Reviewing Human Resource Management Policies of Etihad Airways and
Their Impact on Organisation’s Objectives:
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Contents
Reviewing Human Resource Management Policies of Etihad Airways and Their Impact on
Organisation’s Objectives: ......................................................................................................... 1
Reviewing Human Resource Management Policies of Etihad Airways and Their Impact on
Organisation’s Objectives: ............................................. Ошибка! Закладка не определена.
Human Resource Management in Context to the Objectives of Etihad Airways: ..................... 3
Human Resource Management and Objectives of Etihad Airways: ...................................... 4
Facilitates at Etihad Airways: ................................................................................................ 5
Etihad and Its Social Responsibility Programs: ..................................................................... 5
Hiring Procedure at Etihad Airways: ......................................................................................... 6
1st stage: .................................................................................................................................. 6
2nd Stage: ................................................................................................................................ 7
3rd stage: ................................................................................................................................. 7
Employee Performance and Benefits: ........................................................................................ 8
Key Factors of Employee Assessment: .................................................................................. 9
Punctuality: ......................................................................................................................... 9
Quality of Work: ............................................................................................................... 10
Personal Habits: ................................................................................................................ 10
Attitude: ............................................................................................................................ 10
Personal presentation: ....................................................................................................... 10
Work Practices: ........................................................................................................................ 10
Work Policies: ...................................................................................................................... 11
Ensuring Safety of Employees: ............................................................................................ 11
Strategies for the Wellbeing of Employees: ............................................................................ 12
Etihad and Its Recreational Programs: ................................................................................. 12
References: ............................................................................................................................... 14
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APPENDIX 1: .......................................................................................................................... 18
APPENDIX 2: .......................................................................................................................... 18
APPENDIX 3: .......................................................................................................................... 18
APPENDIX 4: ................................................................ Ошибка! Закладка не определена.
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Introduction
To every organisation from all the things ranging from capital to revenue, revenue to sales
and from sales to employees the most important thing is their employees. As like every
organisation in the world Etihad Airways with its 26,953 employees all over the globe give
the highest importance to its employees (FAST FACTS & FIGURES, 2016). Etihad Airways
is working towards the expansion of their workforce of 26,637 to 26,953 from Feb 2016 to
April 2016 (Apr 2016 en, 2016). This shows that in this crunch time when organisations are
reducing their workforces Etihad Airways is working towards expanding theirs.
Human Resource Management and Objectives of Etihad Airways:
The first and the foremost step in the Harvard Model of Human Resource Management
identifies the significance of employees, strategies and management policies out of which
hiring of the employee is basic key to all these because the employee you hire will actual give
the direction to the organisation (Noon, 1999) (refer appendix 1).The employment contract is
the exchange of labour and wages and can be a key source of dispute one satisfaction of
employee towards his job if he is to paid properly (Richbell and Wood, 2009). Etihad
Airways offers their employee tax-free basic salary, accommodation allowances, convince
allowances as well. Apart from this they also give more benefits to their employees such as
profit sharing scheme, annual leave of 30 days in addition to 10 days of public holiday per
annum, end of service gratuity, education support allowance and much more. This indicates
that Etihad Airways gives their employees the status of assets for the organisation (Group,
2016).
Recently when Etihad opened vacancies for their cabin crew they received 15,000+
applications when they needed around 1200 people this shows that people are willing to work
with them.
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As an employee works in the organisation their benefits increase with increase4 in their time
at Etihad Airways. Their relationship with the employees was questioned recently in response
to which Etihad Airways have opened their doors for a journalist to come and visit their
facilities. They are providing facilities which are above then the laws of UAE – their base
operation country. In order to have their relations with its employee’s part from everything
else they are also providing full assistance to their female cabin view in case of fertile women
and if an employee is a year or more than a year old they are also giving her paid maternity
leave after which she can join them again on the board. In case if the employee has not
passed the minimum period they will settle her duties in the ground operations (staff, 2015).
