People Management Report: Issues, Skills, and Performance in Tesco

This report provides an in-depth analysis of people management practices within Tesco, addressing contemporary issues faced by line managers. It explores crucial aspects such as the skills and behaviors required for effective people management, including adaptability to technological changes and understanding employee behavior. The report also delves into HR processes that support and underpin performance management, emphasizing goal setting, performance appraisals, feedback frequency, and recognition strategies. It highlights the importance of employee engagement, training, and development in achieving organizational goals, drawing conclusions on the significance of these practices for sustained success in the retail industry.

Introduction to people
management

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................3
Contemporary issues face line management in case of people management..............................3
Knowledge, skills and behaviours to be an effective people manager........................................4
HR processes that support and underpin management for performance management................6
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................7
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................8

INTRODUCTION
Managing the workforce is important for the company to be able to achieve their goals
and targets from time to time. This is going to help the company have higher sales and
profitability. Tesco is operating in the market from 1919 which is 101 years and the company is
having more than 6,800 stores in the world. The net income of the company is £1.320 billion
which is a great factor for the company to have to be able to invest for further expansion. The
report is going to consist of knowledge, skill, behaviour and performance management of HR in
an organization so that the issues and problems in the industry can be dealt with on time which is
good for the brand value and reputation.
MAIN BODY
Contemporary issues face line management in case of people management
Line managers are responsible for the management of employees and other organisational
resources for the attainment of particular functional and organisational objectives. Many of these
include function like recruitment and selection for filing out the vacant team positions, provision
of support and training for the new hires and provision of coaching and performance feedback to
the workers. People management can be defined as certain practices which encompasses the end-
to-end practices of talent acquisition, management, training and development, optimisation,
health and safety and retention (Knies, Leisink and Van De Schoot, 2020). It oversees on how
employee work, engage, behave and develop at work. Line managers in the human resources
department supervise the employees and report to the HR director or manager. However, while
conducting their functions, line managers tend to face certain issues and challenges in context of
people management, such as:
 Reduced levels of performance: Line managers need to consistently review the procedures and
processes within the organisation which increases the performance of the workers that the line
manager is supervising. It is common that the employees have decreased productivity at some
point of time and impact the company goals and other team members (Panagiotakopoulos,
2016). The line manager needs to perform a workflow analysis for reviewing the current
systems and weak structures.
 Being understaffed: Line managers should understand the requirements of hiring and
vacancies in order to be adequately staffed in their department. It is quite evident that staff
3

turnover is high in present times, especially in retail industry and the hiring process is also
very time consuming and effective workforce planning can be a major challenge in line
management. The process involves creation of job description, interviewing candidates, and
selection of the right candidate for the job role.
 Lack of communication: Major issue for line management is the overseeing of all teams and
workers to ensure that effective communication is taking place. This is due the variance in
personalities of employees which leads to miscommunication quite frequently within the
workplace. It is important that the line managers redefine the objectives of the team and
increasing the frequency of communication is necessary (Brewster and Söderström, 2017).
 Absence of structure: This is a very common issue that line managers face as the absence of
any specific structure on how to remain and develop, and oversee a new team possess
challenges for them. Due to the dynamic workplace environments, it is possible that few
teams need more and closer supervision in order to maintain theory productivity.
 Difficult employees: In many instances observed in Tesco, managers tend to continuously
oversee and supervise the employees that can cause potential conflicts and tensions in the
workplace. Line managers have to effectively resolve all such issues before they become
major problems. In order to address the concerns, a feedback can be requested by the manager
to learn regarding issues and then communicating with the workers (López‐Cotarelo, 2018).
 Inadequate support: Line managers can sometimes work less efficiently due to inadequacy of
support, organisational structure, authority issues, lack of resources etc. They need to get
approvals from the executive team of the owner before they can move ahead with the project.
 Time management: this is a big issue for line management as they struggle with creating a
balance between people management and their other task and goals. Prioritization of
responsibilities is a big deal and ca be done effectively by scheduling activities and updating
the calendars (Lawless and Trif, 2016).
Knowledge, skills and behaviours to be an effective people manager
There are a lot of changes which have come in the organization due to Covid-19 which
the company must adapt on time so that the functioning is going to be stable. There is a lot of
improvement in the leaders as well of the company so that they can understand the behaviour of
the employees as well. Leaders make sure that all the employees have the right skills and
4

knowledge of the targets that they must achieve so that the company will be able to operate
effectively in the market which is a very important factor for the organization to have in the
market (Wangwacharakul, Berglund and Harlin, 2020). There have to be no errors in the
organizations functioning so that the company will be able to operate and also the brand value
and image in the market is not going to get affected. Employees can consult the managers and
leaders any time they wish to so that there is going to be higher operations and functioning which
would be present of the organization in the market which is a very important factor for the
organization to have in the market. There are a lot of errors which workforce can make regarding
the technological changes which have come in the market after Covid-19 which has to be well
maintained in the company so that the organization will be able to maintain their competitive
advantage and brand value in the market for a long run.
There is path goal theory which leaders of Tesco to make sure that the organization is having
higher achievement which is going to be present for the organization to have. There are a lot of
leaders which motivate the employees as well because there is a lot of de motivation and the
safety measures as well for the employees must be thought about so that there is going to be
higher retention level of the company in the market. There has to be higher trust and loyalty of
the employees so that there has to be lesser hiring of the employees who is going to be required
in the company so that there would be better functioning. There is good interaction of the
employees with the managers and leaders so that there is going to be more discussions and right
measures and actions can be decided by the company for better functioning which is going to
make the organization have higher functioning (Garavan, McCarthy and Carbery, 2017).
Democratic style is being used in the company so that there is going to be effective working
which is going to be present in the company which is going to make the performance of the
people or workforce of the company be more involved in the organization so that there is going
to be effective working which would be present.
There is a requirement of a lot of experience of the past which needs to be present in
employees, managers and leaders of the company so that there is going to be better dealing of the
situations which are going to rise in the organization. The company is expanding themselves in a
lot of locations which is going to make the company’s portfolio get affected and for that there
must be good working and functioning which is going to be provided by the company to have so
that there is going to be effective working. The skills of the employees have to be used at the
5

