Tanglewood case study human resources analysis

Tanglewood like many of its competitors has a high employee turnover rate which makes their recruitment efforts to be constantly on the high levels. The method used by the company varies from one region to another. By conducting an in-depth review and analysis of the methods that are used by Tanglewood in the different regions, it will be possible to create a comprehensive guide which will be functional to help Tanglewood to develop its recruitment drives to reflect the unique personality of Tanglewood.

Recruitment guide

Position

Store associate

Shift supervisor

Qualifications

Training available

Relevant labor market

Western Washington

Timeline

Continuously recruiting

Activities undertaken to source for well-qualified candidates:

Regional media advertisement

Post job openings on company Web site

Request employee referrals

Contact job placement companies

Contact local schools for referrals

Job fairs

Staff members involved:

Human resources recruiting manager

Store manager

Assistant store manager

Potential peers and direct reports

Budget

$3,000 - $5,000

Targets for recruiting efforts

Internal promotions are an important aspect of Tanglewood. Since all the company employees start at the level of store associates, the company will need to attract the best talent at the level of store associate who are then trained and their talent developed then promoted to the higher level positions. Therefore, the company will benefit greatly from building a work environment that attracts high quality and the most talented individuals. The company can do this by ensuring the employees are well remunerated and also by training managers and supervisors to make them well aware of how to train and manage the employees in the way that ensure the productivity of the company is highest Marrewijk & Timmers, 2003()

Tanglewood will benefit greatly from attracting high school seniors and freshmen in college. These levels of people are easy to train and to develop their talents to make them the perfect kind of people that Tanglewood needs. It will also help to ensure the employee turnover rate is low since they will be able to promote their brand loyalty among the employees who will have a sense of loyalty to the company. They will also feel motivated to work since the company will have invested greatly in their education and training.

Tanglewood currently uses five different strategies of recruitment. The first is media advertising such as radio, television and print advertising. The company has also placed kiosks in their various stores where candidates can fill out the standardized application form. These media outlets and the kiosks reach a variety of people in their various locations. They are an open approach since they reach a wide variety of people. Tanglewood also utilizes the referral system to recruit. These are a more targeted approach to recruitment since the employees are extremely cautious of upholding their reputation thus only refer those who they feel meet the KSAOs.

Another method which Tanglewood uses to recruit is job agencies. Tanglewood provides these agencies with their specific human resource needs and the KSAOs that they are looking for after which the agencies then look for candidates with these KSAOs and who they feel would be a good fit for Tanglewood. This is a targeted strategy of recruitment since Tanglewood only looks at the candidates who possess the desired KSAOs. The last method of recruitment is state job services which is much cheaper than staffing agencies but uses methods similar to those used by staffing agencies. It is also a targeted strategy of recruitment.

Analysis of recruitment methods

Tanglewood uses four different recruitment methods in the Western Washington region. These are media, kiosks, referrals and state job services. Referrals cost more but are the most effective method of recruitment. This is because referrals are the number one source of hired applicants in the region and secondly because there is an extremely high percentage of employees who were referred that are still with the company. State job services are also effective in the region. Though they provide only a small number of hired employees, the one-year retention rate is quite high.

Eastern Washington region on the contrary uses three recruitment methods which are media, kiosks and referrals. Referral are also effective, however, there is a high rejection rate for referrals. This is because they lack the required KSAOs for the position. The regional manager should find a way to reduce the number of referrals and increase their quality to ensure they possess the KSAOs desired. Referrals have an extremely high one-year retention rate and a very low cost to the company.

Northern Oregon also uses three recruiting strategies which are media, kiosks and job agencies. Job agencies and kiosks have been recorded to have good one-year retention rates. They also have relatively average costs. However, the region needs to consider leaving out the media strategy since it is least effective. If on the other hand they feel that they need to use this method, they need to consider revising their plan. The company should also consider adding a referral system in this region since it has proved to be beneficial in the other regions.

Southern Oregon does a great job in mixing and matching the recruitment strategies and in attracting talent. However, the cost per one-year survival for kiosks is almost double that of agencies and referrals. The region should thus either leave out the kiosks method or re-evaluate the strategy to find the method which produces the highest cost per one-year survival.

Northern Oregon's suggestion of kiosks and staffing agencies

Northern Oregon has created a valid suggestion on the use of kiosks and staffing agencies as opposed to the referral system. However, this suggestion does not seem to hold much water since looking at the total spending and total cost per hire, by omitting the referral program, Tanglewood would be greatly disadvantaged. Tanglewood should thus assess the importance of the methods suggested by Northern Oregon as compared to the other methods in order to find the method which has the greatest impact on filling the human resource needs of the company and also to find the method that is most cost-effective for the company Kammeyer-Mueller, 2009()

Metrics for the recruiting methods

Senior management officials at Tanglewood have expressed serious concerns that even though the company would work best by using the cheapest method available to hire their employees, the method may not be the most effective for ensuring the company meets its human resource needs. Cost and retention become the most important measures for evaluation of the recruitment methods. Therefore the management team should be concerned with the skill of the employees and the customer service that they give in relation to the people recruited so as to ensure there are other metrics used to measure their recruitment methods. One metric that could be used is the job performance of the employees. If Tanglewood was to track the performance of their employees for customer service, and other job performance reviews, the company will be able to track how the employees chosen by each of the recruiting methods ranks. This will help to gauge the quality of each recruitment method.

A second metric that can be used is the score for potential leadership skills. This will help to tell the employees that have the greatest potential for leadership. This metric will enable the Tanglewood management to analyze the methods of recruitment used to know which will give them the best potential for leadership in order to complement the company's strategy of developing talent.

Realism in the recruitment policy

Targeted recruiting message

Are you a college graduate looking for a new and exciting career prospect? We at Tanglewood need you. We are hiring store associates and giving them opportunities for advancement. All employees will receive competitive remuneration with great bonuses. We also have a profit sharing system and other benefits. This might just be the perfect opportunity for you to develop your skills to complete the job. By focusing on your own high standards, you will have the opportunity to fast track your career. If this sounds like a breeze for you, we need you.