Developing a Project Human Resource Plan

Human Resource Management refers to the management of employees by using strategic approaches to achieve competitive advantage (Rao, 2010; Harzing & Pinnington, 2010). Further, also helps to maximize the employee’s performance and attain the organization’s objectives by using effective leadership styles. In this context, the current report is based on Human resource plan with respect to Ecological Wastewater Solutions Pty Ltd (EWS). The company offers the eco-friendly wastewater management systems. Currently, the company has entered into Chinese market through a joint venture with Chinese manufacturing organization for the expansion of a business. Apart from this, the report has been completed on the basis of two aspects such as team building and team management components for achieving the objectives related to sustainable supply chain, legalities and changes internal organizational structure. Furthermore, different types of plans involving recruitment, staffing, communication, assessment and improvement plan etc. have been prepared for the achievement of the company’s objectives.

According to case study, EWS is going to expand the business in China, for this purpose the company will focus on the change in organization structure with support of sustainable supply chain and involvement of legalities. In this context, EWS will build a team and prepare the organizational chart, recruitment and team building plan as follows-

Organizational structure has an important role in the expansion of business in remote as well as local countries. According to the case study, for changing the organizational structure, the manager of EWS company will implement the Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and technological systems in the organizational hierarchy so that successful expansion will take place on a large scale. Moreover, dynamic structure, dependency on electronic devices, cultural diversity will be helpful to enhance the trust among virtual teams.  In this regard, all the team of EWS will work on virtual basis and it will be possible through ERP system in management. On the other hand, many organizations which are operating the business through outsourcing are using the relatively both unstructured and structural structure to manage the virtual teams (Gibson & Gibbs, 2006).

To manage the virtual teams, the manager of EWS will change the structure in a systematic manner by involving different departments such as human resource, accounting, administration, marketing, finance. For the integration of teams and achievement of objective of effective organizational structure, manager will assign different roles to each department in EWS as follows-

Figure 1: Organizational chart for EWS company

(Source: Researcher’s own diagram)

• Role of Human Resource (HR) department- HR department of EWS company will be responsible to frame strategic policies and frameworks to operate the business in China. In this context, the HR manager will hire new skilled employees, suggest the policies for employee benefits and also recommend the training and development strategies for the employees etc. so that an effective ERP can be implemented in the organizational structure and that would be helpful to maintain a sustainable supply chain in the organization so that effective deliveries can easily take place from different locations.
• Role of the marketing department- For the attainment of objective of organizational structure, the marketing department will play as a role of market analysis.On the basis of collected data, a perfect strategy will be implemented to collaborate all the virtual teams of the organization. According to the case study, as a marketing manager of EWS will play a role to frame marketing strategies to take advantages of the entire marketplace including the online market. As per the case study, the manager will use a social media networking marketing strategy to provide information regarding the expansion of business and attract the number of customers. With the social media, the objective of legalities will also be fulfilled because EWS will operate the official site as per the governmental laws and regulations.
• Role of finance and accounting department- Finance department will be responsible to maintain all business activities in a specified budget to minimize the unnecessary expenses (Story, O’Malley & Hart, 2011). In this context, the objective of legalities will be achieved because the finance manager of EWS will play a role to keep the records regarding bills of shipping, maintain the transactions of export and import in new Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) nations on the basis of legal policies. In this manner, a structure of the organization will remain in a structured form on the basis of roles and responsibilities.

On the basis of case study, EWS company is planning to achieve the sustainability in its supply chain through changing the internal organizational structure and legalities aspect. For this purpose, the recruitment plan will also be changed, wherein following approaches will be considered-

