Hrm Final Essay
RestaurantCo is a large non-unionised restaurant company with over 300 branches in United Kingdom (UK). It was founded during 1960s, and encountered several changes to its ownership from the 1960s to the 1990s. With the change of ownership to a privately owned supply chain, the business strategy and management of RestaurantCo has varied and refocused on building the company value. This essay will analyse on the key issues, such as decision-making autonomy, the role and responsibilities of branch manager and, employee involvement and participation, resulting from the changes implemented in RestaurantCo.
Initially, RestaurantCo takes on a resource-based view approach in which it views its employees “as part of the company’s assets” and put strong focus in building its employee relations. The resource-based view of a organization suggests that employees are seen as a pool of human capital with valuable knowledge and skills - a unique resource that is both difficult to imitate and replaced - thereby providing the important factor of competitive edge (Hendry & Pettigrew,1990; Barney,1991; Wright, McMahan, & McWilliam,1992; Leonard-Barton,1995). However, with the recent changes in ownership, the management of RestaurantCo adopted a more strategic approach in managing its business and its HR practices. The importance of strategic goals and managerial focus are stressed upon its employees, displaying signs of using an instrumental approach to its human resource management; also known as the ‘hard’ approach.
Referring to the case study, RestaurantCo was said to give a large amount of decision-making autonomy to its branch manager although as highlighted below, contradicts this autonomy given.
Previously, branch manager was given a fair autonomy to manage their own branch. They could order directly with the suppliers to meet the needs of their individual branch. However, the introduction of a cost-cutting strategy by the management reassigned this
Initially, RestaurantCo takes on a resource-based view approach in which it views its employees “as part of the company’s assets” and put strong focus in building its employee relations. The resource-based view of a organization suggests that employees are seen as a pool of human capital with valuable knowledge and skills - a unique resource that is both difficult to imitate and replaced - thereby providing the important factor of competitive edge (Hendry & Pettigrew,1990; Barney,1991; Wright, McMahan, & McWilliam,1992; Leonard-Barton,1995). However, with the recent changes in ownership, the management of RestaurantCo adopted a more strategic approach in managing its business and its HR practices. The importance of strategic goals and managerial focus are stressed upon its employees, displaying signs of using an instrumental approach to its human resource management; also known as the ‘hard’ approach.
Referring to the case study, RestaurantCo was said to give a large amount of decision-making autonomy to its branch manager although as highlighted below, contradicts this autonomy given.
Previously, branch manager was given a fair autonomy to manage their own branch. They could order directly with the suppliers to meet the needs of their individual branch. However, the introduction of a cost-cutting strategy by the management reassigned this
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