This is a paper on recommendations to improve hr functions. This is a proposal that outlines recommendations to improve the HR function of the chosen organization. An APA formatted research paper that addresses proposed recommendations for the organization. You need to use at least 12 outside resources to support your analysis. The final project should contain an introduction, body, and conclusion. The body will include, at a minimum, sections labeled: Recruiting and Selection. Training and Development. Performance Managment. Employee Discipline. Compensation and Benefits. Labor Relations. For each element, you submit your proposed recommendations to the organization.

1. Wal-Mart
Running Head: HR RECOMMENDATIONS
Recommendations to Improve HR Functions of Wal-Mart
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2. Wal-Mart
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Introduction
Wal-Mart is one of the largest retail chain stores all over the world. It was instituted
by Sam Walton in 1962. It is an American Public multinational corporation that serves more
than 200 million customers all over the world with the help of its 2.2 million associates and
more than 7,800 departmental stores. In accordance to the Fortune Magazine 2009, the
company has secured first position in ‘Most Admired Companies’ survey (About Us, 2011).
As well, as per the business survey of Fortune Global 500, 2008, it is one of the major public
corporations on the basis of revenue. The factors, which help Wal-Mart in obtaining &
exerting competitive advantage, are its large number of stores and low price of products.
The company operates with significant guidelines and principles. In addition to these
principles, the company have significant HR functions that are revised from time-to-time.
The company have effective recruitment and selection process along with well-designed
training and development programme (Vance, Vance & Paik, 2006). The company always try
to enhance and appraise its employee’s performance with the help of different performance
appraisal and employee discipline programs. As well, several other functions like
compensation & benefits and labor relation are also handled with due care and planning.
All these HR functions has been managed from last several years and rendering
company with lots of advantages, but still it needs improvements in regard to increasing
competition (Storey, 2009). The company can enhance its HR functions with the help of
significant HR recommendation that will be discussed here in this paper.
Improving HR Functions of Wal-Mart
Wal-Mart is one of the leading departmental stores of the world. It operates with wellestablished set of principles that are significantly shared within the company and all of its
employees. From, its beginning it gives a high important to its employees and due to this it

3. Wal-Mart
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significantly invests in regard to its employees (Storey, 2009). The company also invests
heavily in the development and significant growth of its employees. For managing its
employees, it makes use of different HR functions and leadership programmes as nowadays it
has become essential to make use of diverse HR functions.
Without HR function, it would not have been possible for the company to attain
substantial growth but still it is also confronting some troubles and challenges that need to be
resolved (Vance, Vance & Paik, 2006). All challenges and troubles related to HRM can be
resolved effectively by making use of advanced learning and development programs and
strategies. The different strategies and tools can be used by Wal-Mart to improve its diverse
HR functions are as follows:
Recruitment and Selection:
The changes that are required in company recruitment and selection process can be
identified after analysing its current practice. At Wal-Mart employees are given significant
importance as company management believes that employees are the one who can bring back
to customers. That’s why it is critical for Wal-Mart to recruit and hire the right people. For
hiring and recruiting appropriate people, the company make use of a conventional HRM
approach. This convention approach is effective but with the increasing competition, it is not
assisting company in hiring employees that are able to deal with company responsibilities and
high competition from competitors.
In present for attaining success, it is essential that the company hire employees that
are able to work and deal with increasingly competitive environment. For dealing with this
kind of trouble, the company need to adopt a more pro-active approach towards recruitment
and selection (Human Resource Management, n.d.). For appointing employees according to
its own and market requirements it need to do a thorough job analysis. With this, the

4. Wal-Mart
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company HR mangers will become able in gaining information about the tasks,
responsibilities, and skills that a job entails and requires from its performers.
Thorough job analysis can be done by undertaking appropriate steps like creating or
developing job descriptions that involve all duties and responsibilities required for a position.
Subsequent to this, HR manager need to develop job specification that involves qualities,
skills and abilities required to perform a job (Vance, Vance & Paik, 2006). By doing job
analysis and identifying appearing employees’ abilities, it will become easy for Wal-Mart to
recruit and select appropriate employees.
Training and Development:
In addition to the use of significant techniques for hiring and retaining best
employees, Wal-Mart also make use of different type of training and development program.
The company management believes in the continuous development of its employees.
Although, the company make use of effective training & development program but still it
feels several difficulties in training and developing its employees (Samli, 1998). The
company confronts problems due to lack of flexible training programs. The company
management follows training program for specific group of employees.
For advanced training and development it is essential that the company management
make use of flexible training program that can be changed according to the needs of
employees and company. A flexible training program can be designed by developing a wellplanned framework (Ahlstrom & Bruton, 2009). First of all the, HR managers need to
understand the basic skills & abilities of its employees and job specifications then there is a
need to select specific training or development program (Mathis & Jackson, 2007).
Here, the company can employ different types of training program according to the
suitability of employees. In this way, by developing a flexible training & development plan

