order to improve the human resource planning for the
company.
Company overview
Organisation undertaken is KK Super Mart is the flagship business of the KK Group
which owns a variety of other business under its umbrella. Established in June 2001 as a humble
convenience store occupying only the ground floor of a shop-house in Kuala Lumpur, the

convenience store chain was founded by Dato Dr KK Chai and saw the 24-hour store as a public
service to the people who needed to buy groceries and other products at odd hours due to their
work or other responsibilities. With this vision, by the 4th quarter of 2010, KK Super Mart had
established 62 outlets in total.
Human resource planning or workforce planning is very important element in the
business organisation and this is because :
 To accomplish the requirements of the organisations : To do work in the organisation,
every company requires an individual who poses the desired skills, knowledge and
experience (Aswathappa, 2013). This can be effectively fulfilled through proper human
resource planning. It helps the company in determining the quantity of personnel as well
as kind of personnel necessitates to satisfy the human needs.
 Counterbalance insecurity and change : There must be proper and effective utilisation
of human and non human resources within the organisation. In this, human resource
planning is necessary to off set the uncertainties and changes as far as possible and allows
to assure the availability of human resources of the right kind, at right place and at right
time.
 Helps in checking labour imbalance : Human resource planning is useful in checking
because it helps to anticipate deficit or surplus of the manpower in the organisation. It is
proven to be very expensive for the organisation because in case of shortage of
manpower, physical resources of the organisation cannot be fully utilised while in case of
surplus, the resources of the organisation can be under utilised. So, this helps in counter
balancing the problem of surplus and deficits.
 To meet the needs of the diversification and expansion : Effective human resource
planning helps in meeting the diversification and expansion needs of the future of the
organisation (Flamholtz, 2012). It assures that enough quantity of employees are
available in the company with required skills and knowledge so that they can manage the
challenging task.
 Training and development : There is a continuous need of training and development in
an organisation so human resource planning is needed to decide upon which trainings are
required so that it can enhance the scope for advancement and development of
employees.

Human resource planning is necessary so that it can improve the planning for the
company in the following ways :
 Plan for staff growth : By making efficient plans for the staff will help the organisation
in accomplishing business goals and objectives effectively and efficiently. Growth of
staff will be advantageous for the company as the goals will be attained as per the plans
and moreover it will encourage them to work with full zeal and confidence.
 Motivation : It is the act of influencing others to accomplish the desired tasks. It helps in
encouraging people so that goals can achieved. There are two kind of motivation that is
financial and non financial in nature like bonus, incentives, respect, recognition, etc.
 Regularly assess the current workforce ability : It crucial to assess the workforce
regularly because it is the only way which will help the company in determining the
quantity and quality of the workforce (Harzing and Pinnington, 2010). This will also help
in assessing the skills and knowledge and determining the kind of training required to be
provided to them.
 Plan for internal management transition and succession : This plan will include things
like having a system that identifies employees with management and leadership abilities.
It also determines the personality and interpersonal strength and weakness in leaders.
Furthermore, establishment of training for management techniques as well as decision
making techniques.
 Improve hiring process : This process can be improved by communicating with the
current employees about the hiring process. Organisation will work seriously on thinking
about the exit interviews and finding out if the process was misleading and led to
turnover. It improves tools regarding whether an employees is fit for the position and
business work culture.
 Budget for human capital issues : Employees of the organisation are treated as asset
and they are the human capital. The company will prepare budget not only for the
expansion but also for the growth of the employees. This takes into account the benefits,
expectations of employees and workplace culture.
 Perform a gap analyses : This gap analyses helps in analysing the deviation and
preparing required solutions for the same. It takes various thing into consideration other
than the employees which actually affects them. For instance, job description will

definitely reflect the jobs, various benefits and allowances for employees like retirement
funds, health insurance, sick days, vacation days, etc.
 Embrace analytics : Data is found everywhere in the organisation from employee
interviews to accounting department (Yalçındağ and et. al., 2016) . It is concerned with
productivity, retention, managerial effectiveness, benefit costs, training, recruiting, etc.
 Find a mentor : Scaling a business will be a challenging as well as scary tasks when
dealing with human resources. So it is a good idea to find a mentor who will guide the
organisation by properly practising guidance and mentoring.
 Focus on education and growth : Organisational leadership requires progressive
measures to work with assorted groups and individuals. A leader must realize the
strengths and weaknesses of different professionals before making a plan of action to
improve the effectiveness of the organization (Jackson, Schuler and Jiang, 2014).
 Work on quality services : Although customers play a role in the effectiveness of a
company, a business must also identify an appropriate level of quality for the products or
services provided. The key is focusing on a balance of quality with cost effective
solutions. The goal of any business is improving the products without exceeding a set
budget or price range.
 Technology : It play an essential role in the efficiency and effectiveness of a company.
Make use of computers, tablets or smartphones to improve the efficiency of the company.
Use software or sharing tools to keep different members of a team up-to-date with the
state of a project, even when they are not actively working on a specific portion of the
project.

C. Analyse and discuss TWO other well-known companies which have been exemplary in their
human resource planning initiatives. Focus on their forecasting methods and staff and
diversity planning.
The two well known companies in the market of Malaysia for this task will be Vern and Reject
shop. The Reject shop is one of the leading Malaysian chain store which deals in the retailing
sector of branded garments (Leon, 2014).
. The company was introduced in the year 1990 by the Metrojaya group of companies. It has a
wide range of stores within the country and also operates in the global market.
The Vern's is growing company in the retail sector from the time of its establishment in
the year 2005. It deals in the fashionable ladies shoes and handbags and is experiencing growth
through successful business operations.
Both the companies mentioned above are facing great success in their respective markets
and all these success is because of good managerial functions within the organisations, proper
allocation of duties, clear vision of their objectives and goals. The overall growth is because of
effective human resource planning initiatives taken by these companies to commence their
business operations in the effective manner. Human resource planning is the process that helps
the organisation in identifying the needs for the human resources to operate the business
activities in order to achieve the desired objectives and goals (Pieper, 2012).
As, the Vern's is the new in the retail market as comparison to Reject shop but, it has
effectively maintained market share and is successful in attracting the customers with help of
their workforce and appropriate managerial functions. The company has a workforce of more
than 400 employees and have around 50 outlets within the country and they focus on the
effective marketing campaigns. The major reason for their success is the effective human
resource planning functions executed within the company and they work with a aim to provide
innovative and attractive designs to the customers. The HR planning helps them in selecting
suitable candidates for the job with appropriate skills and knowledge. They have involved
human resource planning properly in the production, financial and marketing planning to
construct a total corporation within the departments for effective growth of the organisation.
Same case with Reject shop organisations as they have also initiated appropriate human
resource planning in conducting their business operations. They have followed different steps to
construct a strategic planning in their business structure for their growth and success in the