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Case analysis

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Introduction
Employees are the greatest assets of any organization they help in the development and growth of the organization (Mathis & Jackson, 2009). This is a case analysis report prepared on the container store. The main objective of this analysis is to critically evaluate the human resources strategies undertaken by the management of container store and its impact on their growth and customer service. This report will include a detailed analysis on the recruitment, selection and training policies of the company. It will also include the actions taken by the management and their impact on the employees, customer and overall growth of the organization. it will also include an analysis to evaluate that whether investing in employees can help the company in retaining both employees and customers.

About the case

This case study includes an overview on the storage and organization retail sector industry of USA; it includes a brief discussion on the growth and development of this sector since 1978. It includes information about the industry profits, development and employee management procedures. Further, this report includes detailed analysis about the employee management and business strategy of the container store. It includes information about its policy, profits and strategies. This case study helped in understanding the effectiveness of employee training and development. It also helps in understanding various strategies that can help in the development of overall industry.

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Recruitment procedure at container store

The container store follows a rigorous and strict recruitment policy, the company believes in waiting for a long time period for the right candidate instead of hiring a wrong one. According to the given case, the container store follows an employee referral program for recruiting employees. It helps in making employees feel responsible in the growth of the company; it also helps in motivating them and giving them the authority to search for the right candidate to work with them. The employees for the vacant positions are recruited through employees referrals (Cieri & Kramar, 2003). As employees understand the organization culture and requirements well, so they can suggest the right candidate that can go fit with the organizational value system. This is one method that also involves low cost, it is a cost effective measure of hiring employees. Otherwise, employees recruitment involves high cost of advertisement, agency hiring etc, it has been observed that many times involving a number of methods increases the total cost of recruitment to a large extent. Instead if the bonus is provided to the employees for the organization for referring a good candidate, as it is done in container store then it will help in good recruitment as well as employee motivation (Armstrong, 2006). This strategy also act as morale booster to the employees, existing employees might like this offer and also participate actively in recruitment of employees. It will also help in maintain a strong pool of talent in the organization. This procedure also helps in saving lots of time as it leads to less number of unnecessary applicants, which leads to fast recruitment. This method also helps in higher retention rates of the employees and increases the employee loyalty towards organization. Further management also recruit from the customers, this shows the ongoing observation technique of recruitment that is being implemented in the organization. This recruitment policy

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of container store also helps in achieving higher return on investment to the company. The company follows a resource based recruitment policy, which helps in developing the organization from within and available resources. The above analysis shows that the recruitment method adopted by container store is much more reliable and helps the company in doing active and successful recruitment of talented employees.

Selection procedure at container store

The company follows a rigorous selection procedure to select the correct employee for the position, according to the company policy the management can wait for two months for selecting the right employee for the position. The selection procedure of the company involves a number of steps which has been discussed below; Telephonic screening This is a pre screen interviews, it helps in selecting few of the employees out of all the applicants. This stage helps in saving time and cost of the organization to a large extent. It helps in collecting additional information about the applicants and their interest. Group interview The next stage of the interview process is the group interview that helps in understanding the team spirit and interpersonal skills of the employee. This type of interview also helps in understanding the narrowing down the conversation and time saving method.

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The above two methods are the elimination rounds and helps in selecting few out of all. The next step, that is the personal interview round helps in understanding the candidate and selecting them for long run. Three different interviews The interviews undertaken helps in understanding the employee ability to understand the work, there inter personal skill and stress handling capability. The above analysis shows that container store gives enough time and labor to recruit the right candidate for the right position. Management encourages right selection of employees even if it cost high to the management.

Training procedure at container store

Management of container store spends around 18 percent of the sales revenue on employee development; this shows the seriousness of the management towards the development of the employees. Company believes in growing with their employees. Company encourages its value system and culture and aims at recruiting candidates who understand the company demands clearly. Different training programs are organized by the management to help the employees to develop their skills and ability (Sumetzberger, 2005). Further, different training programs are organized for new employees for better understanding and analysis. The training and development investment and labor given by container store is much higher than the general industry standard, which helped in increasing employee satisfaction and loyalty towards the organization. It has been observed that majority of the organizations use to provide

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only 7 hours of training to their employees, whereas, container store provides annual training for 235 hours. Each department has a full time trainer which shows that container store management was highly dedicated towards employee development. Besides providing adequate training to old employees, management ensured active development of new employees in the organization. This is done by the foundation week program, which was specially designed to help the newly recruited employees to understand the organizational culture and value system. It also helps the employees in adjusting with the organization easily and fast. Under this training program employees are informed about the organization, the products, services, code of conduct and also tricks of selling. It helps in learning new things and get associated with their job in the best way. These types of training program also helps in increasing employees knowledge and gain their long term loyalty towards organization (Harzing & Ruysseveldt, 2005). The management of container store actively investment in the development of their organizational resource, their employees. This will help in continuous development of their present resources; this also helped the company in gaining competitive advantage in the market by delivering excellent customer service. This concept of training goes well with the human capital theory which states that training helps in increasing the employee productivity by increasing their knowledge and skills. Management of container store has invested in the right place as employee satisfaction will lead to customer satisfaction.

