HR760_D1 HRM Total Rewards- Total Rewards Plan: Step 1

In Chapter 4, the authors outline how to prepare a total rewards program. The first step is to analyze and assess the organization to gain a clear understanding of what already is in place in the organization when it comes to total rewards for employees.

On page 29, Step 1: Analyze and assess is described.

In this assignment, please address each of the six components listed under the subheading: “How to Conduct an Assessment”. This assignment kicks off your work on the Final Project, so use the organization that you have decided to use for your final project.

HR760_D1 HRM Total Rewards- Total Rewards Plan: Step 1

Introduction

In organizations, the components of the total rewards systems include compensating employees for work done and promoting career development. It is also about the recognition of employees and offering a flexible work structure. It is important to assess the organization to find out what is already being practiced and then discover the vital areas of improvement in the total rewards system (WorldatWork, 2007). In this paper, there is an organizational assessment of Bridgestone. Bridgestone is a world-renowned tire and rubber products company. It produces tires for cars, mining vehicles, and aircraft (Bridgestone Group, 2020). A product diversification strategy is at the heart of Bridgestone. This diversification enables the firm to make other products like bicycles.

Internal and External Data Analysis

Internal Data

The average age of a Bridgestone employee is 40 years old. Most of the employees are scattered in the following geographical locations: America, Europe, especially Russia, Middle East, China, Africa, and Japan. Bridgestone values diversity. As a result of this, the company has employed both men and women. However, the number of women employed at the institution is considerably lower compared to the number of men (Bridgestone Corporation, 2020). In senior management positions in 2020, the number of men was 1394 while women were 44. Bridgestone is a multi-ethnic society. The firm employs people from all over the globe. There are Caucasians, Latinos, Africa Americans, Eastern Europeans, Indians, and the Asians. Because most of the employees at Bridgestone fall under the category of middle-aged employees, the company encourages, through its many employees, employees to have an active lifestyle.

In a company, the set performance objectives influence the firm’s competitiveness and production efficiency ( Pozo et al., 2018). It has an effect on whether the company production will lead to wastage, or if it will be lean. Each employee at Bridgestone has his/her objectives, which are outlined in their KPIs (Key Performance Indicators). At the firm, managers must ensure all objectives are followed. Among other benefits, Bridgestone has an elaborate benefits structure where workers are offered competitive salary rates, housing, medical insurance, and gym membership.

External Data

The United States Tire Manufacturers Association awarded Bridgestone an excellence award for their efforts in promoting leadership and practice in advancing Workers Safety and Health (Demouy, 2018). Bridgestone has carried out several agreements in the past with other companies such as the United States Steel Millers Cooperation in 2005 to streamline the performance and the benefits that are offered to the union members and to state the penalties that are paid by the union employee who does not want to join the union. The United States Bureau of Labor Statistics report shows that at Bridgestone, unionization has also helped the company employees get better services in the past. For instance, an agreement between the United Rubber Workers Union and Bridgestone led to contract renegotiations where employees were required to make co-payments for medical insurance schemes; the company was required to rehire all the employees previously dismissed. Seniority was named the key reason for increasing employees’ salaries (United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, n.d.). Key Industry reports detail which production segment will bring more revenue to the organization. From the report analysis, there is a growing demand for passenger vehicles globally, and thus, Bridgestone expects to get a lot of revenue from this product segment (Laura, 2021). Furthermore, innovation will drive the tire manufacturing industry in the near future, specifically the design of fuel-efficient tires.

Benchmark the Organizational Strategies against Top Performing Companies

The benchmark will focus on the organizational strategies regarding the benefits offered to employees. Benchmarking is a practice used in getting organizations as reference points, analyzing what these organizations do best, and using their best performance practices to offer insights into how the organization can improve its employee compensation practices. Whereas some business managers in the organization might think that benchmarking is a long and tiresome process, it is helpful because it enables the organization to gain real and accurate information about what is making other companies perform exceedingly well compared to them (Erdil &Erbiyik, 2019). According to payscale.com, ‘U.S. Employer Comparative Research, the key benefits offered by Bridgestone include a base salary of 81,000 dollars per year and a $9000 bonus (PayScale Inc., 2021). Other benefits include severance pay. The kind of insurance offered by the company included health, life, dental, and accident insurance. There is also long-term disability insurance for employees who get accidents and get disabled in their work (PayScale Inc., 2021).

According to Forbes Magazine, the best employers to work for include companies like Marriott International, BCG Group, the Atlantic, KPMG, Delloite, and New York Life (Lewis & Bush, 2018). These companies have put in place strategies that have enabled them to be on top compared to other firms. Some of these include ensuring equality at the workplace (Lewis & Bush, 2018). In these firms, the ratio of male to female workers and managers is not that big; there is equality in the employment of male and female workers. There is also a consistent strategy of ensuring that positive experiences are created in the workplace to ensure that the worker gets results, develops, and carries out his or her duty in the friendliest possible workplace environment (Lewis & Bush, 2081). In these organizations, there is a huge focus on leadership. The Chief Executive Officers provide managerial functions and roles to the company, but sometimes they act as social activists. They ensure that the organizational change process can come from all the stages in the organization, whether it is from the middle-level workers or the bottom.