• Social media- Social media is a useful tool to post a relevant job and develop constructive two-way communication between the company and prospective employees (Connors, 2011). In this context, EWS will use social media approach to hire new employees for the achievement of the purpose of business along with involvement of legalities. Here, the manager will use expert power to train the new workforce and guide them according to task requirements. Moreover, expert power is useful to build trust and lead the followers in the right direction on the basis of knowledge and experience (Phillips & Gully, 2012).  Hence, it would be helpful to achieve the objective of structured organization because all the power will be distributed as per the requirements and everything will go in a streamline flow.
• Employee referral program- According to Barnett, Aguilar, Brittner & Bonuck (2012), most of the people hired on the basis of reference of existing employees in different project teams. In this context, the project manager uses the referent power to recruit skilled people and admire the team in front of higher authorities of the company (Shenoy, 2016). Moreover, the respective approach is effective to motivate the workforce towards business activities because team leaders always perform a task as per the instructions of a leader. In this manner, as per the case study, knowledgeable and experienced people will be required to expand the business of EWS company in China and that would improve the organizational structure by involvement of experts in a management que.
• Re-employment of past experienced candidates- By re-analyzing the resumes of past left candidates who are possessing the specified new skills can be recruited with the help of re-employment program (Gibson & Gibbs, 2006). These employees have more experience regarding the working criteria of the business and will be more familiar with the company and policies. By considering this, through qualified past employees the objective of sustainable supply chain will also be achieved because those employees would form the strong relation with associate suppliers and will deliver the material on time. It reflects that re-employment of past experienced candidates will be an appropriate strategy for EWS to operate the business in China. Further, different virtual teams will be easily managed by experienced employees by implementing ERP in the organizational structure.

The objective of organizational structure and sustainable supply chain can be achieved by incorporating different types of strategies in team building plan such as leadership style, build a relationship through participation, gamification theory etc. (Kamasheva, Valeev, Yagudin & Maksimova, 2015; Sharp & Ryan, 2011)

• Effective leadership style- An authoritarian leadership styles refer to a strict leadership in which all decisions would be taken by a leader without the involvement of followers and team members (Gonos & Gallo, 2013; Iqbal, Anwar & Haider, 2015). In this context, a leader of different virtual teams of EWS company, an authoritarian leadership will be adopted to lead all teams in the right direction and to achieve the organizational goals by an implemented structure. This leadership would strictly communicate about the sustainability standards and legalities which will be implemented and achieved by the project teams. Furthermore, a leader will also follow the policies and rules which are formulated by international law and in continuity, the same procedure will be followed by different team members of the company and bound all the members in a quality group.
• Gamify work approach- Gamification relates to offering the rewards to team members to appreciate on the basis of work and motivate to work more smartly (Cosentino, Gérard & Cabot, 2017).By considering this, the objective of organizational structure will be achieved because a project leader of EWS will use the gamification approach to build an effective team and boost the morale of members by providing attractive incentives. Further, rewards can be in the form of recognition and esteem- promotion instead of monetary terms such as gifts, bonus (Shenoy, 2016). Apart from this, an instant feedback approach will also be appropriate for EWS company to engage the team members in a productive team because all teams are associated with current generations and demanded an immediate response on deeds. Hence, they will be able to work on a regular basis and remains attached with each other for further processing of business which is going to be operated in China because all aspects would be based on legal expectations (refer case study).  

  The changing legalaties aspect, sustainability and organizational structure related objectives of the EWS will be achieved by planning for the staff management. Owing to this, the plan has been prepared in the following manner-

• In this manner, in the case of EWS, the leader will ensure that every team member of the project will feel motivated and understand the purpose of sustainability and legal requirement.In this context, the project manager offers different monetary and non-monetary benefits like promotion in the designation or in salary or in the both (Mowday, Porter & Steers, 2013). All the benefit policies will be based on legal forms so that will encourage the project team member to perform their tasks with the full efforts and accordingly the objective of legalities would be fulfill.
• Further, the organization will remain in a structured way because company will strive on legitimating power through which the project manager will be clearly communicating with the team members for their role and responsibility toward the project.It will enhance transparency of the projects’ task among the team member and forced them to perform their task in a precise manner (Shenoy, 2016).  Therefore, by using different leadership power the leader of a project will ensure that the staff will handle in an effective manner.

