Case studies
Mudflats Biscuit Manufacturing Plant Roles Mudflat is said to be a leading businessman in the hill country who owns the largest and the one and only state of the art biscuit manufacturing plant in the country that was running for more than 30 years. His business constitutes over 2000 employees and his products had a 70% market share in the local market. He also exports his products to 20 countries including USA. Roles Mudflat also had other business Interests In the field of hotels, travel, apparel and plantation.
He is a father of two children who has completed their Master Degrees in Bangor n the field of IT and Fashion Design. His belief was that it’s his prime responsibility to look after the welfare of his fellow employees’ and their families and his character towards them was more of father than an owner of the plant Itself. He also proved that paper qualification does not matter when It came to real life business. Them in order to enjoy his retirement. He then appointed his son Reason as the Director Operations and his daughter Rossini as the Director Marketing.
Overall analysis of this case is to see as to how the new management approach is different to that of the old management approach of managing the biscuit manufacturing plant. 2. Question 1 – Discuss about the leadership approach of Roles Mudflat and how the company was benefited for many years with his self-learned management skills and main drawbacks of the process. The leadership approach used during the reign of Roles Mudflat at his manufacturing plant is a mixture of Autocratic approach, Democratic approach and Paternalistic approach.
As an autocratic he decided that his manufacturing plant would be more controlled if he did not recruit professional managers. Through practicing autocratic approach he was able to make quick decisions, this was rather unofficial as he was facing constant changes in the environment due to competitiveness in the local as well as the foreign markets. It was rather a challenging thing for Roles Mudflat to be looking into his workers needs as they were needed to keep his business from falling apart.
Through democratic approach Roles Mudflat was able to create an environment as such that he appointed his most senior employees as Supervisors to overlook employees under thereby encouraging decision-making amongst them. He also believed in an open-door policy, which encouraged employees to come to him whenever and whatever time they wanted to talk to him. This resulted in building the employer and employee relationship which built trust in-between, encouraged team- work amongst his fellow employees and so forth. Finally, as a paternalistic Roles Mudflat was more looked as a father rather than a boss.
This is so because he believed that the people working for him were the best assets he possessed. He not only looked into the needs of his employees, he also extended an extra hand towards the needs of their families too. He supported his workers by giving 02 month bonuses, provided soft loans to purchase a motor cycle to errors who worked more than 05 years, distributed a dry ration pack worth of RSI. 1000/-, offered scholarships to their children whom were selected to universities, provided books and other accessories to needy children. Society, without which survival of the company would be damaged. And he also was a people person, although he did not have an HRS to look into the needs of the employees he happen to do it the way he understood how to manage people. The benefits gained through Roles Mudflat with his self-learned management skills are however very few compared to that of the drawbacks. He believed in an open or policy, whereby all employees’ feedback was considered and he acted upon accordingly. This policy improved the morale of employees to a greater extent and had a direct impact to the turnover.
When employees feel that their decisions and feedback are accounted for they gain a sense of belongingness and trust which helps Roles Mudflat retain his fellow employees. Another benefit is that Roles Mudflat has a 70% market share in the local market, exports his products to 20 countries including USA, caters to the needs of over 2000 employees and also together has won over the society through certain CAR projects. The little knowledge of management he has, had helped him not only look into the internal environment but also to cater to the external environment too.
The drawbacks of the leadership approach used by him is such that, it is the result of lack of interest of the leader that leads to his adopting this style. This proves poor management and makes the employees lose their direction and focus. Roles Mudflat has no interest about the future of his business, I. E. No mission or vision of the business, no career development for his employees. According to the case, his most senior employees are Just Supervisors. They have no development beyond that because he does not see the importance of such a promotion for such employees.
This may be due to his lack of knowledge of how to manage people or more or less the reason as to his lack of interest to take his business forward. There is no proper organizational structure that illustrates the positioning of the employees of the manufacturing plant. He has no set procedure and policy of how the business has been running in the past and how it came to be. This is necessary for the next heir who would be taking over. Without this policy or procedure no one can put two and woo together and continue the business, or to survive in the competitive market. . Question 2 – What are the shortcomings of the new approach taken by the young directors and their team to the change the process? The new approach taken by the young directors and their team to the change the process was rather costly. Rather than providing internal promotions they hired two Secretaries as Personal Assistants to the newly appointed directors. Six managers were hired for the core functions of the company namely Production, HRS, Quality, Supply Chain, Marketing and Finance.
The managers were the newly appointed directors’ classmates. They failed to identify manpower requirement, through internal recruitment. They incurred a lot of finance on unnecessary expenses like for instance; Reason came to understand that the company was running without a vision consultant in the country to come up with an attractive vision and corporate plan. Reason made available printed cards to all employees with the vision and mission statement and spent one million rupees on fixing digital boards with the company’s vision.
The HRS introduced a new incentive scheme based on individual performance and informed all employees that their annual bonus will be based on performance appraisals. Here the new management failed to inform the employees as to how their performances were going to be appraised and as to what they had to do in order to improve their current performance. Employees had no one to go with their grievances as they were not given much attention as compared to Roles Mudflat. Employees were highly denominated as they faced difficulties communicating with the new management.
The new directors failed to integrate the culture of the company’s vision and mission. There was a clash between the previous culture and the existing culture. Reason and Rossini were too busy recruiting new blood to the organization that they ailed to realize the damages it was doing to the company. The employee turnover increased by 25% of the first three months Reason and Rossini took over the company. 4. Question 3 – Being the HRS Manager, what is your proposal to young directors to implement best HRS practices and processes in this 30 year-old company with over 2000 employees?
When we look at the business that Roles Mudflat maintained for the past 30 years and the manufacturing plant that is now about to reach extinct, we could see that the main reason for this unsuccessful turn is the lack of knowledge the new management as about the culture and the business itself that was run by their father. As an HRS Manager, before I implement best HRS practices and processes I shall first speak to the employees and learn from them about the manufacturing plant. This is done so as to get a wider picture of the business as a whole, and as to how it was controlled by Roles Mudflat.
Through this I could derive his secret of managing people and do a comparison of before and after the new management took control. As it is the employees are much disgusted over the way they have been treated and how much they have been ignored. So as an initial step I would involve employees in helping me to work out a SOOT of the past and present and get their valuable comments or suggestions, if any. Based on the SOOT analysis, I shall look into the areas that were lacking much expertise.
Initially, the HRS manager should be able to fix the denominated staff and to do so he/she has to be very open to them, allow them to speak about their problems bothering them. Later, recruit a counselor to help those employees whose minds needs special attention. The HRS Manager should effectively encourage employee engagement benefit from owe employee turnover, greater customer satisfaction, a solid corporate culture, improved performance and communication, and higher commitment to the core values and objectives of the organization which had been embedded during the initial period when Roles Mudflat was leading.
HRS Manager should also clarify the strategic direction by means of articulating the Vision, Mission and Values of the organization. HRS Manager should also integrate HRS programmed through HRS practices. For instance, by establishing a Staffing and Recruitment Policy it well help the organization to develop an effective recruitment tragedy in order to attract qualified workers who are committed to the organization’s goals.
The HRS Manager should also be able to identify the short-term and long-term human resources needs through a HRS planning process in order to mitigate resignations. HRS Manager should also develop a compensation policy. This is done by identifying goals and objectives of the organization by considering the competitiveness in attracting and retaining employees and whether performance is tied with pay increases. HRS Manager should also provide for training and development programmed so as to eater to all employees in need of training.
