Enhancing Employee Relations at Unilever: Impact, Compliance, and Organizational Success

Unilever PLC, founded in 1929, is headquartered in London, UK. It offers its product or services in approximately more than 189 countries, owning around 400 brands. The company operates to provide home products, food and beverages, personal and beauty products. It offers wide range of products to its consumers worldwide. Unilever is one of the top soap manufacturer at international level. Get best assignment Help from Instant assignment Help @51% off.

Value and Significance of employee relations along with the fundamentals of employment law

Employee relationship plays a crucial role for the business organisation as it assists in building positive working environment, resulting in increased involvement and commitment of the workforce. An appreciated and acknowledged employee is considered as a valuable asset for any organisation (Barnes and Cheng, Y., 2023). In order to improve the employee relations at workplace, there are numerous practices and methods that can be followed by the company, such as performance reward on the basis of evaluation, on boarding assistance and effectively resolving the current grievances and conflicts of the staffs. Constructive employee relations can be ensured by the firm through efficiently communicating the organisation's vision, encouraging the work-life balance and supporting them to grab opportunities to grow professionally.

Significance of the Employee relations

Here is the significance of the working relation of employees that can be understood with respect to Unilever PLC:

• Intensifies the employee loyalty-An organisation's culture primarily affects its employees. Retention of employees majorly depends on working environment. Productive and supportive working relations ensure a sense of satisfaction and motivation among the employees, resulting in increased retention rate. With reference to Unilever, it makes certain to provide their employees with various initiatives for their employees like loyalty bonus schemes along with discounted Unilever's products in form of loyalty reward.
• Increases Motivation- An employee's productivity can be optimised with the help of blooming and constructive work environment, motivating the employees to enhance their efficiency. Positive work environment is not just restricted to efficient interaction but also must include acknowledging and appreciating the employees' efforts (Fu, Ji and Jing, 2023). This results in encouragement for employees to contribute further in the success of the company. In case of Unilever, it has been observed that the workforce becomes more productive and dedicated, when they are acknowledged with initiatives of loyalty bonuses and rewards.
• Minimised probability of conflicts- Conflicts among the workforce and departments can be a factor which pulls the organisation down. These conflicts might be resultant of disagreement between the unsatisfied workforce. This can be eliminated or resolved through ensuring constructive employee relations in the company. Similarly, Unilever has made certain to diminish the arising conflicts at the workplace by promoting efficacious and fruitful environment at workplace.
• Enhances the confidence and faith- A  better employee relationship allows the enhancement of faith and confidence among the workforce. It further aids the firm to retain efficient and productive skill force (Garrison, 2023). Similarly in case of Unilever, a better relationship with its staff guides them to become a successful leader in the market.
• Employee satisfaction-An Organisation with impactful, better and positive relationship with their staffs generally tends to be more commercial, having minimal staff turnover. A satisfied employee result in overall optimised productivity of the company (Gong and Sims, 2023). Being the reason, Unilever is making sure to conduct regular surveys to analyse the employee satisfaction that can be beneficial to deal with increased staff turnover, which has been proven as a dissatisfying factor among their employees.

Employment law

Employment law is the legislation which controls the relationship between employer and employee. It suggests that the organisation with more than one staff has to abide by the regulations laid down in it (Carlson, and et. al., 2023). The fundamentals of employment law are said to be defining the layout law, including aspects such as Minimum wage, Labour relations, employee benefits, family and medical leave, employment discrimination, etc. Thus, Unilever ensures to apply the fundamentals of employment law in their practices. It is committed to provide fair remuneration, promoting equality, inclusion and diversity within their organisation. The recruitment policy of the company is solely based on qualification criteria irrespective of social and demographic backgrounds (Colfer, and et. al., 2023). Other than this, Unilever provides its staffs with minimum salary package, meeting the standards prescribed by Employment law.  get free examples of assignment of Instant assignment help to achieve A+ Grade in your assignment.

Different types of rights, duties and obligations with reference to employer and employee

The employers as well as employees possess the rights and obligations in the business. These responsibilities are fulfilled by both, employers and employees. This emphasizes the relevance for both to comprehend their rights and duties, resulting in improved efficiency and satisfaction. Similarly, Unilever ensures to sustain the rights, duties and obligations of employer and employees through the following:

• Safe environment- The major significant duty of an employer is to provide a healthy and safe workplace for the employees. It further helps the company to build a better reputation in the market. Thus, Unilever ensures to define and communicate responsibilities in well manner within the company, so that the operations are conducted smoothly.
• Arrangements- The employees in the company are in charge of to ensure the safe arrangements by preventing the utilisation of dangerous substances, detrimental products and chemicals. The Unilever has laid down regulations for the application and storage of such substances (Gupta and Krishnamurti, 2023). Both the employees and employer are aware of their rights and obligations of this arrangement.
• Equality- It is the duty of the employer to ensure fair, equality and discrimination free environment for employees in the company. In Unilever, equality is ensured and no such issue is being faced by the employees, as all legislations are maintained in accordance to the employees.
• Necessities-It is the responsibility of employer to ensure that the basic necessities and amenities like clean workplace, sanitation, drinking water and other are provided to the workforce in the company. The Unilever's employer takes due care to provide these basic amenities to their staffs. This has also resulted in decreased staff turnover.

