Research of Issues Faced by Wal-Mart and Its Effects on the Company

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Executive Summary

This proposal will highlight some issues in Wal-Mart, which is giving a negative prospect to the business success wise. Those issue will be examined which will be related to underpaying staff, loopholes in organizational strategy and some cost related analysis.

Introduction

Wal-Mart was established in 1962by Sam Walton when he was 44 year in Arkansas. The company became front-runner worldwide in merchandizing business from year 1970 and onward after it got public (Walmart.com, 2016). Company made great profits through their great supply chain network and huge purchasing strength. Nevertheless, in one of study in year 2016, company fourth quarter profit was down by 7.9 percent due to various issues both internally and externally (Calton, 2015). To find out more issues effecting company progress, a research was necessary to conduct.

Research Objectives:

The objective of this research is to highlight issues faced by Wal-Mart and its effects on the company.

Wal-Mart Internal Structural Issues.

Issues related to internal organization structure and their employees are some of serious issues faced by the company (Wood, 2015). Some of which are highlighted below,

Salary Theft:

Wal-Mart does not provide uniform to their employees and ask its employees to buy their own uniform for over the year whereas company should provide uniform to its employees (Koca, 2015). In one of other study, Wal-Mart in Pennsylvania was indicted of forcing its employees to work during break and meal times (Timilsina, 2015) and for which they were not paid and employees ended up in logging a lawsuit alongside company.

Female Employees underpaying

The employees in Wal-Mart U.S comprise of 57 percent females and regardless of this number, the female employees are being paid $1.16 less per hour in comparison to male employees, which makes it really difficult for the female employees to perform well in the company (Reed, Harding & Kelly, 2015). The females, who are pregnant, are facing worst conduct from the company. In one of the study by Mourad, Jaime & Garcia (2014) pregnant females forced to work in unsafe environment, and expected to work more than the defined workload. Therefore, company is facing many lawsuits filed by pregnant females.

Wal-Mart External Structural Issues

Cleaning issues in Wal-Mart Stores.

Wal-Mart CEO acknowledged that their stores are not clean. Customers are not happy with the dirty and disorderly stores and need to be improved (Kenny, 2014).

Selling Strategy

Wal-Mart known for selling fair and low pricing goods. This pricing policy has helped them attract big consumer market, however due to strong competitor challenge Wal-Mart is losing on great profits (Schuetz ,2015).

Ecommerce strategy:

Wal-Mart is facing great pressure from big retail giants like E-Bay and Amazon (Persky & Merriman, 2012). For that very reason, Wal-Mart is improving their online system for customer so they can order their groceries online and can pick up or deliver to their doorstep.

Business Strategies of Wal-Mart

Productivity

Wal-Mart has great number of employees working for them in U.S .Around 210,000 people work with Wal-Mart in the U.S. Company also assists in saving $2500 a year for employees with families (Taillie & Popkin, 2016). Their huge food discount raise American shopper’s health by around $50 million a year (Walmart.com, 2016).

Operation strategy

Wal-Mart known for selling cheap products. It function in ‘everyday low price’ methods where it does not leave any room for local and small businesses to operate with such low prices and hence close their businesses (Lieber, 2012). Therefore, Wal-Mart faces low pressure from competitors due to its lower prices.

Competitive Strategy

Wal-Mart has a huge successful warehouse and logistic strategy and enjoys high customer satisfaction due to their own logistic chain (Morillo, McNally & Block, 2015)

Research Methodology

The research methodology will include a pragmatic approach to assist in study, which will establish, on suitable evidence and proofs (Abdulghani et al., 2014). Logical research attitude followed to monitor and gather data from various models, theories and studies already available on the subject of Wal-Mart (Ellis, 2013). With the help of 40 Wal-Mart employees, it is recommended that a survey need to be done in order to know the issue employees face while working in Wal-Mart. For problems related to external issues interview with 4 of Wal-Mart managers will be scheduled. The focus of my research will also include a survey conducted with a set of 20 female employees of the organization in order to gather data of issues faced by female employees at work place. All this sample data for survey will collected from Wal-Mart employees. This survey will not include senior management and stakeholders as my research thesis based on issue mostly related to junior employees.

The recruitment strategy of Wal-Mart

Wal-Mart is considered as one of the biggest employer with around 2.5 million employees (Walmart.com , 2016). The HR department of Wal-Mart employees people with the help of various recruitment agencies and practices suitable for filling the vacancies. This hiring process carried out in more than 100 colleges and the organization prefers colleges with merchandizing associations (Pope & Pope, 2015)

Insight company report and advantage of the proposal

I examined from the proposal that, despite being the market leaders in the retail sector, Wal-Mart has a number of internal and external issues in its organization. Company claims that they provide best customer services but on the other hand, due to improper attitude with their employees the company is slightly losing a grip in the world market.

