ITM sample

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Lahore University of Management Sciences, Lahore *

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4002

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Management

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Nov 24, 2024

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docx

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Define the organisation Background of the organisation, Travis Perkins plc is a British builders' merchant and home improvement retailer with head offices based in Northampton. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange, and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. The company began in 1797, when the Benjamin Ingram company of joiners and carpenters was founded at Beech Street in London.[3] Benjamin Ingram subsequently merged with Perkins to become Ingram Perkins in 1850. Ingram Perkins then merged with Sandell Smythe & Drayson in 1970 to form Sandell Perkins.[5] Sandell Perkins was first listed on the London Stock Exchange in 1986, shortly before it merged with Travis & Arnold in 1988, to form Travis Perkins. In June 2020, Travis Perkins sought to cut 2,500 jobs under plans to close 165 branches during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United Kingdom. the type of business and the area(s) in which it operates Travis Perkins is the largest product supplier to the building, construction and home improvement markets. Travis Perkins businesses are organised into 3 main divisions: General Merchanting Supplying building materials to the trade, including for all types of repair and maintenance as well as residential and commercial construction. Consumer Travis Perkins DIY brands supply domestic building and decorative materials to the trade and direct to customers. Specialist Merchanting Travis Perkins Specialist Merchanting division typically works with large developers, main contractors and commercial subcontractors for materials used generally in large construction projects from new road and rail infrastructure, power generation construction and public service infrastructure such as hospitals and schools. Outline the management structure of the selected organisation Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the organisation’s management structure The divisional organizational structure organizes the activities of Travis Perkins around product and service groups. Thus, a company organized on divisional lines could have operating groups for General Merchanting, Consumer and Specialist Merchanting. Each such division contains a complete set of functions. Thus, the each division at Travis Perkins would handle its own accounting activities, sales and marketing, engineering, production, and so forth.

This approach is useful when decision-making should be clustered at the division level to react more quickly to local conditions. The divisional structure is especially useful when a company has many regions, markets, and/or products. However, it can cause higher total costs, and can result in a number of small, quarreling fiefdoms within a company that do not necessarily work together for the good of the entire entity. Advantages of the Divisional Organization Structure The key points in favor of the divisional structure involve placing decision making as close to the customer as possible. The advantages are noted below. Accountability: This approach makes it much easier to assign responsibility for actions and results. In particular, a division is run by its own management group, which looks out for the best interests of the division. Competition: The divisional structure works well in markets where there is a great deal of competition, where local managers can quickly shift the direction of their businesses to respond to changes in local conditions. Culture: Travis Perkins can use this structure to create a culture at the divisional level that most closely meets the needs of the local market. For example, a retail division could have a culture specifically designed to increase the level of service to customers. Local Decisions: The divisional structure allows decision-making to be shifted downward in the organization, which may improve the company's ability to respond to local market conditions. Multiple Offerings: When a company has a large number of product offerings, or different markets that it services, and they are not similar, it makes more sense to adopt the divisional structure. Speed: This approach tends to yield faster responses to local market conditions. Disadvantages of the Divisional Organization Structure The key points against the divisional structure involve the cost of duplicating functions and a reduced focus on the overall direction of the company. The disadvantages are noted below. Cost: When Travis Perkins set up a complete set of functions within each division, there are likely to be more employees in total than would be the case if the business had instead been organized under a purely functional structure. Also, there must still be a corporate organization, which adds more overhead cost to the business. Economies of Scale: The company as a whole may not be able to take advantage of economies of scale, unless purchases are integrated across the entire organization. Inefficiencies: When there are a number of functional areas spread among many divisions, no one functional area will be as efficient as would have been the case if there had instead been one central organization for each function. Rivalries: The various divisions may have no incentive to work together, and may even work at cross- purposes, as some managers undercut the actions of other divisions in order to gain localized advantages.

Silos: All skills are compartmentalized by division, so it can be difficult to transfer skills or best practices across the organization. It is also more difficult to cross-sell products and services between the divisions. Strategic Focus: Each division will tend to have its own strategic direction, which may differ from the strategic direction of the company as a whole. Introduce marketing and its role within the selected organisation Briefly discuss the 4Ps of the Marketing Mix in relation to the selected organisation The main function of marketing is to increase the profitability by increasing the sales of the company, thus it can be achieved with the participation of all the departments of the organization simultaneously. The finance department provides appropriate budget to the marketing department for the planning and implementation of marketing plan. Production department communicates with logistics department to fulfil the demand and supply of product and services. Marketing Mix 1. Product sells its products under 3 broad categories, and each of these serves as separate product lines. All of its products are sold under the brand name of. Sells products with a lot of variety available, which allows customers to select the product variety that best suits them. Sells products that are highly differentiated, with various features offered to customers those competitors don’t offer. Its products are therefore considered to be unique. Its products are perceived to be of higher quality than that of competitors. Therefore, customers are willing to pay a higher price for these. sells products that are famous for its traditional design that is also practical for customers to use. 2. Price The current pricing strategy to set the price level that follows is a competitive based pricing strategy. This is because the data on competitors is easily available due to a large number of competitors that exists within the industry. It also takes costs into consideration to set prices for a few products for which either information is not available on competitors, or are costlier to make, sells its products at a higher price than competitors. This is because it offers more features, and the high price makes up for these. It currently uses product bundle pricing as well, where products are bundled together and sold at prices lower than the total of individual items. It also uses an optional product pricing strategy for certain products, where it offers a price for the base product and separate prices for the accessories that come along with it. 3. Place