5. Wal-Mart
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the company can easily resolve its troubles related to developing its employees all around the
world (Samli, 1998).
Performance Management:
Performance management is a process through which a firm can identify, evaluate and
develop the performance of its employees by aligning it with organisational goals and
objectives. At Wal-Mart also HR managers make use of different techniques to measure its
employee’s performance. The company managers employ different techniques to enhance its
employees’ performance (Ahlstrom & Bruton, 2009). One of the substantial techniques used
by Wal-Mart is to create a positive and healthy working environment in which everyone is
treated as partners.
In addition to this, the company managers also give and receive feedbacks from its
employees so that their performance can be increased but it is not done continuously. Assured
increase in employee performance requires continuous performance monitoring (Gary, 2010).
It can be done more effectively by developing a system that enables the company in
following up on the evolution of its business projects and analyzing that how employees are
behaving at the time of performing their jobs.
The company can develop a well-planned and advanced monitoring system by adding
aspects like role clarification, coaching and ongoing communications in addition to
traditional aspects of performance appraisal (Deckop & Deckop, 2006). The most critical
steps of performance management process should include communicating expectations,
performance monitoring, and performance documentation, coaching, giving and receiving
feedback, including staff and appraising performance. By following all these steps, the WalMart can easily develop a most effective performance monitoring system.
Employee Discipline:

6. Wal-Mart
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In present controlling and disciplining employees is a critical factor for almost all
firms. Without disciplining employees, it is not possible for a firm to attain its all business
related objective and goals. Until or unless employees are not disciplined they cannot be
directed towards their goals and as well as completion of organisational goals. Wal-Mart also
operates with same philosophy but it makes use of more flexible approach to discipline its
employees. The company try to discipline its employees with the help of different policies
and guiding principles that are effective but not sufficient.
In present controlling and disciplining employees require stricter approach as it is
difficult to direct employees towards organisational goals. This can be done at Wal-Mart with
the help of appropriate tools and their sequential use (Deckop & Deckop, 2006). First of all,
the company management should clarify its expectations from employees and this in turn will
also assist in creating accountability. Afterwards, a well-organized document should be
prepared that include record of conversations, expectations and concerns.
Then, if something wrong happens informal corrective actions should be taken like
verbal warning. In the end, formal discipline needs to be taken like firing employees or taking
significant measures to correct their performance (Gary, 2010). Following this process, it will
become easy for the company to control and discipline its employees in the most significant
manner.
Compensation and Benefits:
In addition to employee recruitment, selection, training, performance management
one other substantial HR function that need to be managed is employee compensation and
benefits. Nowadays this is the most substantial HR function as almost all employees think it
significant at the time of doing job somewhere. In Wal-Mart also this function is given high
importance from the time of its establishment (Jackson, Schuler & Werner, 2008). The
company have designed different workers compensation programs for its employees but still

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it has confronted severe criticism due to lack of effective benefit and compensation plan
(Vance, Vance & Paik, 2006).
For dealing with its underlying troubles related to employee benefit and
compensation, the company management should try to design a more practical benefits and
compensation program. It can be done by developing a well-planned compensation
philosophy and objectives (Deckop & Deckop, 2006). It is essential to develop an
environment in which all employers and employees work with fair practices and all
employees are compensated in a similar way or on the basis of their performance.
Objectives like fair & competitive compensation, attraction of talent essential to
achieve company objectives, retaining employees by instilling long-term commitment and
developing a sense of company ownership are some objective that can help company in
developing effective benefits and compensation programs (Jackson, Schuler & Werner,
2008).
Labor Relations:
From the time of establishment of Wal-Mart, the company is opposed to unionization
of its employees and associates. Although, the company is not neutral on this subject as it
takes several measures to manage labor relations so that they can feel satisfied. The company
management thinks that it is much better to work without a labor organisation but this
sometimes creates troubles for it (Mason, 1991). It annoys its employees who feels exploited
and not paid fairly. For handling these types of issues related to labor relation, the company
need to undertake a more careful approach in which some appropriate guidelines and
objectives need to be made that are as follows:
•
Develop a good relationship between managers and workers along with open line of
communication to and from management.
•
Pay wages which are good and competitive according to as per industry rates.

