Unit 14 Working with and leading people Assignment British Airways

Introduction

People are the major contributors to the success of the organisation and it is very important to recruit and select right people for the right job for which effective recruitment and selection processes are required. This project is made with an aim to develop the skills and knowledge which are required for working in the organisations with many other people. This report investigates the recruitment and selection methods needed to fulfil the requirements of an airline company. It also includes the concepts of team building, motivation, communication within workplace and leading them to achieve the aims of the organisation by working together.

Section 1- Lo 1: Be able to use recruitment, selection and retention procedures

1.1 The preparation of job analysis, job description, person specifications.

Working in the British Airways, largest airlines in the United Kingdom, creates a responsibility to perform job with excellence. British airways carry a lot of passengers which creates a need to provide excellent services by the staff of the company to provide them satisfaction. Cabin crew is the staff of airlines that provide services to the customers during the flights. They are trained and skilled to help customers during any situation or emergency arises throughout the flights (Cordner & Cordner, 2011).

British airways need some fresh and new employees to recruit in the company for filling the cabin crew requirements. For recruitment and selection of a new employee, different documents are required as many laws and regulations are to be followed. Below given are the details about different documents which are needed to recruit and select the appropriate talent in the required position of British airways (Cordner & Cordner, 2011).

British Airways is planning a hiring of 5 new cabin crew members as there is a need in the company. The human resource department will prepare the following documents for the selection:

Job analysis:

It is the process to recognize the details of roles and responsibilities of a particular job and functions required to be performed at job (Cordner & Cordner, 2011).

The job analysis of British Airways- cabin crew members of British Airways includes flight attendants, Stewards or Air hostess. The job of the cabin crew members is to take care of the safety and welfare of the passengers and for their comfort. It is legally required to have a minimum cabin crew in the flights. Cabin crew members are the face of British Airways and they are expected to fulfil following responsibilities:

Major responsibilities

• To greet the passengers
• To guide the passengers in the flights
• To demonstrate the emergency procedures
• To carry out pre-flight duties
• To make announcements
• To serve meals and drinks to passengers
• To complete paperwork after the flights (Redrup-May, 2010).

Job description

Last date for application: 31.12.2016
Location: Britain
Salary: £25,000 per annum
Vacancy: 5

Cabin crew members are required to fulfil certain responsibilities and they are required to possess some qualities and skills.

• To provide first aid to the passengers
• To ensure all the equipment’s are working in the flight
• To demonstrate safety requirements and emergency procedures to passengers
• To maintain the standard of British Airways during flights
• To carry out pre-flight duties
• To make announcements, sell duty free goods and serve meals to the passengers
• To complete paperwork regarding the details of the flights.

(Redrup-May, 2010)

Skills and knowledge required

• Confident and knowledgeable
• Friendly and positive attitude
• Self-motivated and committed
• Good communication skills
• Required to have a valid degree

Person specification

The main characteristics of cabin crew member include:

• Be positive and confident in difficult situations
• Be Clear and excellent in communication skills
• Be calm and act quickly under emergency situations
• Be committed for providing services to people
• Enjoy team work

(Redrup-May, 2010)

1.2 Assess  the impact of legal, regulatory and ethical considerations that are needed for the recruitment and selection process

When the recruitment and selection process of cabin crew of British Airways starts, the human resource manager has to take care of some rules and regulations which not only minimises the risks but helps in getting the best suitable candidate for the company. Various rules and regulations which are considered and their impact on recruiting and selecting the cabin crew members for British Airways are:

• Equality act: While recruiting or selecting the candidates for cabin crew, the Human Resources department cannot make discrimination among the candidates on the basis of age, gender, disability or any other factor. The candidates should be selected on the basis of their skills and capabilities and not on any other basis (Kadam, et. al., 2016).
• Sex discrimination act: It is seen that people discriminate among different genders and often give more preference to a single gender but should not be followed in British Airways. If any candidate qualifies for the job, irrespective of their gender, should be recruited and selected.
• Race relation act: British Airways cannot advertise for the position of cabin crew for some particular race or nationality because it will be against the law of Race Relation Act. Any person who qualifies for the position should be given chance irrespective of the race, he/ she belongs to (Kadam, et. al., 2016).

