Toyota's Global Recruitment Practices: A Case Study

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GLOBALISATION AND ITS POSITIVE
ETHICAL AND CULTURAL IMPACTS ON
RECRUITMENT AND SELECTION. THE
CASE OF TOYOTA
A Research Project

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................................2
LO1 & LO2................................................................................................................................ 3
P1& M1................................................................................................................................ 3
P2& M1................................................................................................................................ 4
P3& M1................................................................................................................................ 7
P4....................................................................................................................................... 10
M2...................................................................................................................................... 13
LO3 & LO4.............................................................................................................................. 14
P5....................................................................................................................................... 14
P6 & M3..............................................................................................................................20
P7 & M4..............................................................................................................................21
CONCLUSION.......................................................................................................................... 22
REFERENCES........................................................................................................................... 23
APPENDIX 1: PROJECT LOGBOOK..........................................................................................24
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INTRODUCTION
Globalisation can be considered to be the biggest driver of international trade and vice
versa. It drives the segmental integration and interdependence among nations in segments
like capital market, labour, trade, communication, etc. thereby establishing linkages among
the countries involved (Michie, 2011). The assignment considers the positive ethical and
cultural impacts of Globalisation on the selection and recruitment of Toyota. Toyota or the
Toyota Motor Corporation is multinational automobile manufacturer considered to be
among the largest in the world. It has annual revenue of nearly £200 billion which is a result
of the efforts of over 369000 employees that produce nearly 10 million vehicles annually.
Toyota has a significant presence in the UK with robust manufacturing, sales, and service
operation within the UK (Toyota, 2018).
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LO1 & LO2
P1& M1
COMPREHENSIVE PROJECT MANAGEMENT PLAN
AIMS AND OBJECTIVES OF THE PROJECT
Title
Globalisation and its Positive Ethical and Cultural Impacts of Globalisation on Recruitment
and Selection, the Case of Toyota
Aim (Wilson, 2014)
To assess the positive ethical and cultural impacts of globalisation on the recruitment and
selection process of Toyota UK
Objectives (O'Leary, 2017)
 To examine the recruitment and selection process for Toyota in the UK.
 To determine the influence of globalisation on the human resource function of the
Toyota UK.
 To determine the changes in the recruitment and selection process of Toyota UK due
to globalisation.
 To determine ethical and cultural changes brought about by Glo0balisation in the
recruitment and selection process.
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P2& M1
COMPREHENSIVE PROJECT MANAGEMENT PLAN
Project Cost
The project cost summarises the estimated cost of executing the project and it includes
potential expenses of components like preparation, printing, and filling of the questionnaire,
man-hours, stationary, etc. (Bell, 2014). The projected cost of the project is £1500.
Project Scope (Wilson, 2014)
The study seeks to understand the ethical and cultural impacts of the globalisation on HR
practices of Toyota UK. These impacts are assumed to be positive. The study will be able to
provide recommendations that can be employed by a company like Toyota to strengthen
and enhance their recruitment and selection process so that it can gain more benefit from
the changes and opportunities brought about by Globalisation. The study provides an
avenue for the collaboration of scholars and professionals to improve the Human resource
practices like recruitment and selection of companies like Toyota so that it satisfies the
ethical and cultural requirements of the global workforce (Michie, 2011).
Project Time (Flick, 2015)
The estimated time frame of the project implementation and completion is ten weeks.
Project quality (Wilson, 2014)
To ensure the delivery of quality recommendations, adherence to the project quality
standards will be ensured. This will involve the collection of quality data and utilisation of
standard and effective tools to analyse the data.
Project Communication (Bell, 2014)
The project communication needs are categorised into three categories to ensure effective
communication during the project execution.
 Project monitoring communication- This will involve a meeting of task teams led by
project coordinators that will take place daily and will ensure seamless execution of
segregated tasks and monitoring the project and task progress. The project manager
will be communicated with the major points of the meeting.
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 Project evaluation communication–It will involve a weekly meeting of managers and
the project teams led by the project manager. The agenda of this meeting will be an
analysis of project progress and considering and resolving the issue presented by the
project teams.
 Project reporting communication–This monthly communication addressed to the
senior management by the project manager will contain details of the project and its
progress.
Project Risk (O'Leary, 2017)
In the current project, the potential of an unplanned and unanticipated event capable of
affecting the project is associated with the research process. To mitigate the risk and
manage it, various aspects of the research process such as questionnaire creation,
distribution, filling, and collection will be monitored carefully.
Figure 1: Project Risk Management Cycle (Zilicus, 2016).
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Project Resources
The resources required will include scholar papers, articles, books, and journals of the
relevant subjects. Other resources that can/will be employed will include internet sources
such as Google Scholar. In addition to this, the resources required will include monetary
resources and man Power (Bell, 2014).
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P3& M1
WORK BREAKDOWN STRUCTURE
The work breakdown structure facilitates the task segmentation and division of the project
into smaller easier tasks. The project is divided into four primary tasks that are the
establishment of the aims & objectives, primary, secondary research, and conclusions and
recommendations that are further divided into different subtasks (Siami-Irdemoosa et al.,
2015).
Figure 2: The Graphic Representation of the Work Breakdown Structure for the Research
Project
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PROJECT SCHEDULE
The project schedule comprises of the milestone schedule and the Gantt chart. The
milestone schedule indicates major research project milestones whereas the Gantt chart
provides a visual representation of the deliverables of the research project. These
deliverables are various tasks along with their execution timeframes (Harrison and Lock,
2017).
