Effective HRM Practices: A Case Study of Squire’s Garden Centre

Desklib provides past papers and solved assignments for students. This report analyzes HRM practices at Squire’s Garden Centre.

HUMAN RESOURCE
MANAGEMENT

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction......................................................................................................................................1
Task 1 (LO1)....................................................................................................................................2
a) Purpose of HR function and its importance to the organization, given the size and nature of
the business and its plans to become an employer of choice.......................................................2
b)Advantages and disadvantages of current recruitment and selection methods of used by the
organization and compare it to other methods of recruitment and selection...............................2
Task 2 (LO4)....................................................................................................................................4
a)Create a job description and person specification for a Customer Service Assistant- a role
which each Garden Centre will have...........................................................................................4
b)Create an advert for Customer Service Assistant role suitable for Squire’s website...............5
c)Recommend at least one other medium that may be appropriate for this vacancy and justify
your recommendation:.................................................................................................................6
d)Provide a medium of four questions which could be asked at the interview for the Customer
Service Assistant, which would help to improve the selection decision making process...........6
Task 3 (LO2)....................................................................................................................................7
a)Evaluate the benefits of Squire’s offering Apprenticeships to both the organization and to
potential apprentices....................................................................................................................7
b)Explain the development opportunities available to employees..............................................8
c)Review the range of rewards and benefits available to staff. Assess to what extent these
might motivate employees and help to retain talented staff?......................................................9
Task 4 (LO3)..................................................................................................................................10
a)An explanation of what is meant by employee engagement and its importance to employee
relations......................................................................................................................................10
b)Recommend ways of engaging workers more efficiently within Squires:.............................10

c) An explanation as to how UK employment legislation influences human resource decision
making (recruitment and selection, training and development and reward to redundancy and
retirement)..................................................................................................................................11
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................13
References......................................................................................................................................14

LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: Recruitment and Selection Methods..................................................................................3
Table 2: Job Specification...............................................................................................................4
Table 3: Person Specification..........................................................................................................4
Table 4: Job Advertisement.............................................................................................................5

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: Apprenticeship Benefits...................................................................................................8

