Management Studies Essay

1. What steps should be taken by an organization that is committee to shattering the glass ceiling? I would use selection plans as a method to shatter the glass ceiling. Selection plans forces a company or organization to conduct a job analysis, establish career ladders and consider alternatives to the traditional ways used in promotion systems. Companies and HR should back away from the use of these traditional methods of assessment in ways consistent with the selection plan. Move away from casual methods such as supervisory recommendations, performance ratings, quick reviews of personnel files, and informal recommendations. Use a more formal, standardized, and job-related assessment method. The organization should pay attention to the types of KSAOs necessary for advancement, and begin training programs to teach these KSAOs to potential employees. Such programs could include: key job and committee assignments, participation in conferences and other networking opportunities, mentoring and coaching programs, and skill acquisition in formal training programs. 2. What guidelines do the Uniform Guidelines on Employee Selection Procedures offer to organizations when it comes to setting cutoff scores? The UGESP advises that cutoff scores be set so as to be reasonable and consistent with normal expectations of acceptable proficiency within the workforce. Applicants should be ranked on the basis of properly validated selection procedures. Applicants scoring below a higher cut-off have little or no chance of being selected for employment. Although the higher cut-off score may be appropriate the degree of adverse impact should also be considered. Companies should ensure their hiring standards are not so high that they create an adverse impact. 3. What are the steps an employer should take to develop and implement its policy regarding employment-at-will? Employment at will involves the right of either the employer or employee to terminate the employment at any time, for any legal reason. To enact a policy of employment at will, a company needs to ensure that job offers are for an indeterminate time period. The job offer should include a statement that the employment will be strictly at will. All written documents, such as employee handbooks and applications must affirm the at will relationship. 4. Discuss some potential problems with downsizing as an organization’s first response to a need to cut labor costs. While downsizing has an immediate impact on decreasing labor costs, too many companies downsize without considering alternatives. There are many problems that can occur based on using downsizing first. Companies initially make job cuts that are too deep. This results in a workforce which is understaffed and unable to function effectively. This affects the other employees who become demoralized, unmotivated, and unproductive. Many organizations that downsize immediately have discovered that they failed to achieve most of the business objectives associated with the downsizing to begin with and they rehire at least some of the staff that they let go. Essay Questions (15 pts each) – No more than 2 pages, double-spaced. 1. For this question you will refer to the Application entitled â€Å"Evaluating Staffing Process Results† found on pages 676-678 in your text. Read the application and answer questions 1&2 ONLY on the bottom of page 677. 1. Determine the yield ratios (offer receivers/applicants, new hires/applicants), time lapse or cycle times (days to offer, days to start), and retention rates associated with each recruitment source. The days to offer measures the average number of days it takes to make job offers to applicants. The days to start measures the average number of days it takes from the beginning of the entire staffing process to the time the new applicant is hired and begins their jobs. From highest to lowest effectiveness are employee referrals, newspaper ads and the employment agency. Employee referrals have the highest rate of return. The recruitment method from highest to lowest is employee referral, employment agency and newspaper ads. Specifically, employee referrals had the smallest days-to-offer and days-to-start figures. In terms of retention methods from highest to lowest are employee referrals, newspaper advertisements, and employment agency. 2. What is the relative effectiveness of the three sources in terms of yield ratios, cycle times, and retention rates differ in their relative effectiveness? Employee referrals were the most effective recruitment method based on yield ratios, time lapse, and retention rates. Current employees fully understand the company, its culture, and the basic job requirements. Due to this situation they are able to recommend people they know who might fit well with the job and the organization. This was the most effective recruitment method. This occurred because current employees did a good job prescreening individuals before they became candidates. The newspaper ads and employment agency did not do as well. These methods normally generate large numbers of applicants without any real screening taking place. You have just signed on as the Manager of Human Resources for a large manufacturing company in the Chicago area. Your company manufactures parts to the automotive industry such as air duct assemblies for various models of new vehicles as well as to the secondary market for these same parts. Upon conducting an audit of HR initiatives and trying to understand the challenges you want to tackle, you find that the overall turnover rate for this company is 37%. You have not worked in this specific industry but you feel at first glance that this number is high. Based on this limited information that you have, lay out a strategy for addressing turnover. You should include the following in your answer: a. a detailed explanation of what other information you must try to uncover to find out if the turnover is an issue that you must tackle b.assuming that you find that turnover is problematic, what strategies you might suggest to the CEO to address the issue, specifically addressing the possible causes of the high turnover in your answer. The 37% turnover rate is a major cause for concern. The turnover is high enough to warrant attention. It would be helpful to have some industry data to make a turnover comparison. Initially I would suggest that the CEO appoint a Senior Manager within HR to look at the backgrounds of the employees who left the in the last year. It would be helpful to know how long they were on the job before they quit and how they were performing in their position. It would extremely valuable to interview the workers who quit to learn more about why they decided to leave. The exit interview data is probably the single most valuable piece of information that can be used to deal with a retention problem. The costs of the turnover are massive. It is disruptive to the organization, it affects the time and resources used to process the departing employees, and require additional time and resources to recruit hire and train new employees. Other costs could include damage to the morale and productivity of other employees and an increased likelihood that some of these workers may quit. I would create a formal exit interview process to find out why workers are leaving the organization. The results of these interviews should be shared with the managers of the departing employees as well as human resources. I would task HR with conducting an annual employee survey to assess the work environment.