Understanding the Human Resource Management Failures at Veroxy Inc Ltd - Research Proposal Example

Understanding the Human Resource Management Failures at Veroxy Inc. Ltd: A Mixed Methods Case Study Approach Name Course Name Instructor’s Name Executive summary Veroxy Inc. Ltd is a speculative pharmaceutical company manufacturing human drugs used in hospitals and clinics for treating patients. The company operations including production and overall efficiency have been on the decline for the past six months and market analysts together with different company stakeholders have identified failures in Human Resource Management as the singular cause for the reduced productivity. The top management of the company is determined to get to the root cause of the continued underperformance. This research proposal sets out a clear proposed procedure to conduct an intensive research to establish or affirm that the failures in HRM practices are the cause for the decline in the Whitener Inc. overall productivity. This proposal regards Whitener as a single case study where failures in HRM are the core issues and hence will serve as the focal point for data collection. In this regard, company documentation specifically related to HRM will be extensively examined to provide the basis and other fundamental information for the case study. Further, using a sequential explanatory mixed method case study approach, a cross-section of staff will be surveyed with respect to their take on the company’s HRM practices. Consequently, semi-structured interviews together with a sub-sample of survey participants will also be conducted. Introduction This research proposal gives a clear plan for undertaking a mixed methods investigations into a single holistic case study organization. The research will zero down to all HRM activities that the company has initiated for the last six months that have culminated into the company’s underperformance. The main actors in this event will Veroxy’s staffs who have been working with the company for the past six months. The sequential explanatory mixed methods design will be employed to; using a cross-sectional survey, a myriad of staff views about the company’s HR practices will be measured. In-depth qualitative interviews will be used to determine personal views about the HRM practices. Accordingly, the survey elements of the research design will be guided by positivist assumptions while the qualitative interviews components will be aided by the constructivist assumptions. Research problem This research proposal is a result of the Veroxy Inc. Ltd request to various consulting companies for an intensive research to determine the failures in the HRM practices that has led to the company’s poor performance for the last six months. Their quest was to provide a comprehensive proposal which could establish facts and give recommendations within three months (Yin, 2009, p.36). The target sample was to be the Veroxy Inc. Ltd employees who have been working with firm for the last six months. The top company management expressed their concern with regard to the poor company productivity and the overall company efficiency in pharmaceutical manufacturing. This concern helped to shape the research problem for the proposal: understanding the views of the company staff with regard to HRM practices that have been initiated for the last six months. Research Context Veroxy Inc. Ltd is a speculative pharmaceutical company that manufactures different pharmaceutical drugs used in hospitals and clinics across the US. The company’s business was booming until the different HRM practices were initiated six months ago. The company profits have been plunged due to reduced productivity and the massive inefficiencies across the plant. The half year company market reports have indicated that the company was performing only up to approximately half of its initial productivity levels. The top management of the company and other stakeholders are concerned and hence there is a need to review the company’s HR practices, establish where the real problem lies and come up with working solutions that will restore the company’s productivity as well as profitability. The competition in the pharmaceuticals market is stiff and hence only pharmaceutical companies with comprehensive and efficient production capacities have the upper hand to compete competitively. Furthermore, it has been established that effective investment in HRM practices results into better performance. Accordingly, different HRM practices for managerial and non-managerial employees always culminate into profound performance of a given company. The inefficiencies that have been experienced by Veroxy Inc. have been alluded to emanate from HRM practices; HR analysts together with other company stakeholders have come to the same conclusion. From this regard, it seems that the HRM department within Veroxy is not fully committed to its mandate and thus scuttling the business operations of the entire company. Human Resource Planning is integral to the efficient and effective continued running of businesses (Wright & Hobfoll, 2004, p. 56). Due to mismanagement of companies by business owners coupled with external factors and extraneous issues have culminated into poor HRM practices. Poor human resource planning always results into immediate and long-term impacts on organizational functioning, management policies, employee recruitment and corporate profitability. The immediate observable indicators of consequential HRM practices are poor planning and management, unmotivated work force, employee demand-supply mismatch, higher staff turnover and the overall impact on the bottom line (Wright & Hobfoll, 2004, p.57). Brief Literature Review Human Resource Management is directed