Developing a Human Resource Development Plan for Woolsworth: Analysis

This report provides a comprehensive HRD plan for Woolsworth, a major Australian supermarket chain, focusing on need analysis to enhance employee performance and career development. It details the importance of HRD in gaining a competitive advantage, especially in a duopoly market. The report outlines the objectives of the HRD plan, including improving employee competency, efficiency, and addressing performance management issues. It includes a detailed need analysis design with steps, resource requirements, and cost considerations for various training programs. A program schedule with activities for employee development and a career growth cycle are also presented. The report further explores performance management models, including goal-setting and expectancy theories, and provides a participant assessment framework. Finally, it outlines the responsibilities of the HRD plan and concludes with recommendations for Woolsworth to improve its human resource practices for better productivity and profitability.

Running head: DEVELOPING HUMAN RESOURCES
DEVELOPING HUMAN RESOURCES
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Executive Summary
This report focuses on the need analysis for Woolsworth to gain competitive advantage in the
global market. It determines the importance of need analysis, the company recognised the
need for training the employees and increase effective performance management system. The
performance management of the organisation helps to increase the proficiency in enhancing
the skills and understand the job role to provide accurate result. The need for training that is
identified from need analysis is a prior topic that is addressed in the report for addressing all
the issues of employees and managers to handle the employees effectively. The purpose of
the report is to analyse the need analysis that can eradicate the issues of Woolsworth. This
can help the company to enhance the operations in performance and career of employees for
high productivity approach.

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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Objective of the HRD plan.........................................................................................................3
Resources and Costs...................................................................................................................5
Program Schedule/ Agenda........................................................................................................6
Career growth Cycle:................................................................................................................7
Models and Theory of performance management system.........................................................8
Participant Assessment for performance management..............................................................9
Responsibilities of HRD plan...................................................................................................10
Conclusion................................................................................................................................15
References................................................................................................................................16

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Introduction
The report focuses on need analysis of Woolsworth. Woolsworth is a supermarket or a
grocery store chain in Australia. The need analysis design helps the organisation to analyse
the need of the organisation, on the basis of training the employees for effective performance.
The performance management and career development approaches can be achieved
effectively when the organisation develops a human resource development plan to address
these two approaches (Ahmed 2016). The HRD plan helps to develop the performance and
enhances career growth. The purpose of this report is to develop an effective and efficient
HRD plan that can help Woolsworth to achieve competitive advantage by improving
performance management system and career development approach through various training
programs. Woolsworth and Coles are now a duopoly in the Australian market of about 80%
(Anitha 2014). The Woolsworth is now trying to expand its business so need analysis of this
organisation can help to analyse which need is to be addressed for leading in the Australian
market. The human resource plan of Woolsworth will help in gaining a systematic
enhancement of human resource efficiency and improvement in performance (Armstrong
2014). This will also ensure all the financial optimization and feasibility criteria. The most
important aspect of human resource department is its assets, they are the people working in
Woolsworth. So there is always a need to analyse their performance and train them for
improving their efficiency. The employee’s ability and competency is determined and issues
related to them is solved through HRD plan (Bednall 2014). The aim of HRD plan is to
increase the productivity and profitability of the organisation.
Objective of the HRD plan
 To ensure the performance of the employees is up to the mark for gaining
competitive advantage.

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 To determine the competency level and improve the efficiency of employees.
 To ensure the HRD plan will solve the issues of management with regard to
managing the employee performance and enhance their career development
approach.
 To minimize the cost to the company by increasing the efficiency of employees and
all other financial operations.
Need analysis design
The main purpose of need analysis is to provide satisfaction to the people
working in the organisation. As the need analysis focuses on the needs of human
resource.
These are the following steps that employer must follow for conducting need analysis-
Step1: Determine the desired business outcome
Step2: Relate both employee behaviour with business outcome
Step3: To identify training programs for competency
Step4: To evaluate competency level
Step5: To determine performance gaps
Step6: To prioritize training needs
Step7: To analyse the training mechanism
Step8: To conduct cost benefit analysis of the company
Step9: Planning for training evaluation
The Human Resource Development Plan is the key aspect for increasing the
performance of the employees by effective training and development program. Human

