Jobs Recruitment and Training for Twinkle Toes - Case Study Example

Fundamentals of Human Resource Management Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Name Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Course Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Lecturer Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 3rd April, 2012. Executive Summary This report sets out to explain how human resource planning can be used so as to determine the desired position for twinkle toes two. It also aims at describing how job analysis can be applied to design the specific jobs. The report also aims at providing recruitment and selection process that jenny should follow and lastly discuss how a systematic training process can be followed to ensure that all employees perform their jobs effectively. Contents Executive Summary 2 Contents 3 Determining the Right Number of Employees at Twinkle Toes Two 4 Analyzing and Designing Jobs at twinkle toes Two 6 Recommended recruitment process 7 Training process for the employees to perform duties effectively 9 References 11 Appendix 1; Sample Job Description for a teacher 13 Background information Twinkle Toes is a day care centre owned by Jenny Carter, he has successfully run the business forsome time now. Increasing demand for similar services has led Jenny to open a new centre Twinkle Toes Two on another suburb of his town. At the centre Jenny employs an administrator, a cook and a cleaner and several child workers. The ratio of child workers to children is 0.2 equivalent workers for each child below three years while that of child workers to children is 0.1 equivalent workers per child above five years. From the fact that the business is successful this can be taken as an optimal number of workers for efficient day to day operations. Originally while planning his human resource at twinkle one, Jenny had faced a number of problems and has decided to approach a human resource consultant to enable him staff the new centre properly. Determining the Right Number of Employees at Twinkle Toes Two Human resource planning (HRP) plays a vital role in any business undertaking and it seeks to make sure the organizations is not understaffed or it has workers who are redundant or at some point during the organizations operation are idle, it seeks to eliminate the costs associated with it. HRP in an organization deals with these two problems. It involves evaluating the business’ present and future numbers of employees that it needs in comparison with the resources it own or has access to currently and those it will envisions it will get in the future (Walker 2001, pp.67). While staffing the new centre Jenny should ensure that he maintains the equilibrium of demands to supply (Fitz-enz 1990, pp. 25-29). Twinkle Toes twoshould avoid a situation where it has excess staff andor where the employees are not enough for efficient and effective operations at the centre as both situation show weaknessesin the positioning strategy of the centre. Lower than adequate employee numbers at the centre would mean Jenny cannot take advantage of economies of scale, while overstaffed businesses ends up paying employees or a workforce whose contribution to the business’ goal is less than the expected in comparison to the resources that Twinkle Two may use to remunerate them for their services. Jenny can use various methods to determine the number of employees his new centre will require and which kind will they be; whether casual or permanent employees. Jenny should take an approach of mixing the permanent employees at the old centre with new recruits and further make the original employees the core of both centersas the skills they have learned can be easily transferred to the new staff. Theissue of staffing numbers then would not be a problem of staffing a whole new centre but rather the simpler task of adding additional workers to an experienced team at both the old and the new centre. Jenny should base the information he already has from the old centre to determine how many members of staff are needed at the new centre (Beardwell, Holden & Claydon 2004, pp.132). The following calculations can be used to come up with the right number of workers at the new centre. To begin with the centre should hire 2 supports and 1 administrative staff just like the old Twinkle Two centre; a receptionist/administrative officer and a cook and cleaner. These three workers ought to be enough for the centre’s operations that does not involve directly caring for the children. Using the ratio of children to practitioners, Jenny can arrive at the following figure for additional workers. Ages Expected Number of children Child to practitioner Ratio Ratio* Expected Number of children Number of practitioners at new centre 1 to 3 20 0.2 20*0.2 4 3 to 6 15 0.1 15*01 1.5 From the calculations table above it can be determined the new centre would have to be staffed by 6 child workers and 3 other staff adding up to 9 new workers. Still the centre will be overstaffed as according to the calculations the centre needs 1.5 practitioners for children above 3 years, to overcome this inefficiency jenny should seek to enroll five more children above the ages of 3 years Analyzing and Designing Jobs at twinkle toes Two Jenny can use job analysis while designing the new jobs at Twinkle two by dividing the jobs into components “organizational structure, work activities, and informational content” by doing the job analysis Jenny can acquire the following information about the design of the new jobs at Twinkle Two: the actions and methods associated with achieving each task and the employee position who is responsible (Hunt and Morgan, 1994, pp. 568-655). By analyzing the currents jobs at the original twinkle toes Jenny can also discover undesirable and desirable human characteristics for each job, he can also discover how much human effort is required for each individual