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QUESTION 1

As a human resource manager, how might you go about convincing top management that you should be heavily involved in the company's strategic planning process? Stress the potential for bottom-line improvement brought about with the help of HRM in the various areas.

QUESTION 2

Read the incident 6.1 (Inside or Outside Recruiting?) and answer the questions:

Incident 6.1

Inside or Outside Recruiting?

Powermat, Inc., has encountered difficulty over the last few years in filling its middle management positions. The company, which manufactures and sells complex machinery, is organized into six semiautonomous manufacturing departments. Top management believes it is necessary for the managers of these departments to make many complex and technical decisions. Therefore, the company originally recruited strictly from within. However, it soon found that employees elevated to middle management often lacked the skills necessary to discharge their new duties.

A decision was then made to recruit from outside, particularly from colleges with good industrial management programs. Through the services of a professional recruiter, the company developed a pool of well-qualified industrial management graduates. Several were hired and placed in lower management positions as preparation for the middle management jobs. Within two years, all these people had left the company.

Management reverted to its former policy of promoting from within and experienced basically the same results as before. Faced with the imminent retirement of employees in several key middle management positions, the company decided to call in a consultant for solutions.

Questions

I. Is recruiting the problem in this company?

2. If you were the consultant, what would you recommend?

QUESTION 3

Read the incident 14.1 (Rewarding Good Performance at a Bank), and explain your answer in details.

Incident 14.1

Rewarding Good Performance at a Bank

The performance of a bank branch manager is often difficult to measure. Evaluation can include such variables as loan quality, deposit growth, employee turnover, complaint levels, or audit results. However, many other factors that influence performance, such as the rate structure, changes in the market area served by the branch, and loan policy as set by senior management, are beyond the branch manager's control. The appraisal system presently used by First Trust Bank is based on points. Points are factored in for a manager's potential productivity and for the actual quality and quantity of work. In this system, the vast majority of raises are between 4 and 10 percent of base salary.

Sales growth is a major responsibility of a branch manager. Although many salespeople are paid a salary plus bonuses and commissions, no commissions are paid on business brought in by a branch manager. Therefore, one problem for the bank has been adequately rewarding those branch managers who excel at sales.

In May 2009, First Trust Bank opened a new branch on Northside Parkway, located in a high-income area. Three competing banks had been in the neighborhood for some 15 years. Jim Bryan, who had grown up in the Northside Parkway area, was selected as branch manager. In addition to Jim, the branch was staffed with five qualified people. Senior executives of the bank had disagreed about the feasibility of opening this branch. However, it was Jim's responsibility to get the bank a share of the market, which at that time consisted of approximately $56 million in deposits.

After one year of operation, this branch had the fastest growth of any ever opened by First Trust Bank. In 12 months, deposits grew to $18 million, commercial loans to $9 million, and installment loans to $2.5 million. As measured by Federal Reserve reports, the new branch captured 50 percent of the market growth in deposits over the 12 months. The customer ser-vice provided was extremely good, and branch goals for profit were reached ahead of schedule. Aware of the success, Jim looked forward to his next raise.

The raise amounted to 10 percent of his salary. His boss said he would have liked to have given Jim more, but the system wouldn't allow it.

Questions

1. Should Jim have been satisfied with his raise since this was the maximum raise the system allowed ?

2. Do you think the bank currently offers adequate sales incentives to its branch managers? If not, what would you recommend ?