Summary:
JD Sports could improve their training programmes by increasing the budget, which is set to train employees. This means that much more information is given away which excites employees and keeps them staying positive.
Assessment Evidence for unit 2: People and business
E1.) Describe the procedures that your chosen business follows for staff training; appraisal and performance review; retraining for new technology or new work practices; any national training initiatives; health and safety training.
JD Sports use a number of procedures for different situations. The procedures that JD Sports use for the following situations are:
Staff training - When JD Sports wish to train existing or new staff they follow set procedures these procedures are:
They must identify with (whoever trains them) that the staff are not performing to the best of their ability or if a new person is recruited and they need to be trained or if simply staff are just due for a training session. The (person who trains them) will agree or possibly disagree with them that that candidate needs training.
Secondly they will decide what kind of training is needed whether it needs to be on the job or off the job training and how long it needs to be for. Whether it needs to be short or long and what needs to be done.
Appraisal and performance reviews -
When JD Sports decide that and appraisal and performance review is in order they participate using the following 6 steps. These six steps are:
- Decide why the appraisal is to be carried out and what data that the business needs to collect, e.g. the performance criteria, the supervisor ratings, and they must consider how the data is going to be collected.
- Talk to the person to appraised and discuss the forthcoming appraisal and the reasons for it. Then they let the person to be appraised make suggestions as to what shall happen he agrees that the appraisal can then be made.
- The data is then collected. It should be as relevant and unbiased as it possibly can be.
- After the data has been collected, it is summarised and made available to both the appraise and the appraised. The information has to be understandable to both groups. Any difficult analyses should be explained.
- The appraise is given time to intake the data and come up with discussion points which may arise from it.
They must then design the interview carefully, planning it so that all related points can be discussed. These can arise from assessing the appraiser's past objectives and success at achieving them from discussion points the appraise wishes to raise. Also it is from a negotiation, where the two groups, appraise and appraised agree on the appraiser's future objectives.
When JD Sports staffs have to go on national training initiatives then the company has to follow set procedures these procedures are:
Health and safety issues:
In JD Sports new safety equipment comes into the store regularly. When there is a new piece of safety equipment or even a new make of till or security mechanism comes into use, JD Sports use the same process to teach their new and old staff how to operate the item. For example if a new type of fire extinguisher is to be used in the store or they are fitting a new fire exit or even if they have new security alarmthen the manager will hold a meeting with all of the staff or all the staff that this new procedure would affect. At this meeting the manager or a suitable representative will show the staff how to use these new pieces of equipment and will give demonstrations and talks about them until the staff are clear on what they have to do. The staff will then be shown examples of what would happen if they used the product wrong and how they would put it right. The staffs then have to try to use the product and use it correctly. Once the manager/suitable replacement is satisfied that the staffs is totally clear about the new arrangement he will terminate the meeting. The meeting will last 20 minutes to an hour totally depending on the detail that the meeting needs to go into and how hard the new arrangement is to understand etc.
New employees are often inexperienced at performing tasks therefore they must be trained to do so. The human resources department are responsible of training new employees. They do this sending the new staff off to workshops or allowing them to spend time with workers who are more experienced in the trade. The training that is given largely depends on what type of job they have, however all employees must be taught health and safety regulations.
After the employee has been in the job for quite a while then they are given an appraisal. Callum has an interview with them about their performance. During this interview Callum sets the employee new targets and helps them to identify their skills and weaknesses. He also watches while their working on the shop floor, this helps him to determine how well the employee can cope under pressure. Once an employee has had an appraisal and are getting on well in their job then different positions in the business may become available. This mostly happens when employees with higher status quit, retire, get fired or get demoted. Another obvious time fro new training initiatives is when new technology is brought into the business. An example of this is when the new cash till brought problems to the company, as many staff were unsure of how to use it and kept setting off the alarm. Then Callum sent a handful of employees to a special workshop where a member of staff trained them and taught them how to use the till and all its new features. They learnt how to use the machine quickly and efficiently and how to print out receipts and add cash totals. When they returned from the workshop back to the outlet their task was to teach the rest of the employees the skills, which they had been taught.
