Company Overview
Tanglewood was originally founded in 1975 by best friends Tanner Emerson and Thurston Wood. The initial concept was a single store in Spokane Washington, named TannerWood, which sold a combination of outdoor clothing and equipment that the pair had designed themselves. With an outdoor theme as a distinguishing trademark each store is known to maintain its own concept while still maintaining the company’s mission goals and statement. Starting with 10 stores the company quickly expanded to over 243 stores. The company is composed of regional managers who oversee the company’s day to day operations. The company has pressing concerns in the organizations management strategies and is looking to improve the functionality while still keeping the historical view between stores. Business Strategy and Goals Tanglewood’s business strategy or niche has been an outdoor theme while expanding to furniture, clothing, and equipment and now they are planning to focus on competitor ideas. These would include food and having its own store products. All mission statements are similar and focus is mainly on providing employees with an open discussion work force.
Hiring is done within with no qualifications needed for management and no particular focus on training requirements and employee planning. Westward expansion is keeping the business running but the company can possibly improve sales by expanding to the east. This would enhance sales during different seasons and expand products for those timeframes. Acquire or Develop Talent The three biggest categories when looking at strategic staffing are acquire or develop talent, hire or retain and hire external or internal. From Tanglewood’s perspective it needs to use all of these techniques. A mixture of hiring and developing current talent is the best solution for Tanglewood. When making the decisions to acquire talent they must look at hiring peak performers and people that can come in to the company with great knowledge, speed, education and an open mind to help develop the current programs. Developing talent will help promote the internal morale and the growth of potential long term management individuals. Hire Yourself or Outsource Many companies are switching to an outsourcing program to recruit and hire. I think that the Tanglewood has proven already that the HR department is strong enough to grow with the expansion and handle all of the processes needed. Tanglewood is already in the process of hiring outside sources to improve company policies and procedures. External or Internal Hiring Hiring external employees can be an advantage, because external employees can bring new ideas to the organization. Committed employees are already promoted from within, which is also a good thing because hiring internal employees reduces the cost of training. Also, internal employees are already familiar with the organization, and will be able to perform much faster than external employees. The company is planning to consolidate the external hiring will be necessary upon the company having rapid growth with large vacancies in job openings. Core or Flexible Workforce The core workforce is your everyday people to the company. This is everyone that is a working person on a day to day basis. A flexible workforce is people that are on an as needed basis or temporary employees. The company follows the method of keeping core employees who already feel part of the organization. If Tanglewood has developed a store opening team, and has developed managers and store team members for success then the need for flexible workers is eliminated. The only time I can foresee Tanglewood using a flexible workforce is during the holiday season. Hire or Retain Retaining current employees is always important for any organization, it is important to maintain a low turnover rate. By retaining employees the organization will not have to spend so much money on hiring and training new employees. I think Tanglewood should focus on retaining employees, by rewarding them, and training them to prepare them for promotions. Cross training employees can be a good way to motivate employees, because it will push them to work hard if they want to be promoted to a higher position. National or Global
When looking at the expansion of the business it is important to understand that every aspect of the business will grow including all of the Human Resource jobs. The decision needs to be made weather or not to outsource these duties or keep them in house. HR outsourcing is the outsourcing of peripheral but necessary administrative tasks such as payroll, benefits, education/training, recruiting personnel, administration, to realize economies of scale and achieve standardization of services. Attract or Relocate In order for the company to attract sufficient employees who will display the required skills the company needs to relocate to areas that supply vast differences in skilled laborers. Situating businesses in country areas should be temporary but focusing on areas with large unemployment numbers will increase the labor coming to them. Tanglewood should also relocate business to college or industry areas to help supply employees who possess the degree for higher positions. Those who become employed can help keep sufficient training available while disposing new ideas of the new century. Overstaff or Understaff
The idea is to be fully staffed to meet the needs of the business. However trends tell us that sales fluctuate during low periods and sky rocket during the fourth quarter. The idea is to have the right amount of people at all times. During a period of expansion it is best practice to hire and stockpile talent. Not just overstaffing people remember to hire quality Short- or Long-Term Focus
I think the HR department should anticipate the growth and the talent levels needed to be successful in the expansion. One specific person needed to add to the staff is the acquisition of a talent manager. The talent manager can build a team for current and future growth which will benefit them for a long time. Person/Job or Person/Organization Match Person/Job and Person Organizational Match is deciding to hire a person that fits a job role or if the fit the overall organization. Employees who seek the job should be able to complete the required tasks. Specific or General KSAOs When understanding KSAO’S It is first best to understand that having a person with specific knowledge, skills, abilities and other outstanding characteristics is key to long term growth. If Tanglewood is looking to fill hole on the staffing chart then general KSAO’S are the way to go, however looking at long term growth and putting together a team for the future they might look at finding people with the talent needed instead of general hire. Tanglewood have to review the KSAOs of the employees they hire to assure that they will be capable of performing in the job. Exceptional or Acceptable Workforce Quality
The exceptional or acceptable quality basically comes down to money. If the company can afford to stockpile people with exceptional talent then your talent pool grows, however you can lose people when you have too much talent and no growth potential in the near future. Acceptable quality can be cheaper and easier to find but will come with the need to train and develop. Active or Passive Diversity Tanglewood should actively diversify their workforce environment, diversity is always good in a workplace. Different people will bring different ideas to the business. With the ever changing demographics of today society the need to diversify your workforce is a must. The advantage to actively searching is that your cliental are changing and if you are hiring from that talent pool your services will be used by a larger diverse community.

In conclusion, I would recommend Tanglewood to continue working on building the teams of the future. First things is to hire a talent manager, set up long term goals and allow the short term goals to be a part of the total decision and goal making process. Also, they should always look into the KSAOs of the individuals they hire, to make sure they are capable of doing the job. By doing that they will be able to build their team that will help them accomplish their short and long term goals.