Assignment Two: Human Resource Strategies of Google, Inc. & Wegmans Food Markets, Inc.
BUS 508-Contemporary Business
Alisha Ball
Dr. Solomon Fakinlede
Strayer University

Compare and contrast the two (2) industries you have identified in terms of size, products, services, customers, economic and regulatory environment.

Human resource management/ strategies refers to a various number of policies as well as practices that influence an organization significantly. It is related to employee behaviors, attitudes, as well as performance. These strategies are used to give organizations a competitive advantage particularly in the areas of recruitment, training and development, and diversity management. These policies and strategies help promote the practice of helping organizations to achieve their business goals as well as objectives by developing the knowledge and skills of employees in order for the organization to meet its mission as well vision. These strategies are often very strategic as well as goal oriented and helps organizations adapt to change as well as meet the needs of the consumers that they serve. These strategies help to make organizations some of the best companies to work for. Google, Inc. ranks number one on the 2015 Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work For. Google is a global company that develops technology including web browsers, smartphones, smart contact lenses and social media apps to help keep people connected. Their innovative technology as well as well as the people that they work for as well as their employees is what makes this industry stand out. The company has approximately 28,000 employees in the United States, where they operate over 30 locations. Google offers a very diverse and employee friendly work environment to promote its employees to accept challenges, be team-oriented, as well as embrace leadership rolls/skills. They also great perks such as tuition reimbursement, nap pods, free food, themed events, as well as recognition events in order for their employees to have a more relaxed environment. An article titled “Google Inc. SWOT Analysis” stated this organization also offers search, advertising, operating systems and platforms, enterprise, and hardware products. The company enjoys strong market share and global reach, which provides sustainable advantage as the company's entrenched position in the market enables it to drive revenues. Another organization, Wegmans Food Supermarkets, Inc. ranks number seven on the 2015 Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work For. Wegmans employees provide customers with a full range of grocery products and is a supermarket chain with 85 stores across New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Virginia, Maryland and Massachusetts. In addition to groceries, the stores feature pharmacies, restaurants and a wine, beer and spirits shop in some locations, according to a review of the Fortune 100 Best Companies to work For. Like Google, Wegmans promotes a positive environment with exercise programs and regular charitable projects. The company also stands out in the grocery business by offering tuition reimbursement for people working part-time and covering 85 to 100 percent of employees' and their dependents' health care premiums. Also like Google, Wegmans, has a large number of employees. According to the Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work For review the company employs approximately 43,211 people in the United States, where they operate 115 locations. Although these industries are very different in what they do being that Google is a media industry and Wegmans is a retail industry that sells food items, they both serve people and have significant opportunities as well as seeks to maintain the culture of creating new ways to boost employee development as well as training. These industries both have onsite health benefits, have ways in which the support the community, as well as have diverse employee populations. Describe the mission, vision, values and core business practices of each of the companies you selected. Google’s mission statement, “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible,” has led to rapid product development and strategic moves to trump competitors on a variety of fronts. (Goodman, 2009) The company primarily focuses on search; advertising; consumer content and platforms; and enterprise products. Some of the core business practices of google include getting to know their employees, creating new ways to reward and promote their high-performing employees, letting their employees own the problems they want to solve, allowing employees to function outside the company’s hierarchy, and have their employees’ performance reviewed by someone they respect for their objectivity and impartiality. (Manimala, M.J. 2013) The employees can operate and experience a free and transparent exchange of ideas in order to best meet the needs of the people in which they serve. Google technology includes the Google Chrome browser, YouTube, Google Maps, Android smartphones and smart contact lenses. The company is also developing a self-driving car. Overall, their managers trust them to carry out these responsibilities without micromanaging them and their core value is to create technology to make life easier and better for everyone.

Wegmans is dedicated to providing customers with a wide selection of quality local and international products. In 2014, Consumer Reports named the company the best grocery store in the United States. Some of the most notable human resource practices of this organization are selective hiring, employment security, competitive compensation, extensive training, information sharing, and egalitarianism and empowerment. Wegmans’ employee practices show that treating and nurturing people as assets can translate into high performance. At Wegmans they value a diverse workforce and their employees are empowered to make decisions to improve their work and benefit their company, so they seek candidates who want to be involved, are open to change, are continuously improvement-minded and enjoy sharing their ideas. Overall, their mission is to help make great meals easy so our people and our customers can live healthier, better lives and their core business practice includes culinary and hospitality is and they select people who are passionate about food to create delicious meals for customers to promote high quality service that is fast-paced in-store and in their free-standing restaurants.
Recommend tree to five (3-5) possible HR strategies that will support each organization’s mission, vision, values and core business practices for each company. Support your recommendations. For both of these companies I recommend that they strengthen their recruitment strategies, to be more clear and concise of their education requirements, and strengthen their measures of success. Although these companies both do a significant job with these HR strategies they could always improve on ways in which they can do better in the future. In terms of recruiting, each company can take a closer look at what they seek to accomplish within their organization as well as potentially consider alternate staffing. This allows these companies to hire personnel other than direct full time employment. With this recommendation these companies could employ if they need extra workers for only part of the year to meet the needs of the people in which they serve. This can be through temporary job assignments or internships. This allows the company to explore young talent while also helping to develop more knowledge for the future. Clear education requirements can save these companies time and money on hiring applicant’s that do not seek to meet the needs or do not seem that they can carry out the mission and vision of the organization. These requirements should be very clear and concise so that applicants know what is expected of them so that they can perform at the highest performance level that seeks to identify their duties and responsibilities. Lastly, both of these organizations could improve on how they measure their success by having more consumer input This would let Google as well as Wegmans know how their customers feel that they are meeting their needs as well as what can be done to create better ways to assist consumers in the future.
Identify how your recommended HR strategies will promote a competitive advantage for each company within their industry. Provide a rationale for your position. The recommendations will promote a competitive advantage by increasing training and development and adding more diversity by strengthening recruitments skills so that these organizations acknowledge a variety of individual characteristics that can promote growth and change. Measuring success an help to create and promote a completive helping to advantage by helping to more target and achieve organizational goals as well as build more morale for employees to share with consumers. In conclusion it is evident that human resource management are significant tools both found in Google as well as Wegmans as well as many other industries. These strategies help to develop and strengthen employee opportunities as well as ways in which organizations seek to carry out their mission, vision, and values. For this reason human resource management should be approached in a dynamic manner to help adapt to organizational changes.

References
Google Inc. (2015). Google Inc. SWOT Analysis, 1-10.

Goodman, A. (2009) Winning Results with Google AdWords. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Manimala, M. J., & Wasdani, K. P. (2013). DISTRIBUTED LEADERSHIP AT GOOGLE: LESSONS FROM THE BILLION DOLLAR BRAND. Ivey Business Journal, 77(3), 12.

Ezzedeen, S., Hyde, C., & Laurin, K. (6006). Is Strategic Human Resource Management Socially Responsible? The Case of Wegmans Food Markets, Inc. Employee Responsibilities & Rights Journal, 18(4), 295-307. doi:10.1007/s10672-006-9026-7