I will motivate my staff because:
- Workers will be more productive, and more productivity usually means higher profit.
- Workers who are well motivated provide a better level of customer service, keeping the customers happy.
- Staff who are well motivated are also more likely to stay with the company as they grow in experience and become even more important to the company.
I can motivate my employees in two ways, financial or non-financial.
Non-financial motivators are things other than money that motivate people to work such as:
- Flexible working hours
- Discounts on company products (subsidies)
- Offering a contract (job security)
Financial methods of motivation are things that motivate people by money, such as:
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Time rate or ‘wages’ – Paying by the number of hours worked. The employee may be motivated to work more hours to earn more money.
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Overtime – Extra pay for more work done and above normal working hours.
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Shift payments – Usually paid for working unsocial hours such as night work.
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Bonus payments – A special single payment for achieving a target.
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Profit sharing – a percentage of the company’s profit is shared amongst the workers.
Paying extra money for jobs with difficult hours may encourage people to work.
A perk is a payment in kind. Instead of giving money I could provide:
- Cars
- Health insurance
- Free uniform
- Discounts on products
- First class travel
I could also offer a loyalty bonus, which can persuade workers to stay with the company for a long period of time. Employees may not want to work longer than there contracted hours but they can often be persuaded to do so by receiving a higher rate of pay.
Strengths
- There are many warehouses and suppliers of sportswear based in Manchester, (which is very close to Cheadle) therefore making it easier for me to purchase products as well as saving transport costs.
- Sportswear is also usually classed, as casual wear so there would probably be a lot of demand for the products that I will be selling.
Weaknesses
- I don’t have a very wide knowledge of sportswear.
- I don’t know much about the cloths industry, so I wont be much help to customers (e.g. ‘is this jacket made of synthetics fibres?’)
Opportunities
- Depending on the success of my business I may be able to expand.
- I can attract a wider rage of audience by selling products to people of a wide range of ages and gender.
- There is only one other sports shop in Cheadle so there may not be much competition, giving my business a higher chance of success.
Threats
- As I found out from the census, the number of young people living in Cheadle was lower than the city average, this data may cause to be little demand for the outlet.
- Peoples demands will alter every few months which means I will have to invest a lot of money on some products that I am not even sure of how long they will remain ‘in fashion’.
Key
- Camera(s)
- Security points/entrance
- Shelves
- Staff/stock room entrance
- Counter
- Glass display unit
- Cash register(s)
Break Even Analysis
I have designed 2 adverts; one, which is in a ‘shop window’ format and the other, is in a ‘newspaper recruitment’ format. I have done this because on each format; different amount of text and types of information is required. For example on my shop window advert I wont have very detailed information, this is because when people go past the shop(s) they wont want to read a vast amount of text, instead they will want something which is easy to read and easy to understand.
Whereas people browsing through a recruitment section in the newspaper will probably expect to read adverts that go into detail such as wages, hours responsibilities etc. there are two types of advertisements; person description and job description. The person description goes into detail about what kind of person the employer wants for the job; personality, educational attainments; skills etc. Whilst a job description is an advert that is about the kind of job available, specific duties, responsibilities involved, location of work, hours of work, working conditions etc.
My first advert, for a shop window is a job description as it only tells the reader what it is advertising (job as part time staff at a Game shop) whereas my second advert is a mixture of a job/person description, I know this because I advertise the educational skills required as well as location of the job etc.
Also when employing I will need to consider equal opportunities, I must make sure I am not being racist or sexist when recruiting staff. Motivation is another area, which I will need to consider after I have recruited my staff, if I want to maintain a successful workforce. This area can be explained using theorist views:
Douglas McGregor
Theory X Theory Y
Workers cannot be trusted. Workers enjoy their work
They work only for money. They work hard and expect to be reasonably paid.
