Strategic Compensation A Human Resource Management Approach 7th Edition Joseph J Martocchio, Joe Martocchio - Solutions

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Are the three main goals of compensation departments equally important, or do you believe that they differ in impor- tance? Give your rationale.
Describe your reaction to the following statement: Compensa- tion has no bearing on a company's performance.
Identify two companies-one that you believe pursues a lowest-cost strategy and another that pursues a differentia- tion strategy. Relying on personal knowledge, company annual reports, or articles in newspapers and business periodicals, discuss these companies' competitive strategies.
Presumably, five core job characteristics promote intrinsic compensation. Give examples of jobs that you believe rate highly on these core job characteristics. Explain your answer.
Define compensation.
Please identify one or more issues besides the ones discussed in this chapter that you feel will help define the future of compensation professionals’ work.
Describe the most recent developments in health care reform.How do these developments compare to what is discussed in this chapter? To help answer this question, conduct a search on the Internet using terms such as “health care reform” or “Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.”
This chapter discusses four important issues that will shape compensation professionals’ work for years to come. Which one of these issues stands to create the greatest uncertainty for compensation professionals? Explain your answer.
What are some labor-related factors that would favor Canada as the location of the new facility? Or Mexico for that matter?
What are some labor-related factors that Threads should consider when comparing Mexico and Canada?
Discuss the main differences between retirement systems in the United States (taking into account legally required and discretionary programs) and one other country discussed in this chapter. Does it appear that the cost of retirement programs are creating burdens for competitive advantage?
Discuss the main differences between the minimum pay regulations in the United States (Chapter 2) and one other country’s practices discussed in this chapter. How do these differences affect companies’ ability to compete with other companies worldwide?
Should Jenkins offer any incentive compensation or additional benefits to the expatriates?Why or why not?
How should Dale approach the determination of the consultant’s salaries as expatriates?
Of the many reimbursements and allowances that U.S. companies make for employees who take foreign assignments, which one is the most essential? Discuss your reasons.
Allowances and reimbursements for international assignments are costly. Should companies avoid international business activities? Explain your answer. If you answer no, what can companies do to minimize costs?
Discuss your reaction to the following statement: “U.S. companies should increase base pay (beyond the level that would be paid in the United States) to motivate employees to accept foreign assignments.”
Fora country of your choice, conduct research into the cultural characteristics that you believe should be important considerations in establishing a core compensation program for a U.S.company that plans to locate there. Discuss these characteristics.Discuss as well whether you feel that
Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the following methods for establishing base pay in international contexts:home country—based pay, headquarters-based pay, and host country—based pay.
What do you recommend MedEx do? Why?
Are there any disadvantages or challenges in offering telecommuting?
Would offering telecommuting as an option benefit MedEx? How?
Provide your reactions to the following statement: Contingent workers should be compensated on a pay-for-knowledge system.
What impact will flexible work schedules have on employees' commitment to their employers? On employee productivity? On company effectiveness?
What arguments can be made in favor of using compressed workweek schedules for companies that pursue lowest-cost strategies? What are the arguments against using compressed workweek schedules in such situations?
Discuss some of the problems that companies are likely to face when both contingent workers and core employees work in the same location. Does it matter whether contingent workers and core employees are performing the same jobs?Explain your answer.. Companies generally pay temporary employees lower
How can Don explain the pay disparity to the employees to ease their concerns about the fairness of the CEO's pay?
What additional information about the CEO's pay package should Don identify to poten- tially share with the employees?
Consult three recent articles (from newspapers, Internet news sources, or business magazines) on executive pay. Using these articles, describe the main issues and then your opinion about whether (or how) executive pay practices should change.
Discuss the differences between enhanced benefits and perquisites.
Discuss your position on executive compensation. Is execu- tive compensation excessive or appropriate?
Which component of compensation is most essential to motivate executives to lead companies toward competitive advantage? Discuss your rationale.
What can be done to make the function of compensation committees consistent with shareholders' interests? Explain your answer.