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Resource Development is the fundamental aspects of Woolsworth that portrays an
integral role in increasing the productivity, efficiency, and progressiveness of the
organization (Bernardin 2013). The competency is achieved through effective HRD that
ensures to determine all the challenges and issues for gaining competitive advantage.
Following competencies are essential for the significance of HRD for Woolsworth
Company to compete at global levels-
 The company must have adequate resources to conduct need assessment
 Must be proficient enough for designing, developing and evaluating the outcome
of performance of employees in training program.
 The company must be able to calculate the financial analysis of the company for
profit or loss status (Cascio 2014).
 To develop new training mechanism that can make efforts for improving
efficiency of employees and improve productivity of the organisation.
Resources and Costs
The cost of the company is determined by developing human resource development plan. The
following are the resources required to develop HRD plan. The cost differ
The inclusion program and psychological assessment is to determine the need of human
resource in the program plan. The cost may be “between” ($2000 to $2500) (Chung 2014).
The training and development program need may cost “between” ($4000 to $5000)
1. Human resource that includes-
 Experienced supervisors
 Trainer
 Interviewers and examiner

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 One member of Executive Board
2. Assets for the company includes-
 Training room
 Multi- media to demonstrate the technology
 Simulators
3. Feedback Development and assessment - $500- $1000
 Human resource- feedback manager
 Statistician who can analyse statistical data for significance of data
 Assets- Database and statistical analysis system
Program Schedule/ Agenda
The employees are the valuable assets of the company which needs more priority and
attention to increase their efficiency and performance. The training programs are conducted
for training them to increase their performance and enhance their skills for appraisal and
promotion. Training is the competitive achievement that helps in improvement in employee
performance (Davis 2016). It is practiced for honing the skills and knowledge for a particular
job position.
The training must contain effective training program that can indulge the employees
with new technologies and advance in progressive work. The organisation boosts for
betterment and ensure retaining of employees so that the standard of performance can be
effective. The performance management software process provides continuous feedback for
employees, integrating compensation and performance (Elnaga 2013). It also supports
individual career development goals for a new change that have empowered the organisation
as most of the employees thinks that the organisation is putting effort for their career
enhancement. It also tries to encourage the workforce to participate in critical situation so as
to improve the performance and development (Ghosh 2013).

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Plan
Introducing various training activities that can help to enhance the employee’s growth. These
activities includes internal learning –
 To determine the challenges faced by employees in the workplace
 To analyse what is the status of their performance and what should be the benchmark
for the organisation.
 To train them with latest technology for gaining competitive advantage.
 To monitor their efficiency and flexibility in doing the task.
 To examine what they have learned and to what extent they have developed their
skills and knowledge.
The above planned activities for training the employees is to aim for managing
performance management and develop the career. The supervisor’s job is to monitor the
performance of the employees for speed and accuracy in doing the job. The trainer ten trains
the employees based on the observation done by the supervisor. The examiner then examines
the employee’s efficiency by interviewing and practical activities in the job (Ingram 2015).
These activities help them enhance and determine the level of competency they gained
through training process.
The management must develop a career growth cycle for the organisation that can enable the
understanding of employees for-
Career growth Cycle:
1
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The above career growth cycle is mentioned below-
Step1: Analyse the journey where the employers study the path for progression
Step2: Set their career goals
Step3: Provide them coaching and evaluate their performance
Step4: Create accountability for their results
Step5: Recognize their efforts and reward their achievements
Step6: Reset the Cycle
Models and Theory of performance management system
With the increased complexities in various operational functions in the organisation,
the business needs to embrace the operations with new and comprehensive concepts that can
enable monitoring the performance and identifying key aspects for improvement. The
effective performance management can then result in profitable approach through
performance appraisal of employees (Ismajli 2015). Managing the performance helps to
provide feedback for the outcome of the performance. The performance management system
have key elements-
 Setting the objective
 Measuring the performance
 Feedback of performance outcome
 Actions for objectives and activities

