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Developing a Human Resource strategy

A Tarmac case study

Page 1: Introduction

Tarmac was established in 1903


and is the UK's leading supplier of building materials and aggregates
to the building industry.

Tarmac is most often associated with constructing roads or major


building projects such as the new Heathrow terminal and Wembley
Stadium. However, materials derived from quarrying are used within
many different sectors, including manufacturing light bulbs, chewing
gum and toothpaste.
Tarmac's operational structure is divided into two key areas: Tarmac
UK and Tarmac International. Tarmac UK is sub-divided into two
separate businesses:

Tarmac Ltd extracts key building aggregates and materials.

Tarmac Building Products Ltd focuses on turning raw materials into


products useable by the building sector.

Tarmac International develops building products for supply around the


world, especially in the United Arab Emirates.

Nearly 11,000 employees work for Tarmac in a variety of work


settings that include:

135 quarries

13 wharves

73 asphalt plants

172 concrete plants

36 recycling sites.

In the past, most people's view of a Tarmac employee would have


been a man in a hard hat. That is not the case anymore. Tarmac
depends on having people with high levels of skill in externally-facing
roles such as sales, customer service and marketing, as well as internal
roles in IT, finance or procurement (often called purchasing). The
recruitment of specialist employees in these roles is now central to
Tarmac's growth.

It is said that the most important resource within an organisation is its


people. This is because an organisation depends on the skills and
capabilities of its employees to meet its mission. Employees are not a
static resource. They need to be engaged, interested, developed and

motivated. It is through such processes that organisations meet their


business objectives and increase their employees' capabilities to create
competitive advantage. This helps the organisation to outperform
many of its rivals.

This case study focuses on Human Resource Management within


Tarmac. It looks at how workforce planning and other HR strategies
enable Tarmac to meet its mission: 'To deliver the highest value from
our resources for our customers, communities, employees and
investors.'
Tarmac | Developing a Human Resource strategy

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2: Human Resource Management

A key element of
Human Resource Management is to identify what level of human resources the business
needs. This includes the skills and knowledge that will be required by the organisation both
now and in the future. This is an integrated process as it involves looking at every area within
an organisation. Tarmac constantly reviews all of its human resource needs.

For Tarmac, Human Resource Management is a strategic process. This is because it involves
the whole business in planning for the future. Having the right skills and knowledge enables
the business to meet its objectives and compete more effectively than its rivals.

Tarmac's vision is to 'achieve the


exceptional'. To deliver value to all its stakeholders, Tarmac created an integrated plan, which
requires all employees to contribute in different ways. Tarmac helps all employees remember
and focus on its five big goals by using the acronym 'DREAM'.
As Tarmacs business is now much broader, it must keep developing its people. A key
element of its plan is to 'engage employees' to use their energy and skills to improve the
business. The HR management process provides the means to do this. For example, the HR
department offers formal internal and external courses to give people training in key skills
related to their current roles.
Engaging people takes many forms. Tarmac ensures that employees are motivated through:
clear and understandable objectives and targets
being helped to improve and acquire the skills, qualifications and training to do their
jobs effectively
being recognised for their performance and rewarded accordingly.

A vital element of this drive to achieve


the exceptional is ensuring that there are excellent communication systems in place. Without
senior managers clearly sharing corporate objectives, employees would not know what they
need to achieve or what skills they may have to acquire to meet these targets.

