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human resource management
Managing Human Resources 7th Edition Luis Gomez Mejia, David Balkin, Robert Cardy - Solutions
Recent economic difficulties, restructurings, and plant closing have left many people without jobs and looking for new career paths. A hiring employer can now enjoy being able to select from among far more applicants than typical. Unfortunately, many of these applicants lack qualifications for the
Should applicants be selected primarily on the basis of ability or on personality/fit? How can fit be assessed?
A company has come up with a new selection test and decides to try it out on some of its current workers before giving it to job applicants. A group of its current workers volunteered to take the test: 84 percent were male and 7 percent were over the age of 40. The scores on the test that each of
Interviewing unqualified applicants can be a frustrating experience and a waste of time for managers, peers, or whoever is responsible for interviewing. How can the HR department minimize or eliminate this problem?
You work for a medium-size, high-tech firm that faces intense competition on a daily basis. Change seems to be the only constant in your workplace, and each worker's responsibilities shift from project to project.Suppose you have the major responsibility for filling the job openings at your
Do you think work-life programs can improve recruitment and retention? Why or why not? How could you assess whether such a program were a good investment?
If there are distinct roles to be played on a team, how would you go about recruiting and hiring for them in a small business?
The characteristics needed by individual team members depend on the team and the strengths and weaknesses of others who are on the team. In other words, the situation is much more dynamic than assuming that there is one static job with a single set of qualifications. How could you model or include
After eight years as a marketing assistant for the New York office of a large French bank, Sarah Schiffler was told that her job, in a nonrevenue-producing department, was being eliminated. Her choices: She could either be laid off (with eight months' severance pay) or stay on and train for the
The Manager's Notebook, "Job Hopping: Voluntary Is Part of the Business Environment in India and China," addressed job hopping. Do you think it is becoming more prevalent? If you are a manger, do you think job hopping is an issue? How would you deal with it?
Would an employer ever want to increase the rate of employee turnover in a company? Why or why not?
In an age when more and more companies are downsizing, an increasingly important concept is "the virtual corporation." The idea is that a company should have a core of owners and managers, but that, to the greatest degree possible, workers should be contingent- temporary, part-time, or on
Under what circumstances might a company's managers prefer to use layoffs instead of early retirements or voluntary severance plans as a way to downsize the workforce?
Under what set of conditions should a company lay off employees without giving them advance notice?
"The people who actually have the face-to-face contact with the person who is being laid off are not the ones who made the decision. They often did not have any input into which of their people would go," says a technician at a firm that experienced large-scale layoffs.What role should managers-who
Managing survivors in a layoff is important. As a manager, what concerns would you have about the surviving workforce after a layoff? How can the HR management staff be of assistance in providing support for the survivors to a layoff?
Why should management be concerned with helping employees retire from their organization successfully?
The departure of senior workers through retirement can mean that years of experience and knowledge are walking out an organization's doors. This "brain drain" can cripple an organization's ability to remain competitive, particularly if it is difficult to regularly hire younger talent. What
Do you think people can be retrained? Why or why not?
Most workers are not covered by explicit or implicit contracts and are at-will employees. Thus, an employer should be able to terminate these workers at any time and for any reason. A practical reality, however, is that a charge of discrimination as a basis for a termination needs to be defended
The employee equity model provides value, brand, and retention equity perceptions as important determinants of whether an employee stays with an organization. Do you think that the three components are independent, or do they influence each other? Is this a problem for managing retention with the
Value, brand, and retention characteristics could be used as criteria, or standards, for assessing management programs and actions. For example, consider recruitment and/or performance appraisal. If you were trying to maximize employee retention, how might you go about recruitment or performance
Which of the three approaches do you think is the most procedurally just basis for selecting workers to be laid off?
Let's suppose that your organization rated most workers as performing above average. In most cases then, you don't have a reason to use a merit-based layoff selection. What approach would you recommend in that situation?
At ARCO Transportation, a $1 billion division of Atlantic Richfield, employees are hired, promoted, and appraised according to how they fulfill the performance dimensions most valued by the company. One of these performance dimensions is "communication"- specifically, "listens and observes
Superficially, it seems preferable to use objective performance data (such as productivity figures), when available, rather than subjective supervisory ratings to assess employees.Why might objective data be less effective performance measures than subjective ratings?
How important are rating formats to the quality of performance ratings? What is the most important influence on rating quality?
What is comparability? How can it be maximized in performance appraisal?
"Occasionally an employee comes along who needs to be reminded who the boss is, and the appraisal is an appropriate place for such a reminder." Would the manager quoted here be likely to use a rational or a political approach to appraisal? Contrast the rational and political approaches. To what
Do you think performance appraisal should be done? Is it worth the cost?