task .Human characteristic desired are a response to the need of the children and their parents and Twinkle toes effort to ensure they are satisfied. A person with jovial characteristics impacts positively on the happiness of children placed under his care daily. A closer look at the work of various staff at the old centre can give a clear picture of the devices “Tools, equipment” and other aids each employee will need in fulfilling his tasks. He can also know what the output of each job is; whether it is a tangible output or intangible output like the safeguarding a child. A job analysis also helps in coming up with ways of measuring the workers performance and his commitment to delivering quality outputs. In job analysis jenny can be able to come up with schedules for carrying out various activities for each job. It also will help him develop various incentives to reward performance both financial and non-financial. With the information obtained through job analysis jenny can specify the requirements for each Job at Twinkle Two (Miceli & Mulvey 2000, pp. 12). In Appendix 1the specification for child worker job are shown. Recommended recruitment process Recruiting teacher and other staffs is a crucial process in the decision making time since the staff and the teachers hired will be offering the kids with necessary life skills they will require in their lives as well as in their other levels in education radar (Lindsay & Lindsay 1987, pp. 56). In most cases, the process of recruiting teachers mostly relies on professional knowledge and intuition about what makes for a good teacher. Therefore, as the child care field struggles for recognition and legitimacy Jenny must recognize that the process must be more systematic rather than professionalism based about the personnel hired. In addition, it is wise to understand that, the hiring process need to be documented so that the hiring process can be defended if need be. The hiring process recommended for Twinkle Toes Two has been tested in other recruitment processes and it has worked. The process involves a ten step process starting from advertisement of the posts through to the monitoring process of the recruited personnel. Step one, in the advertisement process; the Twinkle Toes Two management must make sure that they have developed a detailed job description about the personnel they want to hire i.e. abilities, skills, knowledge and the level of competence (Ruopp, et al 1979, pp. 99). They should also describe their school philosophy, organization structure, job duties and responsibilities and staffing mix. The description should not be narrowed down to the professional qualification only, but other qualifications such as criminal records of the personnel and experience. Step two; this step requires the management to involve qualified professionals in determining the most suited candidate as per the job description. Therefore, the management of the school should come up with a panel of experts who will be given the responsibility of recruiting the candidates. The responsibility of the panel should be; to advertise for the position, make the personal contacts with relevant authorities that can give the best candidate and other forums should be included in their agenda. Step three, prior to the actual process of interviewing the candidates, the management should go through the application forms to establish whether the candidates have the minimum requirements as prescribed in the job description advertisement. The preview of the documents should be aimed at selecting the preferred qualifications both education and experience. Step four; it is advisable to enquire from the candidates for more information through telephone or e-mail. At this stage, the management should dig for information such as; what made the candidate apply for the post and any other information that the management may feel it is necessary. Step five; it is preferable to provide the candidates with the portfolio of items that will be discussed during the interview process. This will make the candidates aware of what will be discussed in the interview so that they won’t panic in the process of the questioning. Step six, this is the interview process. At the interview, the panel should make sure that what was in the portfolio was discussed to the letter and that the candidates have provided sufficient knowledge about the information required. Step seven; the selected panel should call the referees of the candidates to authenticate the information provided by the candidates (Lindsay & Lindsay 1987, pp. 90). Step eight; the candidates should be given a chance to demonstrate their skills in the classroom or any other physical test so as to determine other factors such as the interaction of the teacher with the children and communication skills to the children. Step nine; the candidate should be assessed on job related physical demands such as the material to use as the learning resources other than textbooks. It can be through recorded tape showing the materials or in an actual classroom. Step ten; this is the final process of the recruitment process where the panel should select the most suitable candidates after meeting all the require qualifications. Thereafter, there should be continuous monitoring of the candidate in probation period. During probation, the candidate should be put through actual teaching process and the relationship of the practitioner with the children both in classroom and other fields assessed. Finally, both long term and short terms on the school should be highlighted to the candidates during the whole process of hiring. This will make the candidate to assess whether the responsibilities rhyme with the objectives of the school. The whole recruitment process should be in line with the contemporary issues that influence the decisions of the HR managers such as the desire to recruit a multi-skilled and flexible