to management particularly in viewing employees as significant and important resources for a company while at the same time focusing on planning, monitoring, motivating as well as mediating instead of control oriented functions alone. The external competitive environmental forces are the key triggers that influence a company or any business organization to adopt HRM practices that will enhance its performance. The failure or misinterpretation of these forces can lead the management to implement HRM practices that may harm the company rather than helping it move to the next level. The failure in HRM practices at Veroxy Inc. can strongly be aligned to misinterpretation of external competitive environmental forces. An organization is always made up of individuals organized in a specific way desired by the firm in order for it to achieve optimal performance or accomplish the company objectives. According to Brook (2003, p.180), some organizations put stress on team while others focus on specific individual activities. The psychological well-being of employees is key in establishing working relationships among employees thus increasing the overall performance of the firm. Anything that compromises psychological well-being of the workers automatically results into poor productivity. Wright and Cropanzano (2004, p.62) established that the relationship between an individuals psychological condition is directly related to his or her job performance. Several studies have established that psychological well-being with regard to happiness maximizes personal health together with the overall job performance thus raising organizational productivity. In regard to this, we can make an assumption that for the last six months the psychological well-being of Veroxy employees was poor and stressed thus the general employee motivation was compromised resulting into poor productivity coupled overall company inefficiencies. The new economy as discussed by DeFillippi, (2002, p.111) is a knowledge based economy that has no borders; race is no longer an issue and hence it is between companies, the faster the company learns to be more flexible the higher are its chances of taking advantage of the technology-based market opportunities. For instance organizations have transformed their operations from the traditional immobile infrastructures to mobile infrastructures, miniature, and have wireless modes of communication, computing and transacting. According to DeFillippi, (2002, p.112) consumers are currently demanding for a 24 hour service to solutions of their place regardless of their time and place. These observations compels us to conclude that HRM is not only used merely for handling recruitment, pay, and discharging, but also it is an instrumental tool for maximizing the company’s human resources in a more strategic manner. The duties of the HRM as put forward by (Torrington, et al. 2005, p.98) are human capital developer; employee advocate; functional expert; strategic partner and HR leader. Failure of any company to proactively and actively undertake these fundamental duties, then, all company’s operations will be at stake. To maintain competitiveness in the market place organizations strategic HRM practices must cover almost all aspects of the business; strategic planning, recruiting, training and developing of its employees to acquire the much needed skills and knowledge for effective company operations. Different researchers have concluded that human resource is an immensely valuable resource of any company. Leadership, employee motivation, rewards and the overall employee appraisal activities are critical in ensuring superb performance. The company attains its competitive advantage through highly efficient employees (Torrington, et al., 2005, p.99). It is commonly accepted that employees make up a significant source of the company’s competitive advantage. In this regard, companies must implement or adopt those human resource management practices that make best use of its employees (Wright & Hobfoll, 2004, p.62). The positive relationship between high performance work practices and different measures of company performance are directly derived from HRM practices that appreciate employees. The firms that align their HRM practices with their business strategy are likely to achieve superior results (Kumar, 2010, p.38). With regard to this the failures in HRM management practices at Veroxy can be said to be ineffective and thus the company was unable to imitate the vital HRM objectives. Thorough and in-depth studies in HRM have established that an incompetent and dysfunctional HRM department usually mirrors the company’s overall situation together with its un-competitiveness in the marketplace. Any lapse between the HR department and the company’s executive management results into miscommunication, poor decision making with regard to operational aspects. Consequently, employee training band development programs are not comprehensively designed and budgeted for. Further, if the HRM department is not functional, the employee recruitment and hiring processes are usually skewed. In essence, the organizational HR assets are not aligned with the goals and objectives of the company (Simon, 2011, p.80). According to DeFillippi, (2002, p.113) the confusion and different attitudes of the top management and HR always trickle down across all organizational levels and employee hierarchies. In this regard the work ethics is compromised, personality conflicts arise and teamwork is virtually abolished. As a result, there is underutilization of skills and capabilities of the working environment. Furthermore, strained employee motivation coupled with lack of incentives automatically results into poor performance and production of products