For Walmart, the competitive environment keeps getting tougher. The company, which operates 5,000 stores and employs...
Fantastic news! We've Found the answer you've been seeking!
Question:
Transcribed Image Text:
For Walmart, the competitive environment keeps getting tougher. The company, which operates 5,000 stores and employs more than 1.5 million people in the United States, is trying to stay ahead of the trend toward online shopping. Meanwhile, continually falling unemployment rates have been making employee retention difficult. Somehow the company needs to keep getting more efficient (which means spending less) while maintaining employee engagement. Competing with online retailers, especially Amazon, requires low prices, because price comparisors are easy online. It also replaces some demand for store employees and need for workers in warehouses and other parts of the distribution system. Walmart has addressed these challenges by restructuring work and closing some lower-performing stores, including more than five dozen Sam's Club stores. The cuts free up money for offering more generous pay and benefits and for directing more resources to online retailing. Some of the Sam's Club stores that closed were to be converted to distribution centers. The restructuring decisions include a revised approach to store management, with fewer assistant managers. Walmart also cut department managers in certain departments such as mobile phones, where it could bring in representatives from the phone service providers. Page 366 In addition, store closures helped to set the stage for several rounds of layoffs: the downsizing of store payrolls by 16,000 and elimination of 7,000 back-office jobs in stores in 2016, layoffs of 1,000 corporate positions in 2017, and the elimination of another 10,000 store jobs and 1,000 headquarters employees in 2018. Automation has enabled a 15% reduction in the number of workers per square foot in stores. But many of the laid-off employees, according to Walmart, were able to move to different positions within the company. At the same time, Walmart is placing more workers in warehouse jobs and store positions that fill online orders. At the same time, the company cannot just be a job cutter and maintain its strength in the labor market. Even as it closes stores, Walmart has announced pay increases from $9 an hour starting pay in 2015 to $10 in 2017, aiming to reach $15 per hour by 2020. Early in 2018, in what it said was a response to cuts in the federal income tax rate. Walmart announced that it would spend about $400 million to give employees wage increases (raising starting pay to $11 per hour) and one-time bonuses of up to $1,000. The new hourly pay rate matched wages paid by Target and came closer to the $13 paid by Costco. Walmart's management appreciates that pay alone will not be enough to create employee engagement, especially for relatively low-paying retail jobs. So the company has announced other initiatives aimed at making the company a preferred employer. Along with the 2018 pay raises and bonuses, Walmart announced it would extend to store employees the paid family leave benefits previously available only to office workers. At the same time, the company promised to spend some of its savings from lower taxes on training. Months later, Walmart announced it would pay college tuition for employees who pursue degrees in business or supply chain management at three schools selected by Walmart for the program. And in a bid to make work more comfortable, Walmart announced it would relax its blue-shirt-and-khakis dress code to allow a variety of solid-color clothing. Questions 1. What circumstances described in this case make employee retention challenging for Walmart? 2. What sources of job satisfaction is Walmart providing, according to the information given? Name two other sources of job satisfaction that you think could improve job satisfaction and employee retention in Walmart stores. For Walmart, the competitive environment keeps getting tougher. The company, which operates 5,000 stores and employs more than 1.5 million people in the United States, is trying to stay ahead of the trend toward online shopping. Meanwhile, continually falling unemployment rates have been making employee retention difficult. Somehow the company needs to keep getting more efficient (which means spending less) while maintaining employee engagement. Competing with online retailers, especially Amazon, requires low prices, because price comparisors are easy online. It also replaces some demand for store employees and need for workers in warehouses and other parts of the distribution system. Walmart has addressed these challenges by restructuring work and closing some lower-performing stores, including more than five dozen Sam's Club stores. The cuts free up money for offering more generous pay and benefits and for directing more resources to online retailing. Some of the Sam's Club stores that closed were to be converted to distribution centers. The restructuring decisions include a revised approach to store management, with fewer assistant managers. Walmart also cut department managers in certain departments such as mobile phones, where it could bring in representatives from the phone service providers. Page 366 In addition, store closures helped to set the stage for several rounds of layoffs: the downsizing of store payrolls by 16,000 and elimination of 7,000 back-office jobs in stores in 2016, layoffs of 1,000 corporate positions in 2017, and the elimination of another 10,000 store jobs and 1,000 headquarters employees in 2018. Automation has enabled a 15% reduction in the number of workers per square foot in stores. But many of the laid-off employees, according to Walmart, were able to move to different positions within the company. At the same time, Walmart is placing more workers in warehouse jobs and store positions that fill online orders. At the same time, the company cannot just be a job cutter and maintain its strength in the labor market. Even as it closes stores, Walmart has announced pay increases from $9 an hour starting pay in 2015 to $10 in 2017, aiming to reach $15 per hour by 2020. Early in 2018, in what it said was a response to cuts in the federal income tax rate. Walmart announced that it would spend about $400 million to give employees wage increases (raising starting pay to $11 per hour) and one-time bonuses of up to $1,000. The new hourly pay rate matched wages paid by Target and came closer to the $13 paid by Costco. Walmart's management appreciates that pay alone will not be enough to create employee engagement, especially for relatively low-paying retail jobs. So the company has announced other initiatives aimed at making the company a preferred employer. Along with the 2018 pay raises and bonuses, Walmart announced it would extend to store employees the paid family leave benefits previously available only to office workers. At the same time, the company promised to spend some of its savings from lower taxes on training. Months later, Walmart announced it would pay college tuition for employees who pursue degrees in business or supply chain management at three schools selected by Walmart for the program. And in a bid to make work more comfortable, Walmart announced it would relax its blue-shirt-and-khakis dress code to allow a variety of solid-color clothing. Questions 1. What circumstances described in this case make employee retention challenging for Walmart? 2. What sources of job satisfaction is Walmart providing, according to the information given? Name two other sources of job satisfaction that you think could improve job satisfaction and employee retention in Walmart stores.