Facilitates at Etihad Airways:
Apart from them, they have recently established aviation clinic in Khalifa city which will
provide medical assistance to more than 23,800 UAE-based employees. This clinic has 6
dedicated medical rooms along with 9 medical consultation rooms with latest medical
devices. The clinic is staffed with 30 medical experts including 10 fully qualified doctors.
This well is monitored by Health Authority Abu Dhabi (HAAD) and UAE General Civil
Aviation Authority (UGCAA) (Airways, 2015).
To ensure the safety of their employees Etihad is doing its best by providing tax-free salary,
profit sharing schemes, medical assistance, annual leaves, education support allowance,
discounted tickets Etihad airways seems to obey the social responsibility it has towards its
employees. It shall be noted that when they were being questioned about misbehaving with
female cabin crew from their side they opened up to media that they can check it by them.
Etihad and Its Social Responsibility Programs:
Another social responsibility is to give jobs and equal employment opportunities to females
in every organisation and Etihad seem to stand tall on this as well. The opening of a female
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call centre is one of the initiatives by the Etihad Airways with 160 women handling more
than 67,000 phone calls per month is an example (Airways, 2015).
Etihad Airways is also working towards its responsibility to give employments to the people
of UAE. They have recently hired 3000+ employees out of which half of them are women
including 50 women pilots (Lindley, 2016). Airline’s own developmental program is also
going on from which 280 Emiratis were graduated in January 2016.
Hiring Procedure at Etihad Airways:
According to CIPD model recruiting right people for the right job at right time ensures the
ability of the organisation to tackle the challenges of the market. Inappropriate selection and
recruitment significantly harm the ability of an organisation’s work power (French and
Rumbles, 2013) (refer to appendix 2).The first step towards employments in Etihad Airways
is that they advertise their job opening on their website, electronic and print media. After job
being announced then people need to apply for the job from their website after which they
shortlist the candidates and email them for their first skype interview. The seconded interview
is usually telephone based. Third and final interview is one on one based interview. This
complete process takes different timings to complete from applying online to receive an
email for skype video interview can take up to 2 to 4 weeks based upon the urgency they
have for the specific job. Then after the first interview it usually takes up to 2 weeks for the
second interview and final interview takes about 2 more weeks to complete. This means that
total process from applying to getting recruited can take up to 8 weeks to 10 weeks.
1st stage:
The first in recruitment involves the advertisement of job openings in their office or fields.
For this purpose, they are using different channels ranging from print to electronic medium.
In advertisements of their job, Etihad Airways gives a complete ad containing job description
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of the job, minimum eligibility criteria, and minimum experience. After this thing on their
website, they do also give information regarding salary package along with the bonuses and
allowances that a person gets when they join on that particular post. There is one thing
different in Etihad’s advertisement on their website than the other organisations and that is
the job responsibility they post on their website is very detailed and it covers all the aspects
of the job (Airways, 2016). This is the best course of action for any employer to post the
complete job description so that they don’t have to rejects the CVs which are of no use to
them. This saves up the cost of the organisation both in terms of time and money.
2nd Stage:
In the second stage after receiving the CVs, it is about time to shortlist the candidates for the
first Skype video interview. In this video interview, they judge a person on different criteria
as according to their need for the particular job. Before that interview, every shortlisted
person receives an email regarding when their interview takes places.
After the first interview, another short interview usually takes place on phone call to judge
further about the person. This particular interview is a short one ranging from different
questions to where the person is situated and how much he is flexible for the final one on one
interview. After that final shortlisted people are emailed about their final one on one
interview and are coordinated to when they can come to their regional office for the
interview.
3rd stage:
Then it is about time for the final interview which can be one on one or there may be more
than one interviewer depending upon the nature of the job. This particular interview can be a
long one ranging from 40 minutes to one hour (60 minutes) or even more than that. This is
the final thing which you need to pass.
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Another process of hiring by Etihad Airways is a there academy in which they first give
admissions to the student teach them and then the graduates from that academy gets the job in
Etihad right away. The first batch of 280 emirates was graduated from the developmental
program of Etihad Airways in January 2016 (Airways, 2016b).
