Solution
The Developing Role of HR within Present Day Business
Background
In the modern business environment with an increased change, understanding different issues and contexts of HR is important to leverage on competitive advantage. In this case, this assessment focuses on evaluating the contemporary business environment issues, internal issues that affect HR function, and the most appropriate strategy to regulate the HR function. Additionally, the role of data in informing on an organisation operation has been evaluated with the role of HR function to attain the intended objectives noted in this report. HR function is a significant department that determines an organisation competitiveness level and the extent to which they improve their profitability and market dominance.
- Key Forces Shaping the HR Agenda
In the contemporary business environment, organisation change has been evident. As a result, HR managers are tasked with the responsibility of evaluating the different changes and identifying the most appropriate strategy to be adopted in an organisation. This is for embracing the different techniques based on their sustainability. The key forces that shape the HR agenda are classified into the internal and external factors. These are;
Organisational culture and structure– An organisation culture entails values, behaviours and work ethics evidently in place in an entity. This is as opposed to the structure which identifies the framework adopted in an organisation operation. In most of the entities, the culture and structure influence their mission, vision, and values. This is the function of HR, which ensures that the overall organisation objectives are achieved. Most importantly, the culture and structure also establish the most appropriate policies and operations of an entity and the level of embracing change. Therefore, part of the HR agenda entails a detailed influence of how the organisation operates, functions and passing the authority across the hierarchy of an organisation.
Business Trends and Innovativeness- It is the HR function-core role of ensuring that they are establishing different strategies for matching the available trends and fulfilling all their customer’s demands. Therefore, the aspects of innovativeness and modernised practices in the management establish the HR function effectiveness and an organisation leadership style. This is affirmed by Phorncharoen (2020) report that points out that in the retail sector where XXX has based their operations, high-level leadership sustainability is supposed to be practiced with innovation implemented to promote the capability of leveraging on a competitive advantage. Hence, in XXX, their growth strategy is informed by the need to implement innovativeness and diversification. Also, their trends include quality in retailed products, learning, and growth strategies. Further, their vision is put into account as it determines the extent to which distinct strategies are put in place in implementing a successful retail sector. This is in a multinational context.
Customer Diversity– In modern organisations, HR function is characterised by the presence of varying culture and demographic change (Gibbons & Karmowska, 2020). For instance, in the retail sector, baby boomers and young generations are evidenced by the existence of varying needs. The difference exists as a consequence of different gender differences, which define an HR agenda and focusing on distinct operations areas. In this form of environment, HR function is actively engaged to advocate their organisation policy development and any potential culture change. These different strategies set in an organisation are intended to harness the existence of varying differences by the existing customers, which is an added advantage towards the establishment of a sustainable competitive advantage.
As pointed out in CIPD (2015), the different models that are applied in determining the HR function offer an opportunity to appreciate the HR roles. This also legitimise the different HR varying strategies and guiding an organisation to promote the core HR practice’s effectiveness. Through the use of the Warwick Model informing on both the internal and external strategies of the HR operation and HRM context is applicable (Andalib et al., 2019). Therefore, through a reference on this model, the XXX HR function is strategic and in alignment with the necessity for innovating their strategies hence establishing a globalised organisation. This is by linking the internal and external factors for promoting their performance levels. Additionally, the Guest Model could be applicable in demonstrating the HR function roles in promoting the status of operations in an organisation. Based on this model, the HR activities include different strategies contributing to the achievement of set organisation strategies.
2.1 Comparison of Different Tools for Analysis of Business Environment
In a business environment internal and external business environment analysis, different tools can be used. The choice of the tool is applicable in prioritising the various stakeholders’ interests (Armstrong & Taylor, 2014). Further, the relevance of the tools is attributed to their effectiveness in understanding the organisation structure, legal environment, all influencing the operations and best practice to achieve the set goals and strategies. As a standard best practice, these tools are SWOT analysis, PESTLE, and the Porters 5 analysis, among others.
SWOT Analysis
This tool is used in identifying the strengths and weaknesses encountered in an organisation. This tool also identifies opportunities and potential threats (Gürel & Tat, 2017). Through appropriate use of this tool, it is possible to establish the best approach to maintain the entire strengths, improve on the encountered weaknesses, and leverage fully on the opportunities to develop the most appropriate strategy to mitigate threats. This tool positively impacts the process of promoting the likelihood of analyzing with limited or zero costs being incurred. Nevertheless, the weaknesses of using this tool are lack of appropriate prioritisation of the issues of focus, ineffective provision of all-inclusive solutions, and alternative decisions. The outcome of this would be the existence of distinct sources of information that are not fit for an organisation.
PESTLE Analysis
This tool is used to evaluate the external environment factors such as politics, economy, social, technology, legal, and environment (Rastogi et al., 2016). An analysis of these factors ensures that an elaborate HR agenda is put into the account in a business environment. The politics are inclusive of factors such as leadership, legal aspects, tax laws, level of authority, and foreign relations/direct investment. The identified factors tend to directly influence the extent to which business activities are applicable to set and formulate the different practices. Regarding the economic factors, these entail the monetary issues, fiscal business strategies with social factors evaluating the culture and relationship issues affecting an organisation operation. The technology factors are the innovativeness, which is applicable in enhancing sustainable growth and market share increase in an organisation. Finally, the legal factors are indicating on the prevailing laws in a specific region with the institutions tasked with the implementation process being noted. The organisations must equally operate within strict environmental factors and green economy depending on the country of focus. As opposed to the SWOT analysis, this tool is more detailed and has more factors being analysed. However, when it comes to decision making, oversimplification is evident hence the effectiveness constrained. Further, PESTLE analysis is more detailed, which presents a significant implication on the analysis effectiveness.
Porters 5 analysis
This is a business analysis model that is used in assisting providing an explanation of the different industries capacity of sustaining varying profitability levels. As opposed to the other two tools, Porter’s 5 forces is best positioned in identifying the strategy guiding a potential profitability. In context of XXX, this tool is applicable in identifying the extent in which their competitors are setting strategies in ensuring they are competitive and also be best positioned in their business environment. The factors that are considered in this tool include; competitive rivalry, supplier power, buyer power, thereat of substitution and threat of new entry. For XXX, the competitive rivalry is high since there are multiple UK organisations that have ventured in the retail sector. On the other hand, there are multiple suppliers for the organisation to choose from and at all times switches to the cheapest supplier with a high-level efficiency in terms of provision of the demanded goods. For the buyer power, XXX e-commerce strategy that they have initiated to mitigate economic effects of COVID-19 places them appropriately against their competitors. Their customers have a high buying power. However, there are multiple substitutes available in the market which are major threats of XXX profitability and ability to dominate the UK retail sector. Lastly, the new entry to the market is easier since minimal regulations exist in UK retail sector.
Application of a tool in comparison with the other
SWOT and PESTLE analysis are both applicable to analyse and to be compared n regard to different aspects pointed out in the tools. For instance, for SWOT analysis, four factors are used in the analysis with PESTLE analysis involving multiple factors. Further, SWOT analysis is applicable to analyse the internal factors available with the future strategies being prioritised. The two tools could be summarised as illustrated in figure 1, focusing on XXX organisation operating in the UK retail sector.
Figure 1: Comparison of SWOT and PESTLE Analysis
3.1 Factors Impacting Organisation Business and its HR Function
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