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3: Workforce planning
Workforce planning involves a continual review of human assets and the business
organisational structure. The process identifies the skills and knowledge required at the

present time. It also estimates what Tarmac needs to have in place to respond to future
challenges in its market place.
At Tarmac, like most other businesses, human resource needs are constantly changing:
Sometimes individuals leave the organisation to take up other posts.
Some individuals retire (this is a growing issue with the UK's ageing population).
Employees are promoted within the business.
New technology removes some roles but also creates new types of jobs.
The changing economic climate may result in more or less demand for its products.
The changing and evolving nature of Tarmac's business means it needs to anticipate where
new skills, such as those involved with different technologies, are required. This helps it to
identify what training existing employees need to support future growth for the business.
Product portfolio

The core business of Tarmac is producing aggregate such as


rock, gravel and sand. The aggregate is extracted from quarries across the UK and distributed
to both wholesale and private customers.
In addition to the production of aggregate, Tarmac uses its own materials to provide the
building trade with many other products. For example, sand, gravel, water and cement mixed
together will make concrete that is helping to build the infrastructure for London 2012
Olympics. A mixture of various sizes of aggregate added to sand and bitumen will be used by
the Nottinghamshire Highways Partnership to repair all roads across the county until 2016.
Harden Quarry in Northumberland produces a decorative stone called Harden Red. This is
used for cycle tracks and for the grounds of Buckingham Palace, due to its unique properties
and red colouring.
Such a distinctive product portfolio means Tarmac needs to have a more diverse workforce
than ever to support its operations. Due to increases in new technology and improved ways of
working, Tarmac requires specialist skills across the business, both on sites and in Head
Offices.
Roles needed
Tarmac's people make the business the market leader that it is. Employing people with
science, business, engineering, finance, language, and information technology backgrounds
helps to ensure Tarmac stays at the forefront of its industry. For example, there are key roles
within the Head Office. Other individuals are required for a range of commercial roles, for
example, an Account Manager looking after a group of customers. This requires strong
communication and organisational skills to ensure all account customers get the materials
they need on time.

Chris moved into this role when joining Tarmac's Graduate


scheme: 'It's my responsibility to analyse the market for the types of materials we supply and
monitor prices. I also provide quotations for customers, support on-site teams at jobs we are
supplying and work with colleagues to ensure the customer gets what they need.'
Other commercial roles support Tarmac's business development:
Web Marketing Officer - This job focuses on developing Tarmacs presence on the
internet. The site uses digital marketing activities to develop relationships with existing and
potential customer groups. This role is vital in a competitive market. Other aspects include
creating, analysing and providing detailed web reports for senior management. These show
how successful previous campaigns have been and help inform development decisions.
Senior Finance Officer - This role is vital in helping Tarmac to achieve financial
targets. Supporting a Director, this involves managing financial teams that generate
information such as regular financial reports. As well as co-ordinating activities relating to
this information, the role involves setting budgets and targets for the business.
Procurement Manager - Managing the supply of more than 20,000 items per year
costing 40-50 million, this role involves monitoring the business' needs and purchasing a
range of resources at the best possible rate.
Inbound Services Co-ordinator - Manages a team that supports customer service
within the business. It involves helpline calls, website enquiries and providing customer
support for a range of services. In the competitive building supplies sector, contracts can be
won or lost on the quality of customer service provided. It is important that this role is
performed effectively.
These posts indicate how much Tarmac's human resource needs and make-up have changed,
requiring more office-based staff to drive the business forwards.

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Developing a Human Resource strategy
A Tarmac case study
Page 4: Getting the right people

The starting point of the workforce


planning process is to identify employment needs for the future. At the heart of this are the
processes of attraction, recruitment and selection.
Tarmac needs to manage these processes effectively in order to ensure it gets high quality
candidates for posts. Recruitment is a costly process and so Tarmac uses a structured approach
to ensure that the right candidates are selected.
Attraction
Attracting people involves constructing job descriptions and person specifications. These
identify what the job involves and what essential and desirable qualities the candidate must
have. These are used to create advertisements, which are placed in relevant press and media,
for instance trade journals like Construction Weekly or Personnel Today. Recruiting the right
people is fundamental to Tarmacs development. It recruits individuals capable of reaching
higher potential. This involves looking for individuals with diverse skills from a range of
backgrounds.
Selection

Selection is the process undertaken by human resource managers to choose the best individual
that has applied for a job vacancy. For graduate applicants, Tarmac uses a range of different
selection tools including competence questions, a group exercise, delivering a presentation,
psychometric testing and an interview. This thorough process ensures that Tarmac appoints
the most suitable individuals.

