Assignment 1: Hershey’s Sweet Mission
Rose-Marie Waters
Dr. Robert Waldo
Human Resource Management Foundations – HRM 500
Week 3: April 22 – April 28, 2013

Recommend the redesign of Hershey’s performance management system to appeal to the diverse groups that it employs.
Hershey has redesigned its performance management system to appeal to their diverse group of employees, specifically the “millennials”, by implementing a “bottom up” style of performance management. Millennial generation employees are defined by their birthdate. A millennial refers to someone who was born after 1980. Currently, this group comprises one-third of the American workforce and will soon become the majority as they come of age. Millennials have expressed a desire to pursue work that is personally meaningful; they resist corporate hierarchy, are eager for challenge, desire autonomy, and are accustomed to getting work done in a variety of environments. When corporations like Hershey understand what motivates employees, like the millennials, they are better able to set mutual expectations for success. This is what Hershey has embraced with the bottom up performance management system. This bottom up approach allows employees to set their own goals and track progress on projects throughout the year. (Noe 2011, pg. 56) In order for the bottom up system to be effective the employee must understand the company’s goals and the strategy for achieving those goals. Employees must also understand what role they play within the company in order to be successful in setting their personal objectives. The bottom up performance management system appeals to the millennials in that they are engaged in their own development, they have an opportunity to set goals for themselves that will allow them to contribute meaningful work to the organization and affords them the ability to be autonomous in their objective planning.

If you were a Hershey’s employee, analyze how you would interpret the values that Hershey embraces in relation to your role.

In terms of trends identified in this chapter, describe which one may impact Hershey the most.

Describe the effects that mentoring could have on integrating values into the Hershey culture.
Mentoring can provide tremendous value to an organization in terms of revolutionizing individual professional growth, enhancing existing knowledge and skills training, fostering relationships among diverse employees, and providing a cost effective alternative to getting employees up to speed and becoming productive, contributing members of their teams. Mentoring should be focused on the organizational culture and corporate strategy as well as embody the core values of the organization. The current mentoring program that Hershey’s uses pairs new hires, which are typically “millennials” with older, more seasoned employees, of the baby boomer generation. (Noe 2011, pg. 55) Older employees that have been with the Hershey Company for an extended period of time have become keenly aware of the company’s core values and incorporate them into their daily work. Corporate values, such as team work, accountability, diversity and knowledge sharing are demonstrated by the older worker to the new employee, thus further integrating these values into the Hershey culture. Mentoring ensures that the company’s core values are passed from one generation to another which is a good way to integrate values, share knowledge and improve retention rates. While mentoring is key to employee retention, it contributes most notably to the retention of women and minority employees (Insala, Mentoring Talent), which aligns with Hershey’s diversity initiative.

http://www.mentoringtalent.com/mentoring-benefits.asp#tabs Retrieved April 22, 2013 http://www.pmhut.com/top-down-vs-bottom-up-management-whats-the-best-way-to-set-goals Retrieved April 22, 2013