They do as little work as possible. They are honest and trustworthy
They cannot think for themselves. They are able to organise themselves
They cannot be relied upon. They can take initiatives
They have to be told what to do. They enjoy responsibility
They must be supervised closely. They can work without close supervision
They avoid responsibility. They are willing to make decisions
They lack ambition. Money is not their only motivation
McGregor’s theory x manager believes that an employee dislikes work and will avoid it if possible. As a result, theory x workers must be controlled, directed and threatened with punishment if necessary to make them work.
McGregor’s theory y manager believes that an employee enjoys his/her job and is happy themselves, and to accept authority and responsibility. Control and punishment are not effective ways to get the theory y employer to work.
This theory tells me that I should treat all my employees as individuals and find out what motivates them, to ensure efficient running of the business.
Another theorist is Abraham Maslow
Self
Actualisation
Ego
Social
Safety
Basic
Maslow’s theory suggests that I should recognise my employees have a range of different needs, and plan work to meet this range of needs.
After considering all the areas above and working through them whilst recruiting personnel I should be able to employ a very efficient workforce, therefore enhancing my chances of running a successful business.
I started this coursework with the aim to satisfy a question:
Is there scope for an additional retail outlet in Cheadle Village?
I think I have a satisfactory answer, I have decided to open a game shop. There are not any in Cheadle village, so I won’t have any competition problems, which I would have acquired if for example if I had opened an outlet associated with sportswear and that is mostly to do with cloths as there are 18 types of shops in Cheadle associated with cloths.
The first thing I started off with was looking at:
- The socio-economic groups in Cheadle and a Cheadle census, these told me what types of people to target, their incomes, their ages etc.
- I looked at the location of Cheadle, this told me whether Cheadle may be in any competition from other areas for example Didsbury village, but this wasn’t too much of a concern to me.
- I made my first visit to Cheadle village towards the end of May 2001; I questioned shopkeepers/managers of businesses. From the information obtained from the questions I made a database, this told me about the types of businesses that already existed, their size and their classification. From this information I was able to identify what types of businesses were missing.
- I decided what I was intending to open in the viilage and what type of business I was (franchise).
- I formed a questioarre to ask the shoppers in Cheadle village, and made a small profile of Cheadle (area) using information from the internet.
- I did three S.W.O.T analyseses to help me decide what kind of outlet to open in the village.
- I chose my business including reasons why I had rejected other ideas; my chosen business was still my initial idea, a game shop.
- I stated business objectives, explaining each one and how it was relevant to my business.
- I went about the marketing of my business by explaining each of the 4p’s in turn, this made it a lot simpler because due to the franchise format of my business, there were some areas in which I was a little bit unsure of the amount of authority I had in the decision making.
- I decide what sources of finance I would be using in the business; I decided on medium term finance.
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I did a break-even analysis, this told me what costs my business would incur on a weekly basis, and I also drew a breakeven chart to make sure I was breaking even.
- I designed 2 adverts for recruiting staff for my business; I explained all the responsibilities I would have when employing personnel.
- I discussed all the health and safety points for my business, as well as the types of insurances I would be taking out.
- I designed a plan of the internal layout for my shop (paying due attention to security). This was so I could make sure the layout was correct before starting the actual fitting of the shop, this would help me save money and time if anything was wrong with the layout of the shop. I also designed a map to show the location of the business, along with a poster advertising my business outlet; I did this using the internet.
During the course I made as much use of ICT wherever possible, in my opinion this was very helpful because ICT could also be used in business to help it run more efficiently and professionally. I used the internet to research information about Cheadle, I word processed the whole coursework and presented data on graphs and in tables.
I don’t think there is anything I would do different if I was to go back and do the coursework again because I tried very hard on the coursework and spent a lot of time and effort when it came to decision making. To improve the accuracy of the coursework I might have made another visit to the village to ask shoppers and residents of their opinions of my choice of business. After doing the coursework I have realised how hard it is to open a business in real life but due to the experience I have gained from this course, I think that if I ever wanted to open a business, I might just be able to manage it!