Some of these best-performing employers are focusing on the employee of the future: the millennial generation. They provide flexibility, ensure that the workers have a purpose in the organization, and create an environment where the employees can express their creativity (Lewis & Bush, 2018). Employees would also like to work at these organizations because they provide the right work and life balance. Giving choice to the employees is also an aspect of the organization becoming the dream destination of employees (Lewis & Bush, 2018). The above firms give voice to female employees so that they can get a safe place to talk about the injustices in the human resources policies and cases of discrimination.

The company in the tire manufacturing industries that Bridgestone can benchmark its performance is Michelin. Although smaller in size than Bridgestone, Michelin ranks higher in employee benefits and satisfaction because it has come up with a strategy of creating a purpose-fulfilling workforce. This is a company that encourages its employees to get engaged in career volunteering activities and ensure that they actively seek to improve their living standards and the living standards of the members of the communities where they come from (Calfas, 2018). Therefore, Bridgestone’s key strategies can learn from the above companies are purposeful employment, positive work environment, flexibility, and career development, giving employees a voice, and creating a workplace where workers know that the company stands for more than just revenue and profitability.

Collection of Additional Information

The collected additional information focuses on the surveys and the focused group discussion between the researcher and the employee and supervisors. The information collected is also depended on the customer service surveys that were conducted. Key questions obtained from this survey were as follows:

What is the level of employee satisfaction with pay and benefit?

95% of the respondents agree that the accurate level of employee satisfaction is one in which the organization offers employees the freedom to work their best and self-actualize through the performance of the key objectives. The employees feel satisfied if the mission, vision, engagement, and commitment values are championed by the organization’s leadership. And the employees are fully involved in leadership and decision-making.

Employees also get satisfied if the organization pays those sufficient wages that will enable them to live comfortable lives and concentrate fully on their work.

What makes employees satisfied in their job?

What makes the employees satisfied in their jobs is a high level of employee engagement and positive culture at the workplace. Employees are satisfied if the organization treats them as stakeholders and not just a means to an end. Further satisfaction of employees is achieved if the workers see that the organization is fully taking care of their needs through a wide range of benefits such as healthcare, childcare, employee bonus schemes, and huge perks or rewards for work done.

Do employees plan to stay with the company? If not, when to they think is the right time to leave?

Most of the employees (80%) expressed positive sentiments that they will remain with the company for the foreseeable future. Whereas the employees were satisfied with the salaries and other benefits that the company offered them, there was a consensus that the company could do better in improving leadership centered on the need for achievement of employees, creating a better work environment, and increased productivity improvement on diversity. Once the company improved on the above key areas, most employees felt that they could work with organization in the foreseeable future.

Summary

Compared to the other firms in the same industry category, Bridgestone is a higher-paying employee. By checking the data posted on Comaprably.com, one can see that Bridgestone’s hourly rate is $63/hour (Comparably.com, 2021). This is by far more than the average hourly rate in America. Trading Economics.com data reveals that the average American earned 25.99 dollars per hour (TradingEconomics.com, 2019).

The employees are generally satisfied with the salaries offered at the institution, but there does seem to be a comprehensive non-monetary recognition strategy in place in the company. There is a high level of agreement across all the departments in the organization. The extent to which employees understand employee satisfaction issues is based on the values that the organization deems important in dealing with employees. This set of values include encouragement of mutual communications in the organization that is based on the elements of trust, promotion of teamwork, ensuring employees respect the issues of diversity in the organization, building a human resource system that encourages the need to have fair compensation strategies in place that seek to reward well the employees that have excelled in their activities (Bridgestone Corporation, 2020). The organization understands that the employer has put in place training initiatives to encourage the employees to reach their potential and develop their leadership capabilities.

The key statement on the employee cultural engagement and involvement is as follows: Bridgestone aims at ensuring that employees look at their jobs with pride. This is done by promoting cooperation between the leaders and the employees and increasing effective communication throughout all organizations. Bridgestone also aims to promote teamwork among its employees, but teams should respect diversity and operate with a high level of sincerity.

Critical Aspects of Culture that should be included in the Total Rewards System

Positivism and reduction of the toxic workplace: The organization should aim to create more positive work environments that assure employees of safety and fulfill the organization’s goals. The company may have won an award on employee safety and health standards, but there is still a long way to go.

Giving employee’s voice: Employees should be empowered to speak out regarding harassment issues of other issues where the human resource policies do not seem to work. All workers should not be afraid to speak out.

