ASSIGNMENT

Reward Strategy



Reward Strategy

Introduction

Flexible working practices and indeed the concept of 'work-life balance' became an important focus for US government policy throughout the 1990s, with Lewis & Cooper (2005) believing that this was mainly in response to the work-family pressures experienced by dual earner couples where both parents were employed. Whereas Fagan et al (2006) understood there to be five main drivers that influenced the development of flexible working practices: namely; globalisation; competition and productivity; learning and the knowledge economy; active ageing; the long hours culture and work and caring roles. This view is supported by Faulkner (2001) who believed that the 'business case' for flexible working partially revolves around the identification of recruitment pools (e.g. women and older workers) that have yet to be fully exploited.

The Employer and Flexible Working

Advocates of flexible working would be keen to highlight the benefits of such practices for the employer, but it should be acknowledged that flexible working also brings management and organisational challenges. Edward (2006), suggested that in this highly competitive labour market, in order to attract and retain staff, work-life policies and procedures are a must for any organisation. Strategic Direction (2008) explained that organisations that take a strategic view of flexible working practises are more likely to succeed and flexible working should be viewed as a business tool which in turn allows employers to get more value from their best asset; the employee. The Managerial Law Review (2006, pg.536) concurred that success in a business environment involves having a flexible workforce in order to meet changeable demands. Planned flexible working projects can bring many benefits to an organisation for both the employee and organisation, such as improved performance on service delivery and customer satisfaction, efficiency savings, reduced recruitment and improved retention, improved employee morale, increased productivity and overall positive impact on the working environment (Strategic Direction, 2008, pg.9).

Discussion

Rewards is one of the important elements to motivate employees for contributing their best effort to generate innovation ideas that lead to better business functionality and further improvise company performance both financially and non-financially. Edward and Christopher (2006) have mentioned that people do not automatically come to work, continue to work, or work hard for an organization. We see that people need motivation to share and fulfill the organization's vision. Undoubtedly, reward strategy and systems are the mechanisms that make this happen. Since 1980s, many research and studies have been done on the reward aspect in other countries especially in the United State and China (Bowen, 2000, pp. 54).

According to Armstrong (2000, pg.232), reward strategy is the policy that provides specific directions for the organization to develop and design programmes which will ensure its rewards the performance outcomes supporting the achievement of its business goals. Vicki (1994) agreed that reward strategy gives specific direction to how the company will design its individual reward programs.

Foundational rewards are core to every organization pay, benefits and other conditions of employment. Performance-based rewards include incentives and other tactics linked to achieving specific results, and ...