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There are two theories that can help to understand the concept of career development and
performance management-
 The goal setting theory
 Expectancy theory
Goal setting Theory- the goal setting theory is proposed by Edwin Locke in 1968. This
theory states that establishing individual goals during employee performance in a job to
motivate for excelling in the performance. This is important because the employees
continuously follow their goals (Jones 2016). If their goals are not achieved then they may
feel disappointed which will result in lower in performance. The employees modifies their
goals and improve their performance. With improvement in performance may result in
achievement of aims of performance management system.
Expectancy theory- The expectancy theory is proposed by Victor Vroom in 1964. This
theory states that the theory is based on hypothesis where individuals set their goals and have
their own behaviour in the organisation based on anticipated satisfaction for the value of the
goals. The individuals modify their behaviour with regard to lead them to attain their goals
(Kallio 2014). The theory conceptualize the performance management to influence the
expectations employees that concerns future events.
Participant Assessment for performance management
The participant assessment for performance management process have four steps that are
effective for performance evaluation-
 Identifying the need of the participant in the job- In this phase, the analysis is done
before the actual training session. An effective training helps the trainer to determine
what an employee needs to know and understand about the organisation (Kallio

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2016). They ensure broad understanding to focus on the skills, knowledge and tools
that will boost them to better their jobs perspectives.
 Match the job requirement with the session learning objective – when the
supervisor analyses all the requirements with thoroughly taking feedbacks from
employees, then alignment of learning objectives is done with needs of participant.
The managers must create assessment methods that allows the employer to determine
whether employees have met their goals with the organisation’s learning objective or
not (Marescaux 2013). The job requirements and employee’s goals are key objective
to be fulfilled for effective job enhancement.
 Assessing individual performance during the training program- In this phase the
effective trainers assess individual performance during the training program for
development of assessment tool for addressing each learning outcome (Maskell
2013). In the program, the manager need to apply variety of assessment methods for
précising the job roles of the individuals.
 Evaluating the efforts of training with appropriate duration- The managers who
are the practitioners states that the success of training is observed as the participants
apply the skills learnt from the training program in their job roles. The managers
assesses effectiveness of training and demonstrates the suitability and consistency of
improvement in the employee performance (McDermott 2013). With continuous
training sessions, tracking the performance of the employees and observing proficient
employees to perform the skills that they have received from the training. When the
manager plan for new training session, at first identifies what all needs of the
participants to be applied for the job (Mone 2018). The manager utilizes the
knowledge for developing various assessment tools and apply it in training sessions.

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Responsibilities of HRD plan
The human resource development plan also includes other responsibilities for
personnel selection. The human resource management contains training and development
process and recruiting proficient employees for effective performance for their career
growth. This personnel selection of employees promotes various roles and responsibilities
(Noe 2017). They are-
 Leadership
 Strategic management
 Personnel management
 Business skills
 Compensation and rewards
 Employee relation
 Recruitment and selection
 Training and development
Program Evaluation
 BARS
 360-degree
 Ranking method
 Feedback
 Formal communication
 Interview and survey
 Examination for outcome
Challenges in performance management