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sells its products through two marketing channels. The first is where it sells directly to its customer through its online website. It follows an omni-channel distribution system where it has integrated its online and offline stores to allow customers easy access to its products. Should open up its shop on social media as well, where it would sell its products on these platforms along with social media posts. This will allow the company to generate more sales. Its online shop and social media pages should be integrated in order to provide easy navigation to its users. Should focus on improving its online website such that it becomes more user-friendly and easier to use. Promotions uses multiple media channels to promote its products. It uses traditional media, which includes an advertisement on television and radio. This is beneficial due to its large reach and ability to attract a large number of people. It uses online and social media advertising, which is cheaper and beneficial due to the increasing usage of the internet. It advertises on various social media platforms with a focus on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter due to the high monthly usage of these. It has over one hundred thousand likes or customer following on these pages, which are exposed to frequent content uploaded by. Provide an overview of the organisations Human Resources functions. Present details of; Recruitment and selection Recruitment revolves around attracting, screening and finally selecting the best individuals for a specific job in an organization. This process can be done by the firms’ professional recruiters or it can still be outsourced to other recruitment organizations. As a matter of fact, there are many stages that are involved in the recruitment process. Every firm or organization has its own ways of recruiting people or individuals. Travis Perkins s has continually recruited people to join its operations. Because the company operations focuses on best construction services, it has been forced to ensure that it attracts the best talent to enhance its operations. In this case, the company manages a full cycle recruitment process. This means that candidates end up having a positive experience in the recruitment and selection process. As a matter of fact, the company has a recruitment department that ensures that it attracts the best talent in the market (Travis Perkins s 17). The company has come up with an open recruitment process to avoid any complaints from different and diverse candidates. Recruitment is a good topic that is supposed to be effectively addressed by all organizations (Ulrich 9). Therefore, there are many benefits that an organization can get by ensuring that it has an effective recruitment and selection process. When an organization effectively addresses this issue, it will save on time and ensure that its operations are not interrupted. This process is very important because it speaks a lot about the organization and its activities. In this case, it will be a true reflection of the company’s professionalism and validity (Legge 14). This therefore explains why Travis Perkins has continually enhanced its recruitment process to build on its existing professionalism. A good recruitment process enables the company to hire the right people. These

people are supposed to have the necessary skills and talent to undertake their duties and responsibilities. Travis Perkins has settled on an internal recruitment process because it saves on costs. In this case, it has been able to save on time and thereby enhance its operations as time goes by. There are various problems that can arise from a recruitment and selection process (Legge 6). In this case, various candidates that were supposed to be recruited can experience issues and delays as far as the recruitment process is concerned. In extreme cases, organizations might have problems in ensuring that their recruitment process is well organized. This means that they will be having a long recruitment process. In this case, an organization might end up with the wrong person for a given job (Ulrich 14). This means that all organizations should have a fairly efficient recruitment process. It should be known that delays can lead to various technical problems that can end up affecting the whole recruitment process. Because the recruitment and selection process is an important aspect that relates to the general well being of the organization, managers are supposed to ensure that it is well addressed for sustainability. Travis Perkins has put in place the right mechanisms to enhance its recruitment process by welcoming suggestions on how it can improve its recruitment activities and processes (Travis Perkins s 15). Managers should ensure that the organizations recruitment process is open enough to attract the best talent. This will encourage various professionals to participate in the recruitment and selection process. Employee relations The employee grudge against the organization has led to a lower profit scale of Travis Perkins . According to Eric Morehead employee happiness is more important than customer satisfaction for organizational success. This problem can be resolved with greater transparency in the recruitment system of Travis Perkins (Streitfeld, 2017). According to the former employees of the organization the bosses lack empathy and do not support personal priorities over job priorities.the narratives from the former employees can help understanding the employment relation and the employee relations relevant inside the company. The issues which the employees have identified are  The company sets unreasonably high standards which seem to be impossible to achieve for the employees(Streitfeld, 2017). The employees feel the pressure of unreachable expectation. Unable to meet such standards they suffer from significant distress.  The management style of the company has been often criticized to be a dominating one. NYT also reported the authority to be bureaucratic.  This organization has always been transparent about who is high-achiever and who is not. Employees are expected to work after their working hours and often for a long period of time. According to the mentioned report the employees are encouraged to negate the ideas of the co workers openly which lead to a unhealthy workplace atmosphere(hbswk.hbs.edu, 2017). Many employees have told NYT that Anytime Facebook Feedback tool is often used for scheming. In several cases the anonymous criticism is often copied directly in the performance reviews of the employees.

