Requesting Kamaa3070 for these questions DUE DATE - AUGUST 19TH, 2015 Assignment 1 BUS4043- Compensation & Benefits Mgmt. Book- Milkovich, G. T., Newman, J. M., & Gerhart, B. (2013). Compensation (11th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill/Irwin. ISBN: 9780078029493. DOCUMENT#1 3-4PAGES Designing Benefit Plans Resources Exhibit 12.6 in Chapter 12 of your text. Given what you have read about benefit plans and options, as well as costs and factors for designing a benefit plan, draft a basic plan for a start-up company of fewer than 100 employees in your local community. First, review Exhibit 12.6 (Factors Influencing Choice of Benefit Package), which lists the employer and employee factors influencing benefit choices. Then look at a company in your community and examine what they provide for their employees. For this assignment you will create a draft of a basic benefit plan. In your plan you will describe the benefit options you will offer along with the cost of these options, and you will also include the following information on factors influencing the choices in your benefit package: 1. Which of the benefits you selected would be considered standard, which are unique for your industry, and which benefits would attract highly qualified candidates? 2. Describe your company's competition in your community, and address the competitive factors that are at play for attracting employees. 3. What cost target as a percentage of the total compensation package is appropriate for your total benefit package? What trends will have an effect on your cost target? 4. How will your plan affect retention and motivation of the work force? 5. How will you ensure that your plan meets legal requirements? 6. Will any of your benefits show an unintended preference for people of a certain age, gender, marital status, or number of dependents? Describe the impact and any issues that might arise from this. 7. Would you be able to administer the plan in a small employer environment? Review the scoring guide linked in the Resources. Submit a 3-4 page, double-spaced, analysis. Be sure to cite all outside resources used in your assignment in APA format. Document#2 Discussion - 200-words Outsourcing, Administration of Benefits Years ago the personnel manager and staff handled employee questions and managed the administration of employee benefits. Today, most companies have decided to outsource their benefit administration to third-party vendors. What is your opinion? Is the 1-800 number a better solution? Does it ensure more privacy for the employee? Or, is the 1-800 number impersonal, thus making the relationship between employer and employee more distant? Post your opinion and as always, be sure to cite examples. In this discussion, use examples from outside resources, your own experiences, or the experiences of others. Response Guidelines From the perspective of a decision maker at a company, how convincing are your peers' arguments for or against outsourcing benefits? What else would you need to know before committing your company's resources one way or the other? Please respond to a minimum of two of your classmates' posts. EXTRA INFORMATION Introduction In the last six units we have covered many topics related to compensation, including the process by which to create an effective pay structure. We also considered the role of compensation in motivating employees. In Unit 7 we will turn our attention towards benefits plans and focus on their role in the total compensation plan. Toggle DrawerHide Full Introduction Historically, unions fought hard for pay and benefits for their members. Companies and the government realized that a certain base level of benefits were essential to a healthy national workforce, as well as to a well-funded retired workforce. As demographics and economics shifted in every direction, benefits issues began to become as important as pay issues for ensuring an effective contract between employer and employee. Fewer than 40 years ago, benefits accounted for approximately one-fourth of payroll. Today, many companies budget benefits at 40 percent of payroll or even more, which is a huge number to fund and manage for any size company (Milkovich, 2013). Unit 7 explores the shaping of a benefits plan and again looks at the competitive factors of benefit planning in a rapidly changing workforce. Reference Milkovich, G. T., Newman, J. M., & Gerhart, B. (2013). Compensation (11th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill/Irwin. Objectives To successfully complete this learning unit, you will be expected to: 1. Analyze the current effectiveness of outsourcing benefits. 2. Design a base benefit plan as a component of a total compensation plan. Learning Activities [u07s1] Unit 7 Study 1 Studies Reading Use your text to complete the following: Read Chapter 12, which explains integrating benefits into a total compensation plan. Research Research a company's total benefits plan by doing one or two of the following: Obtain a copy of your current employer's benefits booklets and summary plan descriptions. Visit the Genentech Benefits Web page to research the benefits package offered to its employees. Click on the benefits in the left navigation menu. Obtain a benefits booklet and summary plan description from another source. To find this type of information on the Internet, select a company you would like to research. If the company Web site has a search engine, you can search for information using Benefits as your keyword. You can also look for this information by going to the Human Resources page on a company Web site and look for benefits-related information there. Processed on 28-Aug-2015 7:15 PM CDT ID: 556331917 Word Count: 1016 Similarity Index 2% Similarity by Source Internet Sources: 2% Publications: 2% Student Papers: 2% sources: 1 2% match (student papers from 14-Oct-2013) Submitted to Capella Education Company on 2013-10-14 paper text: Designing Benefit Plans Many factors affect the employee benefits plan provided by the employer retirement plans. Such factors comprise of a formula used to compute the benefits plan, the age, which an individual