PART-A

 On the basis of the case study of EWS, the manager will be enhanced the collaboration between the project teams because it is one of the key factors which affect the effectiveness of project progress. Apart from this, it will be considered that the delay in one team will not affect the operation of another team. In this regard, the leader will be ensured the effective scheduling between the different teams of project. Owing to this, it will reduce the wastage of teams’ valuable time because working of one team not affected by another team. On the other hand, by establishing scheduling in the supply chain the objective of sustainable supply chain will be achieved because the leader will ensure the continuity in the arrival of goods and streamlines flow in the business operation (Hartmann & Briskorn, 2010). Therefore, the appropriate staff management enhances the efficiency of the project which consequent in the greater project’s outcome.            

The legal scenario and sustainability will be clearly communicated by the leader of the different teams so that team can understand the potential requirement and work accordingly. Here, ERP will have a contribution in engagement of different virtual teams so that a complete communication can take place. Further, communication budget will be set for maintaining cost of the communication plan. In this context, the communication plan will be initiated by communicating the aims and objectives of the team members. The responses from the team member will obtain by emails. For this purpose, the technical resources will be upgraded in each department for effective collaborating the supply chain managers, legal advisor and HR manager. Apart from this, meetings will be arranged in the regular time span and discussed issues new ways of performing the work. It helps management to avoid the issue related differences in the actual and standards outcomes and new system as ERP can be effectively implemented for improvement in the sustainable supply chain and streamline operation of the business.

According to the case study of EWS, the organization wants to expand their business in different countries. Some of its team members operate at the remote locations which are difficult for the manager to establish effective communication with those employees. For this purpose, advanced wireless devices will be provided like smartphones which enhance the communication between the team members and leaders (Edmondson, 2009). It helps management for monitoring the progress of those employees and ensures the continuity in the project process by ensuring the effective supply chain. Apart from this, it will also help manager to establish interaction with remote employees through the web conferencing. The communication richness is necessary for a project for achieving the desired outcome of a business project (Sharp and Ryan, 2011). Therefore, by implementing effective communication in the human resource plan, the leaders of EWS can be achieved the valued outcome of the project.   Assessment plan

According to Huang & Shah (2012), the assessment of teams’ performance is most crucial for a business to elevate effectiveness of the project’s outcome. In this manner, in the case of EWS, the objective legalities and sustainability and organizational structure will be achieved by an assessment plan because in which the performance of each team will be analyzed on the basis of set standards. In this regard, the performance of each team will be assessed by proving short deadlines of each task through which every team perform their task in minimum time and avoids the cause which brings delay in the project. Further, if it has been found that all planning is not going according to expectations then growth strategies will be involved in assessment plan for the more development of teams. However, the delays in project increase the expenditure of the project because the extra time of project completion needs increased human, financial and technological resources. Apart from this, assessment plan will be based on legalities because for motivating highly performed team the reward will be given as per the framed policies. It will further help in the encouraging the other teams for elevating their performance (Shenoy, 2016). In the same manner, it will also help leaders of project for encouraging trust in the team member. Therefore, it will increase the efficiency of each team by motivation them for executing their allocated task in an effective manner.

Team Building Components

  The performance of each team will be evaluated in a regular time span. This will help the management for identifying any breaches in the current operations and fix in a fast and precise manner (Lockwood, 2010). If teams meet their goals then the leader will reward them otherwise punished them (Shenoy, 2016). Apart from this, it will also help the management of EWS for ensuring the continuity in the project operation without any interruption.  Thus, it is most crucial for EWS for analyzing and increasing the performance of the project by considering the importance of performance assessment and consider that the objectives are fulfilling or not. If not, then an improvement plan will be prepared for achievement of specified objectives.

  On the basis of the outcome of assessment plan, the improvement plan will be implemented. In this regard, the current strategies of the project will be modified on the basis of necessity.  In this manner, if the performance of the team will deviate from the standard then the management of EWS will be facilitated the teams by executing different development program like training (Uma, 2013). For instance, if it will be found that the teams of the different region are facing the problem related to communication then the training to fill the communication gap will be given to affected team members. It is most important in the case of EWS because of adaptation of an effective improvement plan in the project. It is also most significant because EWS deals with a major issue for expanding business globally. The poor consideration of the improvement of current strategies brings the project at the stage of failure and creates the cause for huge financial losses (Crawford, 2014). However, the improvement process has short-term negative consequences because it interrupts the streamline flow project operations but in long-term it is most effective. Therefore, the improvement plan helps the management to achieve the desired goal such as organizational structure, sustainable supply chain and legalities by resolving loophole of the present plan in an effective manner.

