Analysis of Responsible Management Challenge
Johnson & Johnson (Lacking Workforce Diversity/Women Participation)
Introduction
The role of human resource management in an organization is in the limelight. The human resource management process helps to develop people and make them significant contributors to organizational success. In the contemporary business era, responsible management has emerged as a critical business aspect, which enables the people’s development and business sustainability effectively. The study revolves around the particular responsibility management challenge and some recommendations by applying or using the prominent corporate function. It is necessary for the management of the company to analyze the responsibility management challenge and use several human resource traits to change the current practices. These recommendations are some strategic considerations, which are to be implemented by the management.
The Johnson & Johnson Company is a prominent American medical, pharmaceutical, and packed consumer good company. The company was founded in 1886. The firm has gained success in the pharmaceutical and medical industry due to sustained revenue growth, a broad range of products and an edge over other rivals. According to 2017 reports, the revenue of the company is US$76.450 billion (Powrbot, 2018). The Johnson & Johnson faces women participation in the workplace, which is creating a hurdle in both work and business sustainability. There is not gender equity in the company, but lack of diverse force means women participation in the workplace. Being a global company, it is responsible for managing employees fairly. Lack of diverse force is a big management challenge, and immediately, the management has to come up with some better strategies. Being a strategic consultant to the company, I am looking forward to providing some recommendations to the chief executive officer of the company.
Analysis of responsible management challenges
· Lacking Diverse Workforce/Women Participation
Women in Johnson & Johnson are underrepresented. These women are making less money compared to men in the workplace (O’Sullivan, 2018). Many competent female employees are discriminated to provide opportunities as compared to males in different departments.
Many causes regarding invisible are quite visible. The most important thing for the Johnson & Johnson management is to identify these causes. For Instance, it has been observed that women are still the caregiver to their families. The company is struggling to have a significant number of women at the workplace due to the lack of family-friendly policies (O’Sullivan, 2018)
Even without children, still, women working in Johnson & Johnson have family lives (Cortese, 2017). They do not have enough time in the workplace to get in the limelight and create a favorable perception.
It is a fact that the company has identified a lack of diversity. Unfortunately, females are discriminated in the organization due to their limited roles in the decision-making process. The current business practice of the company does not contain a balanced youth program, which can facilitate women to enhance their contribution to the company (O’Sullivan, 2018).
It has been revealed that diversity & inclusion are a significant responsibility management challenge, as far as the ethical business and sustainable actions in Johnson & Johnson are concerned. Johnson & Johnson has shaped innovative culture. In the innovative culture, different voices are to be considered. However, having only 40% in the leadership team and fewer women’s participation at the bottom-line is a big hurdle to embrace the diversity of thought (Urban, 2017)
Women want to depict their rights. Ongoing strikes, urgency, and disruptions in the workplace are creating issues for companies. Johnson & Johnson operates in different countries, which support feminism. Invisible work diversity is a prominent challenge for responsible management because it creates hurdles in brainstorming ideas and thoughts. The inclusion of women’s minds in the workplace is not up to the mark. For Instance, the company failed to use women’s brains when developing health care products for women around the globe. Thus, creating an inclusive environment for women is a big challenge for the company. The firm always aims to drive superior business outcomes to get an advantage in the global market as well. However, the target of a diverse workforce/women’s participation is till to achieve (McSweeney, 2016)
Being a prominent stakeholder of Johnson & Johnson Company, I would like to tell several consequences of the lack of gender diversity in the workplace. For Instance, in this modern work era, Johnson & Johnson intends to enhance the women support in society and the workplace. However, managing a large-scale business in different countries is a big challenge. It seems essential to integrate excessive work traits, and due to invisible diversity or lack of women’s participation, it looks impossible. The management needs to build a strong employee face, which can work on the same agenda. Unfortunately, this issue restrains the company from adopting different work traits in the workplace, and it creates an impact on productivity and performance. A diverse workforce can help the administration to work on multiple ideas and mass production to meet the demand for an immense range of customers in the global market. Human resource management is a prominent corporate function of Johnson & Johnson, which can be used to tackle this challenge. Several strategic considerations are to be streamlined to get rid of this challenge.