8. Wal-Mart
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Provide exclusive benefits to company workers.
•
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Develop a trust and honest attitude among workers and as well commitment towards
company (Mason, 1991).
•
Offer a sense of job security to workers as it must to develop effective labor relations.
•
Provide workers with an opportunity to take part in company profits through profit
sharing plans (Deckop & Deckop, 2006).
•
Providing them with the best working conditions.
With the help of all these things, it will become easy for company HR managers to
develop effective labor relations with its employees.
Conclusion
With the help of above discussion, it can be said that managing employees in a
company is not easy as it involves several complex tasks like recruitment, selection, training,
and development, performance and appraisals, reward system, compensation and benefit and
labor relations. All these aspects can be managed effectively if all are handled individually
(Deckop & Deckop, 2006). All these HR functions have high importance for a firm like WalMart so need to be changed from time-to-time according to the changes in market, customers
and employees. A similar approach cannot be useful in every situation so it is vital to make
changes in all HR function at Wal-Mart with changes in other aspects.

9. Wal-Mart
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References
About Us. (2011). Company Website. Retrieved from http://walmartstores.com/AboutUs/
Ahlstrom, D. & Bruton, G.D. (2009). International Management: Strategy and Culture in the
Emerging World. Cengage Learning.
Deckop, J.R. & Deckop, J.R. (2006). Human resource management ethics. IAP.
Gary, D. (2010). Fundamentals of Human Resource Management: Content, Competencies
and Applications. Pearson Education.
Human Resource Management. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.webbooks.com/eLibrary/NC/B0/B66/055MB66.html
Jackson, S.E., Schuler, R.S. & Werner, S. (2008). Managing Human Resources (10th ed).
Cengage Learning.
Mason, O. (1991). Labor relations and you at the Wal-mart distribution center. Retrieved
from http://www.reclaimdemocracy.org/walmart/distribctr6022manual.pdf
Mathis, R.L. & Jackson, J.H. (2007). Human Resource Management. Cengage Learning.
Samli, A.C. (1998). Strategic marketing for success in retailing. Greenwood Publishing
Group.
Storey, J. (2009). The Routledge companion to strategic human resource management.
Taylor & Francis.
Vance, C.M., Vance, C. & Paik, Y. (2006) Managing a Global Workforce: Challenges and
Opportunities in International Human Resources Management. M.E. Sharpe.
Wal-mart’s Worker compensation program. (2007). Retrieved from
http://walmartwatch.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/2/files/pdf/workers_compensation.pdf

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References
About Us. (2011). Company Website. Retrieved from http://walmartstores.com/AboutUs/
Ahlstrom, D. & Bruton, G.D. (2009). International Management: Strategy and Culture in the
Emerging World. Cengage Learning.
Deckop, J.R. & Deckop, J.R. (2006). Human resource management ethics. IAP.
Gary, D. (2010). Fundamentals of Human Resource Management: Content, Competencies
and Applications. Pearson Education.
Human Resource Management. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.webbooks.com/eLibrary/NC/B0/B66/055MB66.html
Jackson, S.E., Schuler, R.S. & Werner, S. (2008). Managing Human Resources (10th ed).
Cengage Learning.
Mason, O. (1991). Labor relations and you at the Wal-mart distribution center. Retrieved
from http://www.reclaimdemocracy.org/walmart/distribctr6022manual.pdf
Mathis, R.L. & Jackson, J.H. (2007). Human Resource Management. Cengage Learning.
Samli, A.C. (1998). Strategic marketing for success in retailing. Greenwood Publishing
Group.
Storey, J. (2009). The Routledge companion to strategic human resource management.
Taylor & Francis.
Vance, C.M., Vance, C. & Paik, Y. (2006) Managing a Global Workforce: Challenges and
Opportunities in International Human Resources Management. M.E. Sharpe.
Wal-mart’s Worker compensation program. (2007). Retrieved from
http://walmartwatch.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/2/files/pdf/workers_compensation.pdf