The 4Ps model

The Organisation that I work for is called La Senza. La Senza is a Luxury Lingerie store that provides women of all ages a unique shopping experience. La Senza employs over 300 members of staff and has over 70 stores across the UK. The Company has now expanded and has franchises across Europe and Ireland. La Senza entered the UK market in 1996 started up by Theo Pathitis (Dragons Den). Since the business was set up the business has won awards and has been a successful business. Theo Pathitis sold the business in 2006 to Lion Capital, a private equity company and still has shares in the business.
La Senza is a flat type organisation and is known as a medium sized enterprise as described in Donald Currie’s Introduction to Human Resource Management book. The HR department is located in Hayes at head office. There is limited communication with the branch and the HR department unless there are major problems or it is relating to new recruits or leavers. Permanent members of staff are given an employee handbook which they will need to refer to for more information on policy and procedures.
he HR Manager advised me that La Senza previously operated as a basic Personnel function but has recently changed to a HR function and has changed the name over to HR instead of Personnel. She advised me that the business is expanding and there are more duties and responsibilities to take on so changing to HR is more relevant than a Personnel function. I have conducted a survey amongst 5 store managers to find out if they understand the duties of the HR department and if they feel the HR department are effective. Most of the managers understand why HR is needed within La Senza and most find the HR department is useful to them.

4 Manager Felt that HR needed to be more involved with them and they all feel HR should improve on the communication with the branches. 4 Managers felt that having a HR department is effective to the business but 1 manager thought it was not. The reason was that she felt she did most of the HR duties in the branch so didn’t really deal with HR very often. (Please see attached Results) 1. Do you understand why HR is needed within the company? 2. Do you feel that the HR department is useful? 3. Would you want to contact HR directly with your problem or speak to your manager?
Do you feel the HR department need to be more involved with store management? 5. Do you think that the HR department needs to improve on their communication? 6. Do you find the HR department effective? Secondary Results I have read chapter 3 of Introduction to Human Resource Management by Donald Currie and have gained a better understanding of a role in HR. Table 3. 1: example of an analysis of HR responsibilities (Donald Currie) Level Responsibility and Specialism Senior HR Managers Participation in corporate-level strategic decision making Formulation of HR Strategy and policies
Advising other managers on the implementation of HR policies and procedures Middle-level HR Managers and Specialist Managing specialist sections including: HR planning Recruitment and selection Employee development Performance and reward Employee relations Health and Safety management of the HR department HR Officers and administrators Day-to-day administration of the HR department Updating and maintaining secure and confidential records Ensuring efficient organisation of events including: interviews, induction and training, liaising with colleges and universities, attending career inventions.