E2.) Analyze how effectively, the procedures described in E1 enable people to perform their jobs well and maintain a safe and secure working environment.
I think that the procedures that are stated above are suitable for a large amount of employees at JD Sports. This is because new employees are being trained by more experienced members of staff. This results in company knowledge being passed down to new workers, the more experienced employees teach the new employees the right skills, which have served them so well in the business. This is effective as it also allows employees to learn from a practical side instead of someone they don't know. The knowledge that they gain then permits the employee to perform their job.
Employees who are given jobs that do not involve running on the first floor have to be trained through workshops and special training days that are provided as well as funded by the human resources department at JD Sports. They do this, as more skills and information need to be obtained to do this job. The employee must learn the information fluently so that if the situation arises they are in control. Although the managers and the employees higher than the shop floor workers have to run the day-to-day activities they also have to sort out any disagreements with employees and learn any appropriate skills through the workshops provided. This gives the managers the chance to prepare a friendly, helpful and well-motivated workforce, which offer the highest quality service that they can.
Whatever positions an employee holds at JD Sports all of them must be taught health and safety procedures. At JD Sports there are lots of opportunities for accidents and mishaps. With numerous sharp objects such as safety pins, security tags, nails etc. being used round the store there are plenty of opportunities for someone to prick themselves and also with wet floors and sharp objects or starting a fire, employees must be taught everything about health and safety. Although these are not major risks to people compared to the risks found in somewhere like a restaurant, there is still room for an accident, which could result in a lawsuit and/or bad publicity. Also the customers would prefer to shop in a clean and safe environment rather than a dangerous one. For this reason certain issues must be addressed such as the availability of fire exits and safety precautions. These will prevent the employees and the customers from gaining an injury if there are any emergencies. With all the staff knowing what to do in an emergency it keeps everyone safe whilst in the shop.
When Callum hired John he was given a drill of all the instructions on what to do if there was an emergency. This training day helped John, as he had had no previous health and safety experience, not only would this benefit him in his current job at JD it would also benefit him in any future employment and could use it on his CV. The kind of scenarios that john had to face included opening up a fire blanket and placing it over a simulated fire and he had to use a fire extinguisher to put out a fire. The training days are successful even though they only provide a small taster of what a real emergency would be like. The day simulates a real emergency to test the employees reactions to these kinds of situations. This is effective as most employees learn from their mistakes before the actual fire or accident and therefore provides a safe as well as secure working environment for employees and customers.
Although JD Sports are already successful in their field of sports retail they still leave space for further improvement. They can improve themselves by making the induction days more exciting and also by testing the employees to monitor what they have learnt, this makes sure that they are learning efficiently. This is important as what they need to know the health and safety precautions.
To make sure that the employees are paying attention they're training days need to be entertaining. This will help them learn the information that they are being taught. They could do this by giving the workforce scenarios where they have to decide what to do in the situation and make sure everyone is safe. Then if these situations do arise in real life, the employees will be able to cope with the stress and be in control with the situation.
E3.) Using the analysis in E2, suggest and justify alternative or additional procedures to those in E1 that might improve the effectiveness of the employees and the safety of the environment.
JD Sports could improve their staff training by allowing the employee more time at workshops and training days, rather than just giving them one day. Callum could have allowed John Beckwith to train for longer e.g. 3 days; this would ensure that her staff and customers are in safe hands, as she knows what to do. Then her and other staff should be taught how to calm customers down in the case of an emergency as customers could panic and do something stupid. This would prevent people panicking and putting theirs or somebody else's life at risk.
JD Sports could improve their training programmes by increasing the budget, which is set to train employees. This means that much more information is given away which excites employees and keeps them staying positive. This should be done as if an employee is bored and isn't paying attention then they will not learn anything and it will be a complete waste of time and money. JD could improve this by providing more real life scenarios. This would be effective as most employees learn from their mistakes before the actual accident occurs and then therefore provides a safe and secure environment to work in.
Bibliography:
Webstites:
www.google.com
www.yahoo.com
www.jdsports.co.uk
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