After this time the brothers moved to the now famous Bournville site where Cadbury world is situated today. The Cadbury brothers changed the employer to employee relations for the better by having the Bournville site as a ‘factory in a garden’. Also the brothers introduced better employee welfare with joint consultation and other innovations in this area.
- Where are Cadburys today?
Today Cadburys are the UK’s market leader and are one of the largest chocolate producers in the world and have opened new business opportunities by producing chocolate within other countries like Ireland, India and Pakistan. Cadburys is the confectionery division of Cadbury Schweppes Plc, which has other big named brands within the soft drinks market such as Dr Pepper.
Compared to when Cadburys began, the business is now known for the chocolate bars that it produces and is, now and then, a favourite amongst children and adults.
- Cadburys current organisational structure
Like Tesco, Cadbury Schweppes also have two different structures. The structure that they use for their board of directors has been re-designed to “clarify accountability and enable swifter diction-making.” (Quote taken from )
Looking at the improved organisation structure it is clear to see who is in charge of which departments within the business.
(The company structure can be found under appendix 2.0)
- Tesco’s and Cadburys Company Structure
- Tesco company structure
Tesco is a company that has also delayered the amount of employees used through out the company. Reasons for Tesco delayering are:
- The company have found more efficient ways of completing a task or business activity.
- The advancement in technology has allowed the company to take some of the more demanding tasks away from employees to minimise human error E.G stock ordering, delivery schedules, etc…
- The company giving general staff more responsibility within stores and allowing them to use their own initiative when helping or serving a customer.
The managers within each store have now been given a much broader span of control with their workforce. This means that each manager will have more employees to communicate with, but each employee has been trained to a set standard, which allows the manager to trust them to get on with the job with little guidance from him or her.
Looking at the Tesco Company the report can see that all of the key decisions for each region of the country are made by the board of directors based in Cheshunt, which makes the company centralised in its diction making.
As the company is run centrally it allows Tesco to minimise the cost of having big finance, general office departments in each of its stores as well as minimise the amount of work each store has and allows them to concentrate on selling the businesses products to the customers.
- Cadburys company structure
Looking at Cadburys it is clear to see that the company, over time, has delayered the amount of:
- Workforce it employees and replaced them with more efficient machines.
- Outsourcing areas of the company like maintenance and market research.
With the introduction of delayering Cadburys have seen advantages such as:
- It is able to guarantee its products will be of satisfactory quality.
- Employees are now multi skilled, thus able to work in more than one area of the business.
- The company has increased its production and profitability or the restructuring.
These advantages can pose some problems as each manager will have more employees to look after as well as have a much broader span of control, which can cause confusion between the managers and the workforce.
The Cadbury factories all work independently and the company as a hole is decentralised as each factory uses the resources (E.g. milk) of the country they are in. The same cannot be said when looking at the board of directors for the Cadbury Schweppes Company, which portrays the company as being more of centralised enterprise as all the major decisions regarding a factory are made at board level.
- The HR department within Tesco and Cadburys.
- Tesco’s HR department
Within Tesco the HR departments are within all of their stores as well as in the regional and head offices. By having a HR department in each store it allows the HR team to see how the store is doing as well as see clearly where the company needs new staff. Also the HR department helps the company by:
- Devising techniques to measure and reduce labour turnover.
- Planning ahead to make sure that every department has enough staff.
- HR planners operate a flexible workforce, which has numerical, financial and functional flexibility.
- Train new employees to be able to work within their designated department correctly and safely.
The main problems of a HR department to deal with are the chances of:
- Having a skills shortage within new staff.
- Having to entice new employees to join as the competition for new staff becomes stronger.
- The sudden increase in labour turnover.
By achieving their main objectives and attempting to avoid the main problem areas the HR department can help the store to meet customer demands as well as achieve the stores aims regarding staff availability.
In an attempt to minimise the level of staff turnover the HR department offer each member of staff the opportunity to increase their flexibility within the business by way of training. Another way in which Tesco’s HR department try to keep staff within the company is by way of reward/incentive. These incentives are things like:
- Staff discount after a years service to the company.
- Increase of pay after 6 months on the job.
- Paid holiday after 6 months.
Tesco also have a reward system, which recognises when an employee has performed excellent customer service towards a customer and the store then rewards the member of staff with a token of their appreciation (e.g. £10 gift voucher).
- Cadburys HR department
Each of Cadburys factories have a HR department, which deal with the factories demand for:
- New staff with a good skill level or possible past factory experience.
- Train new/current staff to be able to use new equipment correctly and efficiently.
- Help current employees with any problems they may have in their work place.
As with any HR department the main problem areas that the HR department in Cadburys faces are:
- Skill gaps in new potential employees
- Competition from other factories meaning less new staff available.
- High staff turnover affecting production.
To try and combat this problem Cadburys offers its staff an incentive and rewards program. This program consists of:
- Increase in pay
- The chance of internal promotion
- Paid holiday
- Discounted company shires
Also the company offers the chance for employees to go on days out to places like Alton Towers or to London with their colleagues and family.
