Market Star Human Resource Management Analysis - Free Essay Example

Market Star Human Resource Management Analysis Brief History Founded in 1988, MarketStar is a sales and marketing outsourcing company providing flexible retail, VAR (Value-added reseller) and direct sales solutions for the worlds leading and emerging companies. MarketStar uses skilled sales and marketing professionals and industry-proven go-to-market tools and intelligence to help clients accelerate sales and achieve market dominance. Its proficiency in recruiting professional and dedicated outsourced sales staff that delivers actionable knowledge has enabled them to consistently produce predictable and profitable results. MarketStar was founded by Alan Hall in his basement in Ogden, Utah. MarketStar is still headquarted in Ogden, Utah, but serves companies all over the country. Now, MarketStar has approximately 2,500 employees worldwide serving clients in more than 20 countries on six different continents. MarketStar is a part of Omnicom Group (NYSE: OMC)—the worlds leading marketing communications company. This affiliation allows MarketStar to collaborate with other Omnicom Group members to better serve its clients. Dave Treadway, president and CEO since 2003, is responsible for the strategic and operational leadership of MarketStar. Under Treadways direction, MarketStar has accelerated investments in thought-based leadership, including market analysis. MarketStar represents several Fortune 500 companies, including Hewlett-Packard (14), Verizon Communications (17), Microsoft (44), and Cisco Systems (71). MarketStar employees drive an average of $5 billion in sales for their clients each year. Characteristics of a good Human Resource Management Most Important * Employment Security * Selectivity in Recruiting * Fair Wages/Incentive Pay * Employee Ownership/Participation and Empowerment * Information Sharing * Self-Managed Teams/Training and Skill Development * Promotion from Within Employment Security MarketStar is contracted to represent other companies, which implies that job security is not guaranteed. The companies represented by MarketStar could decide to forgo the services provided; causing a lack of jobs for the teams that represented the dismissed company. In such scenarios, MarketStar does all possible to move the employees of the dismissed teams to other teams available. The downside to employment security at MarketStar is there is simply no future work guarantee. When certain MarketStar accounts close, the company may have no choice but to lay the employees off. However, in our survey, the majority of MarketStar employees felt fairly comfortable that job security was available to an extent. Some employees were even found in the situation of an account closing, but were repositioned and kept their jobs as different employees in different teams. We feel the employment security at MarketStar is rated around the average score because even though there is no guaranteed work for life, MarketStar will help to keep their current employees with the business. Layoffs may come but mostly due to outside circumstances. Selectivity in Recruiting MarketStar helps many different types of companies and therefore attempts to place MarketStar employees to best fit the needs of their clients, other companies. MarketStar posts job opening on their website with a brief overview of their company and then the responsibilities expected of the opening they are seeking. Here is an example of a current job opening in Ogden, UT for a Player/Coach Inside Sales Rep. Marketstar currently has an opportunity available for Inside Sales Player Coach who will be responsible to work with the Inside Sales Account Managers to provide sales support and be responsible for outbound calls into prospective accounts regarding inContact products, services and provide leadership for the team. RESPONSIBILITIES: †¢ Assist manager with day to day management of the team †¢ Identify needed skill sets, and teach those skills to those he/she upervises, both in individual and group settings †¢ Understand the industry and the client’s business objectives and develop and implement a strategy that will achieve those objectives †¢ Responsible for sales lead entry REQUIREMENTS: †¢ College degree preferred †¢ 5 years+ work experience †¢ Knowledge and experience in the B2B channel and IT industry †¢ At least 1 year previous management/coa ching experience †¢ Previous sales and marketing experience needed †¢ Prior experience in handling customers †¢ Must be detail oriented Strong ability to multi task and manage time †¢ General knowledge of the business to business sales process †¢ Motivated to excel in results and be a self-starter †¢ Must have a technology aptitude MarketStar does not discriminate in any aspect of employment on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity and/or expression, age, veteran status, disability, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state, or local employment discrimination laws where MarketStar does business. This job posting shows they are very selective with requirements such as, 5 years+ experience, must be detail oriented, at least 1 year previous management, etc. If you apply online for this job it requires an answer from each one of the requirements listed above. Since MarketStar is very specific in the needs they are looking for we do not recommend in changes in this area. Fair Wages/Incentive Pay MarketStar offers competitive wages with very competitive benefits. Although exact salaries and wages are not made available, nearly all of the surveyed employees expressed feelings of being paid fairly in regards to their job responsibilities. MarketStar also offers performance-based bonuses, work related reimbursements such as mileage reimbursements and cell phone service reimbursements, and other pay incentives that are all dependent on the position and the client. MarketStar also offers competitive benefits including multiple medical and dental plan options, paid holidays with additional floating holidays, paid vacation and personal time, 401k matching, stock purchase options, and more. Some of the extra benefits that MarketStar employees receive include employee discounts, paid birthdays off work, semi frequent contests, and extracurricular activities during the paid workday such as movie days or barbeques. In the end, MarketStar seems to rank pretty highly in regards to competitive pay and benefits. Employee Ownership/Participation and Empowerment Employees are given personal and team related goals that are generally measured monthly or quarterly. Although this allows employees to have a direct affect on the organization, the consensus