Also, the HR department of British Airways has to check that whether the candidate have legal right or permissions to work in UK or not and the person is legally qualified and hold a required degree or not. The employee should be informed about the correct terms of employment like hours of work, salaries, leaves, other terms and conditions (Kadam, et. al., 2016).

1.3 Take part in the selection process

Once the candidate’s technical and other skills are identified, these should be assessed in the candidates who applied. A process of selection of candidates is followed which includes certain steps where the most suitable candidate will be selected for the company (Mooring, 2016). The selection process for cabin crew of British Airways, in which the HR department takes part, is given below:

• Selecting a panel for interview:  A panel will be selected for taking interviews of the candidates for the job profile of cabin crew in British Airways. This panel is selected by the HR manager of the company where the knowledgeable people of different departments will be taking part so that the candidate can be tested on every basis.
• Short listing of candidates: The selection panel will shortlist the candidates for interview from the available applications (CV’s) received through advertisements on web and newspaper. The short listing is done on the basis of academic scores, aptitude tests, skills and experience. The shortlisted candidate is called for an interview (Mooring, 2016).
• Interviews: Here, the shortlisted candidates are called and one by one, they are asked certain questions about their background, experience, personal interests, education and skills.
• Appointment letter: Once, the candidate clears an interview, he is provided with an appointment letter mentioning the day and date of joining with all the other documents of formality (Mooring, 2016).

1.4 How have you contributed to the selection process to make it more effective

The selection process by the British airways is well suited to select the best candidate for the cabin crew of the company’s flights. To make it more effective, I as a Human Resource Manager, took part in the selection process to prepare the documents which are published in the advertisements to recruit the maximum candidates by attracting them. I also took part in selecting the perfect selection panels which consists of the experts of different fields to check the overall qualities of the candidate (Simone, 2010).

I also assisted the selection panel in short listing the best candidate out of the received applications and helped the selection panel to prepare questions which are to be asked from those candidates. Also, to end the selection process successfully, I prepared the documents which are to be delivered to the candidates for informing them for their appointment in the company and then call them individually to congratulate them and inform them personally so that no information can be missed out. I will also assist the new employees in completing their joining formalities and making the process smooth and eliminate hurdles for the new employees of British Airways (Simone, 2010).

Section 2: LO 2:   Understand the styles and impact of leadership

Presentation

Notes: The difference between management and leadership will be explained in the presentation and different leadership styles will be discussed referring to different situations in the organisation. Virgin Atlantic is facing a loss of sales in recent years which have to be considered and for that, the employees should be motivated so that the sales can be increased. The ways to motivate staff of Virgin Atlantic will be discussed in further presentation (Sawati, et. al., 2011).

Notes: Virgin Atlantic which is a Joint Venture between Virgin group and Delta airlines. This company is facing the loss and decline of sales in the recent years. The total passengers carried by Virgin Atlantic has dipped a little in the recent years which is a cause of concern for the company because the competition is high in the industry and there are lot of other players which are doing well in the area. To fight the competition, the company needs to work on its leadership styles and strategies along with the motivation given to workers (Alloubani, et. al., 2015).

Notes: Leadership is significant for providing direction to many people in the organisation. Leadership are of different types which play different roles and have different significance in various situations in the organisation. Virgin Atlantic has to adopt some leadership styles which help it in managing its business properly and the types of leadership will be discussed to select the most suitable one for the company (Alloubani, et. al., 2015).

Notes: For being good leader, certain skills and attributes are needed so that the leader can direct and guide a group of people in the most effective way. These skills are like:

• Excellent communication skills: It is among the most important skills because excellent communication skills of the leader will determine the flow of communication in the group.
• Interpersonal skills: These skills shows that how person interact with individuals and in groups. It’s the ability of the leader to get along with everyone.
• Decision making powers: The leader has power to take decisions for the team so that the work can be completed according to the plans and on time (Behery & Al-Nasser, 2016).
• Motivation: A leader is a self-motivated person and motivates other people in the team to perform better and to give their best to the company.
• Confidence: A leader is a confident person who does not lose hopes and creates confidence in others to perform better
• Ombudsperson: A leader acts as an ombudsperson in the team who acts as an intermediary between the team and the managers.
• Positive attitude: A leader should have positive attitude towards work so that the team is developed positively and no negative environment can hamper the performance of the team (Behery & Al-Nasser, 2016).
• Problem solving: A leader should have problem solving approach so that he can solve every difficult situation quickly and efficiently.

