Tesco always needs to be correctly staffed. If Tesco are understaffed, they will lose their business economies of scale, which leads also leads to a loss of customers and profits. Understaffing is also very expensive to eliminate because of modern legislation regarding things such as redundancy payments, consultation, minimum periods of notice, etc. Future staffing needs will derive from the following:
- Sales and product forecasts
- Technological changes
- Variations in the flexibility, efficiency and productivity of labour as a result of things such as training, organisational change, etc
- New legislation
Another thing that can improve the efficiency of the business is employment motivation. In order for Tesco to retain their existing staff and to encourage them to work to the best of their ability, Tesco needs to offer them financial, psychological and physiological rewards continuously. Financially, rewards can be offered, such as bonuses, pay rises, etc. Psychologically, this can involve making the employee feel important in the business and as a vital part of the team. This can be done by done by giving the employee more responsibilities. Physiologically, this can be ensuring that the workplace is a safe and pleasant workplace in which to be employed. These factors will all help to keep the employees happy thus increasing their productivity and efficiency for the tasks which they are responsible for.
Employee evaluation is an important aspect of the competitiveness of Tesco. They need to constantly assess the workforce’s performance in their existing jobs. This is due to the following reasons:
- To improve the organisational performance by improving the performance of employees
- To identify potential i.e. to recognise the existing talent in Tesco and to use it to fill vacancies where better use can be made of their skills and abilities.
This will, of course, in turn means that they be an overall more efficient company with an effective workforce.
Industrial relations are an aspect that needs to be considered when attempting to make the efficiency of Tesco as great as possible. Good industrial relations are difficult to define due to the fact that a good system of industrial relations involves complex relationships between:
- Workers
- Trade Unions
- Employers
- Government and legislation
There are 7 main functions that a manager needs to provide in order for the business to be effective:
- To keep within industrial law
- To conduct negotiations
- To make sure that agreements made are interpreted so that they are fully understood and agreed upon by both parties
- Produce policies to make sure that the agreements are followed in the company
- To encourage worker participation in decision-making within the business
- To provide statistics and figures in negotiations to work out the best possible method of solving the problem
Employee services are quite an important part of making the business as efficient as possible. Tesco need to pay attention to the physical and mental wellbeing of their employees. This allows them to keep their existing staff happy but it also makes the company look more attractive to people seeking employment. There are many different forms of employee services that companies, such as Tesco use. Here are some of them:
- Schemes for sick pay and sick leave
- Schemes for absence due to bereavement
- Making access easy for disabled employees
- Provision of information handbooks
- Running of pre-retirement handbooks
- Provision of first aid training
Employee training and development is a very important aspect that Tesco needs to look a very carefully. According to the Accel Team website, training is defined as ‘the systematic development of the attitude, knowledge, skill pattern required by a person to perform a given task or job adequately’ and development is defined as ‘the growth of the individual in terms of ability, understanding and awareness’. These aspects need to be considered by Tesco and provided for employees in order to for Tesco to have a competitive edge over rivals. Training and development are needed in Tesco in order to:
- Develop workers in order to undertake more advanced tasks
- Provide the conventional training of new and younger workers
- Raise efficiency and standard of employees
- Meet legislative requirements
A business may change its training from time to time. This can be due to:
- New machinery being introduced
- Changes in job content
- Shortcomings of employee output
- Recommendations by the government and industry training organisations
- Suggestions made by a specialist
Training can take many forms. These may include the following:
- Courses
- Observation of trained workers
- Coaching from senior members of staff
- Job swaps
- Self-teaching via books, videos, etc
- Research and report writing
Evaluation of the effectiveness of the training is done to ensure that it is cost effective, gets the job done and any improvements that could be made to make it more efficient and effective. In making these judgements, the senior managers will have to consider whether their efforts have produced:
- More effective and efficient employees
- Faster results in making newcomers knowledgeable than would follow from experience
- More effective and efficient use of machinery
- Fewer accidents, both personal and to property
- Abilities for employees to take on more difficult roles
- Better employee loyalty to the business with more willingness to innovate and accept change