Do you think the firm should offer benefits to part-time workers? If yes, should they offer paid time off, the 401(k) plan, and health insurance? Or only one or two of the benefits?Explain your recommendation.
What are some factors that Alan should consider when determining whether or not to offer benefits to part-time workers?
Conduct some research on the future of the Social Security programs (see the Web site www.ssa.gov). Based on your research, prepare a statement, not to exceed 250 words, that describes your view of the Social Security programs (e.g., whether they are necessary, their viability, or whether there
Provide your reaction to the statement, “Employee benefits is seen by employees as an entitlement for their membership in
Except for the Family and Medical Leave Act, the remaining legally required benefits were conceived decades ago. What changes in the business environment and society might affect the relevance or perhaps the viability of any of these benefits?Discuss your ideas.
What do you recommend? Why?
What are some potential disadvantages of the HSA option?
What are some advantages of implementing the HSA option?
Discuss some of the choices an employer may make to help control health care costs.
Describe the principles of fee-for-service plans and managed care plans. What are the similarities and differences?
Discuss the basic concept of insurance. How does this concept apply to health care?
Summarize the controversial issues regarding cash balance plans.
Are employees more likely to favor defined contribution plans over defined benefit plans? How about employers?Explain your answer.
Are there any disadvantages to offering PTO?
Beyond reducing occurrences of unscheduled time off, are there any other benefits to offering PTO?
Do you think changing Superior’s time off policies will decrease unscheduled time off?
Your instructor will assign you an industry. Conduct some research in order to identify the prevalent employee benefits practices for that industry. Also, what factors (e.g., technology, competition, and government regulation)might influence the present practices? How will these practices change?
Assume that you are an HRM professional whose responsibility is to develop a brochure for the purpose of conveying the value of your company’s benefits program to potential employees. Your company has asked you to showcase the benefits program in a manner that will encourage recruits to join the
Discuss your views about whether discretionary employee benefits should be an entitlement or something earned based on job performance.
Many compensation professionals are faced with making choices about which discretionary benefits to drop because funds are limited, and the costs of these benefits continually increase. Assume you must make such choices. Rank-order discretionary benefits, starting with the ones you would most
What kind of sales incentive plan do you recommend? Why?
What role will the compensation design play in motivating the new sales representative?
What are the sales objectives for the new sales representative?
Compression represents a serious dysfunction of pay structures.Discuss some of the major ramifications of compression.Also, discuss how companies can minimize or avoid these ramifications.
React to the statement: “Merit pay grids have the potential to undermine employee motivation.” Please discuss your views.
Describe some ethical dilemmas sales professionals may encounter. How can sales compensation programs be modified to minimize ethical dilemmas?
Two employees perform the same job, and each received exemplary performance ratings. Is it fair to give one employee a smaller percentage merit increase because his pay falls within the 3rd quartile but give a larger percentage merit increase to the other because his pay falls within the Ist
Respond to the following statement: “Pay grades limit a company’s ability to achieve competitive advantage.” Do you agree? Provide a rationale for your position.
Should Jack suggest a pay policy to lead, lag, or match the market? Explain your recommendation.
What are some strategic considerations in establishing a pay structure at Nutriment?
Refer to Table 7-2. Cross out salaries 26-35. Calculate the mean and median for this reduced data set.
Refer to the regression equation presented earlier in this chapter. When 4= 0, the market pay line is parallel to the x-axis(i.e., job evaluation points). Provide your interpretation.
Which do you believe is most important for a company’s competitive advantage: internal consistency or market competitiveness?Explain your answer.
Can companies easily develop compensations that are both internally consistent and market competitive? What are some of the challenges to this goal?
You are a compensation analyst for Worry-Not Insurance Company, which is located in Hartford, Connecticut.Define the relevant labor market for insurance claims adjusters and for data entry clerks. Describe the rationale for your definitions.
What do you recommend Customers First do? Why?
What is your opinion on Joan’s view on job analysis and job evaluation?
Do you think that job analysis and job evaluation will benefit Customers First?
Do you consider job evaluation to be an art or a science?Please explain.
