Employee Management at John Lewis: A Recruitment and Training Report

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of employee management practices at John Lewis, focusing on recruitment, training, and motivation. It begins by examining the recruitment and selection process for marketing executives, outlining the online application, video interviews, and assessment center stages. The report then delves into the importance of induction programs, highlighting their benefits such as familiarizing new hires with their roles and the company culture, while also acknowledging the challenges like role clarity and navigating the organizational culture. It further explores motivational theories and strategies used by John Lewis, alongside recommendations for improvement. Finally, the report investigates factors influencing individual behavior in the workplace and suggests recommendations to enhance employee behavior and retention. The report concludes with a summary of the findings and recommendations for improving employee management at John Lewis.

People in
Organisations

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
Recruitment and selection process of organisation.....................................................................1
Recommendation for future improvement..................................................................................5
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................6
Importance of induction program that leads to greater performance and output........................6
Challenges encountered during induction process......................................................................7
Different training program used by organisation along with challenges faced and measures to
overcome.....................................................................................................................................7
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................9
Motivational theory and its application.......................................................................................9
Motivational strategies used by John Lewis and further improvement....................................10
TASK 4..........................................................................................................................................10
Factors affecting individual behaviour at workplace................................................................10
Recommendation regarding employee behaviour.....................................................................11
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................11
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
Management of people is consider to be one of the critical role of human resource
department that focuses toward the managing them and aligning them toward the
accomplishment of organisational goals. This report is based on John Lewis that maintain a chain
of departmental stores in order to offer its product categories that ranging from clothing to
household essentials (Anttila and Jussila, 2013). Current project mainly focuses over the
employee turnover issue faced by organisation. It contains a description about recruitment &
selection and training & induction procedure along with the challenges involve in process. In
addition to this it also includes recommendation to improve those challenges for the successful
implementation of the program. It also includes implementation of motivational theory and
factors that affect individual behaviour at workplace along with recommendations to improve
them.
TASK 1
Recruitment and selection process of organisation
Recruitment and selection are consider to be most essential factor of an organisation
which help in development of high skilled and competent workforce that support company in
accomplishing its objective and achieving competitive advantage at workplace. John Lewis is a
well known brand that maintain a chain of departmental stores and deals in several product
categories such as fashion, home-ware, electricals and more (Basu, 2014). But currently
company is facing the issue of employee turnover, hence in order to overcome this it is very
essential for John Lewis to hire employees that can remain with organisation for longer period of
time. Turnover is mainly seen within marketing department i.e. marketing executive. Hence to
fill up the vacant position following is the process used by John Lewis follow for recruitment and
selection:
Recruitment & Selection:- It refers to the process of finding and hiring the best
candidate that are having adequate skills as well as capability regarding the particular job
vacancy. Following is the process recruitment and selection which is followed by John Lewis:
Recruitment Process Online application:- It is a process which compromises of number of stages that support
in assessing the suitability of opportunity. In this first of all, marketing executive will be
1

provided with questionnaire for assessing its skills to match up with requirement after
which ability of candidate interpreted and analysed through numerical test (Blandford,
2012). After this verbal test conducted to determine the capability of individual, once
candidate clear all these test, management will judge the ability of person to work within
John Lewis. Once candidates approved by management a candidate is provided with
multiple choice question and after which application form will be given to continue over
further hiring process. Video Interview:- Once the online application form has been filled and candidate clear all
the test they are then invited for interview over video conferencing online. In this several
questions asked by management from the candidate applied for marketing executive
position to determine their capability to fulfil the expectation of particular job criteria
(Application Journey, 2019).
Selection process
Once the candidate who meet the requirement of vacant job has been analysed they went
for the final test i.e. selection process where best candidate get selected fro the job. Assessment Centre:- After getting clear with online video interview, selected candidates
are invited come and meet up in assessment centre. At that centre a candidate for
marketing executive is being invited to showcase their skills as well as ability to deal
with several job challenges. This stage contains a mix of interview as well as exercise.
 Final interview:- Once a candidate has showcased their skills and capability which is
accepted by management, selected candidates for marketing executive position would be
then send for final round i.e. face to face interview which is undertaken by director. The
applicant selected in this step will be then offered by joining letters (Bourne, 2011).
Following are the example of job description, personal specification and job
advertisement that John Lewis has used for attracting and hiring marketing executives. Job
advertisement and job description is the part of recruitment process, thus in an organisation
people are applying through the process of job advertisement and shortlisted by their description,
as in this people are shortlisted through analysing the skills that are mentioned in the description.
Further more Persons Specification is the part of selection process as in this applicants are
selected for their unique specifications that make their self stand out rather among the shortlisted
applicants.
2