Conclusion

On the basis of the report, it has been concluded that different departments required varied roles to implement the sustainable supply chain through considering the new legalities scenario. In this context, HR will play a role of recruiter whereas a finance manager will perform a function for maintenance of accounts and budget control etc. On the other hand, it has also been concluded that social media has a major contribution in the staffing of skilled people. On the basis of different management components, it has been concluded that collaboration in the employees is one of the most important aspects of projects because it affects the effectiveness of the projects. In this regard, the communication among the teams enhances the collaboration in the teams so they can effectively achieve the sustainability in the supply chain by considering the legal aspects. It can also be concluded that new organization structure will be implemented by setting the different roles and responsibilities for newly formed team. 

References

Barnett, J., Aguilar, S., Brittner, M., & Bonuck, K. (2012). Recruiting and retaining low-income, multi-ethnic women into randomized controlled trials: successful strategies and staffing. Contemporary clinical trials, 33(5), 925-932.

Connors, T. D. (Ed.). (2011). The volunteer management handbook: Leadership strategies for success (Vol. 235). John Wiley & Sons.

Cosentino, V., Gérard, S., & Cabot, J. (2017). A Model-based Approach to Gamify the Learning of Modeling. In Proceedings of the 5th SCME Symposium. CEUR-WS (Vol. 142).

Crawford, J. K. (2014). Project management maturity model. Auerbach Publications.

Edmondson, J. (2009). Let’s be clear: How to manage communication styles. T+ D, 63(9), 30-31.

Gibson, C. B., & Gibbs, J. L. (2006). Unpacking the concept of virtuality: The effects of geographic dispersion, electronic dependence, dynamic structure, and national diversity on team innovation. Administrative Science Quarterly, 51(3), 451-495.

Gonos, J., & Gallo, P. (2013). Model for leadership style evaluation. Management: journal of contemporary management issues, 18(2), 157-168.

Hartmann, S., & Briskorn, D. (2010). A survey of variants and extensions of the resource-constrained project scheduling problem. European Journal of operational research, 207(1), 1-14.

Harzing, A. W., & Pinnington, A. (Eds.). (2010). International human resource management. Sage.

Huang, B., & Shah, S. L. (2012). Performance assessment of control loops: theory and applications. Springer Science & Business Media.

Iqbal, N., Anwar, S., & Haider, N. (2015). Effect of leadership style on employee performance. Arabian Journal of Business and Management Review, 5(5), 1-6.

Kamasheva, A. V., Valeev, E. R., Yagudin, R. K., & Maksimova, K. R. (2015). Usage of gamification theory for increase motivation of employees. Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences, 6(1 S3), 77.

Lockwood, N. (2010). Successfully transitioning to a virtual organization: Challenges, impact and technology. Alexandria, VA: SHRM Research Quarterly.

Mowday, R. T., Porter, L. W., & Steers, R. M. (2013). Employee—organization linkages: The psychology of commitment, absenteeism, and turnover. Academic press.

Phillips, J., & Gully, S. M. (2012). Strategic staffing. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall.

Rao, P. S. (2010). Essentials of Human Resource Management and Industrial Relations: Text, Cases and Games. Himalaya Publishing House.

Sharp, J. H., & Ryan, S. D. (2011). Global agile team configuration. Journal of Strategic Innovation and Sustainability, 7(1), 120-134.

Shenoy, S., (2016). 5 Types of Power You Can Use As a Project Manager!. [Pdf]. Available at: < file:///E:/871523_Organisational%20Behaviour%20and%20People%20Management/2847802_1419381582_PROJ6006-Shenoy.pdf>. [Accessed on 20^th November 2018]

Story, V., O’Malley, L., & Hart, S. (2011). Roles, role performance, and radical innovation competences. Industrial Marketing Management, 40(6), 952-966.

Uma, S. N. (2013). A study on training importance for employees of their successful performance in the organization. International Journal of Science and Research, 11, 137-140.