Introduction
Multinational companies are enlarging their market base as time progresses. However, as these companies expand, so does the number of their employees. The multinational companies have to have a human resource management team that takes care of all its employees. Employees are the backbone of a firm, and they should always be comfortable in the workplace. A successful business requires a human resource management team that effectively manages the employees. An example of a company with an effective HR team is Nike Inc. This paper will look at Nike’s organizational background, human resource, and organizational behavior analysis, Key HR Issues, Obstacles, Challenges, recommendations, and conclusion.
Organization Background
Nike Inc. (Nike) is a company that was founded fifty-four years ago in 1964 by Bill Bowerman and Phil Knight to facilitate the importation of Japanese shoes. The company has significantly grown over the years to become the largest footwear marketer in the world (Briscoe, Tarique, & Schuler, 2012). Additionally, Nike holds thirty-seven percent of the global market share. Nike’s products are sold in approximately 21,500 retail stores in the United States. The company also sells its products to more than 150 countries. The company’s headquarters are located in Washington County, Oregon in the United States (Briscoe, Tarique, & Schuler, 2012). Nike employs overseas independent contractors to make most of its products, but it is in charge of marketing development and design processes. Nike had approximately 73,000 employees by 2017 and revenues rose by six percent to $34.4 billion, which signifies a currency-neutral basis growth of eight percent.
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Human Resource and Organizational Behavior Analysis
Recruiting and selecting employees
Nike uses a rigorous interview procedure for all its potential personnel like most of the other major companies. The company validates, prods, and tests each of its potential employees. Nike’s human resource has a policy, which believes in the hiring of most eligible persons to become part of their employee team (Locke, Amengual, & Mangla, 2009). Nike hires employees on permanent contracts or temporary contracts depending on the season and job availability. Once hired, the company highly encourages its new staff to start interviewing throughout the firm’s many departments. Nike Inc. prefers its new employees to interview around its departments to ensure that these employees land where they are comfortable (Locke, Amengual, & Mangla, 2009). The exercise of finding the most appropriate department for a newly hired employee in Nike takes approximately one month. Nike uses this hiring technique because it believes employees are capable of choosing the perfect job by themselves. Additionally, Nike accepts to incur the short-term challenge of its employees moving about the departments because they know the result will be a highly motivated staff.
Training and developing employees
The Human Resource management at Nike Inc. uses the results-oriented approach and the relational model to train its employees on areas like revolutionary coding applications and designing sneakers (Briscoe, Tarique, & Schuler, 2012). A relational model is an approach that majorly focuses on fostering the relationship between Nike and its entire staff. Additionally, Nike upholds productive internal relations to enhance staff contribution towards innovative and creative processes. Conversely, Nike also uses the results-oriented method, which focuses on training results. Consequently, when Nike wants to start a training program, the first step would involve using the results-oriented method to ensure employees learn effectively (Briscoe, Tarique, & Schuler, 2012). Therefore, the results-oriented method ensures the effectiveness of Nike’s Human resources whereas; the relational approach ensures optimal employee relations.
Additionally, Nike Inc. human resource management trains its employees through simulations, on-the-job training, and discussions. Nike uses simulations to help its employees to appreciate the details of the company’s products, projects, and tasks. Similarly, Nike Inc. adapts simulations because they help to generate creative responses. Nike’s HRM concentrates on using on-the-job training technique because it capitalizes on knowledge transfer to new interns or employees. Consequently, Nike Inc. absorbs the majority of its interns (Briscoe, Tarique, & Schuler, 2012). Discussions assist Nike to maintain effective communication among its staff members. Employees who engage in effective communications ensure high productivity of training programs due to the maximum feedback.
Managing diversity in the workforce
Nike maintains that a slight majority of its employees in the United States belongs to ethnic minorities. A business report centering on staffing and sustainability of Nike asserted that there was a fifty percent rise of non-white employees in the U.S in 2015.The 2015 report claimed that out of the 31,977 U.S employees, 15,320 staff identified as white. The employees of Nike within the United States that identified as white were approximately forty-seven percent in 2015(Bratton& Gold,2017).African/American employees constitute twenty percent of Nike’s employees in the United States. Additionally, Hispanic employees were about sixteen percent, and the Asians made up ten percent of the staff. The rest of the Nike employees in the United States were made up of American Indians, individuals belonging to two or more races and the Pacific Islanders (Bratton & Gold, 2017). Nike believes in having an employee team that is as diverse as its consumers are. Additionally, Nike advocates for an employee team that adopts inclusivity and respects the different communities in which they live and work. The male-female ratio has been evenly split between Nike with the women workforce making up to forty-nine percent of all of Nike’s employees. However, when it comes to management roles, women make up to forty percent of the managerial staff in Nike globally.