decides to retire, the duration that a person serves as an employee, as well as pre- retirement benefits. The employer offers employees with a retirement benefits package that can ensure that the retiree is provided with economic security when out of service. The provided retirement benefit plans may turn to be more essential to the monetary security of pensioners. There are different proposition meant to guarantee the feasibility of the present Social Security Plans. An overall benefit for the coverage of the benefit plans has stayed in a steady status lately. Further, there have been changes in the sorts of arrangements giving coverage to retirees. Various factors influence the advantages that cover what retirees get upon retirement. For instance, for members of plans, such as, the defined benefit pension plans, it entails retirement age served as an employee of the retiree, as well as, the pre-retirement benefits. Moreover, the benefits plan may also be influenced, in case the participant belongs to a program that offers post-retirement increases. The benefit formula refers to the terminal earnings based formulas, which are the most prevalent method that used in the determination of the retirement benefits package. Previously, almost all workers who operate on a full-time basis and taking part in in defined pensioned plans were liable to the terminal income. In such plans, the advantages are figured at a rate of the terminal income increased by the aggregate number of years that a member was still in active service. Hence, for a greater part of general society nearly 60%, terminal profits are over a third- year period. For the greater part of the private sector, employees the terminal profit is the normal of over a five-year period. Utilizing the normal level dollar sum, an employee who has been in service of administration would get yearly benefits of 28.47 x 30 x 12, which would be 10,249.20 (Milkovich, Newman & Gerhart, 2013). Early retirement is likewise another variable that influences worker benefits plans. Most retirees can resign before the ordinary retirement age and get decreased benefits. In 1994, approximately 96% of people working in private firms and 80% of people in public governments took an interest in arrangements with ahead of the schedule retirement procurement. Then again, among the private sector members with ahead of schedule retirement procurement, the best extent we're in retirement arranges that permit early retirement advantages at age 55 with ten years of the administration. There was a considerable extent in the arrangements that took into consideration early retirements at five years old with five years of work and age of 55 with 15 years of work. On the other hand, the most widely recognized early retirement ages and work necessities for general society segment members were at 55 years old and 25 years of service. Approximately 20% of people in the public sector were in the pension plans that considered early retirements before the age of 55 with different years of work contrasted with a 10 percent of the private sector workers (Milkovich, Newman & Gerhart, 2013). Thus, that is the reason all factors being equal; such employees would more often than not get smaller pension benefits when contrasted with the particular case that the retirement benefits had started at an ordinary age. Accordingly, early pension benefits are given the normal retirement benefit whereby a diminishment variable is appropriate. In many pension plans, the diminishment arrangements are smaller when contrasted with pension plans that are resolved actuarial, demonstrating that the employer is providing the early retirement benefits Post-retirement increments are used to decide employee retirement plans. Some pension plans indicate programmed typical cost of essential items that rely on upon the adjustments on the Consumer Price Index. For instance, in 1995, nearly half of public employees were in such plans that compared with a 3 % of people in the private sector. The post-retirement benefit plans may not ultimately offer assurance against consumer buying index. Likewise, such plans may be regularly limited to a part of the CPI change or through roofs. An employee may decide on the post-retirement increments in any case, the benefits are not pre-decided, but rather rely on upon contributed sums and whatever other plans may be beneficial in the long-run (Milkovich, Newman & Gerhart, 2013). These factors make it more challenging when contrasted with other benefit plans keeping in mind the end goal to focus the advantages that is to be gotten. Benefit plans vary broadly in the measure of indicated benefits and worker commitments that should be made relating to benefits. A critical explanation of the costs of the benefits plans is the focus of such plans. In most cases, the points of interest of a given benefits plan are considered regarding an aggregate bundle expenses or measure of increasing costs in future. Hence, to control the spiraling benefits costs, employee ought to receive a more extensive, pension plan approach. An initial step would require strategy choice on the level of benefits plans adequate both in the short-term as well as in the long-term. The present costs of the benefit plans would be distinguished, and if the associated costs appeared to be sensible, hence, the decided benefits plan would be given to retirees. The legitimate prerequisites are that an executive ought to adhere to all parts of the law. Such enactment are the Employee Retirement Income Security Act 1974, which stipulated that if an employer chooses to give benefits to the retirees, then they should be able to determine rules that must be followed (Milkovich, Newman & Gerhart, 2013). Also, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act provides that the chosen benefit plan must be regulated in a way that does not depend on the premise that discriminate others in terms of national origin, sex, religion, sex, and age Reference 1Milkovich, G. T., Newman, J. M., & Gerhart, B. (2013). Compensation (11th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill/Irwin. ISBN: 9780078029493