In-depth Analysis of Human Resource Management at Tesco

This report provides an in-depth analysis of Human Resource Management (HRM) practices at Tesco, a major British retailer. The report begins with an introduction to HRM and its significance, followed by an overview of Tesco's business operations and its competitive landscape. Part 1 delves into the purpose, roles, and responsibilities of the HR function at Tesco, including workforce planning, recruitment and selection, performance management, and employee engagement. It critically evaluates different approaches to these functions, highlighting strengths and weaknesses. The report also examines the effectiveness of employee relations and key areas of employee legislation. Part 2 focuses on testing the recruitment and selection process at Tesco. The report concludes with a summary of the findings and relevant references. This report, contributed by a student, is available on Desklib, a platform providing AI-based study tools and resources for students.

Unit 3: Human Resource
Management

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
PART 1............................................................................................................................................3
Purpose, roles and responsibilities of HR function.....................................................................3
Critical evaluation of the approaches to various functions of HRM...........................................6
Effectiveness of employee relations and employee engagement..............................................10
Key areas of employee Legislation............................................................................................11
PART 2..........................................................................................................................................12
Testing the Recruitment and Selection process at Tesco...........................................................12
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................18
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................19

INTRODUCTION
Human Resource management (HRM) is responsible for organizing, planning,
coordinating and controlling individuals and their groups in an organization (Alam and Raut-
Roy, 2019). It plays a significant role in providing welfare to the employees as well as
contributes in the achievement of the organizational goals. It performs its operations in various
significant processes at workplace such as recruitment-selection, reward-punishment, providing
training and development, enhances employee retention and many such processes. It also aims at
improving the productivity and growth of the business in the emerging market by motivating the
employees.
Overview of the company: The report will focus upon the HRM of Tesco which is a British
retailer having its presence in multinationals dealing in groceries and general commodities. It is
headquartered in England, UK. It is the third largest retailer in UK in terms of gross revenues. It
has a market share of 28.4% which made it the leader of groceries in UK. Its founder is Jack
Cohen who founded this company in 1919 (Tesco plc, 2020). Since then, Tesco has expanded
itself globally by performing its operations in many other countries and also diversified in sectors
including retailing of books, clothes, electronic appliances, furnitures, providing petrol, provided
services related to finance and many more. It has attracted a large number of customers through
its low-cost and premium cost strategies. Its major competitors include Sainsbury, ASDA and
Morrison which gives a tough competition to Tesco. The company gives the credit of its success
which is evident by its revenue which is £63.911 billion to its 450,000 employees giving their
services across many countries (Tesco, 2020).
The report will lay emphasis on the Tesco’s HRM along with its purpose and responsibilities. It
will also critically evaluate the approaches of various functions of HRM including its strengths
and weaknesses. The effectiveness of the employee relations will also be highlighted.
Furthermore, it will also analyse the major areas of employee legislation. At the end, the report
will provide a document portfolio for certain position in order to test the recruitment and
selection process in Tesco.
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PART 1
Purpose, roles and responsibilities of HR function
The main purpose of the HRM is to manage the numerous needs of the employees of the
company. HRM contributes greatly in maximizing the efficiency of the organisation from
financial matters to legal ones (Aiello and et.al., 2020). The major 5 purposes of the HR function
as evaluated by HRM in Tesco includes staffing needs like recruitment by identifying job duties
and recognizing skills needed for the same, providing compensations like fair payment,
developing employee benefits in order to facilitate its employees with health insurance,
retirement plan, paid leaves in case of maternity etc., performance appraisal by evaluating the
performance of its employees and especially it also follows certain laws in doing all these
purposes along with providing safety and equitable treatment to all the employees of Tesco.
Roles and Responsibilities of HR function
Tesco considers its HRM a distinctive approach in managing the employees and to
motivate them to help the company in achieving a competitive advantage by strategically
deploying highly dedicated workforce (Evans and Mason, 2018). It has certain roles and
responsibilities which are as follows:
Planning
Under this, the HRM of Tesco identifies the future needs of the organization and it
recruits and selects the employees accordingly. It performs all its functions by analysing the
organizational goals and objectives.