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page 5: Building skills and capabilities

At Tarmac, each individual has a personal


development plan. This enables employees to identify the skills or knowledge they want to
develop to improve their capability and efficiency. As a key part of the process of workforce
planning, this helps Tarmac and individual employees to set targets for the future.
Personal development

The process of personal development helps employees to achieve their full potential. This
never stops and demonstrates the underlying practice of 'learning for life'. Individual
employees are assessed on how they perform in their plan. This therefore takes both them and
the business forward.
The roles that they might move towards include:
Commercial Analyst - this involves supporting Finance and Commercial Managers by
analysing the way in which the business performs, managing major projects and setting
targets for the different parts of the organisation. In particular, this helps assess how close
projects are to 'getting things right first time', minimising waste and improving profitability.
Business Administration Team Leader - this role ensures that systems are in place to
support business processes. This role also includes mentoring and identifying opportunities to
improve systems.
Human Resources Advisor - this involves providing a range of human resource
services across the organisation. These include recruitment and selection, being involved in
developing good relationships across the business, health and safety issues and grievance
procedures.
Developing employees' skills motivates staff and provides great opportunities for them to
progress, whilst helping Tarmac to improve its efficiency and profitability.

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6: Conclusion

Human Resource Management focuses on matching the needs of the business with the needs
and development of employees. Tarmac depends on its people because their skills contribute
to achieving its business objectives.
Within Tarmac, every employee has a valuable role to play. The emphasis is on helping
individuals to work together. Workforce planning is part of this strategic process, which looks
at the long-term needs across the organisation.
Personal development plans enable every individual to grow both professionally and
personally within the business. They also help Tarmac to create a distinct and important
competitive advantage through selecting and developing highly motivated and skilled staff
who are able to perform at high levels.

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Page 1: Introduction

In 1901 county surveyor Thomas Hooley noticed a fallen


barrel of tar that had split open in the road. The mess had been covered by waste slag from a
nearby ironworks. At once Hooley observed that an excellent patch of road surface had been
formed. A year later he had taken out a patent for mixing slag with tar and in 1903 formed the
company that became Tarmac.
Today Tarmac is still the UK market leader in road surfacing. It is also the country's largest
quarrying company and key producer of aggregates (gravel), ready-mixed cement and mortar.
Tarmac UK is sub-divided into two separate businesses:
Tarmac Ltd extracts key building aggregates and materials.
Tarmac Building Products Ltd focuses on turning raw materials into products useable
by the building sector.
This case study focuses solely on Tarmac Ltd but will refer to it as Tarmac. Tarmac the
company and Tarmac the brand are to be found on major construction projects all over the
country. The new Wembley stadium, the M1 widening and London 2012 are high profile
examples. It also has operations in the Middle East producing crushed rock, sand and gravel,
asphalt and contracting activities.

With sales approaching 2 billion in 2010 Tarmac has just over 5,000 UK employees. As a
firm in the heavy building materials industry, the company traditionally had a strong male bias
in its workforce, but this is changing. Many posts are now open to men and women across a
huge range of job roles.
For Tarmac to succeed in a competitive marketplace, people are a critical resource. This is
because the diverse talents of staff make Tarmac distinctive in the marketplace. Technical
knowledge, corporate experience and the understanding of customer needs all make a critical
difference. Drawing staff from the widest possible pool of talent is key to building and
sustaining competitive advantage. This case study demonstrates how Tarmac is benefiting
from developing a diverse workforce.
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Page 2: What is diversity and inclusion?

The idea of equal opportunities is concerned with eliminating discrimination. The


purpose is to ensure workers have equality of access to recruitment, training and
promotion opportunities in the workplace. This increases the pool of potential
employees for firms. Recruitment decisions are therefore based on getting 'the right
person for the job'.
Tarmac has a rigorous policy for equal opportunities. No current or potential
employee should experience any discrimination arising from:
background
gender
ethnic origin
age
religion
sexual orientation
political belief
disability.

