C & S Department Store is the second largest clothing andretail store chain in Jamaica. At present, they have 5 clothing andretail stores in all 14 parishes and are planning to expand to 7stores per parish in the next 3 years. C & S Department Storehas a centralized Human Resource Department located at its mainoffice in Kingston. Unfortunately, although the HR processes aremanaged centrally, there are many HR tasks, policies and proceduresthat are controlled by the clothing and retail store managers or bythe lead parish manger in each parish. Currently, the HR managementprocesses are using Excel spreadsheet to compile reports fromvarious parish Headquarters and stores. This task is beingperformed by a team of HR executives at its main office inKingston.
Simone Coram is the Senior HR Manager of C & S DepartmentStore and has discovered various administrative and HR issues withthe clothing and retail store sites. Due to high focus on salesrevenue and stores profitability, Retail Store Managers havedifficulties in managing the stores in the areas of staffattendance, discipline and critical HR practices.
The fundamental emphasis and foundation of C & SDepartment Store has been centered on always maintaining thehighest standards of customer service and for that reason they arein direct contact with customers at each and every DepartmentStore. What sets C & S Department apart is a commitment toexceeding expectations making it one of their unique sellingpoints. Giving excellent customer service is one of the mainreasons why their customers choose C & S Department Store andwhy they keep coming back.
Imperatively, the entity’s strategy is purposed towardsemploying the ideal candidate for both their part-time andfull-time sales associates with the capacity and proficiency togrow and hone their skills for prospective advanced position withinthe organization. Presently, the store managers for three (3) ofC&S Department Store have made the announcement that they planto retire within the next 18 to 24 month. These three managers haveinsisted that they will not remain in their position beyond thisparticular point.
A team of HR internal auditors has conducted a study andidentified that there are irregularities in the staff attendancedata both at the retail stores and regional offices. Sometimes manyof the staff did not sign the attendance register or signedintermittently. During the HR audit, it was discovered that somestaff signed the attendance register only at the end of the day.Further, sometimes staff signed the register and then left theirpost. There was also no mechanism to track the leave data ofemployees. Employees did not know their exact leave data. At theend of the year it was revealed that some employees have takenexcess leave while some employees worked incessantly, creatingfrustration among staff.
There was also no standardization in the reports between headoffice, regional offices and the retail stores and this createddiscrepancies. HR provided a set of excel sheets and paper-basedforms to help store managers maintain data. However, many storemanagers used and made unique formats of reports making itdifficult to collate the reports. The data thus collated had to beverified over again and again, as there was a tendency for errorsto emerge.
This discrepancy has caused a significant issue in salary. HRand attendance data were used to generate data for payroll. Asthere were many discrepancies in HR data and reports, this createdseveral salary discrepancies and caused numerous issues among theemployees, thus lowering employee satisfaction rate and affectingthe employee morale.
Training and communication have become a major issue at C& S Department Store. As the company was growing at a fastpace, training employees on various HR procedures and policies wasbecoming increasingly difficult. Thus line managers took decisionsbased on their previous experience or personal insights and createdunnecessary hassles that required HR intervention.
The staff turnover in two (2) key departments of Marketing andAccounts was running at 90%. Estimated cost of staff turnover -including overtime, loss of revenue, loss of skills, training timeand management time to replace a staff member – is equivalent toapproximately $3,000 per position thus costing the business around$500,000 per year.
Human Resource Management focuses on matching the needs of thebusiness with the needs and development of employees and as suchyou are required to answer the following questions based on thescenario represented above.
Question
Evidently, the staff at C&S Department Stores isdisgruntled. Differentiate between disciplinary and grievanceprocedures. Using the appropriate legislation, indicate theinstitutions involved and methods available to employees to havetheir grievances addressed in Jamaica. As Miss Simone Coram, makerecommendations to the management team to minimize the incidents ofgrievance at C&S Department Store
