Wm Morrison
Supermarkets PLC
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Wm Morrison Supermarkets PLC is the UK's fourth largest food retailer with 377 stores and 117,000 employees and an annual turnover of over 12.5 billion.
The arrival of a new Chief Executive (Marc Bolland), accompanied by the retirement of Sir Ken Morrison in 2008, saw the company move into a new 5 year Optimisation plan: a strategic agenda which retained the company's areas of strength and focused on the areas needing change.
Wm Morrison Supermarkets PLC hired a new Group HR Director, Norman Pickavance, to drive a significant change program across the organisation, working with the Board to build the People agenda to support the business plan.
The People Agenda
In order to achieve success and to support the change, Norman needed to resource, develop and build a strong HR team, to help him define the strategy but also deliver on the operational needs.
Independent RPO was engaged in September 2007 and provided support to the program in keys areas:
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Strategic HR support through its Independent HR division
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Talent management
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Organisational design and development
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Resourcing and selection (delivering at Senior level)
The Strategic HR team worked with senior HR team members of defining Vision & Values, Engagement strategies, Performance models and Leadership Development plans.
The Talent Management Agenda
The Talent Management agenda was two pronged, working initially with the business to bring a proactive resource planning approach to recruitment, and then launching internal talent mapping exercises.
An immediate requirement was to support the business and deliver against their resource plans. An under-resourced, over stretched Morrisons in-house recruitment team, were given support from the implementation of an on-site IRPO recruitment team.
An Ongoing Success
The Morrison's change agenda is ongoing but achievements already include:
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Delivery of Visions & Values across all (circa) 117,000 Morrison's employees
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Implementation of job profiles, performance management processes, competency based assessment and leadership development programs.
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Recruitment of an entire senior HR team including Head of OD & Talent, Head of Reward, Head of Leadership Development, HR Business Partners etc
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Recruitment campaign delivery of over 500 new hires in less than 12 months.
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Implementation of Resource plans approved by The Board (first time in Morrisons)
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A new employer brand - see www.iwantafreshstart.com
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Over £500k of recruitment savings made in the first six months
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A resourcing approach and process that went from negative business feedback to an example of new HR service in six months.
"Independent are a key part of our Business and HR change agenda. The ability to manage our existing and new talent across the organisation will be key in the company being competitive. Independent are helping us to achieve this."
Norman Pickavance, Group HR Director for Wm Morrison Supermarkets PLC -
What our clients say
“ Independent are a key part of our Business and HR change agenda. The ability to manage our existing and new talent across the organisation will be key in the company being competitive. Independent are helping us to achieve this. ”
Norman Pickavance, Group HR Director for Wm Morrison Supermarkets PLC