- The culture of Tesco and Cadburys
- Tesco’s culture
When Tesco started out the business had a culture of being a company of cheep affordable products. The reason for this was due to Sir Jack Cohen (the founder of Tesco) as he would always buy products in bulk as well as tins that Sainsbury’s had discarded because it was his vision to be able to ‘pile it high and sell it cheep’.
In Tesco today the company is still recognised by the motto of ‘pile it high and sell it cheep’, but the company has introduced quality into its products by offering three different key areas of products. The first area consists of very high quality products such as organic and these products are usually the most expensive. The middle group of products are usually a collection of Tesco and company branded products and covers a wide price bracket. The third group of products are Tesco’s value range, which consists of the cheapest products such as toilet rolls, bin liners and ready meals. These types of products are all about value for money and are not priced by the level of quality.
As well as offer their customers more choice, in the way of groceries, Tesco now offer their customers the opportunity to purchase clothes, electrical goods, DVD’s CD’s, etc…
By offering their customers these other products Tesco are changing their culture into becoming a ‘one stop shop’, which offers customers the chance to purchase almost anything they need at the same time.
A danger for Tesco is the threat of ASDA overtaking them in affordability along with viability and becoming the new store that ‘piles it high and sells it cheap’.
- Cadburys culture
The culture of Cadburys started out being paternalistic as the company was devoted to making its employees feel welcome and valued within the company. Cadburys relied on its staff very heavily as without a vast employee base the company would not be the big corporation it is today.
To entice employees to the company Cadburys built their famous Bournville site along with accommodation so the workforce would be close to their place of business. Along with this the factory was built in the middle of a garden so when employees had finished work or were on a break they had somewhere to relax as well as socialise with other colleges on a Sunday as the factory was closed.
Today Cadburys have become a company who have a culture, which is interested in keeping its stakeholders happy. Along with this and the advancement in technology Cadburys have now lost its extensive employee range and replaced it with machines and now only employ enough staff to keep the machines going. By being stakeholder driven the company has now become controlled by shareholders who are mainly interested in the company making a profit.
- How advancing technology has affected Tesco and Cadburys.
- Tesco
Tesco has seen technology help their business by allowing them to take some jobs away from employees, which could have big affects on the company’s profit, product availability and product waste if not done properly.
The key areas that Tesco have handed over to technology to complete are:
- The control of stock that each store holds as this will help the company to minimise the chance of running out on key products and disappointing customers.
- The tills have been changed over the years and are now linked with the main computer. This allows the correct price to be charged to the customer as well as tell the main computer how much of each product has been sold and how much to order next time.
Along with technology the range of products has also advanced considerably. These changes are things like:
- Ready meals, which would normally take time and effort to put together.
- Different tastes from other countries like Chinese or Indian.
- The appeal of celebrity chefs with their endorsement of a line of products (e.g. Jamie Oliver for Sainsbury’s).
The advancements in grocery market and their products have, in recent times, hit a peak. This has meant that Tesco and other grocers have now increased their product range to include new items such as music, films, cloths and some electrical appliances. This has allowed Tesco to keep the company at the top of its market place as well as start to rival some of the cloth retailers.
- Cadburys
Over time Cadburys have owned different brands which have produced different products, but today only produce chocolate and associated products.
Product changes for Cadburys have not been as advanced as Tesco as Cadburys dairy milk chocolate has been around for over 100 years with little or no changes. Cadburys have released new products such as Boost as well as dairy milk chocolate with caramel.
The reason that Cadburys have not released many new products in resent years is that the market place is one of little change where as with Tesco the market place is very volatile with the never ending price wars and innovations.
- Where should Tesco and Cadburys go now?
- Tesco
Looking at Tesco it seams that they have hit a peak in what they can do as they have achieved the view of becoming a ‘one stop shop’. The down side to some of the electrical goods that Tesco offer is that they are not of a brand that some customers would usually associate with quality or reliability like Sony, JVC, Phillips and LG.
When it comes to clothes customers like to be able to brows other shops before they make their final purchase. This can be a problem for Tesco as most of the stores that stock clothes are out side the shopping centres of the cities or towns where they are situated. To combat this Tesco could open specific stores that only sell clothes or electrical goods and these stores could be situated within the shopping centres along with all of the big clothing shops such as Top Man/Shop, BHS, Debenhams and Marks and Spencers. The advantage for Tesco could be to compete directly against the main clothing companies and consumers would start to benefit with a new type of price war.
- Cadburys
One down side for Cadburys is that it is hard for a consumer to define which product is produced by which company and with such a large choice in the market place it is hard for a consumer to stay loyal to one brand. To combat this Cadburys have started to have their company name on the front of the product. E.g. Cadburys dairy milk with caramel, etc…
With consumers becoming even more concerned with healthy eating Cadburys would be wise to look into producing a low fat or fat free chocolate range. The advantages of this, as well as the British market, could open a potential US market where people are becoming more aware of healthy eating such as the Atkins diet.