Tarmac has taken this a stage further. It is now building a


culture and vision that is known by the term 'Diversity and Inclusion. In this context,
diversity means all the complex ways in which people are different. This includes
visible differences such as gender or ethnic origin. The term also captures less
obvious differences between people: religious or political beliefs, sexual orientation or
education and social background. When a person comes to work, they bring with
them their own thinking and learning style, personality type, experience, ambitions
even their own sense of humour. A diverse workforce better reflects Tarmacs target
market. It can be more adaptable to changes in the market because of the range of
skills and experiences to draw from. A greater cultural understanding can also lead to
the provision of a better level of service.
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Inclusion strategy
To embrace all these differences, Tarmac is pursuing a strategy of inclusion. This
means creating a working culture that values the differences between people. It does
not try to stifle or devalue the individuality of staff. Such a culture is tolerant but also
practical in recognising these differences and enabling every member of a team to
exploit their personal strengths.
The heavy building materials industry has developed a stereotype of older, male
employees. This is not inclusive. To achieve change, effective training and the active
example of leadership right up to CEO level are essential. Senior managers aim to
provide Diversity and Inclusion support, guidance and resources for employees.
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Page 3: Diversity as a HR strategy

Like any other business, Tarmac has to add value. While


Tarmac is highly efficient in controlling its costs, the company's real achievement lies

in offering customers something special. This comes through the strength of


relationships, the quality of service, the ingenuity of solutions and the reliability of its
staff and systems.
Recruiting, deploying and retaining the right people who can deliver this 'something
special' is the task of the Human Resources (HR) department. Its work involves
supplying and managing the human inputs that will fulfil Tarmac's overall mission:
To deliver the highest value from our resources for our customers, communities,
employees and investors.

Diversity and inclusion is now an essential part of this


strategy.
The firm actively searches for staff in the widest possible labour pool. For example, it
advertises job vacancies on the Equality Britain website. Once appointed, keeping
staff motivated is the key to quality and productivity. Retaining employees is also
important. Low staff turnover can reduce recruitment and training costs, but perhaps
more importantly, results in an experienced and skilled workforce. By valuing the
distinctive qualities that each worker brings to a job, Tarmac can generate a 'feel
good factor' among employees. This gives them the confidence to add that extra
value for each customer.
Tarmacs stance on diversity also promotes family-friendly working patterns for both
male and female employees as well as anti-bullying or harassment policies. This
approach is supported by a commitment to training and development.
All employees receive core training to do their job effectively and safely. A full annual
appraisal identifies personal goals and training needs. Tarmac offers a wide range of
internal courses for all levels of staff. There are many opportunities to gain external
qualifications including NVQs, BTECs and degrees.

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Diversity and Inclusion is a key dimension to HR management. It is also embedded in
Tarmac's overall business strategy. This is driven by a compelling goal: Achieve the
Exceptional. This is achieved through diverse talent and leadership within Tarmac.

Engage employees
Tarmac recruits in a highly diverse labour market to achieve corresponding diversity
in its workforce. By motivating this diverse talent through appropriate training and
development, then the exceptional becomes possible.

Develop markets
Tarmac needs the confidence and trust of its customers. A diverse workforce can
build the necessary relationships with increasingly diverse customers in both existing
and new markets. This can be a source of advantage that is difficult for competitors
to copy.

Reduce Costs
Valuing all employees for who they are and what they offer increases motivation and
improves retention. These are two powerful ways to reduce costs and raise quality.
Differences in experience, attitude and values open new perspectives and breed a
creative culture. This is vital since Tarmac is often in the business of finding solutions
to client problems.