Addressing the Challenge of Workforce Diversity/Invisible Women Participation
· Corporate Function: Human Resource Management
Johnson & Johnson contains HR process as an active corporate function of the organization. Different dimensions of the human resource management process can be considered to overcome this challenge. The most appropriate way to overcome this challenge is the training and development programs for the employee. Training and development are a crucial HR dimension to eliminate the root causes of the issue or problem.
Diversity & Inclusion & Training
Diversity & Inclusion has become an appropriate solution for the company to address this challenge. By integrating with diversity and inclusion, the company will be in the best position to seek output from all. The issue is associated with the minimum presence of women, and therefore, sexual preference is the best way to justify the diversity and inclusion (Human Resources Developement, 2018).
Training and development programs should be shaped by the company to seek output from all genders. The company aims to reach 60% women (Human Resources Developement, 2018). Equal skill development drive is essential for both the management and employees, including women. The company must have to make different teams in the workplace and help women to enhance their involvements (Inclusion) in various team activities.
Also, the training can help the management eliminate the gender-based roles. Diversity and inclusion are significant elements to streamline in the training process (CSR Wire, 2018). For Instance, the company can assess different areas of work, which are pertinent to different employees. On the job training is a part of the human resource process. This process may help to identify the strength of employees. Accordingly, the firm can create job positions to take benefits. Training and development programs give time or create space for the company management to analyze the performance and strengths of people. Thus, Johnson & Johnson aims to get the perfect score regarding the gender fair index. Through training, this company can develop women leaders (CSR Wire, 2018)
Training and Development
The training and development provide the same opportunity to all employees in the company. Top decisions in the company have been made at a high level. In other words, women can accelerate the women potential or capability to involve them in the strategic planning process.
Training management can impartially offer training opportunities for better performance and growth. Initiating the on-the-job training or other training sessions is a right approach by the human resource management to enable frequent opportunities to both genders. Training and development do not believe in gender difference, as it is based on learning and adopting new things to contribute to the success of the company in an effective and lucrative manner.
Developing women as leaders to enhance diversity
Awareness training is another trait of human resource management, which can be considered by the responsible management. For Instance, in the awareness training, the firm can conduct some social experiments to let people know values and norms. People in this company must know these norms and values to collaborate in different groups or the workplace as a whole. Developing woman as leaders is the core element of Johnson & Johnson mission. For Instance, Luly de Samper is working as a head of women leaders to create awareness and provide career opportunities for women (Ahern, 2018). Attracting Women are the primary challenge in this firm. The awareness and training program is the best way to give respect to women. The organization must initiate awareness and training at all levels to facilitate all key stakeholders (Rao et al., 2015).
Diversity Training
Johnson & Johnson’s HR can demonstrate diversity training. Social accountability is the right way for the management to bring transparency and create performance ratings. In different teams, the administration will assess all employees through these ratings and make decisions reasonably. It is one of the prominent solutions to eliminate the issue of lack of women’s participation (Gino, 2014).
Work-Life Balance
Work diversity has been perceived differently in Johnson & Johnson. There is a perception that men are privileged by the management as compared to women in the workplace. Interestingly, new workplace traits are emerging as critical solutions for responsible human resource management. For Instance, women usually complain about the time and tough working hours, as they fail to take care of their facilities. Thus, the appropriate solution to facilitate women is to initiate the onsite childcare, working from home and several job-sharing activities (Diversity Mine, 2010)
On the other hand, men, who are committed or determined to earn more and get appreciation, like to spend more time at the workplace. Shaping flexible work routines along with flexible work hours is a sufficient work-life balance activity. It can help to eliminate negative perceptions. Women or men can enjoy flexible working hours to integrate with social life as well. The performance of employees will be measured during the working hours only (Aiuto, 2017).
Cultural Change for the Management
Another HR initiative or recommendation for Johnson & Johnson is the cultural change in the management. It is an excellent approach, which can shape the manager’s behavior to boost the women involvement. Beyond pay, promotions, and rewards, managers have to eliminate gender stereotypes in the workplace. In this reshaped culture, the manager has to act sharply. It has to be proactive to work with females to empower them and make them a great contributor to the company’s success. (Filby, 2018). The HR function can implement these strategies to face the challenge drastically. Dramatically, the impact of the internal force, especially a group of women employees, is positive.