Notes: Management: It refers to the systematic arrangement and organisation of people and resources for achieving goals of the company. It is task oriented and aims to complete the tasks by organising them well. It focuses on managing all the activities well so that the ultimate results can be obtained.

Leadership: It is an art of leading others for achieving common goal and objectives. It focuses on motivating people so that they can perform in the most effective way and it is also people oriented (Behery & Al-Nasser, 2016).

Notes:

Different leadership styles are:

• The Autocratic Leadership Style: This type of style is followed when the leaders does not involve the team members and takes any decision on their own. They take decisions and pass on to the team members. They have authority to impose their views and ideas on the employees.
• The Democratic Leadership Style: This style of leadership is also called participative leadership style. Here, the leaders take opinions and views of the employees while taking any decision but the final decision is made by the leader himself (Clinebell, et. al., 2013).
• Laissez Faire Leadership style: In this leadership style, the highly experienced employees are given the task of taking decisions and the leader does not get involved. Here, there is a lack of control of managers on the employees.

Notes: Different leadership styles are used for different situations in the company. A leader should modify his style of leadership matching to these situations like in the situation of crisis in the company, autocratic style of leadership is most suitable. In these situations, a leader has to take all control in his hands to avoid further losses and to handle the situation (Clinebell, et. al., 2013).

In the case of changes in the company, participative leadership style is best suitable because the manager needs fresh ideas and views of different team members so that the change can be brought to Virgin Atlantic for its better operations.

In the case of implementation of a new strategy to improve declining sales of the company, a combination of autocratic and participative leadership should be adopted because it needs a strong control over the activities and also needs new vision and thoughts to complete and achieve the goals successfully (Clinebell, et. al., 2013).

Notes: Motivation is created through some external and internal factors which maintain the commitment in an individual to work and also creates a feel of giving his best to the organisation. Motivation is given by the leaders to the employees for taking best performance in return.

Notes: The sales of Virgin Atlantic are declining and to bring the sales numbers on track, there are different methods by which the employees can be motivated:

• Monetary rewards- for achieving more sales, bonus or incentives can be provided to motivate staff.
• Recognition: For achieving high numbers, the employees can be given recognition in front of whole team which motivates him to work well.
• Employee involvement: By involving employee in the decisions and by taking his views will create motivation in them.
• Responsibilities: By giving responsibilities to the employees, the leader can motivate the employees.
• Communication: Effective communication is the key to success and this can bring motivation among the team members (Clinebell, et. al., 2013).

Notes: It can be included that the presentation is about the characteristics and traits of a good leader and how different leadership styles can be adopted for handling different situations in the company. It is discussed that there are differences between a manager and a leader. Manager is concerned for arrangements of resources to achieve a common goal of the company while a leader focuses on its team members so that they can provide their best to the company.

Motivation is an important concept which can be provided to the employees for gaining more sales for the company and to control the declining sales of Virgin Atlantic in the airline industry of UK (Clinebell, et. al., 2013).

Section 3: LO 3:

This report contains the benefits of working in a team in British Airways. The team is of 10 members of cabin crew. The report contains that how the leader of this team handles the conflicts in the team and the effectiveness of the team has been reviewed in satisfying the customers of the company.

