CMNS 1115-001 EMPLOYEE RETENTION AT FOREVER 21 Prepared For
CMNS 1115-001
EMPLOYEE RETENTION AT FOREVER 21
Prepared For: Dr. Philip George
Prepared By: Simranpreet Kaur
(300301277)
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
“Employees have competencies that are critical for the survival of an organisation” (Mwasaru, Kazungu Kingi, 2015). Employee at Forever 21 are not given enough growth opportunities and the efforts invested by them in their job are not given any recognition. Company has its focus on appointing more and more employees rather than satisfying the existing employees.
This report analyzes the problem of employee retention at Forever 21 in terms of five areas. It explains the need of employee retention along with problems at forever 21 and recommendation to solve those problems. Its main purpose is to make company feel the importance of talented employees in any organization.
To get information about the personal experience of any employee at forever 21 primary research was conducted. They were asked to go through a questionnaire and answer the question. On other hand, secondary research was conducted to know the importance of retaining employees. Under this many articles were researched.
The main recommendation to lower down the employee turnover are:
(a) By giving them respect
(b) By giving them growth opportunities
(c) By giving them right to participate in decision making process of company
(d) By giving them bonus, promotion etc.
Table of Contents:
1. List of figures……………………………………………………………………………………………………..
2. Introduction………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
3. Research methods……………………………………………………………………………………………….
Primary Research………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Secondary Research…………………………………………………………………………………………….
4. Discussion……………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
Need of employee retention………………………………………………………………………………..
Role of HR manager…………………………………….…………………………………………………..
Problems associated with increasing
employee turnover at Forever 21………………………………………………………………………
Loss of reputation and status of company……………………………………………
Loss of talented employees………………………………………………………………….
Loss of money in training new employees………………………………………….
5. Conclusions………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
6. Recommendations…………………………………………………………………………………………………..
Talent Management…………………………………………………………………………………………..
Effective Communication…………………………………………………………………………………
Other Motivational Incentive…………………………………………………………………………….
Participation in decision-making……………………………………………………………………..
7. Appendix………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
8. References………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
List of figures:
Figure 1: “The employee retention & Job satisfaction model”
Introduction:
Every company needs well trained and experienced employees for success. As the company starts growing and new employees are recruited, the concern for employee retention starts increasing. Forever 21 is an International fashion company. Most of the employees are unsatisfied working here because of the stringent strategies of company. Employees are asked to do overtime and that also without any extra pay. Their lunch breaks are delayed and are ordered to work continuously without any rest. They are always burdened with work which make them feel bored and tired. The company is expanding and recruiting new employees which results in less importance of old employees. New employees are given more respect than the older ones which leads to dissatisfaction among them. This is the main reason for low confidence in employees resulting in bad results. The purpose of appointing employees is to fulfil the desired short-term goals. No training is provided to the newly appointed people which is the reason that they leave the company very early. The company is just focusing of achieving organizational goals and is not employee-focused at all.
This report analyzes the problem Every of employee retention at forever 21 in terms of 5 areas including need of employee retention, workforce stability, Problems associated with increasing employee retention, HR role in company’s high performance, methods to improve employee satisfaction and reduce turnover rate by giving them incentives (training, promotion, bonuses, increased participation). Its purpose is to find out the ways to retain employees and to increase their satisfaction, so that they do not leave the company.
Research Methods:
The audience for the report is the management of the company as they are the one who are responsible for all the decisions of the company. They need to understand the importance of retaining employees as if more and more people will leave the job, then the reputation and profits of company would get affected. Two researches were conducted to know about the personal experiences of employees working there. Another purpose was to find out the key areas on which company could work and the problem of employee retention starts disappearing.
PRIMARY RESEARCH:
I had personally met some of the employees of forever 21. I had prepared a questionnaire including questions related to their experience with the company and were they satisfied with all the services or not? Whether they were given full respect or not? What changes do they want in the rules? This had helped me in gathering a lot of data and making a proper estimate of needs, wants and problems of employees about which the management was unaware.
SECONDARY RESEARCH:
This research had included various journal articles. This had helped in getting the information about the major areas that were needed to be focused by the company to satisfy employees and stop them from leaving the job. It had included various incentives and plans to motivate the employee and get best results.
Discussion:
Need of employee retention:
Employees are an important part of any organization. Without them, company can’t do anything. Sometimes, because of dissatisfaction or any other personal reason people start leaving their job and company left with unaware about the reason for their resign. In order to succeed in any field of business, it is very important that the company had well trained and experienced staff. On the other hand, the task of retaining that experienced staff is also a crucial job in today’s competitive world (Mwasaru, Kazungu, 2015, p1). The reputation and status of company is reflected by its staff. At forever 21, employees had started leaving the company because they were not satisfied with rules liked no breaks, no extra pay for overtime etc. Leaving of more and more employee had affected the profits of company a lot. So, there is a lot of need that they know the importance of employee retention.
Role of HR manager:
HR manager plays the role of employee retention specialist (Herman, 2005, p1). These managers exactly know what steps are to be taken and what steps are to be ignored to stop employees from leaving the company. Herman (2005) stated that “the vital task of employee retention specialist is design, development and implementation of effective retention strategies that promote measurable results” (p6). The HR manager make such policies by which employees gets motivated and their self confidence get increased. This, in turn help the company achieve good profits, as employees work with full dedication.