person among others. Training process for the employees to perform duties effectively Though the aim of recruiting employee include the appointment of people with sufficient knowledge, skills and experience to fully work towards the specific job requirement such as the goals and the objectives of the school, there is need to train the new recruits through orientation or any other process to make them more aware of their jobs, the other working mates and the organization at large (Whitebook, et al 1981, pp. 67) The training process therefore should make the employees aware of culture in the school and hence increase the productivity of the employees as the move will enhance teamwork spirit. The training is supposed to address the long term approach to the changing attitudes and behaviors through interaction with the surrounding environment. The employees should learn both cognitively and physically therefore the HR managers should understand how employees learn for effective training to occur. The training process should address the contemporary learning in which; experience, reviews and planning are taught to the employees. These should incorporate the doing, thinking and new ways of tackling a particular task. The process should again be based on experiential learning in that; the employees play an active role in acquiring the new knowledge and skills. Though learning process involve a combination of tasks such as reading, listening, and virtual arts like pictures, the training process should be geared to accomplish only through doing and saying participation process. As mentioned earlier, learning involve a combination of skills through interaction with the existing environment to change the attitudes, behaviors and cognition of the recruits, training involves the deliberate activities planned by the organization to increase the productivity of the workers and it occurs at any time, focusing at shorter term that will influence on the interaction of all the stakeholders. As a result, the HR management ensures an effective training strategy is build and followed (Bernotavicz 1993, pp. 63). The following criterion is followed for an effective training process; to establish the training needs, determine the input materials required for the training, the actual training process and the output of the training. If the HR management ensures that the above criterion is followed, then the training process of the new recruits will be effective for Twinkle Toes Two to thrive in a highly competitive market. References Analoui, F. 2007, Strategic human resource management, Thomson, Australia. Beardwell, I., Holden, L., & Claydon, T. 2004 Human resource management: a contemporary Approach. Harlow: Prentice Hall. Bernotavicz, F. 1993 “Learning from the Experience of Teachers: A New Approach to Staffing Child Care Centers.” Unpublished manuscript. Fitz-enz, J. 1990, ‘Getting and keeping good employees’, Journal of personnel, Vol. 67, no. 8, pp. 25-29. Hunt, S & Morgan, R. 1994, ‘Organizational commitment: one of many commitments or key mediating construct’, Academy of management journal, Vol. 37, pp. 568-655. Lepak, D & Gowan, M. 2010, Human Resource management. Australia: Pearson Education. Lindsay, P & Lindsay, C. 1987. “Teachers in preschools and child care Centers: Overlooked and undervalued.” Child Care and Youth Quarterly, 16, 91-105. Miceli, M. & Mulvey, P. 2000, ‘Consequences of satisfaction with pay systems: two fields studies’, Journal of Industrial relations, Vol.39, pp. 62-87. Nankervis, A., Crompton, R., Baird, M & Coffey, J .2011, Human Resource management, Australia: Cengage Learning. Ruopp, R., Travers, J., Glantz, F and Coelen, J 1979 “Children at the center. Final Report of the national day care study.” Cambridge: Abt Associates. Walker, J. 2001, ‘Perspectives’, Human resource planning, Vol. 24(1), pp 6-10. Whitebook, M., Howes, C., Darrah, R & Friedman, J. 1981. “Who’s Minding the Child Care Workers? A Look at Staff Burn-Out.” Children Today, January-February 2-7. Appendix 1; Sample Job Description for a teacher JOB DESCRIPTION I. Title: Teacher Location of employment: Twinkle Twoes or Twinkle Toes Two Schedule: 8-hour with the children as directed by the administrator from Monday to Friday II. Organizational Relationships: Supervisor: Administrator Directs: Cleaner worker and trainee teachers Coordinates with: Everyone employed at twinkle Twoes III.Statement of Job The holder of this job will determine the daily activities of children under his care and implement a learning program and report the progress of those under his care to the parents and other stakeholders IV. Functions Essential: 1. Makes sure children are not hurt during the time they are in his/her care 2. Arranges for meetings with other staff aimed at improving the contents taught to children at the centre 3. Ensures the classrooms have appealing features to children and their learning 4. Report children progress during meetings with parents arranged by the administrators. 5. Supervises the cleanliness of the classroom and surrounding areas and ensures that the children are served with quality foods 6. Should be able involve themselvesphysically in the activities of children whether while learning in class or playing outside Marginal: 1. Assist administrator in tasks of public relations, reporting to parents and research. 2. Participation and contribution in school meetings. V. Budget Responsibilities None. VI. Public/Professional Activities Attend professional workshop in her/his line of work; assist in research by organization touching on his/her line of work VII. Knowledge, Skills and Abilities 1. Diploma in early childhood education or related field, or equal experience working in a similar environment 2. At least years’ experience in a busy child care environment. 3. Should be able to workeffectively with children, colleagues and authorities in her work environment. Read More