Mateo Rasmussen· Compensation Consultant, Independent
Posted in Job Architecture & Careers ·
Most of what is written about job architecture assumes a professional workforce. I work for a grocery retailer in the Netherlands and Belgium with about 21,000 employees, and 80% of our store population sits in three levels: assistant, senior assistant and team leader. The collective agreement defines the first two.
Our consultants proposed the same ten-level structure for stores and head office. We tested it and store managers could not use it; the bottom levels were split so finely that it made no sense on the shop floor.
We ended up with one framework of ten levels on paper, but stores use only five, with criteria rewritten in terms of what you are trusted to do unsupervised: open the store, handle cash discrepancies, run a shift. I'd like to compare notes with others in frontline-heavy organisations.
1 helpful · 3 insightful · 3 replies · 149 views · 3 following
Noor MensahGRS, CBS
Global Mobility Manager, Halcyon Financial Group
Very similar in hospitality in Canada, about 9,000 hourly staff. Our frontline criteria are all in terms of certification and trust: which stations you are signed off on, whether you can close alone. Progression between the first three levels takes months, not years, and that pace is the point. The professional framework would have had people waiting three years for a first step.
Nina VargasGRS
Global Mobility Manager, Steinbach Industrie
Did you keep one framework for the sake of principle? We split into two at a UK retailer, stores and support centre, with a published bridge at team leader and store manager level. I found one framework with half its levels unused in stores was harder to explain than two that each fit.
Victor UedaCEP
Job Architecture Lead, Independent
Partly principle, partly practical. About 120 people a year move from stores into head office roles in buying, supply chain and HR, and a single level scale means nobody has to be re-levelled on the way across. If that flow were smaller I think two frameworks with a bridge would have been the simpler choice.