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Motivational theories implemented at container store

The overall organizational culture of container store was motivational; it was structured in such a way that it encourages higher employee satisfaction and loyalty. There was high level of transparency in the system which helped the management in gaining employees trust in the management, it also helped in avoiding any type of employee conflict in the company. Further, the organizational structure of the company is also very motivating and supportive. As the organizational structure is flat and employees are praised and prompted on the basis of work done. This gives all the employees an encouragement to work better. Flat organizational structure helps in easy delegation of duties, fast decision making and higher authorities to employees. It helps in gaining higher employee satisfaction (Lauby, 2005). Equal treatment of all the employees is also another important factor that helped in motivating the employees of the organization. All the part time and full time employees were treated equally in the organization. There was no gender discrimination in the organization, there were around 60 percent of women employees working in the organization and they were treated equally in the organization. Further the team work and performance appraisal system in the organization also helps in motivating employees of the organization. Team working and empowerment are great motivational tools; it gives higher autonomy to employees to work for the organization. It also helps better organization of task. Management gives credit and appreciation to all employees for their good work; this helps in motivating employees and also increases their confidence. Management of container store provides both financial and non financial motivation tools to the employees; it helps in fulfilling different employees demand and gains their loyalty (Manzoor,

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2011). It also helps in increasing employee satisfaction from the work done by them (Noharia, Groysberg, & Eling Lee, 2008). There are number of motivational techniques used by the company such as appreciation, discounts, financial support, and free classes. The company ensured the overall development and support to the employees. The initiatives taken by container stores ensure continuous social learning among employees; this technique also helps in increasing team spirit among employees. It also enhances group efforts and ensures effective productivity in the organization. This technique helps in development of employee knowledge through discussion and sharing. It also helps in developing their skills and abilities to perform better. This approach of motivation helps in gaining employee commitment towards the work as they feel responsible and part of the organizational success (Simard, Doucet, & Bernard, 2005).

Conclusion
The above analysis case helped in understanding how container store succeeded in the competitive market with the help of effective human resource strategies. Organization managed to increased its revenue by investing more on employees than on advertisement and other factors. Satisfied employees can help the company in earning a satisfied customer as well. The investment made by the management on its human resource helped in gaining competitive advantage over its competitor, also this investment brought higher ROI to the company. It is very costly to hire new employees frequently, with the help of effective human resource strategy management gain higher commitment and loyalty from the employees. It also helped in reducing the employee turnover rates and increasing organizational profitability.

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The management and strategies of container store helped in understanding the true value of employee management and satisfaction. The company was following a totally different track from the industry and proved itself right by being so successful at their job. This case study also helped in understanding the importance of developing the internal resources of the company to beat the external market conditions.

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Bibliography
Armstrong, M. (2006). A handbook of Human Resource Management practice. USA: Cambridge University Press. Cieri, D., & Kramar, R. (2003). Human Resource Management in Australia: Strategy, People, Performance. Australia: McGraw-Hill Australia. Harzing, A.-W., & Ruysseveldt, J. v. (2005). International human resource management. California: Sage publication. Lauby, S. J. (2005). Motivating Employees. Lauderdel: American Society for Training and Development. Manzoor, Q.-A. (2011). Impact of Employees Motivation on Organizational. Business Management and Strategy Effectiveness , 22-32. Mathis, R. L., & Jackson, J. H. (2009). Human Resource Management. USA: South western cenage learning. Noharia, N., Groysberg, B., & Eling Lee, L. (2008). Employee motivation- a powerful new model. Harvard business review , 5-8. Simard, G., Doucet, O., & Bernard, S. (2005). HRM Practices and Employee Commitment: The Role of Justice. Relations Industrielles/Industrial Relations, , 25-39. Sumetzberger, W. (2005). Managing human resources in a multinational context. Journal of European Industrial Training , 29 (8), 663-674.