What criteria do you think should be used to measure team performance? What sources should be used for the appraisal? Should individual performance still be measured? Why or why not?
You're the owner of a 25-employee company that has just had a fantastic year. Everyone pulled together and worked hard to achieve the boost in company profits. Unfortunately, you need to sink most of those profits into paying your suppliers. All you can afford to give your workers is a 3 percent
Is there a distinction between diversity and cultural competency, or are they the same thing? Explain.
A possible negative impact of cultural-competency training is the furthering of stereotypes. For example, training content might portray people of certain ethnic backgrounds as acting the same way and lead to overgeneralizations. Do you think this problem could be avoided? How?
Innovator, technical expert, and team leader are some possible roles that may be common in the workplace. What other roles and additional measures do you think would be useful for role-based appraisal?
What advantage might a role-based appraisal system offer to the organization? To the worker?
Place yourself in the position of an employee receiving a performance review. Would it matter to you whether your performance review, the narrative description of your performance levels, and suggestions for improvement were generated by computer or by your manager? Why?
From the perspective of a manager, what advantages might be associated with taking an electronic approach to reviewing the workers' performance levels? List these advantages into two categories: rational and political. The rational category is for advantages such as the speed with which the
Given your answers to the previous questions, would you recommend the use of electronic performance reviews? Justify your position.
Place yourself in the position of the manager of a small business. Describe situations when ethical performance appraisal for your employees would be useful.
Are there disadvantages to a focus on ethics in performance appraisal? Describe.
How should a small-business owner or manager develope an appraisal system that measures ethical performance? Identify the steps.
Performance problems seem all too common in your workplace. People do not seem to be putting forth the needed effort, and interpersonal conflict on the work teams seems to be a constant. Is training the answer? If so, what kind of training should be done? What other actions may be appropriate?
How effective do you think training can be in raising employee motivation?
Workers who are illiterate suffer from embarrassment and fear. An HR manager notes, "They will ask for directions many times, even though the instruction manual is alongside their machine . . . . Some workers always seem to be having problems with their eyesight or their glasses . . . . The truth
How important is it that the effectiveness of a training program be measured in dollar terms? Why is it important to measure training effectiveness in the first place?
Training provides workers with skills needed in the workplace. However, many organizations have dynamic environments in which change is the norm. How can training requirements be identified when job duties are a moving target?
Simuflite, a Texas aviation training company, expected to whip the competition with FasTrak, its computer-based training (CBT) curriculum for corporate pilots. Instead, the new venture sent Simuflite into a nose dive. In traditional ground-school training, pilots ask questions and learn from "war
According to one survey, trainees list the following as some of the traits of a successful trainer: knowledge of the subject, adaptability, sincerity, and sense of humor. What other traits do you think trainers need to be successful in the training situation?
Auto-Valve was an example in this chapter of an organization that used a simple spreadsheet to determine which skills were most critical and should be taught to employees first. Using the general spreadsheet approach, how could you determine which training topics should be covered? For the rows on
Small businesses have limited budgets for training. If you were a small-business owner, how would you address training needs cost effectively?
If you have a clear code of ethics, do you think training to challenge unethical behavior would still be needed? Why or why not?
Might challenging someone who is engaging in unethical behavior have some risk? How can this risk be minimized?
When would the ROI of training be a useful measure? Explain.
When would measures of training effectiveness other than ROI be useful? Describe.
It has been argued that training can lead to turnover, but career development can reduce it. Differentiate between training and career development. Why might training lead to turnover whereas career development might improve retention? Explain.
How would you go about retaining and developing older employees who are part of a dual-career couple?
Today's organizations are flatter and offer fewer opportunities for advancement. How do you think careers should be developed in this type of organizational environment?
What challenges do nontraditional family units pose to company career development plans? How can companies meet these challenges?
People who adopt a careerist strategy focus on career advancement through political machinations rather than excellent performance. Experts have pointed out four ways in which workers try to influence their superiors' opinions of them: favor doing (doing a favor for a superior in hopes that the
Companies use various tactics to encourage managers to make employee development a top priority. What do you think of this policy of tying financial rewards to people development? What are some other ways companies can hold managers accountable for developing those they supervise?
Do you think that SWOT analysis is a useful tool for career development? Why or why not?
Opportunities and threats have to do with external factors. What sources could be useful for obtaining this information?
Which should drive action planning more, strengths or weaknesses? That is, is it more important to build on your strengths or to reduce your weaknesses? Explain.
Do you think a small-business manager should be concerned with employee development? Why or why not?
How can you measure and take into account differences among workers in terms of their development needs and interests?