Expert Answer:
Answer rating: 100% (QA)
1 Some given below are the circumstances described in the case that makes employee retention challen... View the full answer
Related Book For
Financial Accounting
ISBN: 978-1259103285
5th Canadian edition
Authors: Robert Libby, Patricia Libby, Daniel Short, George Kanaan, M
Posted Date:
Students also viewed these accounting questions
-
The robot industry in the United States is growing at a rate of 30% a year [8]. A typical industrial robot has degrees of freedom. A unity feedback position control system for a force-sensing joint...
-
The most widely consumed fruit in the United States is the humble banana. Most of the bananas consumed in the United States are imported from Latin America. Ecuador is one of the largest exporters of...
-
The total annual energy consumption in the United States is about 8 X 1019 J. How much mass would have to be converted to energy to fuel this need?
-
3. How do the marginal costs of pollution reduction and the marginal costs of pollution damage change as pollution levels increase? The marginal costs of pollution reduction remain constant and the...
-
Managers and accountants often encounter transactions with which they are unfamiliar. Use your analytical skills to analyze and prepare journal entries for the following transactions, which have not...
-
Identify and describe the major tax implications of child support.
-
What source does an auditor use as the starting point for tests of personnel and payroll activities?
-
The following three situations involve the capitalization of interest. Situation I: On January 1, 2014, Oksana Baiul, Inc. signed a fixed-price contract to have Builder Associates construct a major...
-
Your client, Mr Imtiaz Khan is assessing two different types of 4-year mutually exclusive investments. From his analysis, he anticipates generating future end-of-year cash flows arising from each of...
-
You are working on a free-form Packet Tracer challenge activity as seen in Figure 1, you have been given the London Railways network.' The purpose of this EMA question is to build upon each of the...
-
Find the minimum sample size n needed to estimate u for the given values of c, o, and E. c= 0.95, o= 5.3, and E = 1 Assume that a preliminary sample has at least 30 members. n = (Round up to the...
-
1. The feed (245 kmol/hr) consists of methanol and water containing 68 moleto methanol and 52 mole % water. The overhead product is to contain 93 mole?. methanol and the bottom product contains 4...
-
1 Two objects are moving towards each other with velocities V and V on a frictionless surface. They collide completely inelastically and move together after the collision with a velocity |V3| = 18,9...
-
A front loader is shown in the figure. The weight of the shovel and the load is 1200 lb. and L = 60 in. 30" 10"- F 12" G E 16" F 10" 20" H 15" 1200 lb 30" 40"- E F 50" L 12" 1- Using Solidworks...
-
What is the magnitude p of the molecule's electric dipole moment? P = C.m The molecule is immersed in a uniform electric field of 2.43105 with its electric dipole vector at an angle of 54.7 from the...
-
The Figure below shows a conveyor belt system. The objective of the system is to move the work piece by a pre-set speed. a) There is a component missing in the figure below, identify this component...
-
Rewrite the following Excel formulas as expressions that would appear in a text. a. =2+(4-6)/9*3+2 b. 2+ (4-6)/(9*3)+2 c. =2+ (4-6)/9*(3+2) d. = 2+4-6/9*3+2 a. Choose the correct answer below. O A....
-
You deposit $10,000 in a savings account that earns 7.5% simple interest per year. What is the minimum number of years you must wait to double your balance? Suppose instead that you deposit the...
-
Refer to the information for Kitchenware Inc. in AP5 5. In Problem Required: 1. Prepare a statement of cash flows for Kitchenware Inc. for the year ended December 31, 2015. Use the direct method to...
-
The Australian company BHP Billiton is one of the worlds biggest mining companies. Some of the items included in its annual consolidated statement of cash flows, presented using the direct method,...
-
Robert Brissette, a local massage therapist, decided to sell his practice and retire. He has had discussions with a therapist from another province who wants to relocate. The discussions are at the...
-
A pillar is shown in Fig. 13.14. The total contraction of the pillar is \(0.25 \mathrm{~mm}\). If \(E_{s}=200 \mathrm{GPa}\) and \(E_{C I}=\) \(120 \mathrm{GPa}\), find the value of load \(P\). Cast...
-
A steel rod \(60 \mathrm{~mm}\) in diameter and \(2 \mathrm{~m}\) long is subjected to a pull of \(120 \mathrm{kN}\). It the strain is to increase by 10 percent, find the length of \(20...
-
A stepped bar as shown in Fig. 13.19 is held between two rigid supports such that there is a gap of \(1.0 \mathrm{~mm}\) between the lower support and the bar. Calculate the stresses in the bar. Take...
Study smarter with the SolutionInn App