It is crucial for the company or manager to effectively deal with the components affecting the employment relationship. This will further aid  the company to build productive and better association with the employees. Here are some components which must be considered by the managers.

• Job responsibilities- The responsibilities of employees must be clearly communicated by the employers to eliminate the chances of misunderstanding and conflicts.
• Organisational culture- The manager is obligated to create a work culture which is well managed, improving the employer and employee relationship in the company (Kwon and Kim, 2020). Unilever emphasizes on enhancing the culture as it will positively impact the overall organisation.
• Discrimination- Any type of discrimination results in setback in the success of the organisation. The leaders of Unilever emphasizes on ensuring equality within the company to build positive environment. Get best accounting assignment Help. We have a team of experienced writers who will provide you best quality of assignment.

Recommendations for Unilever company to manage the employment relationship

In order to effectively manage the working relationship in Unilever company, the following mechanisms can be practised:

• Open communication- The most appropriate way to sustain effectiveness in the employment relationship is through open communication, resulting in productive relationship. Unilever can adopt this practise to preserve effectiveness in relationship with their workforce.
• Invest in employees- A company should necessarily invest in the training for employees which can be fruitful for the company. This can improve the retention rate of employees (Storey,  2023). Therefore, Unilever should not only invest in employees but also fund in training the employees to make certain that the errors on the production and management part is avoided. Unilever has already started to invest a substantial amount in their staff training.
• Showing Gratitude- It has been recommended that Unilever can implement the scheme of loyalty bonuses and rewards to express their gratitude towards the dedicated employees (Mikkelson and Hesse, 2023). Company can also take initiatives to provide performance bonuses and appreciation seminars to motivate the employees.
• Regular feedback- Reviewing and providing frequent feedback will help the employees to take corrective actions as and when required. This can be practised by Unilever not to specify mistakes, but to recognise the areas which needs to be improved.

Analysis of the stakeholder and impact of the stakeholders' engagement on the employment relationship

The very first stage included in the management of stakeholder in an organisation is stakeholder analysis. It is referred to as a crucial element adopted by the leaders to win the people's support, to be successful (Lee and Raschke, 2023). Thus, it has been proven advantageous to Unilever, as it aids in determining and planning the design of the projects, creating the comprehension and achieving the competitive edge in the  market. Here are the three steps included in the stakeholder analysis with reference to Unilever:

Identifying the stakeholders:

The stakeholder analysis begins with the identification of stakeholders associated with the company (Marrucci, Daddi and Iraldo, 2023). This step comprises of recognising the individuals or institutions who will be affected by Unilever's operations, power of decision making and has influence on the success and failure of the company. This step must be effectively implemented as it will aid the company to comprehend their stakeholders. Further, it will also enable the company in decision making for the business operations.

Stakeholders:

Here is the Stakeholder Analysis for the Unilever company:

• Government is deemed to have low interest and high power with reference to Unilever. It has no such interest in the conduct of the business, however has the authority and power to collect taxes from them. So it is necessary for Unilever to ensure they meet all the legislations laid down by the authority.
• Customers are considered to have low interest and high power. The primary concern of customers are to receive the goods and services at reasonable rate. However, they have a high power to influence the decision making of the company.
• Shareholders are said to have high interest with high power in the business functions. They are concerned in optimising the profits and also have authority to vote in the shareholders meeting over the important discussions.
• Employeeshave high interest and low power. The main interest of employees is to receive a handsome amount of salary. This can be he reason for them to exit and affecting the functioning of company.
• Suppliersare said to have low power and high interest. Their interest is to provide the raw materials to the company at good prices. Unilever being the largest company, suppliers have the interest to be connected with them.
• LocalCommunitieshave high interest and low power in the Unilever's functioning. This suggests that they influence the company's welfare activities and employment generation programs. Also, company has to ensure to adopt sustainable practices to keep the environmental authorities satisfied and to avoid any objections from them.  

Understanding the key stakeholders:

It is essential for Unilever to consider the perception of the prime stakeholders while executing any project. It also involves the consideration of emotional and economical interest. For Unilever, engagement of stakeholder is thus deduced to be impactful in the decision making by acknowledging the stakeholders' requirements (Kaginalkar and et. al., 2023). This will also assist the company to ensure avoidance of any conflicts from the stakeholders' side. Effective involvement of stakeholders will  help Unilever to nurture better relationships and trust between the company and stakeholders to take corrective course of action. Furthermore, this process will enable improved retention of employees in Unilever as it builds positive and constructive employment relationship  through positive work environment. We have team of experts who will help you to complete your Finance assignment Help.