Manage assets
Diversity builds new networks of communications. Tarmac's quarries, processing
plants and highway contracts typically have a high profile within local communities. A
diverse workforce is best able to represent the company in gaining contracts and
local approval for investment decisions.

Cement kiln at Tunstead


Tarmac has a large cement kiln at Tunstead near Buxton in Derbyshire. In 2009 the
company planned a major expansion that would bring new jobs both in the
construction phase and in subsequent operation. Before applying for the necessary
planning permission, Tarmac ran an extensive consultation with the local community.
A village exhibition explained the plans to local people and gave them the chance to
discuss the proposal.

Act Responsibly
Tarmac is committed to accepting social responsibility in all its business activities.
This means a high level of concern for all of its stakeholders, including the local
environment. The diversity and inclusion strategy helps support the development of a
workforce that is able to engage with stakeholders more effectively. This often leads
to winning an informal 'licence to operate' through local acceptance or even approval
of the company.

Quarry at Bayston Hill


Tarmac operates an important gritstone quarry near Shrewsbury in the West
Midlands. In 2008 the company wanted to more than double its size. Local people,
many of whom worked at the quarry, were consulted at every stage of the planning
process. Tarmac used presentations and a video to keep stakeholders informed.
Approval for the project was gained with no objections.
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age 5: Diversity in practice


A diverse workforce will have employees from a variety of backgrounds.

Pedro is a Procurement Contract Data Manager at


Tarmac.
I'm originally from Columbia with a family background in the construction industry.
Good luck took me to Tarmac where my specialism is procurement obtaining the
right materials and services at the right time and at the right price. I joined Tarmac in
2008 and gained a place on the Tarmac Managers' Foundation Development
Programme. I now lead a team of four staff. We work hard to deliver on our
commitments to the business and to achieve the exceptional.
The nature of Tarmacs business means that historically the majority of its employees
were male. Even now 86% of the workforce are men, although this is changing as
women are being employed in a range of roles at different levels.

Mandy is a Human Resource Project Manager.


I graduated from university in 2007 and being keen on people management, took a
temporary job with Tarmac as a HR administrator. Thanks to internal management
training, I gained my current job as an HR Project Manager in 2010. I'm now
responsible for HR management information flows and the development of the HR
intranet pages
Tarmac is keen to attract young employees into the workforce as well as more
experienced workers.

Luke is a Quantity Surveyor with the firm.

I wanted to be a Quantity Surveyor and joined Tarmac in


2005 as a management trainee. During my first year I was given a wide range of
tasks which included site supervision, estimating and basic quantity surveying. Soon
I was involved in high profile projects such as the Liverpool Airport upgrade.
Tarmac is monitoring the progress of its Diversity and Inclusion policy. Some of this
evaluation is qualitative and flows through the management structure. The HR
department provides regular insight regarding both progress and problems. It also
records the 'diversity range' of both external job applicants and internal applicants for
training and promotion. In addition, the company carries out an annual diversity
survey. This asks all employees (on a voluntary basis) questions about marital status,
ethnicity and any disability.
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Page 6: Conclusion
Tarmac is deeply committed to a vision of diversity and inclusion among its staff.
However, there are challenges to be addressed. Diversity is dynamic. Tarmac's
workforce changes regularly. A diverse staff at one location may become much less
diverse through promotions, resignations and retirement. In addition, economic
conditions also change. Recruitment unavoidably slowed quite sharply following the
recession and the public spending cuts of 2010/2011.
There are no simple answers to these problems. Tarmac, however, is a pioneer in
making diversity and inclusion central to its HR policy and wider business strategy.
The quarrying and heavy building materials industries have been historically
dominated by able-bodied men. This makes it a challenging area to develop a
diversity policy, yet that only makes the need greater. A very significant part of
Tarmac's overall competitive advantage depends on the collective interaction, talent
and insight of its workforce. Diversity and Inclusion are not just a set of boxes to be
ticked. They are a part of culture that enables Tarmac to stand out from competitors.
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