 Insensitive management is another factor identified by the former employees of the organization.the employees commented that they are often judged or pushed out in spite of personal crises(hbswk.hbs.edu, 2017). Though an Travis Perkins spokesman defended by stating that they would take swift action to correct the charges that have been brought against them regarding employee dissatisfaction.  This organization favors criticism over harmony which further complicates the employee relationship. One of the distinctive management belief of this organization is that harmony in workplace is overvalued rather than the organization needs to prompt the competitive spirit among the employees(Rosin, 2017).  Unlike other companies Travis Perkins does not provide any special benefit to the employees of the organization. They do not cater to the basic needs of the employees and obsessed in meeting the customer demands.  Lack of praise and unfair systems of ranking are other issues that the employees have pointed out(Rosin, 2017). This organization holds Annual Organization Level Reviews and the managers discuss and decide the ranking of the employees in the presence higher level managers. They often fire valuable talents just to meet a standardized quota. Talent management The HR is having different activities and one of the key activities is toward the employees and their management. The term talent management is used to the talents that are recruited, developed and retained in the organization. It is the role of the HR to search for the best talent depending on the requirement of the organization. The management of this talent is done by proving them training for their development. The employees are assessed time to time to analyze their improvement and guide them according to the need. The retaining of talent is also a part of their management skill in which all the benefits are provided to the employees so that they feel to be the part of the organization and provides their best. talent identification is one of the most important tasks of human resource management. Employees have different skills and talents that make the unique and best suited for different tasks. Many organisations struggle to achieve success because they have not been able to match their employees’ talents with the tasks. However, this can only be done if these talents can be identified. Sometimes the employees themselves may not realise that they have a special talent that can be useful to their employer. This means that it is necessary for organisations to develop programmes that would help identify these talents. According to Mathis and Jackson (2009), Travis Perkins has perfected the art of talent identification as it seeks to maintain innovation in the firm. The firm uses regular contest in order to identify special talent among its employees. Such competition would involve developing new software, advancing the current software, or addressing various issues within the organisation in a way that is unique and superior to the approaches that are in use. Through this, the organisation is able to identify special talents that may help it in various areas.

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According to Price (2011), talent identification can also be done by the non-management stakeholders. This may be through the feedback received from the clients based on these services they receive from the firm. This information can be used to identify some of the desirable capabilities of some of the employees. Some organisations consider using services of other institutions that have specialised in this area. They would be expected to work closely with the employees as an independent authority to identify their skills and special talents. This information would then be delivered to the management so that a decision can be taken. However, this approach is not being applied at this firm. Travis Perkins Corporation uses its own management to identify these talents. Talent Assessment According to Shukla (2009), once the talent has been identified, the next important phase is to assess it in order to determine its usefulness to the organisation. Talent assessment is a review process that involves identifying the relevance of a given talent to a given organisation. Sometimes it may occur that the talents of a given employee are not relevant to a given organisation. Waldrop (2008) says that a talented chef may be more beneficial to Hilton chain of hotels than to Apple Inc. similarly, a talented software developer may not have a place at the Sheraton Hotels, but may be an invaluable individual to Travis Perkins Corporation or Apple Inc. when assessing the talent, the focus would be on determining how relevant the special feature on the employee is to the organisation. Before dismissing a given talent as being irrelevant, it is necessary to evaluate various areas within an organisation that needs different skills. A skilled security officer may not have the knowledge in software development needed at Travis Perkins , but his skills are very important to this organisation in ensuring the safety and security of people and properties of the firm. Making a rush decision of declaring a given talent irrelevant may be a costly process. It may make an organisation to lose a skill that may be used to advance its operations. At Travis Perkins , human resource management has rolled out various programmes that are meant to identify and assess talents of the employees in various fields. The mid managers and supervisors are always given opportunity to identify employees will skills that they feel are needed within their department. They would then be expected to write a letter to the human resource explaining why they feel that these employees have the skills they need in their departments. The human resource will review such letters and determine the necessity to reassign employees from their current tasks to other tasks in the same department or other departments within the organisation. The aim is to ensure that in the long run, every employee is assigned duties that best meet their capacities as employees of the firm. This strategy not only boosts the results, but also enhances employee morale. Conclusion The profit of an organization is dependent on the role of management. The management needs to function systematically in which care is taken to achieve the target by acquisition of talents. The skills of the employee and coordination of work between all the departments will become a key towards the success of the organization

ITM sample

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