Introduction
In the report below, the importance of human resource management for attaining business
objectives will be discussed. The current report is related to Squires Garden Centre, which is a
medium size firm dealing with plantation and gardening activities. The firm is in need to recruit
skilled candidates for the job position available. The job description, person specification and job
advertisement as per the job position of Customer Service Assistant will also be shown in the
report below. Organization can also use other medium for advertising the vacant position in the
firm. The current report will also discuss the benefits of apprenticeship programs for both the
employees or apprentices and the organization.
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Task 1 (LO1)
a) Purpose of HR function and its importance to the organization, given the size and nature of the
business and its plans to become an employer of choice.
Meaning of HRM:
Human resource management in Squire’s Garden Centres is the management function to recruit
and select best suitable candidates for the available vacant position in the firm so that the goals
of the organization can be accomplished. HRM also plans to maintain effective employee
relations and improve their performance (Hull and Nezhad, 2016).
Purpose and importance of HRM function:
Training and development: HR department of Squire’s Garden Centres focus on analysing the
training needs of employees so that training sessions can be conducted as per the requirements. It
is also important for the HR manager to achieve personal and professional development of
employees.
Employee relations: motivation of the employees of the firm can be provided by engaging
employee participation at workplace. This will lead to gain trust and loyalty of employees
towards business goals and employee relations can be improved.
Recruitment and induction: employees in Squires Garden Centres are selected on the basis of
their skills and job requirements. After being selected, the employee goes through an effective
orientation process to get the information about the job roles.
Hard and Soft HRM:
Hard HRM in Squires Garden focus on the costs incurred for the employee to perform their job
roles by monitoring their activities whereas in Soft HRM employees are treated as the most
important assets and motivated by rewards (Anderson-Gough et.al, 2016).
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b)Advantages and disadvantages of current recruitment and selection methods of used by the
organization and compare it to other methods of recruitment and selection
Recruitment and Selection Methods comparison:
Table 1: Recruitment and Selection Methods
Merits and demerits of Recruitment and selection methods
In Squires Garden Centre Other methods
Online website:
Merits:
 Increase the cost effectiveness in the
firm.
 Quick process and increase activity
coordination.
Demerits: Negative impact of improper websites. Not every candidate is aware about
technology usage.
Recruitment agencies:
Merits:
 Quick responses are provided by this
fast process.
 Saves time as the involvement of the
firm is low.
Demerits:
 Sometimes agencies fail to provide
suitable candidate as per job needs.
 Involve more cost because of involving
agency payments (Rees and Smith,
2017).
Recruitment’s external sources:
Merits: More alternatives for recruiting best
employee in Squires Garden Centre. New and effective ideas by new
employees for business operations.
Demerits: These are complex process as it
involves various steps. Consumes more time and cost of
Squires Garden firm.
Press advertisements:
Merits:
 Increase goodwill and brand image of
the firm.
 Communication is easy to attract more
talented candidate.
Demerits:
 More chances of negative results for the
firm’ success.
 The process is slow and involves higher
costs.
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Best fit and best practice model: Best Fit approach in Squires Garden Centres includes the
initiatives of HR manger to consider employees needs. On the other hand, the firm on
formulating the plans and practices on their own in case of Best Practice model in business
(Davies, 2016).
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Task 2 (LO4)
a)Create a job description and person specification for a Customer Service Assistant- a role
which each Garden Centre will have
Table 2: Job Specification
Customer Care Assistant at Squires Garden
Hours: 9 Hours
Salary: Based on Profile
Job Title: Customer Service Assistant
Purpose of Job:
To ensure better communication to solve customer quires and issues so that customer satisfaction
can be achieved. The candidate is required to help in gardening activities of the customer (Hill
and Brierley, 2017).
Skills required:
 Interactive, calm and confident
 Problem solving skills
 Communication skills
Job Duties:
 Providing guidance to customers about plantation and gardening activities.
 Making arrangements for the plantation activity place.
 Providing satisfaction to customers by fulfilling their needs.
 Providing proper transaction details to the visitors.
Table 3: Person Specification
Name of Firm: Squires Garden Centre
Hours for Work: 9 hours
Candidate Name: XYZ
Title of Job Position: Customer Service Assistant
Qualification and Experience:
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 graduate in the field of agriculture
 gardening centre experience of one year
 Gardening and planting equipments knowledge
Personal attributes:
 Maintaining healthy relations with customers by polite nature
 Understanding customer needs by effective communication
 Harmony and love towards the gardening work.
 Solving the queries of customers by effective interactive skills.
b)Create an advert for Customer Service Assistant role suitable for Squire’s website
Table 4: Job Advertisement
Job title: Customer Service Assistant
Overview of the Firm: Squires Garden Centers is a family owned business firm which is in the
need of some Customer Service Assistants so that Gardening and plantation activities in the firm
can be managed.
Preference of Job: Having at least one year job experience in the field of agriculture and
gardening activities.
The candidate must possess the knowledge about the following;
 Must be familiar in attending and receiving phone calls and to manage mails.
 Providing customers the necessary information related to plantation activities.
 Must have the knowledge to handle general business operations (Hazen et.al, 2018).
Skills required:
 Effective behavioral skills.
 Computer operations understanding
 Effective interactive and communication skills.
 Love and care for gardening work.
The interested candidates are required to send their resume or CV at the given website of Squires
Garden which is [e-mail]. Given below is the firm’s address where the
candidate can provide their hard copy of the CV i.e. Led Road; Colony name is Badshot, Name
of the firm is Squires Garden Centre.
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c)Recommend at least one other medium that may be appropriate for this vacancy and justify
your recommendation:
For the purpose of filling the job requirements and the vacancy of Customer Service Assistant
available in Squires Garden Centre, the organization can use the other medium like Job Portals.
By using job portals for meeting the job needs, organization can select the best suited employee
so that they can perform their work efficiently. Candidates who are in requirement of job as per
their skills and qualifications can use job portals as it used at a wide range. For example,
LinkedIn is a type of job portal which can be used by Squires Garden Centre where all the
necessary information related to candidate skills, knowledge, abilities, capabilities and
experience is available. There are various other alternatives also like social sites, E-ads,
Facebook, Instagram, etc. by which firm can use to select suitable candidates (Lee et.al 20180.
d)Provide a medium of four questions which could be asked at the interview for the Customer
Service Assistant, which would help to improve the selection decision making process.
 What is your knowledge about the Customer Service Assistant job?
 What is your motive to join our Squires Garden Centre firm?
 What are your strengths and weaknesses about handling quires of customers and visitors?
 How will you manage in case you will not be able to solve the issues related to the
critical situations of the Squires Garden centre?
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