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.’
Curriculum Topics
• Human Resource
Management
• Workforce planning
• Getting the right people
• Building skills and
capabilities
G
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www.thetimes100.co.uk
Mission: Energising overall purpose
and direction for an organisation.
Competitive advantage: An ability to
earn superior profits through lower costs
or distinctive product quality that
competitors cannot readily copy.
Human Resource Management:
Deployment, training and development
of people as a strategic resource within
an organisation.
Workforce planning: Process of
anticipating an organisation's future
staffing needs and then making a plan
to fulfil them.
EDITION
15 www.thetimes100.co.uk Tarmac | Developing a Human Resource strategy 101
D ...
IntroductionTarmac was established in 1903 and is the UK’s.docx
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
2. • 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.’
Curriculum Topics
3. • Human Resource
Management
• Workforce planning
• Getting the right people
• Building skills and
capabilities
G
L
O
S
S
A
R
Y
www.thetimes100.co.uk
Mission: Energising overall purpose
and direction for an organisation.
Competitive advantage: An ability to
earn superior profits through lower costs
or distinctive product quality that
competitors cannot readily copy.
Human Resource Management:
Deployment, training and development
4. of people as a strategic resource within
an organisation.
Workforce planning: Process of
anticipating an organisation's future
staffing needs and then making a plan
to fulfil them.
EDITION
15 www.thetimes100.co.uk Tarmac | Developing a Human
Resource strategy 101
Developing a Human Resource strategy
G
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Strategic: Fundamental to a plan for
achieving key objectives.
Stakeholders: Person or group with
a direct interest in the decisions or
behaviour of an organisation (eg
shareholders, employees, customers,
5. suppliers, creditors, local community).
EDITION
15www.thetimes100.co.ukTarmac | Developing a Human
Resource strategy102
www.thetimes100.co.uk
Business objectives
Strategic Human Resources Management
Recruitment
and selection
Recruitment
and selection
Recruitment
and selection
Recruitment
and selection
Recruitment
and selection
Workforce
planning
Training and
development Appraisal
Well qualified
motivated staff
6. Reward
and payment
High performance
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 Tarmac’s business is now much broader, it must keep
developing
7. 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
8. have to acquire to meet these targets.
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. Like most other
businesses,
Tarmac’s 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
9. demand for its products.
D Develop markets By targeting customers and working
closely with them
R Reduce costs By being operationally efficient
E Engage employees With everyone working to one plan
and having good performance
recognised
A Act responsibly By promoting a sustainable and safe
approach to business
M Manage assets By looking after investments and
equipment, as well as the natural
resources used by the business
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.
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
10. 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.
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
11. 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
Tarmac’s 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 to £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
12. 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.
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.
EDITION
15 www.thetimes100.co.uk Tarmac | Developing a Human
Resource strategy 103
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13. YRecruitment: Process of identifying the
need for new employee(s), defining the
job(s), attracting candidates and
selecting those most suitable.
Selection: The process of choosing
which person to appoint from those that
apply for a job vacancy.
Interview
Short-list based on applications received
Advertisements
Set job description and person specification
Identification of recruitment needs
Selection
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14. Job description: A document setting
out the key responsibilities and tasks
involved in performing a particular job.
Person specifications: Details of the
qualifications, experience and personal
qualities required to perform a particular
job.
Psychometric testing: A set of
questions which, when analysed,
suggest an outline of a job applicant's
personality.
Personal development plan: A plan
setting out ways in which individual
employees will have their training and
development needs met.
EDITION
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Resource strategy104
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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 Tarmac’s
development. It recruits individuals capable of reaching higher
potential. This involves looking for individuals with diverse
15. skills
from a range of backgrounds.
Selection is the process undertaken by human resource
managers of
choosing 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.
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.
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
16. 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.
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
17. developing highly motivated and skilled staff who are able to
perform at high levels.
When will I do this?
What actions will I take to develop them?
What skills or behaviours do I want to develop?
How do I measure my success?
What are the benefits of development for me?
How do they help Tarmac?
Review
Q
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1. Using an example, describe what is meant by human
resource management.
2. Explain the difference between training and development.
3. Analyse why a range of job roles are necessary in order
to support a large business like Tarmac.
4. Evaluate the key strategic benefits of workforce