Compensation and benefits
Nike Inc. employees receive an average salary of $83,000 annually. The annual salaries of Nike’s employees range from $52,000 to $134,000( Briscoe, Tarique, & Schuler, 2012 ).The divisional managers of Nike Inc. get the highest salaries of approximately $210,000 every year. Conversely, the cashiers of Nike Inc. make the least salaries of approximately, $14,000 every year. Additionally, Nike has a 401(k) profit sharing and savings plan for all of its employees. The executive employees and the other junior employees of Nike use their cash compensations to make pre-tax contributions to the savings plan (Briscoe, Tarique, & Schuler, 2012) . Similarly, Nike uses the 401(k) profit sharing, and savings plan to make yearly profit sharing contributions to all their employees’ accounts. The company uses a percentage of the employee’s total annual salaries and bonuses to allocate the profit sharing contributions to the qualified staff members.
Nike’s Board of Directors decides the percentage of salaries, bonuses, and the full profit sharing contribution that each employee should contribute. The full profit sharing contribution for every employee in the 2009 fiscal year was approximately four percent of the total employee bonuses and salaries( Briscoe, Tarique, & Schuler,2012 ).Additionally, Nike has a competitive benefits program that helps its staff to keep their families healthy, stay fit and create a peaceful working environment ( Briscoe, Tarique, & Schuler, 2012 ). Consequently, Nike ensures that all its employees around the globe have access to retirement savings, fitness centers, generous discounts, time-off, health coverage, and many more benefits. The benefits package majorly depends on the employee’s years with the firm, position served, and the location.
Performance appraisal and career management
Nike’s efforts towards improving performance planning involve aspects of its human resource like problem-solving abilities, communication, support for diversity, and customer service (Bratton & Gold, 2017). Similarly, Nike’s performance appraisal plans also adopt variables related to these four dimensions. An example is Nike’s human resource assesses staff performance in problem-solving events and internal communications to select an appropriate performance management approach. Nike has also ensured that its performance management activities coincide with all the corporate goals for the human resource management (Bratton & gold, 2017). Linking performance management activities to corporate goals ensure that the company’s staff can still support the firm’s business endeavors. For instance, encouraging staff to improve their problem-solving abilities ensures that Nike’s human resource effectively develop its managerial resilience.
Nike has human resource management that uses several arrays of measurements and standards in all its performance management practices (Bratton & Gold, 2017). Nike incorporates measurement of its employee’s output quality, ethical conduct, and innovative contributions. The company also focuses on the collaboration level of its staff teams. The human resource also uses creativity as a variable to measure its performance because creative staff plays a part in improving Nike’s innovative culture. Nike ensures that its employees perform optimally to sustain the high standards for all the measures (Bratton & Gold, 2017). Additionally, Nike’s human resource management makes use performance interviews to gauge employees individual and team performance. The team performance interviews majorly focus on the performance of employee teams in Nike’s projects. Similarly, individual performance interviews focus on employee abilities, knowledge, and skills (Bratton & Gold, 2017). Nike forms different teams depending on the projects at hand and disbands them after the project is complete. The interviews may be formal, informal, structured, and unstructured. Nike’s human resource uses the informal and unstructured interviews in informal settings like break rooms and recreational rooms within the organization.
Key HR Issues, Obstacles, Challenges
Compliance with international Laws
Nike has to adapt to new tax liabilities and new labor laws because it hires employees from diverse cultural and geographic backgrounds in its quest to expand into the global marketplace (Briscoe, Tarique, & Schuler, 2012). When engaging in business transactions in Europe, for instance, Nike must pay value-added tax. Additionally, the human resource might have to be used to reporting economic data to the federal government and applying for work visas in case it considers employing staff who are non-naturalized United States citizens. Nike’s human resource managers face a challenge when it comes to complying with international laws (Briscoe, Tarique, & Schuler, 2012). Most of these laws are complex and cause difficulties when it comes to the implementation stage.
