questions that follow appoint HR specialists Case Study (20 marks) Read the following case and answer ALL the Servan upsets the Applecart vappointment: the firm's first HR manager. The firm, which has o The partners of a small accountancy firm have just made a radical new has grown to 150 employees. Now, the partners partners feel that their people management activities need more professional support. They have like them, with around 100 to 300 staff, typically always prided themselves on running a friendly, caring style of stati management but other fimms accounting fimm is actually a people business. It depends on recruiting good stall, training them in the key Accountancy might seem to be about numbers but they know that running an your best to hang on to high performers, and so on. practices of professional accountancy, paying as well as you can (but not over the top), doing each other's profit performance and engage in the soul searching process of deciding who, if Every year, the partners collectively monitor anyone, will be offered the ultimate accolade of being invited to join them in partnership. The firm is successful and being a partner is hard work but very rewarding from an elite department within it. This is a branch of government which only recruits people The new HR manager has actually arrived from the public sector but from no ordinary part with first-class honours degrees from the top universities and which invests heavily in their ongoing development. The department, which will remain nameless, is not one of the mainstream parts of the public service, where budgets select cadre dealing with the crme de la crme, much as the French do in the higher echelons are always under pressure, but a small, of their public service. Its HR policies are well established, well-resourced and well insulated from other branches of government. The new HR manager, Serwaa, was an HR advisor there and, like everybody else, has a first- class degree from an elite university and, in her case, a flair with foreign languages. Even though she had no private sector experience, she told the partners she was keen to get into the private sector and develop her career further on this basis. She feels more attracted to the private sector than the public, despite the excellent conditions she enjoyed in the elite unit. She clearly sees herself as rising, in due course, to a position as HR Director in a top-100 company. The partners responded warmly to this and decided to recruit her because they considered her experience in the management of professionals would have carry-over value to their firm. Things went well for the first three months. Serwaa immediately threw herself into helping the firm with its annual recruitment of new accounting graduates . This greatly relieved the managing partner and his PA, who had previously handled this work themselves and could now rely on someone to handle campus liaison, presentation of the firm at recruitment fairs, and initial screening of candidates to create a set of good possibles' that the parts could sexiew Now, however the runners are their stall have they (the partners consider to be unrealistic expectations for print development. From these development programme where she worked previously. There il transpires staff were conversations they discern that Senwaa has been talking tray with statt about the career in fact, allowed plenty of paid time oil to attend class and also to prepare for exams. This encouraged to enroll in postgraduate degrees at the employer's expense (all fees paid) and were, largesse nas available after only one year with the department Seria was talking freely about her that the firm should adopt more generous HR policies and become an employer of choice this personal development policy as an HR 'best practice and staff were getting the idea from in the industry Started by talking about ways of improving their employee selection practices through some They decided to call Servaa in for a meeting to hear her viens on HR issues in the firm. Serwaa tests to assess cognitive ability rather than relying on university grades and a more formal method of reference checking for experienced job hires. All this sounded good and the conversation ran along in a non-threatening way for some time. Then, Koti, the managing partner, decided to grasp the nettle: "I think I speak for the partners when I say this is all y good Servaa. We like your ideas on how to make this form a more effective recruiter and I know de benefited already from your mortiste are not so sure about Starve been contingere with the idea that the firm should pay for postgraduate study for them and give them generous time of for study. We be never done this sort of thing before and more importantly , we try not to raise these sorts of expectationsAfier all, everything we do has to be charged to clients and, as we explained to jou or your recruitment, we're not a first-tier accountancy firm... We're in a tier of small and mid-size firms where we try to pay well relative to our competitors and can look after people, up to a point. People often come to us because they don't want to work in a huge firm where nobody takes any notice of them. They're not the A students but they are good B students who can do the job well enough. We have a personal touch with our people. When Jayne, who has worked for our ter section for 28 years had a stress breakdown last year when her husband died sudilenly, we gave her 3 months of paid leave to help her recover. That's the sort of thing we do our we're never going to be big spenders on further education for new staff. There's ahwas going to be a high rate of artrition among new accounting graduates. At least half of them will leave us afier 3 years, thur's the reality. We see their best development as taking place through the experience we give them, not through more education Serwsa thought for a while and then responded: -Well, I think you are in the game of managing professionals and professionals have these sorts of expectations these days. I think you have to change or .die. Yes, I think it's as serious as that you need to evolve beyond a small-firm mentality. Any HR professional will tell you same thing. How do you expect to become more successfulf you don t embrace best practice the PCU IDL BLKT 11-20.30 lugars Page 3 of 6 At this point, another senior partner, Kwame, chipped But we are successful! Your view is simply nok. 1 commercial. It's not something accounting firms operating in the private sector can take seriously. If it's one size fits all in HR then I say "HR be damned'." This brought a nervous laugh or two and, as it was now after 6pm, Koti, sensing the need to de matter further there, in a more relaxed vein. stress the situation, suggested they adjourn to the pub. Perhaps they might be able to take the (Adapted from Boxall and Purcell, 2016) Answer the following questions based on the above case. 1. Why do you think the partners are opposing Serwaa's ideas on employee development once they are hired? (4 marks) 2. Do you think that Serwaa overestimated the context in which she is now working? Give reasons for your answer. (4marks) 3. Do you think that her concept of 'best practice" shows sensitivity to the importance of cost- effectiveness when it comes to evaluating ideas for HR policies? Give reasons for your answer. (4 marks) 4. What is your comment on how the partners have managed Serwaa so far. (4 marks) 5. Comment on how Serwaa has approached her relationship with the partners? (4 marks)