Recruitment and Selection
The HRM of the Tesco attracts the people who can work for the organization and selects
the best candidates. The employer brand in the company is also very strong with right sourcing
strategies which helps in picking the best qualified and highest-potential candidates from the
pool of candidates (Richards and Sang, 2019).
Performance Management
The HRM of Tesco ensures that workers and the employees stay productive and engaged.
The company has efficient leaders who performs goal setting and open feedback to review its
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employees’ performance. The company also manages the performance of its employees by tools
like 360-degree feedback (Deakin, 2016).
Rewards
The Tesco’s HRM rewards its employees for their best performance. It does not facilitate
its employees only by financial rewards but also provide growth and career opportunities,
recognition, good organisational culture and a satisfied work-life balance. It also facilitates them
by meaningful work and fantastic colleagues.
Industrial Relations
The HRM of Tesco also focusses on maintaining and cultivating relationships with the
labour unions and the other collectives and their members. This helps in spotting and resolving
the conflicts and also helps in difficult economic times when there is requirement of lay-off and
other actions (Filimonau and Gherbin, 2017).
Training and Development
The HRM of Tesco considers its employees as the biggest assets. Therefore, it strives
hard to enhance the skills of the employees in order to enhance their performance and
productivity. The HR recognizes the existing skills of the employees and provide the required
trainings to them which helps in gaining the competitive advantage.
Employee Engagement
This is the main role of HR of Tesco when the HR is to be a credible activist for the
employees. The HR of Tesco informs all the employees about the relevant topics and the
decisions to be made. It also considers the views and opinions of the employees in the decision-
making processes.
Health and Safety
The HR of the Tesco considers the health and safety of its employees a major
responsibility thus implements certain health and safety regulations. It ensures that all the
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employees working at the workplace remains healthy and safe to perform all the tasks effectively
in order to achieve organisational goals.
Administrative Responsibilities
This includes the personnel procedures and the Human Resource Information Systems.
The HRM of Tesco handles the promotions, discipline, improving the performance, managing
the cultural diversity, bullying and many more. In doing this, it develops various policies and
procedures in order to successfully comply with the requests and overcoming these challenges.
Therefore, the HRM of Tesco carries out the above mentioned roles and responsibilities in order
to increase the employees’ performance, organizational productivity and the overall progress of
the company.
Critical evaluation of the approaches to various functions of HRM
There are various approaches which can be used in order to perform the functions of HRM.
The HRM of Tesco uses the following approaches in carrying out its certain functions:
Workforce Planning: It is must for the HRM of Tesco to recognize and implement the skills
and abilities of the employees in order to reach the organizational objectives. It can be done
through two main approaches:
Model the Current Workforce: This is done by enhancing the skills of the existing employees
and to make them much more talented and skilled.
Strengths: It gives various opportunities to the existing employees to prove themselves. They
also get an exposure to enhance their skills and contributes greatly towards the overall growth of
the company.
Weaknesses: It sometimes leads to conflicts as the employees on the same positions are
expecting the same opportunities which are not always compulsory. This creates a sense of
distrust among the employees which hinders their performance.
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Manage the Future Workforce: It focusses on picking up the most talented employees from
outside the organization. It tries to build a stronger workforce which can satisfy the future needs
of the organization.
Strengths: The employees recruited from outside the company helps in bring the innovation
which also helps the company to gain the competitive advantage.
Weaknesses: It is much time-consuming to train the new employees and to make them aware of
the policies and goals of the organization.
Therefore, the approach to model the current workforce must be used by Tesco so that the
existing employees get a chance to enhance themselves and their skills and also it creates a sense
of competitiveness among the employees which can increase the overall performance and
productivity.
Recruitment and Selection: It becomes the major function of HRM of Tesco in order to recruit
and select the best and talented employees from large number of candidates who are able
perform in a way such that it can take the organization to greater heights (Cook, MacKenzie and
Forde, 2016).
