A Harrods case study

Harrods is a brand that is recognised all over the world. Its Knightsbridge store has $1$ million square feet of selling space with over $330$ different departments. Its global reputation and prestige is instilled through its brand values. Brand values represent what an organisation stands for. Harrods values are $$ British; Luxury; Service; Innovation and Sensation.

Harrods has been in business for over $160$ years. It employs $4000$ employees with an additional $3,500$ agency and concession employees. In $2010$ Qatar Holdings purchased Harrods from Mohamed Al$-$Fayed. The new owners are strongly committed to all of Harrods$$ employees. They recognise that engaged employees are essential to the continuing success of the business. Such employees are likely to be happy and consistently high performers who want to progress their careers with Harrods. Managing employee relationships is the role of the Human Resources department.

Harrods carried out its first comprehensive employee survey to find out what they thought about working at Harrods. The employee survey has now become an integral aspect of Harrods$$ Human Resource Management programme. The survey results were used to create strategic plans for change focused on improving employee engagement and trust. The four main elements were:

$$ Changing Organisational Structure

$$ Changing Leadership

$$ Improved communications

$$ Living brand values

Find out how the human resource management ensured these elements were implemented in the full case study.

There have now been four employee surveys. Each survey has seen a higher return from employees and an improvement in the indicators of employee engagement because of the actions the HRM team took. Significantly, $91\%$ of employees have stated in the most recent survey that they are proud to work for Harrods and employee turnover has halved in the last five years.

Answer the question below:

a$).$ In relation to the above case study, outline strategies for Increasing employee

engagement through Human Resource Management.