Digitalisatio of Human Resources Management (HRM) in the Zimbabwe Retail Sector: An analysis of its State, Benefits and Challenges

Title

Digitalisatio of Human Resources Management (HRM) in the Zimbabwe Retail Sector: An analysis of its State, Benefits and Challenges

Creator

Mutumwa Allen, , , ,

Charehwa Mpho

Mutongoreni Noah Ariel

Kwembeya Maurice

Matsikure-Cheure Memory

Zengeya-Nyandima Rudo

Abstract

Technology is ever-growing and organisations are increasingly digitalising their HRM functions with the quest to ensure efficiency of this important functional department. The Zimbabwean retail sector is instrumental to the economy in pursuit of the country’s vision 2030 and other strategic economic goals. Effective digitalisation can therefore promote the bottom-line through enhancement of overall efficiency of the retail businesses. The purpose of this study was to investigate the state of digitalisation of HRM, benefits and challenges with particular focus on the retail sector. Most studies on digitalisation of HRM are not contextualised to retail businesses, a gap which was addressed by this study. The study adopted multiple case study design and mixed research methodology. The population for the study was 637, with a sample size of 164. The sample consisted of managerial and non-managerial staff, equally selected from five selected supermarkets from Masvingo urban and Mutare urban. Managerial staff was selected using purposive sampling while non-managerial employees were selected using random sampling. Twenty in-depth face-to-face and telephone interviews were successfully conducted with managerial staff and of the 144 structured questionnaires distributed to non-managerial staff, 120 were returned. Qualitative data were coded and presented in verbatim and quantitative data were analysed through descriptive statistics with the aid of Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software. The study established that although some large supermarkets do not have a standalone HR department, the adoption of ICT has been instrumental in driving efficiency and effectiveness in HR related activities such as records administration, tracking employee performance, skills audit, communication and payroll administration.
Keywords: Digitalisation of Human Resource Management (HRM), Information and Communication Technology (ICT), Retail Sector, Human Resource Efficiency, Zimbabwe

Date

2024

Source

African Journal of Human Resource, Marketing and Organisational Studies

volume

1

issue

2