HR Strategies | Edexcel Business A2

[Maximum number: 12]

Extract A The Five Guys' family, freshness and customisation Jerry and Janie Mitchell lived in Arlington, Virginia. In 1986 they gave their five sons a choice: start a business or go to college. The business route won and the family opened the first Five Guys - named after the five brothers.

To this day, the formula remains simple: 'Burgers and fries cooked to perfection' in keeping with Jerry's philosophy of 'To perfect and to serve.' The family is still very much involved in the business, meeting every Tuesday.

Five Guys is organised differently from other fast-food burger outlets. You will not find a freezer in any Five Guys restaurant because everything is cooked from fresh ingredients. Food is prepared every day for maximum freshness including hand cutting the potatoes. Employees do the cooking without timers and are trained to judge the food's readiness by sight, aroma and texture. In other fast-food outlets machines are used to cook the food and timers are relied on to indicate when the food is ready to serve.

The burgers, hotdogs and sandwiches come with up to 15 free toppings, giving 250,000 combinations to choose from. If you had one a day, it would take you 684 years to try them all and the milkshake machines give over 1,000 possible combinations.

Extract B Selected financial data for Five Guys (UK and Europe) 31 December 2020 and 2021

Table for Question 3.3.5.3c - HR strategies question 1 — Edexcel A-Level Business A2

Extract C Data for purchasing a new £10000 milkshake machine for a Five Guys restaurant

Extract D How to Incentivise Your Crew The fast-food industry is well known for its over 100\% labour turnover levels. Many businesses are relying on employee incentive programmes to retain their workers.

One popular way is using mystery shoppers. A mystery shopper is a person employed to visit a shop or restaurant anonymously to assess the quality of the goods and services.

Five Guys uses mystery shoppers to assess the quality of its food and the customer services given by employees. The information gathered from mystery shoppers is used to create weekly, monthly and quarterly rewards programmes for its employees.

Five Guys rewards the top 200 restaurants every week. The weekly reward is anywhere from $900 to $1 300 per restaurant. The money is shared between the employees working in the restaurant when they were mystery shopped.

Molly Catalano, Director of Communications and Marketing at Five Guys, said, "We think that our success can be seen in the increasing mystery shopper scores over time, in the satisfaction of our employees and in our growth as a company. We have seen success in all three areas."

Five Guys is still expanding and has 1,600 locations in 19 countries across the world.

Extract E Five Guys launches merchandise collection Five Guys, known for its burgers, hot dogs and milkshakes, has launched the first of its clothing lines branded with the Five Guys logo in the UK.

The main item from the collection is the black and white embroidered unisex college jacket that pays tribute to Arlington, Virginia, where the brand was founded in 1986. This follows the current trend for American-styled clothing, which has seen college jackets feature in high street and designer collections during summer 2022.

Alongside the college jackets are the official Five Guys t-shirts, featured in red, black and white, branded sweatshirts and hoodies, baseball caps and red-and-white checked sports socks. There is even a lightweight rain jacket with the Five Guys logo.

Prices start from £10 for the socks to £75 for the college jacket. T-shirts cost £20 each, while sweatshirts are priced at £35 and hoodies at £45. All can be purchased at the Five Guys online store.

Assess the likely effectiveness for Five Guys of using financial rewards to reduce labour turnover.

Indicative content guidance
Answers must be credited by using the level descriptors (below) in line with the general marking guidance. The indicative content below exemplifies some of the points that candidates may make but this does not imply that any of these must be included. Other relevant points must also be credited.
QS: QS8 and QS9
Knowledge, Application, Analysis, Evaluation - indicative content
- Financial rewards include the use of bonuses, commission and piecework and performance-related pay
- Five Guys rewards its best 200 performing restaurants every week with
between $900 to $1 300 when visited by a mystery shopper
- The money is split amongst the people working when they were mystery
shopped
- FW Taylor stated that money motivates and for many employees the opportunity to earn additional financial rewards on top of a wage is very
attractive
- The fast-food industry is well known for high labour turnover so this strategy may in fact help to reduce the number of employees wanting to
leave Five Guys due to the higher reward
- The amount shared between employees can be a significant amount and is awarded weekly therefore giving a regular incentive to remain at Five Guys
- However, the financial bonuses are only awarded to the top 200 restaurants and with over 1,600 locations around the world, not every employee will be able to gain the bonus
- The total cost of providing the financial bonuses at the 200 restaurants
could be as high as $13 520000 per year which is which very expensive to
maintain
- This money could be better spent on other ways to retain its employees.
For many employees good working conditions and promotion prospects are
more important than financial rewards to persuade them to stay at a business
- There are other ways to improve retention such as empowerment strategies and consultation, which might be more effective and does not require additional financial rewards to be given to employees
- A combination of financial and non-financial human resource strategies
might be the best way to reduce labour turnover as employees are often
motivated by different factors

Level

Mark

Descriptor

0

No rewardable material.

Level 1

1-2

Isolated elements of knowledge and understanding - recall based.

Weak or no relevant application to business examples.

Generic assertions may be presented.

Level 2

3-4

Elements of knowledge and understanding, which are applied to the business example.

Chains of reasoning are presented, but may be assertions or incomplete.

A generic or superficial assessment is presented.

Level 3

5-8

Accurate and thorough knowledge and understanding, supported throughout by relevant and effective use of the business behaviour/context.

Analytical perspectives are presented, with developed chains of reasoning, showing cause(s) and/or effect(s).

An attempt at an assessment is presented, using quantitative and/or qualitative information though unlikely to show the significance of competing arguments.

Level 4

9-12

Accurate and thorough knowledge and understanding, supported throughout by relevant and effective use of the business behaviour/context.

A coherent and logical chain of reasoning, showing cause(s) and/or effect(s).

Assessment is balanced, wide ranging and well contextualised, using quantitative and/or qualitative information and shows an awareness of competing arguments/factors leading to a supported judgement.

3.3.5.3c - HR strategies question 1