Job Description
Organisation Name John Lewis
Job Designation Marketing Executive
Location London, United Kingdom
Reporting To Head of Department
Roles and Responsibilities  Research about the need of customer to offer
satisfactory product.
 To analyse the need of promotion and then posting
advertisement over sources which company uses fro
promotion.
 Analyse competitor activity and then plan to attract
customer for products and service
Working Hours 9.30 am to 6:00pm
Salary 6500 Pound per month
Working Facilities Better working environment, Flexible working hours and
incentives or bonus as per the performance.
Person Specification
General Information
Name- Ella Thomas
Address- 36, Washington Street,London
Contact no.- 1236548
3

Email id- Ellal12@gmail. com
Career objective- To acquire a challenging position where I utilise my capabilities and
contribute toward increasing productivity so that mine development goals can be achieved with
organisational success.
Experience level- 4 years
Qualification
Educational Qualification University Grades
MBA in Marketing University of England 7.5
BA Honours University of England 5.6
Roles and Responsibilities- Perform periodical performance evaluation
 Formulation marketing tactics for accomplishment of target.
 Assigning tasks to team as per their skills and qualification.
 Know how to prepare marketing budget and plan in a way that help in acheiveing
maximum result at minimum cost.
 Conducting some marketing campaigns for company to promote product & services.
Computer proficiency- MS office
 SAP
 MS Excel
 MS PowerPoint
Personal Details
Date of Birth- 19th September, 1989
Languages Known- English, French, German
Interests- Travelling, reading, sports activities.
Job advertisement
4

Marketing Executive required
Candidates must be aware of marketing tools & technique along with the capability to formulate
tactics to achieve targets in cost effective manner.
Marketing Executive
Candidates with following skills are needed-
 Minimum 2 years of working experience in a marketing activities.
 Must be responsible for formulating effective strategic plan to promote companies
product or services.
 Capability to achieve sale target by attracting large number of people through
promotional activities.
 Clearly representing the product or services in front of customer for influencing them.
 Maintain proper records of products sold and profit earned.
 Attractive incentives and benefit will be offered to deserving candidate. As per their
experience additional benefits will also be offered.
Interested candidates can send their applications through personal e-mail with their qualification
documents over [e-mail]. In case of any query contact at 0112-7685297.
Schedule
Invitation for applications 22-25 January, 2019
Short listing of applications 8-9 February, 2019
Call for HR round 13-15 February, 2019
Interview date 18-20 February, 2019
Recommendation for future improvement
John Lewis is an international retail business that operates a chain of departmental stores
to market its product or services. Recently, company is facing a severe issue of employees
turnover which is required to be rectified by improving HR practices so that employees can be
retain for longer period of time (Bush and Middlewood, 2013). Following are the
recommendation for the improvement regarding hiring process:
5

