Strategy and Human Resources Planning Ch. 2

1.) 3 2.) 2 3.) 1

1.) Managers evaluate each HR practice on a scale of -5 (not supportive) to 5 (supportive). 2.) Managers identify each of the HR practices used to elicit or reinforce the workforce objectives (job design, staffing, training, appraisal, compensation, and so on). 3.) Managers identify the key workforce objectives they hope to achieve. Often, this information can come from the people/learning cell of the Balanced Scorecard and might include loyalty, customer service, productivity, and creativity.

HR can use HR planning to optimize the size of the workforce for the low cost strategy.

A U.S.-based furniture manufacturer competes against foreign competitors by doing its manufacturing operations in North Carolina and running an extremely efficient operation. The CEO of the company has asked the vice president of HR to suggest how HR can support this strategy. In which area can HR help?

Horizontal

Cultivating teamwork/HR compensation policies for teams

Complementary partners

A legal firm has a retainer with a financial services firm to provide legal counsel and other services to the company. This is an example of:

Lack of horizontal alignment

A management consulting firm wants to establish a close connection between the job performance of its business analysts and their annual pay increases. Unfortunately, the firm does not have a formal performance appraisal form that is used to document performance ratings. It does have a merit pay system, though, that says that managers must give everyone the same sized merit increases in order to be fair to everyone. This would be an example of which type of alignment?

An internal analysis of the company

Chris Middlestat, founder and CEO of The FruitGuys, says that when the dot-com bust hit his company in 2001, he had to rethink both the company's finances and his own role within the company. By analyzing the firm's strengths and weaknesses, Chris was conducting:

Vertical

Competing through innovation/HR policies that foster creativity

1.) Differentiation 2.) Low-Cost

Complete the following table by selecting the business strategy most likely associated with each HR action. 1.) Hire employees that live company values. 2.) Lay off employees.

Hire a consultant to provide benchmarking data on what competitors are doing. Scan the environment for opportunities and threats.

In order for an organization to be prepared to change its mission, what does it need to do? Check all that apply.

Ecological Environment

Management at a fast-food restaurant chain wanted to analyze its business environment in order to support a strategic planning process. Based on this, which of the following factors should be analyzed?

Conduct a culture audit

Senior leaders at a large global conglomerate are interested in determining whether there are subcultures in the company's various units and locations and how well they align with the overall culture of the company at the headquarters in Seattle. Based on this situation, what should management do?

Alignment

Senior management at a major pharmaceutical company needs to enhance the company's emphasis on execution of strategy, especially in its research and development and its sales and marketing units. The action plan that management created to enhance the company's effectiveness with strategy execution placed emphasis on reviewing and recommitting to the vision, mission, and values of the company and a culture of accountability and common performance objectives. Based on the 4A framework of execution capability, the action plan of management emphasizes which element of strategy execution?

Strategic Vision

Senior management at a telecommunications firm reviewed its strategic plan and discovered that it was missing an aspirational statement regarding the long-term desired end for the company. Senior management at the company needs to formulate a ____________________ in order to resolve the deficiency with its strategic plan.

Strategic Planning

Senior managers from an advertising firm held a retreat in a remote location where they reviewed the state of the company and made some key decisions about its long-term goals and strategies for the next five years. The activity that senior managers engaged in is called:

Rivalry among competitors

The _______ is influenced by all of the other competitive forces.

Natural Disasters Supply of Labor Climate Change

The ecological dimension of an organization's external environment includes _____. Check all that apply.

Where is your market and where are your customers?

The owner of a small retail store expressed interest in getting some assistance creating a mission statement for his business. If you were his consultant, which question would you ask to help him to develop an effective mission?

coordination agility

The production manager at a large food company focuses on running its production facility with a high degree of responsiveness so that the company can react to changes in its environment quickly in terms of retraining and allocating workers based on demand. This is an example of:

Where is our market and our customers?

The senior management team at a global cosmetics company is working on its strategic plan. One of the first steps in this process is to formulate an organizational mission statement. As the vice president of HR at the meeting, what is a question that management could ask itself to help facilitate the process for formulating a mission statement?

Offer training programs to employees on sustainability and how it relates to their jobs.

The vice president of HR at a department store chain met with the CEO of the company to discuss its sustainability strategy for store operations. What kinds of ideas should the VP of HR offer to the CEO to achieve vertical fit/alignment in this situation?

Should we hire or train and develop our required employees?

Which of the following questions will an HR manager likely face in a company with a growth or diversification strategy?