Workers can learn about policies, procedures, and so on, by reading electronic or hard-copy documents. What else does mentoring bring to the situation that apparently makes this form of employee development so effective?
Do you think that people should be required to serve as mentors? What characteristics should these mentors possess?
What topics, other than technology, would be appropriate for the reverse mentoring approach?
Mentoring and reverse mentoring can be seen as particular directions of knowledge sharing. Would peer-to-peer mentoring be possible? What about customer to employee? Could the traditional concept of mentoring be expanded to something similar to 360° feedback? If so, how would it change the nature
Several companies are moving in the direction of compensating employees with nonmonetary rewards in lieu of higher wages (see the Manager's Notebook, "Rewarding Employees with Nonmonetary Compensation"). Why do you think this is happening? Do you think this is a good thing for companies and
In a feisty response to critics who accuse Wal-Mart of providing poverty-level wages (around $9.68 an hour, on average) and few benefits, Wal-Mart chief executive H. Lee Scott, Jr., said Wal-Mart offered good, stable jobs, noting that when it opens a store, more than 3,000 people often apply for
One observer argues that external equity should always be the primary concern in compensation, noting that it attracts the best employees and prevents the top performers from leaving.
Go to any of the salary survey sources listed in the Manager's Notebook, "How Much Is a Position Worth in the Marketplace?" and research the salary ranges of four to five positions of your choice. Assume that you are planning to recruit five individuals into each of those positions. How would you
As noted in the Manager's Notebook, "Compensation Entitlements Are Going out the Window," fixed or secure pay is becoming rare. What impact do you think this has on employees' outlook? What, if any, are the negative and positive aspects of this trend? Explain.
Do you think a company should keep pay secret and demand that all employees not disclose their pay to coworkers? Why or why not?
As discussed in this chapter, firms vary widely on the extent to which they emphasize money as an incentive. Do you think an emphasis on financial incentives is good or bad? Explain.
For the past 90 years or so, job evaluation as a compensation tool has been designed to assess the value of each job rather than to evaluate the person doing the job, prompting a relatively flat pay schedule for all incumbents in a particular position. Some HR experts believe that the emerging
Do you think companies provide paid voluntary opportunities for employees for altruistic reasons? Do you see this as a trend? Explain.
Is the dean's explanation for decreased pay differences by rank and/or seniority justifiable?
How would you suggest the dean deal with senior faculty who feel underpaid?
This chapter identifies three assumptions underlying pay-for-performance plans. Do you believe these assumptions are valid?
One observer notes that "the problem with using pay as an incentive is that it is such a powerful motivational weapon that management can easily lose control of the situation." Do you agree? Why or why not?
Reread the Manager's Notebook, "Incentives Come to Medicine." Do you agree that it is a good idea to offer incentives to doctors for better patient care? What are the drawbacks? Can these problems be avoided? Explain.
According to a recent Wall Street Journal article entitled "Pay gap fuels worker woes,". the gap between top executive and employee compensation has never been greater. That's triggering lower morale and productivity on some corporate staffs, and making it more difficult to attract and keep talent,
A customer survey for Landmark Company reports that people do not trust what sales representatives say about their firm's products. How might you use the compensation system to help change this negative image?
Do you think offering incentives to teachers motivates them to do a better job in the classroom? Why or why not? Explain.
What major issues and problems concerning the design and implementation of pay-for-performance systems does this case illustrate? Explain.
Are team-based incentives appropriate for the type of work done by Johnson's crews?
What do you see as the main advantages and disadvantages of this proposal? Explain.
What is the common thread across the widely different examples of "merit pay" and "pay for performance" given in this case?
What are some of the pros and cons of linking pay to objective criteria that are important to the organization such as quality control measures, profitability, and low turnover?
How would you prevent the problems that arose at Green Giant, the software developer, and Sunbeam and still reward good performance? Explain.
Assuming you are a top executive at Green Giant and the software developer, would you punish the employees who engaged in those unethical acts, the managers who devised the incentive system, or both?
Some people believe that most employees will act ethically even though they have a chance to take advantage of an incentive system through inappropriate behaviors. Do you agree?
How might the increasing diversity of the workforce affect the design of employee benefits packages in large companies?
The United States mandates only four benefits, yet U.S. employers provide many other benefits-such as health insurance, retirement benefits, and paid vacations-voluntarily. Why do so many employers provide these benefits even though they are not legally required to do so?
How do managed-care health insurance plans (HMOs and PPOs) differ from traditional fee-for-service health insurance plans? What are the costs and benefits of each to the employer? To the employee?
Why should younger employees (those in their 20s and 30s) care about retirement benefits?
Why is cost containment such an important issue in employee benefits programs?
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