The company is attempting to make certain improvements to address these issues; however, lack of information poses challenges for them. This research has provided an insight in to the issues faced by Wal-Mart. Companies like Tesco and Asda have gained higher position than Wal-Mart whereas Wal-Mart position declined over the time. In addition, various other companies like Amazon, Kmart and various online businesses are giving tough time to Wal-Mart.

It was therefore important to do research that would assess Wal-Mart’s problems in depth and will help the company focus on those matters based on the references.

Legal and Ethical Obligations

For my research, I need to take care of legal and any confidential findings that need not to disclose. Proper permission from organization should take before sharing any legal or confidential data. Personal details of employees need to keep undisclosed. In that case, I need to store my research thesis where it is safe and not available to public unless all legal bindings met.

As part of ethical obligations employees or management involved have the right to reject being part of this research thesis. They have the right to decide whether their name should kept private or make their reviews public. Instead of using personal details and name, terms like participant can used to keep individuals identity secret.

Timelines and Report Format

Timeline for delivery of report 1-week 2-week 3-week

Summary and research objective

Data analysis 
Business strategies and methodologies/compiling research data 
Business legal and ethical obligation/ recommendations/ conclusion/presentation/referencing 

Conclusion

Therefore, it can be argued that Wal-Mart not only faces inside problems but also has external issues. Many employees have filed in court against the company, which means Wal-Mart administrative structure is exposed with defects. Also company has low price strategy but still it has to access online competitor markets. For action plan, Company needs to implement new steps in the right direction.

Still, Wal-Mart CEO has specified that the company has already made various modification to help them recover their ranking in the market. The company also lacks amount of data so that they can do improvement in various remaining sectors.

This business research thesis will therefore help Wal-Mart to be in position to overcome sectors where they lack improvement by accessing valuable data. Such approach and study will improve company value and profits in the market.

References

Abdulghani, H. M., Shaik, S. A., Khamis, N., Al-Drees, A. A., Irshad, M., Khalil, M. S. & Isnani, A. (2014). Research methodology workshops evaluation using the Kirkpatrick’s model: translating theory into practice. Medical teacher, 36(sup1), S24-S29.
Calton, J. (2015). A Decentred Stakeholder Network Path to Creating Mutual Value: Is Walmart Showing the Way?. Journal of Corporate Citizenship,2015(59), 82-91.
Ellis, C. (2013). Intrinsic ethnographic enquiry: towards a general practice research methodology. South African Family Practice, 55(1), 103-103.
Kenny, B. (2014). Walmart in South Africa: Precarious Labor and Retail Expansion. International Labor and Working-Class History, 86, 173-177.
Koca-Helvaci, Z. C. (2015). Walmart and its employee relations: organizational stance taking and legitimacy. On the Horizon, 23(4), 374-386.
Lieber, L. D. (2012). Considerations for attracting and retaining a qualified, diverse workforce. Employment Relations Today, 38(4), 85-92.
Morillo, J., McNally, C., & Block, W. E. (2015). The Real Walmart. Business and Society Review, 120(3), 385-408.
Mourad, A. L., Jaime, S. B. M., & Garcia, E. E. C. (2014). Sustainability & Ethics–key issues for packaging trends. In Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Life Cycle Assessment in the Agri-Food Sector (LCA Food 2014), San Francisco, California, USA, 8-10 October, 2014. (pp. 864-871). American Center for Life Cycle Assessment
Persky, J., & Merriman, D. (2012). Focus Issue WalMart. Economic Development Quarterly, 26(4), 283-284.
Pope, D. G., & Pope, J. C. (2015). When Walmart comes to town: Always low housing prices? Always?. Journal of Urban Economics, 87, 1-13.
Reed, T., Harding, J., & Kelly, W. (2015). Employee Class Actions Four Years After WalMart v. Dukes. Def. Counsel J., 82, 255.
Schuetz, J. (2015). Why are Walmart and Target Next-Door neighbors?.Regional Science and Urban Economics, 54, 38-48.
Taillie, L. S., Ng, S. W., & Popkin, B. M. (2016). Walmart and Other Food Retail Chains: Trends and Disparities in the Nutritional Profile of Packaged Food Purchases. American journal of preventive medicine, 50(2), 171-179.
Timilsina, B., 2015. Competitively Distinct Operations as a Key for Superior and Sustainable Business Performance: An Example from Walmart.Management, 10(3), pp.273-292.
Walmart.com,(2016). Walmart. Walmart.com. Retrieved 29 January 2020, from http://www.walmart.com/
Wood, A. J. (2015). Networks of injustice and worker mobilisation at Walmart. Industrial Relations Journal, 46(4), 259-274.

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