of low quality (Simon, 2011, p.81). In the same line of discussion, poor HR planning affects the working culture of the company; for instance, performance reviews and performance appraisal are poorly managed thus employee become uncertain of their future and immediate prospects (Kumar, 2010, p.27). Similarly, it have been established that employee safety practices together with their working conditions can be vastly compromised particularly in manufacturing settings. In this regard, poor working environment forces the skilled and highly qualified employees to quit. Paradigm Guiding Assumptions to be adopted From the literature reviewed above, it is significantly clear that it was guided by the positivist assumptions where survey methods were used. However for the purposes getting a clear understanding and achieving commendable results and recommendations, the proposed study will employ the use of mixed methods research design. This will comprise of different assumptions for different components in order to increase the importance for learning for the research. In this regard, the quantitative survey will fundamentally be founded on positivist guiding assumptions hence focusing measuring key constructs together with inter-relationships explorations. On the other hand, qualitative interview element will be based on interpretivist guiding assumptions seeking to understand at a personal level how employees view the HRM practices at Veroxy Inc. Ltd. Research question Following the research problem as stated above together with the knowledge gathered through the literature review, the following research questions and hypotheses will be dealt with and addressed accordingly. There will be two research questions one addressing the positivist quantitative component of the research while the second question will be addressed using the interpretivist qualitative approach. 1. The organizational psychology literature states that there are specific hypothesized relationships between different constructs: Hypothesis (a) Employees who felt that the company continued underperformance is directly related to failures in HRM practices, citing lack of leadership and employee appraisal as the core factors. The company can only restore its optimal levels of productivity only if and only if employees are treated as a valuable resource to the company. Hypothesis (b) Employees relationships are wanting and hence building working teams within the company is a nightmare. The psychological well-being of the employees is poor and hence resulting into strained performance and overall productivity. Hypothesis (c) Employee development through well organized and budgeted employee training is lacking. HRM is an instrumental tool for maximizing the company’s human resources in a more strategic manner, however, the lack of employee development has compromised all company operations leading to reduced productivity together overall company inefficiencies. In order to have a comprehensive understanding, evaluation of the above hypothesis; employees at different levels of management will be examined. 1. What are the company’s top management perspectives with regard to the HRM practices of the company and how do they regard the relationships of employees for the last six months? Research design Overall research plan In general the overall research plan will take a single holistic case study format where Veroxy Inc. Ltd serving as the organization under study and HRM practices as the main focus. The mixed method data gathering strategies will be designed using explanatory sequential design. In this regard, the first stage of the research design will use field-administered quantitative survey involving a cross-section of staff across all management levels. The second stage will employ a series of in-depth qualitative interviews with a sample of participants who undertook and completed the first stage survey (Wright & Hobfoll, 2004, p.63). The main objective of the second stage will be to deliver a comprehensive learning with regard to employee participants across different levels of management; this will help in explaining the different patterns observed in the survey outcomes of the first stage. Accordingly, before executing both stage one and two, Veroxy Inc. Ltd’s HRM documentations will be reviewed in order to establish the contextual background of the company together with its HRM practices. For this matter, the overall research design will take the format shown in the figure below. Key Constructs and measures of Survey The survey has been designed short and easy to understand; the survey targets specific areas where the company has failed in HRM practices (Radburm, 2008, p.33). Consequently, the critical areas identified by the literature review to be of significance to tap into will also be considered. In this regard, the survey will evaluate the views of employees in relation to the company’s underperformance, particularly their views of the company’s appraisal and employee motivation practices (Radburm, 2008, p.35). Accordingly, the employee relationships and teamwork levels within the company will also be surveyed. Similarly, the survey will also find out if the company has employee development program that is well budgeted for. Finally, the survey will contact follow-up interview particularly from the willing respondents. Figure1. Showing the exploratory mixed methods design for Veroxy Inc. ltd HRM practices failures case study Sampling of participants The sampling process targets employees across all levels of management who have been working with Veroxy Inc. Ltd for the last six months. In this regard, for the first stage, surveys will be sent to a stratified random sample of employees across all levels of management in Veroxy