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 Lack of alignment- With lack in alignment, the managers may feel lack of allocating
adequate resources to achieve organisation goal. The communication between
employees and employers may avoid the progress in a wrong direction where
profitability and productivity is lacking (Rothaermel 2013). As communication
enables the team to understand the key objective and key aspects to improve their
ability and desire to do the task.
 Combating inconsistency in engagement level of different managers- Getting all
the managers on the table is very difficult. As managers have different ability and
managerial skills, the HR need to monitor the managers for their actions in the
training program (Rudolph 2017). There is a need to enable monitor the efficiency of
managers at different levels to manage employee performance effectively.
 Lack of measurement- If the manager have not calculated the employee performance
accurately then it may impact in the appraisal process of the employee. The company
may lose an efficient employee for a right position (Stefanovic 2014). The
measurement must be accurate to enable all the managers to take correct decisions
and improve the productivity of the organisation.
 Introducing the right metrics – The metrics must be measurable. It must match with
the strategic plan o the company. The strategic plan helps to focus on which direction
will best suit the company for profit aspect. The aspects must be prioritized in the
short term and long term of the metrics.
 Leadership and management commitment- The leaders and managers must fulfil
their commitment towards the company and employees. When they are assigned to
guide the employees they must not neglect the activities that may lead to loss of the
company.

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 Rewarding the employees for motivation- The employees must be rewarded with
bonus, allowances and other benefits. This results in increase in motivation level
among employees and tries to achieve the goal within specific time. The managers
must discuss with employees about their job role and objectives (van den Brink 2013).
The employees must also understand to achieve the organisation’s goals with strategic
goal.
 Managing of the performance system- The managers are responsible for
performance management of employees. They are required to monitor the
performance of the employees. This will help them to evaluate their performance on
the marginal scale. By providing feedback may help the employee to understand the
responsibilities and will improve in skilling themselves (Rudolph 2017).
 Developing a system that distinguishes high performers from average
performers- This distinction is the key to provide compensation differences for
various performance levels. These are the goals which performance management
process address. When the company tries to create distinction between performance
levels then many ratings may be confusing and can be problematic.
 Managing poor performance – to manage poor performance the training must be
available in the organisation for improving the performance and skill them with new
technology so that they can improve their confidence level. To manage such poor
performance, manager must understand the problems faced by the employee
(McDermott 2013). This may be problems related to conflicts within employees,
improper training, and low guidance by the manager. This must be highly focused on
managing poor performance to increase the competitive advantage.
 Eliminate entitlement mentality- the Entitlement mentality usually minimizes the
effectiveness of the employee. This should not be the norm that every year the

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employees will be raised regardless of their performance. With increase in the
performance level, the appraisal must be agreeable. The company must not entitle the
mentality to provide bonus which is not related to company performance. It is very
difficult to change, but is possible with time. The performance must impact be the pay
and enhance HR actions in order to be effective.
 Effectively using limited budget- The levels of budget impacts the employee pay
which is based on performance ratings. There must be distinction margin whether
they are big or small because it is easy if less performance levels are introduced.
Implementing a performance management process results in cultural shift (Kallio
2016). This must be addressed with proper care as conflicts needs time to change. The
performance management process implementation needs highly proficient manager,
HR and top management.

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Conclusion
This report concludes that need analysis is important for Woolsworth to gain
competitive advantage in the global market. With need analysis, the company recognised the
need for training the employees and increase effective performance management system. The
performance management of the organisation helps to increase the proficiency in enhancing
the skills and understand the job role to provide accurate result. The need for training that is
identified from need analysis is a prior topic that is addressed in the report for addressing all
the issues of employees and managers to handle the employees effectively. The career
development of the employees is also addressed for improving the career of the employees on
the respective goals they want to enrich their career goals. The career development is
enhanced so as to develop new skills and knowledge for handling new job roles in the
organisation. The Woolsworth needed career development strategy for increasing confidence
and loyalty towards the company, as providing the employees with sufficient benefits and
training them for their career goals helps to increase the productivity of the company. The
report have addressed both performance management and career development which have
high priority for achieving competitive advantage in international market. To provide more
opportunities for the employees to up- skill and reskill their knowledge on specific job role.
This helped to improve the proficiency in doing that particular job role. The managers are
also guided to manage and handle the workforce effectively so that they can determine what
they are lacking behind. This helped to determine the issues and challenges of the company
and employees faced in their job. The managers provided the employees with effective
training and development program that could advance their performance. The need analysis
have resulted in gaining competitive advantage by providing the company with suitable
decision and solutions to address problems related to employees and employers.

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