Group Member

MD. Mostafizur Rohman

ID: 22-92752-3

Sefat E Rabbi Abesh

ID: 22-92671-3

Annie

ID: 22-92673-3

Shahriar Emon

22-92675-3

Harrison Brothers Case Analysis

1. How does McCain view her role as human resource manager?

Brenda McCain was the Human Resource Manager at the West park store of Harrison Brothers
Corporation. She has several years of experience in retail stores and views herself as the primary contact
for all human resource related topics and issues. She has brought many changes and new initiatives into
the system where earlier many human resource duties were performed by the operation’s manager. She
has developed policies and procedures as a guideline for the hiring process and spends a lot of time
managing the human resource staff. Brenda’s primary responsibilities are interviewing and hiring
applicants, assisting the trainer with the new employee training classes, and administering the
performance evaluation and career planning processes. She has modified the way employee complaints
are dealt with. Now she is also the sole person responsible for all disciplinary actions, which include
gathering the initial complaint from the supervisor, conducting the investigation and administering the
appropriate discipline. In this was there is consistency in the application of disciplinary rules. Also, she
initiated a system of employee development into the process, where supervisors are required to discuss
career opportunities with the employees.

2. What is Harrison Brothers’ business strategy?

The Harrison Brothers is a multi-line traditional department store. Their existing business plan has been
successful and allowed Harrison Brothers to become one of the largest privately owned retail chains in
the U.S with more than 20 stores. Their major products have been men’s, women’s and children’s
clothing. However, the store has considered expanding new items, adding household furnishings recently.
James Harrison, the current CEO has realized that the company must reposition itself as the market is
constantly changing and customers are now looking for both value and specialization. The same model
that worked in the past may not work now. He plans to incorporate exciting brand names, excellent sales
help, and frequent sales. Also sales staff who knows the merchandise and understands customer
preferences is the need of the hour. Buying expertise also needs to be developed because fashions and
consumer tastes never stay the same. Mr. Harrison has identified that giant discounters provide attractive
lines to customers and maintaining qualified sales personnel as key objectives in his transition plan. In
brief the five strategic goals are: a. Convert non selling space into revenue generating selling space. b.
Build up underdeveloped merchandise categories. c. Invest aggressively in private brands like Polo and
Tommy Hilfiger. d. Reduce costs through use of advanced computer systems to project sales and manage
inventory. e. Improve productivity of sales associates, buyers, and department heads.

3. What is the structure and staffing of the human resources department?

Currently Harrison Brothers is being led by the CEO, James Harrison. He took over the business after
earning MBA at a prestigious business school. Mr. Harrison is thinking about the future for Harrison
Brothers and would like to shift away from the traditional business strategy which was followed by
Harrison brothers as the market is constantly changing and customers are now looking for both value and
specialization. He plans to implement new ideas that will generate more revenue for the store. With that
in mind, the store should have a great human resource department as employee quality and performance
would be one of the keys to the future. He has hired a consultant to access the company’s strength and
weakness. Brenda McCain was the Human Resource Manager at the West park store of Harrison Brothers
Corporation. When Brenda first joined the team there was many responsibilities that were being
performed by the operations manager and one of the department heads. Since then she has reorganized
responsibilities and spends much of her time managing the department, supervising employees and
selecting new employees for sales and support jobs. Many of the employees at Harrison Brothers are part
time, older or are in between jobs i.e. if a better job came along, they would snap it immediately. This has
led to high turnover for the store. Employees are hired based on motivation, personality and drive. There
also exists a Trainer, Joanne Flynn who assures all employees are exposed to selling techniques and
different ways of interacting with customers. The training sessions for new executives are held once in
two weeks generally and once a week during peak season. To take care of compensation there also exists
a payroll clerk. Manager, Jennifer Daft stated that Brenda and the rest of her staff seem to be struggling
with keeping up with day-to-day operations. Operations manager, Pat Hartlake believes the human
resource department is understaffed and overworked most of the time and hence is slow in filling the
vacant sales position.

4. Analyze the data in Exhibit 1.4. What are its implications?

The data in exhibit 1.4 compares the results of questionnaires completed by HR managers and non-HR
manager where respondents were given a list of human resource responsibilities and were asked to rate
their importance to store performance. The findings reveal that that staffing is considered to be of equal
importance to HR and store managers. This received the maximum rating and hence everyone more or
less agrees that the main role of HR is to ensure proper and adequate staffing. Also the store managers
feel that training the employees is a more crucial, whereas the HR managers feel that performance
management is more vital to their job. Both the HR managers and the store managers agree that
compensation and safety are not of utmost priority. This may be because of Harrison Brothers being a
departmental store with fewer chances of any incident and a well-defined compensation policy. However,
stark differences exist in perception of business knowledge and as change managers. The store managers
feel that HR should drive the change as in line with the company’s current business strategy.

5. Given the organizations size and strategic goals, evaluate the development of the human resource
function at Harrison Brothers. What problems do you see? How could its major human resource functions
be improved?

Given the size of organization, the HR department seems to be understaffed and overworked most of the
time. With the CEO’s new business strategy there is an enhanced focus on Human resources. Earlier the
human resource was not playing a key role in the organization. The operations manager also experienced
problems with the human resource unit when they were not able to recommend decisive action on
immediate human resource problems. These problems were attributed to the operations manager having
to perform a dual task of handling operations and human resource functions and the heightened employee
disillusionment expressed in the high turnover rate. The company recognized the need to boost its human
resource unit to support its strategic goals. Hence once Brenda took over, major functions such as
staffing, training and disciplinary actions were being looked after by Human resource department.
However, the changes made in human resources management are not sufficient to fully support the
company’s strategic goals. Brenda herself felt that the employee career development assessment remain
as problem areas. The human resource management unit should enhance the assumption of its role as a
key player in the organization to help achieve the strategic goals of the company. It starts with
identification of human resource issues of the company, the determination of the best possible solution to
these issues through coordination with the other work units. In achieving the goal of improving the sales
performance of personnel, human resource activities have to improve staffing, training and motivation
policies to attract qualified personnel to remain and contribute their knowledge. It also has to develop
good relations with the managers of the other working units through communication. It also has to
organize and streamline all its activities to include all important functions, particularly employee career
development assessment and policy innovations. Also the human resource department needs to be
adequately staffed so that Brenda and team could off load some of its duties and focus on other new
policies.