Unit 8: Course Project- Final Paper

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Course Project- Strategic Analysis Recommendations

Rymario Armstrong

Park University

Stacy Yeager-Okosi

MBA695 Strategic Management

20220719

Problem

A major problem facing Amazon is high turnover rates at its warehouses. Many employees have quit working at the warehouses of the organization citing being forced to meet unrealistic performance quotas that are super-fast and mentally taxing to be covered within a 10-hour shift (Kantor et al., 2021). Repetitive and tedious tasks have the potential to increase worker boredom. The entire business, not just the employees, may be negatively impacted when there is a lack of motivation. Employees who are not motivated or engaged in their work are more likely to become bored or burned out as a result of a lack of prospects for advancement. In addition, when they simply go through the routines, burned-out employees are more likely to make mistakes, which leads to a decline in their performance appraisal since they are less engaged in their work. A decrease in involvement and an increase in mistakes both contribute to a drop in the overall work quality in the organization, which in turn slows the growth of the business (Kantor et al., 2021). It is estimated that workers who are bored or burned out are two times more likely to quit their jobs, leading to an increase in turnover and the cost linkages that come with it. This leads to the loss of potential income as well as a poor image of the organization, which in turn undermines the reputation of the company among existing stakeholders.

Recommendation

The major recommendation is for the company to mechanize repetitive tasks by making use of robots. The organization still heavily relies on people to be used as pickers in the majority of the warehouses. By fully mechanization of such tasks and using robotics technology the company will avoid the majority of problems in this section while at the same time greatly improving productivity. It is possible to automate day-to-day tasks that are repetitive and do not need specific, hands-on attention if the appropriate automation tools are used. This increases availability for teams, which allows them to spend more time working on other complex and highly technical tasks that need their attention. The flow of work throughout the company has a direct bearing on the level of overall productivity and success that may be achieved on any given day. Daily, repetitive activities are accomplished swiftly and effectively by integrating automation technology into the corporate infrastructure because automation technologies and robotics are faster (Agnihotri & Bhattacharya, 2022). This removes any delays that would have occurred in the overall flow, which is especially helpful in sequences where the activities are a prerequisite job that has to be finished before going on to the next step.

Another solution is to introduce more breaks and set realistic performance quotas for its pickers. A performance target of picking 4000 items within a 10-hour shift is clearly unbearable for the majority of workers. This target can be reduced in an attempt to reduce employee burnout resulting from feeling overworked. Such efforts can be supported by establishing policies that favor flexibility in the workplace. Employees need to feel empowered in order to stay longer at an organization (Corbato et al., 2018). Currently, the majority of employees at its fulfillment centers don’t feel valued or cared for by the organization. The organization is creating a bad image of itself within the general population where it uses individuals and discards them without concern for their overall wellbeing.

The recommendations suggested are best implemented in stages as opposed to ones in order to overcome any resistance to changes. Automation and use of robotics need to be implemented in phases while still using human labor to complement the technology. Implementation of the second solution should start with the revision of current policies on performance quotas by introducing acceptable quotas for all. The newly adopted performance quotas should then be communicated to all employees at fulfillment centers.

In conclusion, it s my opinion that the organization stands a chance to be more successful by adopting the recommended solutions. The recommended solutions will greatly reduce turnover rates at its fulfillment centers and correct the negative image of the company as an employer in the long run.

References

Agnihotri, A., & Bhattacharya, S. (2022). Addressing Poor Working Conditions at Amazon, Inc.: Challenges Before, During, and After COVID-19. In SAGE Knowledge. https://sk.sagepub.com/cases/addressing-poor-working-conditions-amazon-challenges-covid-19

Corbato, C. H., Bharatheesha, M., van Egmond, J., Ju, J., & Wisse, M. (2018). Integrating Different Levels of Automation: Lessons From Winning the Amazon Robotics Challenge 2016. IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics, 14(11), 4916–4926. https://doi.org/10.1109/tii.2018.2800744

Kantor, J., Weise, K., & Ashford, G. (2021). The Amazon That Customers Don’t See. http://www.kooriweb.org/foley/news/2000s/2021/june/nyt15june2021.pdf