Promotion of community involvement and volunteer activities: At Bridgestone, employees should be more involved in community outreach activities like planting trees and promoting hygiene standards in the community. The employees need to feel that they are making improvement in their lives. The employees need to know that the organization stands for something else, bigger and better, rather than just profit-making initiatives.

The total rewards system needs to focus on improving the following key values: equality, diversity, fairness, and engagement. There should be a measurement of employee feedback through surveys to determine whether these employees will be receptive to the changes being made in the total rewards scheme. Lack of equality, specifically between men and women, might hinder the continued success of the rewards process.

Definition of the Improvement Opportunities in the Organization

At Bridgestone, there should be a revamping of the recruitment policies in the human resource function to ensure that more women are recruited and retained in the organization. They are retained by being offered attractive competitive packages, and they are also retained by ensuring that they are given leadership and managerial positions in the organization.

Other future actions include changing cultural orientation at the organization to make the culture more positive, more engaging, and increase cooperation between employees. On cooperation, in the future, the employees need to be more involved in decision making, feedback is sought from employees on the best ways of carrying out a corporate strategy and Corporate

Social Responsibility.

Bridgestone should copy the approach by Michelin where the workers increasingly see more purpose in their work. This can be done by promoting volunteer activities in the firm and helping the employees become change-makers in their local communities. Transformational leadership action is needed. Leaders not only need to provide managerial functions, but they should be agents of change in the organization.

Conclusion

An Assessment of Bridgestone’s Internal and External Data reveals that the company is a well-paying firm. Bridgestone offers salaries and benefits such as health insurance and disability insurance. The company places importance on teamwork, training, and engagement. However, the company needs to improve on equality, specifically aspects of gender equality. There is a need to ensure that more women in the organization occupy leadership and managerial positions. The firm needs to create a culture where workers will feel more fulfilled in their position, and the work they are doing needs to feel like it is creating a much more beneficial purpose that goes beyond the need to earn salaries. Leaders need to go beyond management and encourage employees to be change-makers and get involved in organizational decision-making.

Reference

Bridgestone Corporation. (2020). Continued enhancement of job satisfaction and pride | Human Rights, Labor Practices | Sustainability | Bridgestone. Bridgestone Corporation.

https://www.bridgestone.com/responsibilities/human_rights/labor_practices/

Bridgestone Group. (2020). Bridgestone Data 2020.

https://www.bridgestone.com/corporate/library/data_book/pdf/BSDATA2020.pdf

Calfas, J. (2018). A Tire Company Was Just Named America’s Best Employer—Beating Google and Facebook. Money. https://money.com/a-tire-company-was-just-named-americas-best-employer-beating-google-and-facebook/

Comparably.com. (2021). Bridgestone Americas Salaries. Comparably.

https://www.comparably.com/companies/bridgestone/salaries

Demouy, J. (2018). Bridgestone Recognized for Efforts to Advance Worker Health and Safety.

Bridgestone Americas, Inc. https://www.bridgestoneamericas.com/en/mewsroom/press-releases/2018/bridgestone-recognized-for-efforts-to-advance-worker-health-and-

Erdil, A., & Eriyik, H. (2019). The Importance of Benchmarking for the Management of the Firm: Evaluating the Relation between Total Quality Management and Benchmarking.

Procedia Computer Science, 158, 705-714. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.procs.2019.09.106

Laura, W. (2021, July 6). Worldwide Tire Industry to 2016 – Key Players Include Michelin,

Bridgestone and Continental Among Others – ResearchAndMarkets.com.

https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210706005425/en/Worldwide-Tire-Industry-to-2026---Key-Players-Include-Michelin-Bridgestone-and-Continental-Among-Others---ResearchAndMarkets.com

Lewis, S., & Bush, M. (2018). What It Takes to Be One of the 100 Best Companies to Work For.

Fortune. https://fortune.com/2018/02/15/best-companies-salesforce/

Payscale Inc. (2021). Bridgestone Americas Benefits & Perks | PayScale. www.payscale.com.

https://www.payscale.com/research/US/Employer=Bridgestone_Americas/Benefits

Pozo, H., Roque da Silva, O., & Tachizawa, T. (2018). The influence of performance objectives on the implementation of lean manufacturing practices: An analysis based on strategic

Groups. Cogent Business & Management, 4(1).

https://doi.org/10.1080/23311975.2017.1405718

TradingEconomics.com. (2019, February 8). United States Average Hourly Wages.

Tradingeconomics.com; TRADING ECONOMICS.

http://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/wages

United Sates Bureau of Labor Statistics. (n.d.). Stretching Out a Victory in Long Rubber

Dispute. https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/cwc/stretching-out-a-victory-in-long-rubber-

dispute.pdf

WorlddatWork. (2007). The WorldatWork handbook of compensation, benefits & total rewards:

A comprehensive guide for HR professionals. John Wiley & Sons.