Inc. Ltd. The surveys will be sent to 75 randomly selected employees across the company. This strategy for sampling enhances the validity for generalization of outcomes of the survey. The second stage will only target 20 respondents who successfully underwent and completed the first stage survey. Methodological Procedures Managing the research stages; permission will be sought to access valuable Veroxy HRM documents particularly those that were acquired in the last six months. Accordingly, the publicly available Veroxy annual reports for the last two years will also be examined. These documents will be relevant in developing the HRM practices background of the company (Banfield & Key, 2012, p.125). The researcher will then distribute the survey in person by visiting the Veroxy main office where possible. Consequently, if this is not possible, the survey will be emailed to potential participants. Through the distribution of the survey, the potential respondents will be advised that complete the survey and return it in a week’s time. Consequently, they will be informed that they might be contacted at a later date for further in-depth interviews that focus on HRM practices at Veroxy Inc. Ltd. Data entry, coding, error checking together with initial statistical analysis will be conducted prior to the start of the second stage. The second stage survey, the researcher’s main objective will be to understand the top management views with regard to the HRM practices of the Veroxy and how they regard the employee relationships for the last six months. Gaining access to participants; the research will sought for permission from the HR department to gain access to relevant contact details of employees across all management levels so that the stratified sampling can be enacted. Accordingly, the research will seek permission to access company HRM documents of the company. Managing Ethical protection of participants; the research will work to ensure that the respondents or participants in the survey are well aware of the general purpose; and the person conducting the survey together with their credentials (Banfield & Key, 2012, p.130). Equally important, the researcher will ensure that participant’s responses will be treated with highest levels of confidentiality and thus the company will have no chance of gaining access to the information acquired. The researcher will also make it known to the participants that their participation in the survey is completely voluntary (Bryman & Bell, 2011, chapter 15). For the qualitative interviews in stage two; the researcher will draft the informed consent letter that will ensure that the respondents are aware of what to expect during the interview; their interviews will only be recorded on their permission (Cornelius, 2001, p.61). Furthermore, they are at liberty to end the interview at any time; and lastly, their sentiments with regard to the topic may be quoted in the research report only if they are identified by a pseudonym. Accordingly, the ethical protection for this research proposal will be vetted by the researcher’s consulting group. Approaches to data analysis; after participants return the stage one survey, the results will prepared for data analysis by the researcher, and will ultimately also enter the data. SPSS version 20 will be used to conduct all statistical analysis. In this regard all the data will entered using the SPSS data entry spreadsheet interface and for accuracy purposes the data will be double-checked. The hypotheses cited above under research question one will be tested using Pearson correlations to relate the relevant variables (Bryman & Bell, 2011, chapter 15). The quantitative interviews captured through the recording device will be transcribed professionally into Word document files before the analyzing it. Consequently, the researcher’s contextual field notes regarding each interview will be typed verbatim into a Word document for analysis. The qualitative analysis software MAXOQDA 11 will be used to provide software support particularly for the qualitative analyses of all transcribed texts (VERBI Software, 2012). The qualitative analyses will fundamentally focus on relevant themes together relationships that emerge from the responses given by the participants and also those that will be as a result of combination of the responses. Timeline and resources for the project The table below shows the schedule of how the survey will be conducted. The research project will take two months complete with full recommendations to be submitted to the organizations top management. The relevant resources required for the completion of this research project are: access to Veroxy HRM documents in order t establish the HR practices background; the access to employee contact details from the HR department; digital recorder integrated with omni-directional microphone with a time limit of 120 minutes of recorded talk storage capacity; access to the professional transcriber for the qualitative interviews; access to PSSS version 20 statistical software; and access to MAXQDA 11 software. Table1. showing the approximate time for the completion of research project activities Research Activity Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 5 Week 6 Week 7 Week 8 Week 9 Ethical clearance Access and analysis of relevant company documents Draw the main sample Distribute the main survey Quantitative data coding, entry and analysis - SPSS Organization and carrying out of qualitative interviews Interview transcription and field notes transcription Analysis of quantitative interviews and contextual field notes – MAXQDA Results integration, creation of relevant data display and writing of the case history. Writing of the case report and final submission. Strengths and