right place and have to be trained from time to time as well (van Gils, 2020). There has to be
good training and development which Tesco is providing to the employees since there are a lot of
technological changes and online platforms which the company has been using. Covid-19 has
changed the functioning and operations of the company which is why it is important for the
employees to understand the importance of this factor and change themselves according to this
which is going to make the functioning of the organization higher. Right knowledge in the
leaders is also going to help the company be able to make the right understanding as well which
is going to be very helpful for the company to have in the market. Behaviour of the employees as
changed as well which needs to be understood and accordingly the changes must come.
HR processes that support and underpin management for performance management
A major benefit that human resources underpin and provide Tesco is the regulation of the
performance management through leadership, constructive feedbacks, training and development,
interpersonal relationships, employee engagements, motivational workshops, team building
exercises, providing fringe benefits, rewards and recognition and focussing on the overall
teamwork (Aguinis, 2019). Various strategies are used by the human resources for improving the
employee productivity:
 Defining and communicating the goals of the company and the performance objectives is an
HR process that is conducted to ensure employees are on-board with expectations in terms of
performance. Employees cannot counter the performance expectations if the objectives and
goals are not outlined with clarity and it makes the first phase of effective performance
management. Sometimes, even employers may not be clear regarding the goals and employees
usually don’t come forward to any follow up or clarifications. This lack in communications
hurts the overall performance of employees. HR uses goal tracking software to manage this by
creation of charts, emails, holding meetings and repeating the messages (Gorbatov and Lane,
2018).
 Conducting performance appraisal through performance management software as it helps in
streamlining the performance management strategies and makes it imperative that upgradation
is necessary. All types pf performance reviews are offered by such system, such as balanced
scorecard, management by objectives, 360 feedback and other new techniques. The
dashboards present in the software allows the HR managers and line managers to use the
6

interface with ease and allows quick and actionable process in reporting, which ultimately
fosters employee development (Cappelli and Tavis, 2016).
 The frequency of the performance feedback is important as whenever the company
communicates the individual and company goals to the employees, it increases the
performance level, but communication is not enough when practiced once. The line managers
need to check on the employees consistently and periodically for the assessment of their
progress and to give them feedback. This is also beneficial in reinforcing strong skill sets and
productive behaviours and the increase in the frequency is needed. Instead of merely a
quarterly or annual review, the whole process has to be made more regular for improving the
performance of the workers.
 Pre-emptive management and recognition: In order to improve the outcomes of performance
in the workplace, the hr process of rewards and practicing pre-emptive management is
necessary. Rewards, recognition, fringe benefits and incentives tend to motivate employees
whenever they meet targets efficiently or performance productively in their tasks. In pre-
emptive management, employees are communicated regarding the performance expectations
and extraordinary performance is even subjected to promotions and salary hikes (Noe and
et.al., 2017).
CONCLUSION
From the above report it can be concluded that people management is highly important in
Tesco and refers to certain practices which encompasses the end-to-end practices of talent
acquisition, management, training and development, optimisation, health and safety and
retention. It oversees on how employee work, engage, behave and develop at work. The
challenges that line managers face in people management are issues of Reduced levels of
performance, being understaffed, being inadequately supported, time management, difficult
employees and absence of structure. All the knowledge, behaviours and skills required to be an
effective people manager was elaborated such as experience, problem-solving, communication
etc. The HR process and strategies that help in the performance management were illustrated
such as defining the company goals, performance appraisal software, frequent performance
appraisal, rewards and recognition etc.
7

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Aguinis, H., 2019. Performance Management For Dummies. John Wiley & Sons.
Brewster, C. and Söderström, M., 2017. Human resources and line management 1. In Policy and
practice in European human resource management (pp. 51-67). Routledge.
Cappelli, P. and Tavis, A., 2016. The performance management revolution. Harvard Business
Review, 94(10), pp.58-67.
Garavan, T., McCarthy, A. and Carbery, R., 2017. International HRD: context, processes and
people–introduction. In Handbook of International Human Resource Development.
Edward Elgar Publishing.
Gorbatov, S. and Lane, A., 2018. Is HR missing the point on performance feedback. MIT Sloan
Management Review, 59(4), pp.65-71.
Knies, E., Leisink, P. and Van De Schoot, R., 2020. People management: developing and testing
a measurement scale. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 31(6),
pp.705-737.
Lawless, J. and Trif, A., 2016. Managing interpersonal conflicts at work by line managers. The
Irish Journal of Management, 35(1), pp.74-87.
López‐Cotarelo, J., 2018. Line managers and HRM: A managerial discretion perspective. Human
Resource Management Journal, 28(2), pp.255-271.
Noe, R.A., and et.al., 2017. Human resource management: Gaining a competitive advantage.
New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Education.
Panagiotakopoulos, A., 2016. A short guide to people management: for HR and line managers.
Routledge.
van Gils, B., 2020. Data Management: a gentle introduction: Balancing theory and practice. Van
Haren.
Wangwacharakul, P., Berglund, M. and Harlin, U., 2020. Quality management to facilitate
product introduction across borders. International Journal of Productivity and Quality
Management. 29(2). pp.268-283.
8