 The recruitment & Selection process followed by John Lewis is too lengthy it must
focuses toward reducing the test that are conducted in Online application stage and focus
over filling up of applications to attract more and more potential candidate toward job.
This will form a positive image in from of applicant and hence they would willingly try
to clear other stages without getting frustrated.
 Company must focuses toward hiring candidates from referrals that help John Lewis to
hire trustworthy employees that stay over their job for longer period of time. Hence help
in reducing employees turnover.
 John lewis must focuses toward performing internal recruitment that in turn help in
motivating existing employees to work better and avail opportunity. This support in
reducing employees turnover along with enhancement of their productivity.
 Job advertisement presented by company must be concise and clearly present the role and
responsibilities of employee for particular job (Chung, Bozkurt and Sparrow, 2012). So,
that candidates have a clear information regarding their work that further help in reducing
the miss-interpretation of job role which sometimes also remains a reason behind
employee turnover.
TASK 2
Importance of induction program that leads to greater performance and output
Induction program is refers to the process which is used by an organisation for
welcoming and introducing new employees with their job role as well as working environment to
prepare them for their job. This is consider to be a crucial part of an organisation which have a
huge impact over the performance of employees. Following are the benefits that John Lewis get
with induction program:
 It help new candidate to get familiar with their task which they have to perform for their
job roles that help in reducing the risk of errors and results in greater productivity and
high quality of performance (Dean, 2012).
 Employees get familiar with rules and policies of John Lewis that help them in accepting
the norms and condition of working in organisation that further help in reducing
6

employees dissatisfaction which in turn reduce the employee turnover (INDUCTION
PROGRAMS, 2018).
 Induction program also John Lewis to make new employees comfortable in their roles
and assimilate with its culture which help in employee retention that save recruitment
cost.
Challenges encountered during induction process
Despite of all the benefit that induction program provide to its employees, there are
certain challenges that John Lewis may face while organising induction program. Following are
the challenges found in induction program:
Role clarity:- One of the major issue found within the induction program is not a clear
understanding of job role among new hires. In John Lewis there are of various responsibilities
and task that marketing executive have to perform, hence it become harder to robust the
employee regarding an understanding of their role (Edmonds, 2011). For example, marketing
executive is a broad term that includes various functions like pricing, promotional activities,
customer relation etc. so insufficient declaration of job role hinders the growth and
understanding of an individual regarding their respective role. Therefore in order to overcome
this challenge John lewis must try to provide its new hire an on-job training so that they would
be able to remain clear toward their job roles.
Navigating the culture:- Main reason behind employees failure over their job is poor
cultural fit which in turn affect the performance of employees in future. This is one of biggest
challenge that John Lewis faces while induction program which indirectly influence the mind set.
For instance, negative image of culture in front of newly hired marketing executive may create
job dissatisfaction at very beginning and new hire will not be able to give their better
performance. In order to over come this issue John Lewis must focuses toward accommodating
new employee’s need so that they accept culture more quickly.
Different training program used by organisation along with challenges faced and measures to
overcome
Training and development is refer to the process of sharpening of concept, skills and
knowledge of new as well as existing employees in order to improve their performance. It is
consider to be the most crucial part of an organisation that help in enhancing the capability of
employees (Hotho and Champion, 2011). There are number of training programs that John Lewis
7

conduct for improving the skills as well as capability of employees that also help in reducing
employee turnover by providing job satisfaction. These are explained below: Theatrical training:- This training is basically provided to employees of marketing
department by John Lewis so that they would be able to interact with customer
effectively and improving their experience. In this company organise a training session
which work toward improving the voice as well as body language skills of employees in
a dramatical manner so that they interact with customers effectively (Theatrical training,
2019). Following are the challenges that John Lewis may face while training:
 Not clear with core concept:- Main issue faced by John Lewis in this training program is
that this mainly focuses over improving the presentation skills of employees and not providing
training regarding the actual job responsibility (Kamoche and Pinnington, 2012). This may
results into improve knowledge of employees regarding their actual job which results into
weaker performance that may create job dissatisfaction. In order to improve this company must
focuses toward providing both theoretical and practical knowledge.
 Conflicts among employees:- This training is mainly focuses over a dramatical medium
to train employees regarding their voice and body language in order to improve customer
experience. But while training dialogues share between two employees may convert into
conflicts that further impact over the performance of employees. In order to overcome
this issue there must be a regular interaction of manager among employees to lighten up
environment and they must take fair decision to resolve issues.
Apprenticeship programme:- It is basically a combination of on the job and classroom
training where new hires are assigned to experience employees which guide them regarding their
work as well as responsibilities toward their job roles (Marin-Lamellet and Haustein, 2015). This
training is basically provided by John Lewis in order to make employees clear about their job
roles (Apprenticeship programme, 2019). But apart from this benefit there are certain challenges
that are usually faced by John Lewis during this training program which are mentioned below: Misleading employees:- Major challenge faced by John lewis regarding this training
program is that if an experienced employee doesn't have adequate knowledge then it may
mislead the new employees. This in turn affect their performance that further result into
employee turnover. In order to overcome this issues company must focuses toward
8