Cultural diversity
The human resource management at Nike oversees employees from diverse cultures worldwide (Jurini, 2013). The HR constantly faces the challenge of maintaining and appreciating the cultural diversity of its employees. Similarly, working with people from different cultures countries means the business should adapt to new ideas (Jurini, 2013). The business is exposed to unfamiliar social practices and new communication ways. Hiring an employee from Spain, for instance, means the employee might come with different technological ideas that are common in their country (Jurini, 2013). The Spanish employee may also introduce different techniques on how to manage the company’s staff. The human resource management constantly has to ensure that these cultural diversities do not affect the overall productivity of the company.
Recommendations
Compliance with international Laws
Nike’s human resource management should be well informed of all the legal requirements of the company in all the countries it operates. Laws like the minimum age limits for employees in a company vary from country to country (Briscoe, Tarique, & Schuler, 2012). A firm that violates such a law might find itself on the wrong side of the law. The human resource should ensure it has an able team in every country that Nike operates. Each of these teams should ensure the strict adherence to the laws of those particular countries. Additionally, Nike’s human resource managers should ensure that local professionals from each of these countries join their teams to advise them appropriately on legal and business matters (Briscoe, Tarique, & Schuler, 2012).
Cultural diversity
Human resource management at Nike Inc. should try to eradicate the challenges emanating from cultural diversity in the firm (Jurini, 2013). The first method of eradicating cultural diversity has an inclusive workplace. Employees in an inclusive workplace feel that their differences are respected and welcome. Additionally, employees feel appreciated for the different ideas and skills that they bring to the company. An inclusive work environment will encourage employees to comfortably take part in the company’s projects and work towards common goals (Jurini, 2013). Such a workplace respects and appreciates all religions and ages. The company, for instance, should have prayer rooms for the Islamic employees who may need to pray over the lunch breaks.
Additionally, Nike’s human resource management should provide sensitivity and diversity training to all its employees. The employer should encourage employees to be respectful and tolerant of each other. Similarly, employees in a company should learn to support and value each other’s ideas and opinions, and accept each other’s differences (Jurini, 2013). The human resource management should encourage its employees to avoid quick judgments and to practice civility within the workplace.
Conclusion
Nike uses a vigorous interview procedure for its potential personnel like most of the other major companies. The company equally believes in hiring the most eligible candidates. When these employees are selected, Nike’s human resource management then uses the results-oriented approach and the rationale model to train those. As Nikes expand its market base to other countries, cultural diversity in the workplace has also increased significantly. Nike’s employees receive competitive salaries with the divisional managers getting the highest salaries of approximately $210,000 every year. Similarly, Nike has a competitive benefits program for its staff like access to fitness centers, time-offs, and generous discounts. Nike’s human resource management faces challenges of cultural diversity in the workplace and compliance with international law. The company struggles to adapt to new tax liabilities and new labor laws. Appreciating cultural diversity in the workplace is also tough since the business has to adapt to these new cultures. The human resource management should incorporate members of staff from the different countries in its management team. Additionally, the company’s human resource management should create an inclusive workplace and provide sensitivity and diversity training to all its employees. These recommendations will help Nike Inc. to tackle its challenges when it comes to cultural diversity and compliance with international law.
References
Bratton, J., & Gold, J. (2017). Human resource management: theory and practice . Palgrave.
Briscoe, D., Tarique, I., & Schuler, R. (2012). International human resource management: Policies and practices for multinational enterprises . Routledge.
Jurini, M. D. (2013). Cultural Diversity at the Workplace. Al-Madinah Managment and Finance Science , 2 (7).
Locke, R. M., Qin, F., & Brause, A. (2007). Does monitoring improve labor standards? Lessons from Nike. ILR Review , 61 (1), 3-31.
Locke, R., Amengual, M., & Mangla, A. (2009). Virtue out of necessity? Compliance, commitment, and the improvement of labor conditions in global supply chains. Politics & Society , 37 (3), 319-351.