Approaches to recruitment
Internal Recruitment: This method can be adopted by Tesco by promoting or transferring the
employees for their existing position. The company decides that the employees who work part-
time can work full time and vice versa (Perera, Thalgaspitiya and Wijewardene, 2017.).
Strengths: It is cost-effective and helps in boosting the employees’ morale. It also helps in
retaining the top talent and reducing the employee turnover.
Weaknesses: It limits the number of potential candidates. By using this approach, the company
may miss out on fresh ideas and perspectives which may lead to conflicts.
External Recruitment: This is done by recruiting the best candidates from the pool of
candidates from outside the company.
Strengths: It gives many options to the HR to select some from them and also helps the company
to have fresh and new ideas which can help in bringing the innovation in the company.
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Weaknesses: It is more expensive and takes more time as Tesco has to pay for checking their
backgrounds, training them and also have to post the ads online or in newspapers.
Therefore, the company must use the method of internal recruitment which does not costs more
and also give a chance to the existing employees to get the trainings and enhance their skills to
develop new and innovative ideas.
Approaches to selection
Interviews: These can be done online or offline both. Under this, the interviewer asks many
questions which are to be answered by the candidate which gives a whole picture (Huang, Xing
and Gamble, 2019).
Strengths: By using this method, the interviewer comes to know about the speaking and
presentation skills of the candidate which is must for a company to be good.
Weaknesses: If the candidate does not answer honestly, then there can be a wrong judgment and
also there can be chances of biases by selecting through interviews.
Testing: These are mostly written evaluations where the candidate is judged on the skills and the
knowledge.
Strengths: This allows the HR managers to evaluate the skills of the candidate and whether they
fit into the company or not. These are more objective, reliable, rely on quantifiable insight and
helps in eliminating bias.
Weaknesses: It sometimes doesn’t give the whole picture of the candidate. Some tests may be
ambiguous which impacts the overall results and the judgement.
Therefore, the HRM of Tesco must use both the approaches in order to make the correct
selection of the candidates. Tests can help in assessing the knowledge and interviews can help in
evaluating the confidence and the communicating skills.
Training and Development: Trainings are necessary for the employees as it can enhance their
skills in their weaker areas and also gives confidence in themselves to perform the tasks in much
better way (Jena, Bhattacharyya and Pradhan, 2017).
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On the Job training: These are the trainings which begins from the day one of the job. It
includes reading manuals, observing certain things, asking questions and many more.
Strengths: By receiving these type of trainings, employees learn all the things hands-on which
gives a practical imagination to certain processes. The employees learn by doing the things on
their own by interacting with the trainers.
Weaknesses: It becomes a stressful method which gives much pressure to the employees to gain
the concepts as well as implements it by own.
Lectures: This is done in a classroom-type setting where the extensive amount of knowledge is
provided to a large number of people.
Strengths: This strengthen the theoretical concepts of the employee and learn to grasp the things.
Weaknesses: There is a lack of knowledge retention and also lack of interaction between the
trainers and the trainees which makes it ineffective and boring.
Therefore, HRM of Tesco must organise on the job trainings as these are much better as the
employees gain the knowledge and implements the same at the same time. The interaction
between the trainees and the trainers is also very effective which leads to best results.
Performance Management: This becomes the backbone of the companies as it measures the
performance of the employees and to assess their contribution in the firm’s growth (Adivar,
Hüseyinoğlu and Christopher, 2019).
Attribute Approach: By following this approach, the employees are judged on the basis of their
certain skills like problem-solving, teamwork, communication, creativity, innovation etc.
Strengths: This approach is much simpler to be adapted as it is easy to assess the individual’s
such skills.
Weaknesses: It only identifies the best and the worst performers as it is highly reliant on the
nature of the one who evaluates.
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Result Approach: It is a simpler and a straight forward approach where the rating of the
employees is given on basis of their performance considering finance, customer, internal &
external operations and learning & growth (Ali and Akter, 2018).
Strengths: It converts the strategies into operations by considering not only the financial
indicators but also the external environment such as customers etc.
Weaknesses: Its focus gets diverted from the aspect of human resource and also the stakeholders
who are involved in the indicators sometimes become absent.