Problems Associated with Increasing Employee Turnover at Forever 21:
Loss of reputation and status of company:
When more and more employees of any company start leaving their job, the company suffers losses. As out of the employees who had left the job, some were well trained and experienced. This would automatically result in lack of experienced knowledge by the company and they would not be able to frame good strategies to gain profits. The company facing losses gains less reputation and low status.
Loss of talented employees:
When companies start expanding, they appoint new employees and old employees are given less importance. This lowers their self confidence and they do not work with full dedication and start leaving the job. Every person has his/her own creative mind which could be beneficial for the success of company. Thus, company suffers from the loss of talented employees who had left.
Loss of money in training new employees:
Newly appointed does not have any knowledge about the rules and policies of company. They need proper training in order to learn the working style of that company. If new employees are appointed regularly after a very short period of time, then a lot of money get wasted on their training.
Conclusion:
Employees are an important part of any organization. Making employees fully satisfied with their job is the duty of company as it is the easiest motivational tool that could be used. If there are fully satisfied, then they would work with full confidence and dedication. This would benefit the company in increasing their profits. On the other hand, talented employees always remain with the company and there would be no loss of money and time.
Recommendations:
Talent management:
“Talent management is known as a popular retention strategy for talented employees” (Narayanan, 2016). Under this, various techniques are used to satisfy employees so that they do not leave the company.
Effective communication:
If there is clear and effective communication between the employer and employee then, there would be better understanding of work style, interests and skills (Kamon, 2016, p29). Thus, there would be no clash of interests and company would earn profits.
Other motivational incentives (bonus, promotion, profit-sharing):
Employees should given bonuses for their good work, promotion after a specified period of time and also a small share in profit (Ravi, 2014, p39). These incentives would motivate them a lot to do more hard work and get these benefits. These would made them feel much more satisfied with their job and they would not leave the company.
Participation in decision-making:
When employees participate in decision making, this helps to build their commitment towards the organization (Saha, Kumar,2017, p82). This commitment gives them motivation towards the achievement of goals and they do not think of leaving the organization.
By giving them respect:
Employees must get respected in any field of business. This make them feel that they are also an important part of organization. Thus, increases their job satisfaction and results in good results of company.
See figure 1, it shows all the factors that
Appendix:
Question set
1. How long have you been working here?
(A) 0-6 month
(B) 1 year
(C) 2 year
(D) More than 2 year
2. How satisfied are you with your job?
(A) Very much
(B) Average
(C) Not at all
3. How good employer-employee relationship does company have?
(A) Extremely well
(B) Average
(C) Not well at all
4. How often do you get enough break time during your work?
(A) Everyday
(B) Sometimes
(C) Never
5. Are you getting incentives such as bonus, promotion etc.?
(A) Yes
(B) No
(C) Only sometimes
6. Are employees are consulted in minor decision-making process of company or not?
(A) Yes
(B) No
(C) Partial
7. How adequate is the training?
(A) Very much
(B) Very less
(C) Partial
8. How much does employers respect the employees?
(A) Very much
(B) Very less
(C) Not at all
9. How often does the employees work as a team?
(A) Always
(B) Sometimes
(C) Never
10. How flexible working hours do you have?
(A) Very much
(B) Very less
(C) Not at all
References:
Herman, Roger E. (2005) HR manager as employee-retention specialists: Job satisfaction, Employee motivation, Employee empowerment, Human capital, Personnel management. Employment Relations Today (Wiley), 32(2), 1-7. http://doi.org/10.1002/ert.20058
Narayanan, Anoopa (2016) Talent management and employee retention: Job satisfaction, Embeddedness, Employee retention. Journal of strategic human resource management, 52(2), 32-40. Retrieved from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/(ISSN)2277-2138
Kamon, Ammiel (2016) Innovative communication strategies: Job satisfaction, Employee retention, Job involvement, personnel department. Employment Relations Today (Wiley). 43(1), 23-31. http://doi.org/10.1002/ert.21547
Saha, S. and Kumar, S.P. (2017). Influence of participation in decision making on job satisfaction, group learning, and group commitment: Empirical study of public sector undertaking in India. Asian Academy of Management Journal, 22(1), 79-101. http://doi.org/10.21315/aamj2017.22.1.4
Ravi, T.S. (2014). Impact of incentives on job satisfaction in Chennai-based small manufacturing units: job satisfaction, monetary incentives, labor incentives, job security, profit-sharing. CLEAR International Journal of Research in Commerce ; Management, 5(6), 37-42. Retrieved from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/(ISSN)2249-4561
Mwasaru, Henry, Kazungu Kingi, William (2015). Effects of Employee retention strategies on Organisational competitive advantage in the hotel industry in Mombasa country: Employee retention, Hotel personnel management, quality of work life, labor turnover, operating costs. CLEAR International Journal of Research in Commerce ; Management, 6(3), 1-4. Retrieved from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/(ISSN)2249-4561