assigning on-job training responsibility to only those employees who are best performer
and have the capability to lead people.
 Negative image of organisation:- This is the another challenge that may be faced by
John Lewis while training new employees in case when a trainer providing on-job
guidance to new employee is dissatisfied with company. This will represent a negative
image of company that may result in employee turnover (Saundry, Jones and Wibberley,
2015). Hence, John Lewis focuses toward rotating the trainers so that each employee get
a chance to learn new things and also keep away from negativity which leads to
employee retention.
TASK 3
Motivational theory and its application
Motivation considered to be a key essential factor that help in fostering the employees to
work effectively and remain within the organisation for longer period of time. The main reason
behind increasing employee turnover is lack of motivational factor. Hence in order to retain
employees for longer John Lewis must focuses toward motivating employees which can be better
perform using following theory:
Maslow's Need Hierarchy Theory: This theory is based on the simple assumption that
every individual comprises of five needs, namely, Psychological needs, Safety needs,
Belongingness needs, Esteem needs and Self-actualisation needs. Every need is to be fulfilled by
this order only as Psychological need remains first to be fulfilled and Self-actualisation last.
The role of manager of John Lewis is to fulfil the safety needs and esteem needs of an
employees as to get their best performance, an employee needs to be feel secured, this comprises
of health, finance and well-being and the esteem need refers to the respect that every individual
needs (Stone and Stone, 2013). A manager in the John Lewis can motivate their employees by
satisfying their needs.
Alderfer- ERG Theory: ERG stands for Existence, Relatedness and Growth Needs.
Alderfer stated that every individual requires Existence, Relatability and Growth to survive.
Existence needs comprises of psychological needs and safety needs. Relatedness needs
comprises of belongingness needs and Growth needs comprises of self actualisation needs and
esteem needs.
9

Continuing the thought of Maslow's Need hierarchy theory, manager of John Lewis feels
that every need does not need to be fulfilled in the same order and in the same way only. An
employee needs can't be distributed in a specific order as they can arrive at any time at any order,
irrespective of person's age or gender.
McClelland – Need for achievement, affiliation and power: McClelland believes that an
individual needs to fulfil their existing needs rather than developing some new needs. These
needs mainly includes for achievements, affiliation and power, as at the end of the day, every
individual needs to be in power and craves for success (Tan and et. al., 2013).
The manager of John Lewis realises the basis of any motivation is rewards and power.
The manager believes that if the employee is doing well and the performance is satisfactory,
then, the person needs to be promoted and will be given major responsibilities to perform. But
this create dissatisfaction among employees who are over same position and one of them get
promotion or incentives.
Motivational strategies used by John Lewis and further improvement
In order to motivate its keep its employees motivated, John Lewis focuses toward
providing a positive working environment to its employees with a open communication. In
addition to this it also focuses toward assigning task as per the capability of individual. Apart
from this it provide both financial and non-financial incentives to employees that includes
bonuses, social events, teamwork, extra leave etc. that help in keeping workers motivated toward
their work (Taylor, Doherty and McGraw, 2015). But apart from all these motivation effort, John
Lewis is facing an issue of employees turnover so in order to overcome this issue company must
focuses toward motivating its employees so they get job satisfaction. For this it must provide
regular incentives over the performance of employees in which monetary should be monthly
basis and non-monetary can be in term of trip. In addition to this, it must also challenge
employees by providing them task above their skills so that they can learn new things and get
motivated toward job to achieve more.
TASK 4
Factors affecting individual behaviour at workplace
The environment at workplace have an huge influence over the performance and
satisfactory level of employees toward management that can be positive or negative. Currently
10