of the surveyed employees was that they were not involved in the goal setting or KPI setting process. Certain positions within the company do allow employees to manage their territories, work schedules, and customer base individually; however, some positions are not as flexible. It seems that employee empowerment is based on what position you have and what client you represent. I recommend that MarketStar implement a goal setting procedure that includes input from the entire team. Each team member of each team should be given the opportunity to participate in the goal setting process to give him or her more empowerment over the work they will set out to achieve. Along with participating in goal setting, employees should be given the opportunity to make decisions on individual and team procedures and requirements to meet the expectations and goals of the individual and team. Information Sharing MarketStar has an internal website where employees can view information and past articles that were written. The public website also contains some information on financials. Occasionally, MarketStar sends emails with information about the company. From an employee perspective, MarketStar does not share much information as a whole to employees, but more on an individual team base. We recommend that MarketStar focus more on sharing information about the position of the whole company through more detailed email reports. This could help employees feel more important about the job they are performing and that it is making a difference to MarketStar as a whole. Self Managed Teams/Training and Skill Development We consider MarketStar’s new hire training to be average. The overall consensus in our survey was adequate but not great. Several online trainings are provided throughout one’s employment. Some are required and some are optional. These online trainings are centered on several different skills associated with general and specific topics. New employees at MarketStar are typically trained face to face, on the job, involving a lot of ride-a-longs and observation scenarios. A leadership training section is also available to help train certain employees. In this training, skills are developed to improve leadership throughout MarketStar. Discipline, compensation, interviewing, and recruiting are some of the topics covered. We found that leadership is a big part of MarketStar because there is a large amount of work done in teams. Teams are self-managed in many situations and have helped MarketStar provide the best service to each company with an account. The recommendations we have for self-managed teams and training-skill development is to provide more in-depth training for new employees. The employees surveyed shared that the training was only considered adequate. This will also help to continue to improve the well-roundedness of employees to enable teams the knowledge to handle non-typical cases they may come across. Better self-managed teams can assist in efficiently providing the service requested. Promotion from within Recruiting within provides current employees advancement for superior performance. Recruiting within supplements and encourages other high performance characteristics such as training and employee empowerment. By promoting within, an organization is less likely see other companies benefit from its training efforts. Needless to say, an employee can feel in charge of their destiny when opportunities are available for their hard work and dedication. Like a chain reaction a list of positive attributes spring from hiring from within; high morale, high employee engagement, retention of valuable employees. At MarketStar existing employees generally have first opportunity at open positions. Although there are a number of avenues for announcing new positions, employees are generally alerted to open positions via email. One employee feels that most managers he knows were hired internally. MarketStar prefers to train and develop their employees to prepare them for more responsibility. Candidates for internal promotions or transfers must meet minimal qualifications, have performed in a current position for a period of 12 months, and must not be in any disciplinary situations. The employees at MarketStar feel they have a better chance at open positions than someone externally. They also feel they can be rewarded for their experience and performance. MarketStar deserves high marks after review their internal hiring practices. MarketStar HR Characteristics Ratings We evaluated each HR Characteristics on a rating from 1-10, 1 being the worst and 10 being the best. . MarketStar Employee Survey 1. Do you feel secure in your job? Do you feel like you could work at Market Star for as long as you would like? All of the employees who responded answered that they currently do feel secure. However, one of them was laid off from another account prior to working on their current one or knew of others who had been laid off. 2. Did you feel you received enough training for your position? If so, what kind of training did you receive? The general consensus was that training was overall adequate but could be a little more frequent and in depth. Most training was done in person for new hire training, and online training throughout their employment. 3. Do you feel that you were selected as an employee based on your experience or credentials? Yes, all employees answered that past experience and credentials as well as having a good interview. 4. Do you feel that MarketStar shares the information, financials, future plans, etc,  that you are interested in? Most employees stated that they did not know. This probably means no. They do get occasional emails and know that some of it is posted on the employee website. 5. Do you feel like you are paid fairly for the work you do? All employees answered yes. How would you rate Marketstars benefits? Every employee answered either average or above average. * Above average * Average * Below average 6. Do you feel that you are empowered in your position? The answers on this one varied from yes because employees are given control over their territories and schedule, and no, because they are not involved in goal setting or other decisions. . Do you feel that you are given a fair chance when promotions become available? All answered yes based on how long they have been there and their performance. 8. Does MarketStar give internal employees a better shot at promotions than external employees? The perception from the employees was yes that internal employees were given priority over external employees. Sources www. marketstart. com, Scott Lewis à ¢â‚¬â€œ MarketStar Employee Other Employees from MarketStar