Therefore, the HRM of Tesco must use the result approach for managing the performance of the
employees as it takes into consideration almost all the aspects of the organization like satisfying
the customers to increase the customer base etc. which are important to achieve in order to face
the rapid growth.
Reward System: Rewards are given on the basis of the performance of the employees. These
motivate the employees by valuing their hard work which encourages them to perform much
better the next time (Reinartz and Linzbach, 2018).
Intrinsic Rewards: These are directly related to one’s ability to perform the job effectively. This
can be provided by including feelings of accomplishing the tasks, autonomy and the ways in
which the employs grow and develop personally.
Strengths: These rewards are not much expensive and are also administered effectively. These
are also self-monitoring and evaluated.
Weaknesses: There is no one to motivate the employees as they only have to reward themselves
by mental pat for the job well done.
Extrinsic Rewards: These are external to the works and are administered externally mostly by
the management. These can be provided in the form of Wages and salary, fringe benefits,
promotions etc.
Strengths: These are mostly the rewards which help the employees financially which is the basic
need of the individual. It has significant impact when accurately evaluated, recorded and
administered.
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Weaknesses: Correct monitoring and evaluation must be done. This becomes much expensive
and also the rewards may not be according to the time of performance.
Therefore, Tesco must reward its employees with the intrinsic rewards as there is no need to
monitor the performance all the time and it also becomes less costly and needs less
administration.
Effectiveness of relations among employees and their engagement
Engagement of employees at the workplace fosters their involvement in their works such
that they get no time for the irrelevant activities (Effective employee engagement in the
workplace, 2017). This was also observed at the workplace of Tesco that its employees are
engaged in their respective works such that they do not have time to fight with each other or
destroys the environment, therefore enjoys warm relationship with the colleagues.
Employee engagement and employee relations exercise a direct proportionality with each
other. Higher the engagement of employees in their works, stronger is relationship between
them. The employees who are busy in their works stays completely away from the dirty politics
or interfering in activities of others.
This is the duty of the employer to adopt such flexible working practices which enhance
employee engagement and employee relations. For example, the team leaders in Tesco always
assign some challenging tasks to the members in which they show their interest. They were
always on their toes in order to do something innovative and thus enjoy doing their work. The
team leaders also take lunch with the members to ensure healthy relationship by spending some
time with them. They never fought with each other instead share some creative ideas satisfying
all. This suggests that the employer must introduce some flexible practices so that no employee
sits idle which can create problems at the workplace (Glaister and et.al., 2018). They must keep
the members engaged by allotting them with the work of their interest which make them satisfied
and which forces them to think in the favour of the company.
This also affects the decision-making of the HRM of the Tesco as it does not have to waste time
in resolving the conflicts instead can think of more ways in which leaders can adapt flexible
practices and also can train the employees to accept the challenging tasks to bring a good name
to themselves and the organisation.
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Key areas of employee Legislation
It is the foremost duty of the HRM of Tesco to be updated about the laws which can reduce
the liability in terms of HR operations. Federal laws can impact the HRM nationally according to
the size of the business and there are much employment law regulations for a state which also
impacts the records' retention, labour relations etc. The employment laws followed by Tesco in
UK are as follows:
The Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 (HSWA) is the part of legislation covering health
and safety measures at the workplace. This gives a duty to the employers for protecting their
health and safety while doing work at the workplace.
The Equality Act 2010 prevents the discrimination at the workplace especially at the time of
recruitment. It ensures that no candidate is selected or rejected by discriminating on any basis.
The Employment Rights Act 1996 is an update to the older labour law which covers the
employees’ right in difficult situations like dismissal, paternity leave, maternity leave and
repetitiveness.
The National Minimum Wage Act 1998 sets out the minimum wage which is approved by the
complete nation for employees and employers in UK. Government reviews it regularly to keep it
in line with the inflation.
The Data Protection Act 2018 regulates the ways in which the businesses store the information
of the customers and the employees.
Therefore, Tesco must perform all its operations by following all the laws which are passed by
the government of UK which can help it to increase its goodwill and the brand image.
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