3.1 Assess the benefits of team working in the airline and the team should be the cabin crew consisting of at least six members

Team working is essential for an organisation. It brings success to the company because the collaborative efforts of all the team members are used for achieving the objectives of the company. Working in airlines and in the team of 10 members of cabin crew, it is very important to maintain good teamwork in order to provide best services to the customers. It not only increases the customer loyalty but the reputation of the brand (Saleem, 2015). The benefits of team working in British airways as a cabin crew team are:

• It creates happy passengers: Team working reflects the happiness of passengers. In the situations of emergency, the team of cabin crew can effectively handle it by supporting each other. They together put their efforts to create safety for the passengers.
• Efficiency in work: From the perspective of cabin crew, it is not possible to work efficiently without any team work. He team’s support is necessary for providing best services to the customers (Saleem, 2015).
• Development of employee relations: Teamwork not only satisfies the passengers but also the members of the crew. They develop relations among them which makes easy for them to handle the different situations during the flights. They value each other, support each other and provide different opinions and ideas to each other. This creates employee loyalty and satisfaction.
• Encourage employees: Teamwork encourages employees to give their best performance and it also develops healthy competition among the team members which helps in the development of the whole team of cabin crew (Drewa, 2016).

3.2 Demonstrate working in a cabin crew team as a leader and member towards specific goals, dealing with any conflict or difficult situations that you may have faced of recent.

British Airways has to face various situations on everyday basis and the cabin crew of the company works together as a team to solve every conflict or situation of problem. Working as a leader in the cabin crew team, I am committed towards fulfilment of goals and direct my team members to play different roles according to their skills and knowledge. For this, Belbin team roles can be taken into consideration which shows that a team consists of different members who play different roles and supports each other for achieving the goals (Drewa, 2016). Recently, a flight of British Airways faced a technical fault which created a situation of emergency in the flight. Different team roles played by crew members in this situation are:

1. Resource Investigator: the member who explores opportunities to get safe landing of the flight.
2. Team worker: Two members who contribute to the whole team and perform duties assigned to them.
3. Coordinator: The coordinator tried to coordinate everyone and tried to establish positive environment in the flight.
4. Plant: Plant is the member who generated ideas for safe landing of the flight so that the passenger’s safety can be maintained.
5. Monitor evaluator: This member evaluate the performance of the whole team and cooperate in taking the decisions.
6. Specialist: This is the technical specialist who is continuously engaged in resolving the technical fault in the flight (Drewa, 2016).
7. Shaper: It is the member who shapes the whole task and provides motivation to others to achieve goals.
8. Implementer: This member implements the ideas made by others and provide cooperation.
9. Completer finisher:  This member is focussed on completing the whole task successfully.

(Drewa, 2016)

3.3 As a leader of the cabin crew review the effectiveness your team has achieved in their recent goal of increasing customer satisfaction.

As a leader of the cabin crew of 10 members of British airways, I would review that the team has been successful in achieving the customer satisfaction. It is very important to gain customer satisfaction and loyalty in this competitive industry where lots of brands are trying to gain the maximum passengers for earning more profits (Nancarrow, et. al., 2013).

The team has to be dynamic and should have diverse information and knowledge in the field to meet the challenges and to take the opportunities which are available. The team of cabin crew need to follow the ethical code of conduct while performing their duties and have to be humble and supportive to the passengers. They need to adjust while working with different types of people in the team.

The team should respect each other so that effective team work can be established.  All he members are given different rules to play according to their skills which bring effectiveness in the achievement of overall goals and objectives of the organisation (Woods, 2015).

It can be concluded from the report that an effective team of workers is the source of success of the company as it provides a combination of different ideas and efforts which creates an effective team and increases the efficiency of the work. It increases the morale of the employees and satisfaction of the customers which directly increases the revenues of the company. So, ultimately, teamwork is the key to organisation’s success (Kirkman, et. al., 2014).

Section 4: LO 4:

British airways are the leading airlines in UK and the work and development needs of an individual in the cabin crew are needed to be assessed. Also he plan is developed to ensure the needs of cabin crew and methods are suggested to evaluate the success of the process of assessment.

4.1What factors will you need to consider in planning and monitoring and assessment of work performance for the cabin crew.

The performance of the cabin crew members of British airways have to be assessed and monitored for which different factors are considered like:

• Learning needs diversity: to monitor the performance of the cabin crew members their learning needs diversity is to be monitored. It means that what diverse or different skills they possess, what are their abilities and what are needed to be learned. The work performance is based on the diverse skills of the employees and this shows how the employee performs in their duties (Carton & Cummings, 2012).
• Age groups: The performance of the employees is dependent on their age too. There is a limit on the age of the cabin crew members and as they pass their limit their performance declines.
• Cultural difference: There is a cultural difference in every worker as they come from different backgrounds, religions and regions. Also, the customers or passengers in the flights belong to different culture. How the employees deal with them shows their work performance (Choi, et. al., 2013).