The impact of positive as well as negative employee relations on different stakeholders

The working relationship has the potential to bring a difference in the success of the company. In case of Unilever, the effective influence of its employee relation is that it assists the company to advance towards success and development, since it recommends numerous recommendations for employer as well as employees and having productive association with the stakeholders too. This helps in building a reputable brand image for the company (Eddula, Peraka and Biligiri, 2023). Also, the effectiveness of working relationship is impactful in having an efficient communication and positive culture within the company. However, the ineffective impact of working relationship can result in creation of hindrances for Unilever to grow. This may further result in overall decreased productivity of the company to accomplish its objectives. Employees are referred to as valuable asset for all the organisations, thus, it is of utmost importance to have good employee relationships. As it results in minimising the chances for conflict among the employees. Also, to accomplish the goal of customer experience, it is necessary for a firm to have positive employee relationship. Through this, Unilever is enabled to establish better relationship with the stakeholders linked with the company, resulting in pro longed advantage for the company. Also, it helps the firm to attain the determined objectives, earn increased revenues and execute the task successfully within stipulated time.

CONCLUSION

From the above report, it can be concluded that effective employee relationship is considered as significant component that decides the fate of the company. It assists the company to treat their workforce in right manner that advances the company to its success. Thus, it can be inferred that positive working relation plays a crucial role in managing and satisfying the stakeholders. Further, it can be deduced how company should implement the practices to ensure the right and laws of employees are met within the organisation. Company must ensure that employment laws are respectfully practised in order to influence the opinion of stakeholder with regards to the organisation. Through adequate analysis and evaluation of impact of employee relations on stakeholders, company can deal with arising conflicts in the firm. This builds better image of the company in the eyes of people and stakeholders.

Read More - Employee Wellbeing

REFERENCES

Books and Journals

• Balkin, D.B. and Werner, S., 2023. Theorizing the relationship between discretionary employee benefits and individual performance. Human Resource Management Review, 33(1), p.100901.
• Barnes, S. and Cheng, Y., 2023. Employee approval of CEOs and firm value: Evidence from Employees' choice awards. Journal of Corporate Finance, 78, p.102341.
• Carlson, R., and et. al., 2023. Employment law. Aspen Publishing.
• Colfer, B., and et. al.,, 2023. Introduction: New Institutional Arrangements for Safeguarding Labour Standards. In Protecting the Future of Work: New Institutional Arrangements for Safeguarding Labour Standards (pp. 1-19). Emerald Publishing Limited.
• Eddula, S.V., Peraka, N.S.P. and Biligiri, K.P., 2023. Stakeholder-Oriented Optimization of Pavement Maintenance Interventions Using Multi-Criteria Decision-Making Approach. International Journal of Pavement Research and Technology, pp.1-13.
• Fu, J., Ji, Y. and Jing, J., 2023. Rank and file employee satisfaction and the implied cost of equity capital. Journal of Accounting, Auditing & Finance, 38(1), pp.182-210.
• Garrison, W., 2023. The Changing Nature of Employee Relations and Working Conditions. In The New World of Work (pp. 51-74). Routledge.
• Gong, B. and Sims, R.L., 2023. Psychological contract breach during the pandemic: How an abrupt transition to a work from home schedule impacted the employment relationship. Journal of Business Research, 154, p.113259.
• Gupta, K. and Krishnamurti, C., 2023. Does employees' interest matter more than shareholders' interest in determining cash management policy?. International Review of Economics & Finance, 84, pp.568-589.
• Kaginalkar, A., and et. al., 2023. Stakeholder analysis for designing an urban air quality data governance ecosystem in smart cities. Urban Climate, 48, p.101403.
• Kwon, K. and Kim, T., 2020. An integrative literature review of employee engagement and innovative behavior: Revisiting the JD-R model. Human Resource Management Review, 30(2), p.100704.
• Lee, M.T. and Raschke, R.L., 2023. Stakeholder legitimacy in firm greening and financial performance: What about greenwashing temptations?☆. Journal of Business Research, 155, p.113393.
• Marrucci, L., Daddi, T. and Iraldo, F., 2023. Institutional and stakeholder pressures on organisational performance and green human resources management. Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, 30(1), pp.324-341.
• Mikkelson, A.C. and Hesse, C., 2023. Conceptualizing and Validating Organizational Communication Patterns and Their Associations with Employee Outcomes. International Journal of Business Communication, 60(1), pp.287-312.
• Storey, J., 2023. Human resource management. In Encyclopedia of Human Resource Management (pp. 182-184). Edward Elgar Publishing.

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