Justification of Recommendation in Current Practices
Johnson & Johnson upholds prominent existing responsible management practices. Current management practices are employee relations, performance management, training and development, recruitment and selection, and compensation and benefits. The administration can start from diversity and inclusion, as it is a critical, responsible management practice to tackle this issue. The firm can build relationships by depicting impartial behavior. So far, the current method is to sustain good relations with top performer males to retain them in the company. Now, due to the change in the management culture, all employees, including females, will be well engaged or interacted to sustain long-term relationships. Diversity and inclusion, training, work-life balance and cultural change in the management can assist the administration to recognize the value of women. These possible initiatives can be justified by building women’s leadership skills in the workplace (Gurowitz, 2015).
The recommendation is realistic and practicable in current business activity. For Instance, when conducting the diversity training, the company can introduce performance appraisal methods to assess women and offer rewards and promotions. It is the best way to retain women in the workplace. Diversity training is associated with the performance rating, as mentioned in the above recommendation, and the firm can combine it with a new performance appraisal (Smith, Rosenstein and Nikolov, 2018).
The hiring and recruitment process is a crucial practice in Johnson & Johnson. Integration with the government regulations provides opportunities females regarding pay, and other opportunities are mandatory. Thus, it can be easily combined with this HR practice to overcome the lack of workforce diversity (Smykal, 2015).
From hiring and recruitment to performance management, the new recommendations are realistic and workable. The administration does not have to make significant changes to execute these strategies. However, it should change the behavior to get expected results.
Development & Change to Implement Recommendations
The firm can start from the top level. 44% of the company’s executive and the manager’s level roles are women. However, it has to increase to become a top-ranked company regarding women empowerment. Women’s involvement at the top level will set the direction of the bottom-line of the company as well (Seven Talent, 2018).
Current practices can be changed or developed to execute these recommendations effectively. Before making some changes in these current practices, the management must create urgency in the company to create awareness and eliminate the issue. Gathering the employee force to work under the same agenda is a big challenge, and if the management builds a diverse workforce, it can be done remarkably.
For Instance, due to inadequate workforce diversity/women participation, the firm has to make some changes in performance management to execute the elaborated training traits. The firm will not judge the employee performance by navigating the completion rates of men and women. It will assess the performance of women separately to achieve the diversity targets. Instead of making the performance management practice complex, the firm will be responsible for taking control of the diverse workforce control (Cecchi-Dimeglio, 2017).
In the recruitment process, the employer branding can be the significant change or development. Inbound and outbound recruitment needs adequate employer branding regarding the ethical practices at the workplace. For Instance, the company aims to hire almost 90,000 women. Adding women to the hiring pipeline is a right approach to justify the possible change in the recruitment practice (Halloran, 2018).
In Johnson & Johnson, the appropriate change for the company to execute strategies is to change the nature of the training and development. The firm may depict a considerable shift in the training process. For Instance, it can replace the on-job training with the mentorship for women, as it can guide women to develop a career and find the leadership paths (Ghazal, 2018).
Overall, training programs must be redesigned to implement the training trait to overcome the issue. Redesigning the training and development process is purposeful because it creates space for women to take part in the decision making, recruitment, planning, and many other business activities.
Thus, minor changes in current practices are essential to implement these new recommendations. The firm upholds the capability to execute these recommendations and derive an immediate impact.
Conclusion
In the end, it is to conclude that Johnson & Johnson can implement these recommendations along with some improvisations. In the competitive business era, strong employee force is a need of the company. The role of responsible management must be streamlined to be relevant in the internal and external business context. Women involvement or participation is the primary responsibility management change. The study emphasized a comprehensive analysis of the challenge along with the impact on the business. Diversity and Inclusion Training and development traits, work-life balance, are some key recommendations, which are elaborated effectively. Some possible changes are illustrated in current practices to implement these recommendations.
References
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