Respond to the statement “Building an internally consistent job structure is burdensome to companies. Instead, it is best to simply define and evaluate the worth ofj obs by surveying the market.”
Conduct a job analysis of a person you know, and write a complete job description (no longer than one page) according to the principles described in this chapter. In class, be prepared to discuss the method you used for conducting the job analysis and some of the challenges you encountered.3, This
Discuss the differences between job analysis and job evaluation.How do these practices help establish internally consistent job structures?
What approach would you recommend for Holly to take in designing a person-focused pay system?
What are some disadvantages?
What are some advantages of a person-focused pay system at Mitron?
As discussed in the chapter, person-focused pay programs are not suitable for all kinds of jobs. Based on your understanding of person-focused pay concepts, identify at least three jobs for which this basis for pay is inappropriate. Be sure to provide your rationale, given the information in this
Name at least three jobs that have been influenced by such technological advances as robotics, word processing software, fax machines, and electronic mail. Describe the jobs prior to the technological advances and explain how these jobs have changed or will change because of the technological
Person-focused pay is becoming more prevalent in companies;however, person-focused pay programs are not always an appropriate basis for compensation. Discuss the conditions under which incentive pay (Chapter 4) is more appropriate than person-focused pay programs. Be sure to include your
“Person-focused pay plans are least preferable compared with individual incentive pay programs” (Chapter 4). Indicate whether you agree or disagree with this statement. Detail your arguments to support your position.
What do you think Sally should do?
What are some advantages of offering a team-based incentive pay plan?
What are some advantages of offering a piece-rate pay plan to the furniture builders at Metropolitan Furniture?
Opponents of incentive pay programs argue that these programs manipulate employees more than seniority and merit pay programs. Discuss your views of this statement.
Unlike individual incentive programs, group and company- wide incentive programs reward individuals based on group (e.g., cost savings in a department) and company- wide (e.g., profits) performance standards, respectively. Under group and companywide incentive programs, it is possible for poor
Critics of profit sharing plans maintain that these plans do not motivate employees to perform at higher levels. Under what conditions are profit sharing plans not likely to motivate employees?
There is currently a tendency among business professionals to endorse the use of incentive pay plans. Identify two jobs for which individual incentive pay is appropriate and two jobs for which individual incentive pay is inappropriate. Be sure to include your justification.
Indicate whether you agree or disagree with the following state- ment: "Individual incentive plans are less preferable than group incentives and companywide incentives." Explain your answer.
What changes do you recommend Precision make to the performance appraisal process to align it with a merit pay program?
What are some problems with Precision’s performance appraisal process that might cause challenges for Jackson to implement a merit pay program?
Select three distinct jobs of your choice (e.g., a clerical job, a technical job, and a professional job). For each job, identify what you believe is the most appropriate performance appraisal method. Based on your choices, sketch a performance appraisal instrument. Discuss the rationale for your
This chapter indicates that merit pay plans appear to be the most common form of compensation in the United States.Although widely used, these systems are not suitable for all kinds of jobs. Based on your knowledge of merit pay systems, identify at least three jobs for which merit pay is
Consider a summer job that you have held. Write a detailed job description for that job. Then, develop a behaviorally anchored rating scale (BARS) that can be used to evaluate an individual who performs that job in the future.
Subjective performance evaluations are subject to several rater errors, which makes objective measures seem a better alternative. Discuss when subjective performance evaluations might be better (or more feasible) than objective ratings.
Human capital theory has been advanced as a rationale underlying seniority pay. Identify two individuals you know who have performed the same job for at least 2 years. Ask them to describe the changes in knowledge and skills they experienced from the time they assumed their jobs to the present.
What are some factors that Amy should consider when determining if shift leaders are exempt or nonexempt?
Do you think that the shift leaders are properly classified as exempt? Why or why not?
Why did Amy classify the shift leaders as exempt? Are there any advantages to Jones Department Store to having the shift leaders classified as exempt?

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Strategic Compensation A Human Resource Management Approach 7th Edition Joseph J Martocchio, Joe Martocchio - Solutions

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