limitations of the proposal The strengths and limitations of this report are given below; Strengths The research offer an integrated and innovative mixed methods approach that gives an inherent understanding of the effects of poor HRM practices at Veroxy Inc. Ltd The research also establishes high degree for generalization of the survey results to all employees across all management levels at Veroxy Consequently, the study provides an opportunity to qualify and contextualize survey outcomes using the subjective view discovered in the qualitative interviews in particular. Limitations The research project is difficult to ascertain and it is hindered by the degree of access that the researcher will be accorded to the company HRM documents. The survey results particularly in the first stage are not likely to meet the required response rate for a comprehensive research. References Banfield, P. and Kay, R. (2012) Introduction to Human Resource management. London: Oxford University Press. Brooks, I. (2003) Organizational Behavior: Individuals, Groups and Organization, London UK, Radburn, N.M. (2008) The Structure of Psychological Well-Being, Chicago USA, Aldine Publishing Company. Bryman, A. & Bell, E. (2011). Business research methods (3rd Ed.). London: Oxford University Press. Cornelius, N. (2001), Human Resource management: a managerial perspective. New York: Cengage Learning EMEA DeFillippi, R. (2002) Organisational Models for Collaboration in The New Economy. Human Resource Planning, Dec 2002 v25 Kumar, R. (2010) Human Resource management: Strategic Analysis Text and Cases. New Delhi: I. K. International Pvt Ltd. Simon, R. (2011) Human Resource Management: Issues, Challenges, and Opportunities. Oakville: CRC Press Torrington, D., Hall, L. & Taylor, S. (2002) Human Resource Management 5th edition, Harlow UK, FT Prentice Hall. VERBI Software. (2012). MAXQDA 11: The art of data analysis – Introduction. Retrieved on 26/5/2013, from http://www.maxqda.com/download/manuals/MAX11_intro_eng.pdf. Wright, T.A. & Hobfoll, S.E. (2004) Commitment, Psychological Well-Being, and Job Performance: An Examination of Conservation of Resources Theory and Job Burnout. Journal of Business and Management, winter 9, 4. Yin, R.K. (2009). Case study research: Design and methods (4th Ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Appendix i: Draft Veroxy Inc. Ltd HRM Survey. Survey Id: __________ This research is designed to obtain your views with regard to the HRM practices at Veroxy Inc. Ltd. Kindly complete all items identified below. This survey is strictly confidential and all your views will treated with highest discretion keeping in mind that the company top management has full consent to respect this confidentiality. Following this standards, after the data acquired through questionnaires have been entered into the computer, all the original questionnaires will be serrated and destroyed completely. Similarly, on your consent, the researcher will contact you for a qualitative interview survey. Kindly respond to the following question by ticking in the appropriate box What is your level of management in this company? Lower Middle Senior Please respond to the following questions by circling the phrase that represents your views. If you circle 1 then, you strongly agree with the statement, circling 4 means that you neither agree nor disagree with the statement, and circling 7 means that you completely disagree with the statement. Strongly agree Moderately agree Slightly agree NEUTRAL Slightly disagree Moderately disagree Strongly Disagree The company’s underperformance is directly related to poor HRM practices 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Lack of leadership and employee appraisal are the main factors that have led to poor performance 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 There are poor employee relationships are prevalent within the company 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 The psychological well-being of employees is poor thus resulting into strained performance and overall productivity 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 The company has no employee developing program 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 I highly acknowledge your participation in this survey. Please kindly fold this survey in half and place it in the return box labeled SURVEY RETURNS. Appendix iii: Details of Semi-Structured Interview Procedure and Interview Transcription. Guidelines Each interview will take 45 minutes. After the interview, the researcher will use extra 30 minutes to finalize the field notes on the interview. The procedure for the interview will be as follows: Set up the interview space before the participant arrive Make sure that batteries in the digital recorder have charge On arrival of the participants, welcome them into the interview room and direct them to where to sit. Obtained their informed consent On permission, switch on the recorder Open the interview in a proper and cordial manner Keep the topic in mind and use non-directive questions After the interview switch off the interview and honestly thank the respondent. Transcription preparation and Guide Ensure you type all the verbal content exactly the way you heard it. Do not record pauses, ums, ahs, stutters or any other language If the interviewee mentions another interviewee replace the person’s name with the appropriate pseudonym. The transcription file should be labeled with the interviewee’s survey ID number as part of the filename. Appendix iii: Draft Plan for data recording field notes page for semi-structured interviews Participant Name:______________________________ Date________________ Notes & Observation Self Reflection/Ideas Contextual Notes Maps & Sketches Read More