Employee Performance and Benefits:
According to Adam’s Equity Theory, there should be a balance between input and output of
an employee (refer appendix 3). Output can be in the form of benefits, bonus and
commissions, promotion and others (Adams, 2016). Bonuses and performance incentives are
one of the greatest ways to encourage the employee to work harder than what they are doing
right bow. The influence of monetary incentive is very significant on the job satisfaction of
the employee as the expectation of higher salary leads a worker to go beyond its current skills
and improve them to new level continuously (Pouliakas, 2010). Different studies show that
performance appraisals can increase the work efficiency of the employee to 12% (Berger,
Harbring, and Sliwka, 2013). Seconded step in HR models is the effect of reward system on
the performance of employees. As every model suggest that a good reward system gives
employee satisfaction towards his job which in reruns gets a high rate of productivity from
employees. Performance management system a relatively new concept and its traces are
linked with Anglo-Saxon management which deals about motivating the employee to work
with the best of their abilities to achieve higher targets (McDonnell and Gunigle, 2009).
Performance appraisal is one the hardest work of a human resource manager. There are
different methods that can be used for the above for mentioned issue one of which is straight
that is appraisal on the basis of the productivity of an employee (Kane, Bernardin, and
Wiatrowski, 2013). Another method is to provide fix percentage to employees as their bonus
bi-annually or quarterly based upon the work given to them.
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Etihad Airways is not behind in this as well they are also working on this and are giving
several performance bonuses and appraisals to their employees. There are different types of
performance appraisal Etihad Airways is giving to their employee ranging from increment in
salary to vacation along with airfare and promotions as well.
It depends on upon which position a person is working a cabin crew person working on
international flights is subjected to get an appraisal in their salary. A First officer might get
promoted to pilot based upon the expertise. A complete system is working in Etihad airways
which take account of the performance of all of its employees. After a predefined time
period, HR department of Etihad airways reviews the performance of the people working for
them and bonuses or appraisals are given to them.
Another approach followed by Etihad is to give a bonus to their employees based upon the
religions on their religious festivals like Muslims gets a bonus on both Eids and Christians
gets bonuses on Christmas and Easter. This bonus usually is a month of basic salary of the
employee.
While working in Etihad airways performance is rewarded strongly as it can evident that
Etihad had won several HR management awards globally and locally as well in past years
such as MENA HR Excellence Award 2014 (Airways, 2014a), Employer of the year award in
Middle East HR Excellence Award 2014 (Airways, 2014b), Nationalization Initiative of the
Year at Middle East HR Excellence Awards 2015 (Airways, 2015).
Key Factors of Employee Assessment:
There are a couple of things which Etihad airways looks when they are checking the
performance of any of its employees.
Punctuality:
Productivity basically depends upon the time person is present in the office both physically
and mentally (Wanyama and Mutsotso, 2010). Punctuality is the first criteria not only in
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Etihad but also everywhere around the globe. A person must be punctual he should come
daily and get late again and again is not what you want to do if you are working in Etihad
because they will not tolerate it.
The quality of Work:
Work assigned to you must be completed on time as well as the quality should be up to par.
According to Bakker and Schaufeli relation of a person to its work and engagement to his
work is a key factor (Bakker and Schaufeli, 2010).
Personal Habits:
Picking up a fight at the office or smoking in office premises is not what you want to do if
you want to grow in Etihad airways.
Attitude:
Attitude plays a vital role in the growth of employee in Etihad. A Humble person with an
attitude to help others, complete own work on time and the one who listens properly to his
senior is going ahead of others in Etihad.
Personal presentation:
While working in Etihad you are needed to maintain your attire to a suitable level. Especially
if you are a cabin crew it's mandatory to keep yourselves updated neat and tidy hair trimmed
beard (for male) and the hygienic look is what you need to have.
Work Practices:
To increase the efficiency of workers the nature of work infrequently changed to reduce the
boredom in accordance with the Hackman and Oldham work (Hutchinson, 2014) (refer to
appendix 4). Working in long shifts can result in significant increase in the hazard of injury
rate to very high frequency (Dembe, 2005). Disruption of circadian rhythm can have a bad
effect on the performance of employee because of rotating and long shifts (Harrington, 2001).
