Tanglewood Case 1 Franklin, M.V.

Tanglewood Case 1 Franklin, M.V.

Tanglewood was founded in 1975 by Tanner Emerson and Thurston Wood. Tanglewood is a chain of general retail stores which features items such as appliances, clothing, electronics, and home decor. Tanglewood targets middle and upper income customers. Tanglewood's has a large camping and outdoor living section in every store as a distinct strategy. The store also distinguishes itself by simple, elegant design concepts for the store and their in-house products.

The stores original name was Tannerwood in Spokane, Washington. They later renamed the store chain to Tanglewood in 1984. It initially worked as a single store and developed from 1975 to 1984. Today Tanglewoods has a total of 243 stores open in Oregon, Northern California, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, Nevada, New Mexico, Washington, Arizona, and Idaho.

Tanglewood's is now trying to consolidate its current management strategy. Before doing so we need to study Tanglewood's operations' that are currently in place.

Based on information in the case, Tanglewood's Return on Revenue (ROR) shows to be on top after Kohl. When ROR grows it means that there are fewer expenses incurred for higher net income. Tanglewood's Return on Assets (ROA) is in second place. This means it has efficiently managed its assets to revenue. Tanglewood should show concern of several competitors like Kohl's, Federated Dept and Target.

The organization structure of Tanglewood's encourages all employees at all levels to make suggestions regarding operations. Many changes have come from employee suggestions. There is now 1 store manager, 3 assistant managers, 17 department managers, approximately 24 shift leaders, approximately 170 associates and around 215 employees per store. All employees, full or part time, are considered as members of the core work force. Tanglewood's does not at length use a flexible workforce, such as temporary employees. A core workforce is important for the organizational values and culture.

Tanglewood places great values on employee involvement. Most retail stores have a traditional structure, however Tanglewood allows each department manager to put together methods for running their departments with the employees they supervise. Employees still have specific job responsibilities, but are involved in the decision process when possible.

Each shift emphasizes team fortitude. The most senior associate is a shift leader, but other members are also given the opportunity to provide suggestions. Work is distributed equally. Employees are expected to be supportive. Performance evaluations reflect the employee's interactions with other team members and initiative.

Tanglewood's upper managers have the opportunity to observe the leadership and decision making qualities of their employees. This identifies good workers for promotion and career prospect. All employees spend a period of time working in the store as an associate. This is a way of keeping the company's values.

In HR the Staffing Services Director supervises three managers for retention, recruiting, and selection. There is also an Equal Employment Opportunity Coordinator. The corporate Staffing Services performs data analysis and design of staffing policies and programs. The data assists in Tanglewood's recruiting, interviewing, testing and selecting employees, and employee turnover. It is sent from stores to the corporate headquarters for recommendations.

Store management is responsible for recruitment, staffing, and training based on the recommendations from corporate staffing. Department managers' interview and the final decision are left to the Store Manager after discussing with the store assistant. Promotion decisions are also done within the store level which is the department manager. Regional Managers perform the hiring for store managers, and work with store's managers to determine promotions.

There are still some issues in the system of Tanglewood that needs addressing. The corporate staffing function is not up to par. The corporate HR acts only as an advisor to the store-level managers. The company wishes to expand staffing centrally rather than two different staffing process taking place. There is the assumption local leadership is inefficient with the increase number of stores. It is thought that centralization will rectify this.

The following are thirteen decisions identified and discussed referring to Tanglewood Stores.

1. Acquire or Develop Talent-Tanglewood is going to have to gain new talent. This would be best for Tanglewood because of the contradiction in management styles between the old and new stores. New employees normally perform immediately. This is the type of performance Tanglewood needs during the acquisition period. It assures that new stores start on the