A) Milestone Schedule (Kanemoto and Perkins, 2012)
Project Milestones Timeframe
Establishment of Aim and Objectives Week 1
Creating the Template for Questionnaire Week 2
Completing the Secondary Research Week 3
Completing Primary Data Collection Week 7
Completing the Data Analysis (Primary Data) Week 8
Finalising the Conclusions Week 10
Finalising the recommendations Week 10
Completion of the Project Week 10
B) Gantt Chart (Geraldi and Lechter, 2012)
Activities/
Timeframe
Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 5 Week 6 Week 7 Week 8 Week 9 Week
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Discussion and
Finalisation of
the Aim
Discussion and
Finalisation of
the Objectives
Identification
of the
Secondary Data
Completion of
the Literature
Review
Developing the
Questionnaire
template
Questionnaire
Distribution
Primary Data
Collection
Primary Data
Processing
Primary Data
analysis
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Primary Data
Evaluation
Deriving
Conclusions
Suggested
Recommendati
ons
Project
Monitoring/
Evaluation
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P4
SMALL SCALE RESEARCH
The research will employ a combination of quantitative and qualitative research
methodology.
QUALITATIVE RESEARCH
The qualitative research will involve reviewing the existing scholarly literature on the subject
of Globalisation, the impact of globalisation on multinationals, and the impact of
globalisation on the HR practices of multinational business organisations. The data being
used for qualitative research will be scholarly in origin (Davies and Hughes, 2014).
Literature Review
Michie (2011) describes Globalisation as the process of promoting world trade that involves
increased interdependence of the Nations on each other and linkages resulting in an
integration of various segments like technology, human resources, capital market,
employment, etc. This facilitates the reduction of trade barriers promoting international
trade and allowing nations to trade with each other by exporting abundant goods and
importing goods that are scarce. The benefits of globalisation are manifold and most of
them are economic and financial in nature. Globalisation promotes the foreign direct
investment brought in by larger organisations that are able and keen to exploit the
opportunities provided by Globalisation. The economic and financial boons promoted by
Globalisation results in the advancement of technologies and their sharing, enhanced levels
of employment, enhanced economic growth of the involved countries, availability of quality
goods and services to the populace (Michie, 2011).
According to Sweeney (2014), Globalisation and the Multinational Enterprises promote each
other but Multinational Enterprises are also not exempt from the impacts of Globalisation
although these impacts are often beneficial for the multinational enterprise. A multinational
enterprise is a business organisation with a presence, operations and tangible assets in at
least one other country in addition to the country of its origin (Sweeney, 2014). Sweeney
(2014) further explains that multinational enterprises like Toyota can be considered to be
the physical embodiments of the Globalisation. These are the businesses that had the ability
both financial and otherwise to exploit the opportunities presented by the Globalisation and
as a result were able to expand their presence across nations. They were able to access
cheaper labour and raw materials as well as cost-effective means of production thereby
increasing not only their profitability but also their size and scope. Now a day, the
multinationals have evolved to a level that they can easily influence the economic
environment of their host countries especially the growing economies (Sweeney, 2014).
According to Budhwar and Debrah (2013), Globalisation is the cause of various upheavals in
the external environment that results in the mutation of Human Resource management
practices and policies. This is especially true in the case of Multinational enterprises like
Toyota. The ever-expanding reach of globalisation is responsible for the increasing
competition both at local and global levels. This increase in competition led to the
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recognition of the importance of the organisational workforce and thereby the importance
of HRM as a tool to make the workforce a competitive advantage. The recruitment and
selection process a key responsibility of the human resource management of an
organisation evolved due to the exposure to factors like labour migration, cultural diversity,
internal market, changes in the demography, competition levels, technological
advancements, emergence of new roles, need of strategically aligning with the
organisational goals, etc. (Budhwar and Debrah, 2013).
Noe et al (2017) explain that the skill level of the employees became critical in the aftermath
of changes brought about by globalisation. The focus of the recruitment and selection
process shifted to the suitability of the employee to a designated job. The HRM of an
organisation like Toyota now had access to different pools of employees and various
methods of attracting potential employees such as the internet. The cultural aspect of the
employee and its suitability to the location of the vacancy became another consideration.
The HRM had at its disposal effective means analysing the vacancies and scrutinising the
potential applicants to fulfil its search of suitable candidates. The compliance to ethical and
legal requirements of different host countries while maintaining a mostly uniform
organisational process became the new challenge. Another challenge was the high level of
competition in the recruitment market focused on capturing skilled employees. These
challenges became the cause of the shift in the selection and the recruitment process of
organisations, especially the multinationals (Noe et al., 2017).
QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH
The chosen method for quantitative research is the Survey Method. It will involve the
collection of data by filling up a questionnaire indicated below (Davies and Hughes, 2014).
The questions will be focused on the recruitment and selection practices of the Toyota as
well as general HRM practices. The sample size will be 50 that will include the HR personnel
of the Toyota from its various offices and employees of the Toyota that are at managerial
levels and are a party of the recruitment and selection process. The sampling method being
employed will be Opportunity sampling (Davies and Hughes, 2014).
Questionnaire Template (Davies and Hughes, 2014)
Survey Questionnaire
1) Are you an Employee of Toyota?
a) No
b) Yes
2) Are you from the HR department of the company?
a) No
b) Yes
3) How did the HRM at Toyota benefit from the Globalisation?
a) Access to Quality resources
b) New and effective method of recruitment
c) Access and assimilation of new strategies and techniques.
d) No benefits
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