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According to UAE labour Law section 7 maximum working hours for an adult can be 8 hours
a day or forty-eight hours in a week (Baldwin, 2015).
Work Policies:
Keeping aforementioned things in check Etihad has kept their working hours between 8 to 9
hours daily. Which gives smooth working to their employees. While these only apply in UAE
work timing are different in different countries but are accordance with the law of the country
in which the worker is present.
Apart from giving them proper work environment Etihad also has a yearly 30 days of
vacation policy along with air ticket to the destination you want to go along with your
dependents (subject to some of the companies policies).
In case if a women become fertile while working in Etihad she will get maternity leaves
which are not included in her 30 days vacations and as soon as her maternity leaves are over
she can join Etihad again. However, if her employment period at Etihad is less than 1 year
then she will not get complete maternal leave but her duties will be changed in such a way
that she can easily do her task with having any risk to her life and health.
Ensuring Safety of Employees:
To ensure the health and safety of their employees Etihad has recently established Aviation
clinic in Khalifa City Abu Dhabi which has 6 medical room dedicated for this and 9 medical
consultation room equipped with the state of the art medical equipment. This clinic is staffed
with 30 medical exports out of which 10 of them are highly qualified doctors. This facility
will be able to keep on the check on more than 23,000 employees of Etihad residing in Abu
Dhabi in nearing areas. Monitoring of this facility will be done by Health Authority of Abu
Dhabi (HAAD) and United Arab Emirates General Civil Aviation Authority UGCAA.
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The opening of different departments is making sure they are moving ahead. Another aspect
is Etihad is following the global trend by giving equal opportunity to women in every field
not only in cabin crew which provided the females perfect working environment to work in.
working in a place where there are other people of your gender working with you certainly
gives a huge amount of boost to your capabilities.
After providing all the above-mentioned facilities to its employee what Etihad gets in return
from them can be evident in their annual financial reports. The success of their team can be
evident from their fiscal reports which are suggesting that they are improving every year.
Profit is growing to show the relationship of employees with the employer. In 2014 net profit
of Etihad was USD 73 million which was USD 25 million more than the profit earned in
2013 which was USD 48 million (Etihad financial statements 2014, 2015).
Strategies for the Wellbeing of Employees:
Making proper arrangements for implementing the health and safety measures, emergency
setups proper training are necessary for and organisation under HASAWA act 1974 (HSE,
2006). Having recreation activity at the office always has a great effect on the mind of people.
This gives them relax environment to work without any issue (Mokaya, Gitari 2012). If an
employee is satisfied with his job it will cause the growth of organisation due to the
commitment of its employees (Susan 2012). To ensure these steps have been taken by Etihad
to ensure that their employee is satisfied with their jobs.
Etihad and Its Recreational Programs:
ADCB privilege club is an example of an initiative by Etihad airways through which
employee can get a discount of several things. On competition of 10 years in service, a family
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fun day was organised by Etihad airways in which there many activities such as jugglers,
singing robot, live performance were few of many activities that were present on the day
(Bell, 2013). A new on-site Emirates Identity Authority centre has been established to reduce
the waiting time for the employees of Etihad.
To ensure the wellbeing not only physically but also mentally several steps have also been
taken by Etihad airways such as they are given airfare in vacations to the employee and their
dependents to the destination where they want to go. Although fare of the dependents is
subjected to the policies of the company. Medical allowance is also there for their employees
which ensure that in the case of medical issues company will take care of the expenditures.
Old-age gratuity is also a step to give their employee confidence that when they will get
retired they will not have to work to live their lives. Discount cards have been given to their
employee in Abu Dhabi from which they can get a discount on more than 100 brands which
also means that their family will be happy while shopping giving the employee a happy
family life. A person whose family life is not happy is at his full potential in work as well
because stress in the family also reflects on the person’s capability to work as well.
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APPENDIX 1:
Figure 1 Harvard model of hrm
APPENDIX 2:
Figure 2CIPD Model
APPENDIX 3:
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Figure 3 Adam's Equity Theory
APPENDIX 4:
Figure 4 Hackman & Oldham's Model
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