4.2 How can you plan and deliver the assessment to ensure needs of the cabin crew is developed

British airways need to provide the members of cabin crew with the training and learning modules so that their learning needs can be developed. The plan is made for this purpose and it includes:

• Training: Training will be given for making the communication skills effective and better. It will also provide the knowledge about various duties and roles they have to play throughout the flights so that the passengers can be made satisfied. First of all, the need of training will be recognized and then it will be planned (Nag, 2011).

Training process of British Airways will follow certain steps which will include:

1. Establishing the objectives of training
2. Assessment of needs
3. Assessment of employee’s learning
4. Identifying the gap
5. Selecting the methods of training and trainees
6. Selecting the methods to evaluate the results of training (Friedman & Westring, 2015)

• Motivation: the cabin crew employees can be motivated for performing better in their jobs so that the motivated employees can create motivated customers. Motivation plays a major role in boosting up sales and revenue of the companies as the satisfied employees are the key to the organisation’s success.
• Delegation: The delegation of duties can be done in the way which makes the cabin crew members trained in every area and activity which is required to be performed in the flights. It is important for them to be trained and developed in every task (Friedman & Westring, 2015).

4.3 What methods can you suggest that the airline should use to evaluate the success of the assessment process

Training is provided to the employees of British airways to develop their skills and to make them effective in working during the flights but the assessment of the employees is necessary for watching out the progress and the outcomes of training (Huber, et. al., 2015). The methods which can be adopted by British Airways to evaluate the success of the assessment process are:

• Appraisal: It is referred to the act of evaluating and assessing. The appraisal of employees can be done by checking their performance after training and their capabilities of future growth in the company.
• Feedback: feedbacks can be taken from the trainers or the trainees themselves that how training has developed their skills and what learning they are provided with. The trainers are asked about the progress of the crew members and the learning and development they actually made during training (Huber, et. al., 2015).
• Promotions: Advertisement and Promotions can be given to the employees who successfully completes training and showcase it in their performance and who all have development opportunities. Promotion is the up gradation of the position of crew members.
• Disciplinary: In this method, the discipline of an employee is reviewed and it is seen that how consistent the employee have been in the training and in his work. This decided his future growth in the organisation (Clark, 2014).

It can be concluded that the employees must be provided with training to develop them and their learning. After the training program is planned, their progress should be reviewed in order to measure that how much beneficial the training program is for the employees. It can be done by evaluating the job performance and productivity of the employees (Clark, 2014).

Conclusion

At the end of the whole assignment, it can be concluded that leaders are the game changers who can bring success or failure to the business. It is important for the leaders to adopt certain styles which match the situation. The assignment is divided into four tasks which discusses about the airline staff, their training needs and evaluation of performance. The Unit 14 Working with and leading people Assignment British Airways also discusses about the recruitment and selection processes of the cabin crew of British airways and what all legislative requirements are followed. It is also evident that team work is essential for the cabin crew services of the British Airways.

References

Alloubani, A.M.'., Abdelhafiz, I.M., Abughalyun, Y., Edris, E.E.M. & Almukhtar, M.M. 2015, "Impact of leadership styles on leadership outcome in the private healthcare sector in Jordan", European Scientific Journal, vol. 2, pp. 286.
Behery, M. & Al-Nasser, A. 2016, "Examining the impact of leadership style and coaching on employees’ commitment and trust: Mediation effect of bullying and job alienation", International Journal of Organizational Analysis, vol. 24, no. 2, pp. 291-314.
Carton, A.M. & Cummings, J.N. 2012, "A theory of subgroups in work teams", Academy of Management Review, vol. 37, no. 3, pp.
441.
Choi, B.Y., Kim, B., Jang, S.H., Jung, S.H., Ahn, S.S., Lee, S.M. & Gysbers, N. 2013, "An individual's work values in career development", Journal of Employment Counseling, vol. 50, no. 4, pp. 154-165

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