BUS 137 HR Module 7

Under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, there will be a question raised any time an employee aged ________ years old or over is terminated.

40

________ asks how the cost of the employee's salary and benefits compares to the income this individual generates. This approach to pay is most appropriate for individuals who make direct sales, produce a manufactured product, or provide direct service.

?Narrative techniques

In high-performing organizations, the elements of the HR system are designed to express best practices that maximize the performance of employees. What are these key elements?

?job design and diversity management

Many corporations have created ________ policies. In addition to limiting access to smartphones and tablets during work hours, these policies also ensure that employees do not share company images, information, or ideas. Although these policies are helpful in theory, they can be very difficult to enforce.

?technology

Frank needs some help with the credit approval process in a computer equipment firm. He wants to hire his friend's niece because she needs a job. Barbara, the HR manager, tells him the first step is

A job analysis to understand exactly what is required to do the job well

________ can learn your business and then leave. They can even learn inside information or business secrets and then use what they've learned to start their own business—or sell what they've learned to a competitor.

Contracted staff

The EEOC is responsible for interpreting and enforcing the laws against discrimination in the workplace. EEOC stands for

Equal Employment Opportunity Commission

The Internet has changed the methods of recruiting job candidates. Social websites like ________ are now common tools for identifying qualified candidates.

Facebook and LinkedIn

________ are the unfortunate outcome of changes in industries or problems with individual corporations. Most often, employees are terminated because their employer has been forced to close stores, stop producing certain products, or simply save money.

Layoffs

________ is a personalized evaluation technique that measures the individual employee's achievement by comparing the employee to objectives agreed upon the prior year. For example, the employee and manager may have agreed on a particular sales objective; at the end of the year, the employee's actual sales can be compared to the individualized objective.

Management by Objectives

Which is the recommended approach to employee development?

Managers have an important role to play to help employees develop their potential.

________ are essays describing employee performance. These are generally written by the employees' direct managers, though they are sometimes written by the employee himself or herself. On the one hand, narrative essays take time and energy away from the manager's (or employee's) daily tasks. On the other hand, they can provide the most detailed and meaningful evaluations, as they are flexible enough to describe individuals' strengths, challenges, obstacles, and opportunities.

Narrative Techniques

________ is thought of as the total reward of an individual's variable pay, share ownership, benefits and their base salary.

Pay

Human resource managers must understand federal and locals laws in their activities. ________ particularly require a knowledge of the law.

Recruitment and selection, safety and health, and employee and labor relations

Why is it important that all the key elements of HR be aligned with the organization's strategy?

So the right rewards are linked to employee contributions to further the organization's goals

________ are making a huge positive difference in company's ability to reach clients and manage business transactions and vice versa. Employees can respond to client queries from a ball game or discuss a bond from the golf course.

Social media

Cara had Ancestry.com run a genetic test to determine her ancestry. The test found that she is 50% Ashkenazi Jew. The local newspaper ran a story about it. Her insurance company dropped her coverage because this group has high incidence of inherited diseases. Is she protected?

The Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2008 prohibits health insurers from using genetic information against customers.

Joseph wants to take time off after the birth of his second child. His employer, the Citadel Group, wants him back after 3 days. Citadel is a covered employer under the Family Medical Leave Act of 1993. What is Joseph's right?

The law allows him up to 12 weeks of leave after a birth.

What are some of the questions HR needs to be prepared to answer to be a strategic asset to a business?

To what extent does our organization have the appropriate skills, abilities, and knowledge to implement its strategy?

If the majority of workers at a facility choose union representation, then the union negotiates for the employees. If the union representative negotiates a raise for its members, then

all employees get more money

What is an example of incentive pay?

an extra $500 to each member of the used car sales team for increasing sales by 50% in a month

From the point of view of a manager, part-time and contingent employees ________ .

can be a flexible, budget-friendly resource

Orientation is part of the onboarding process. It ________

can lower costs by helping the employee get up to speed quickly and avoid time- or money-consuming mistakes.

What is an example of a formal business course used for training?

college courses

You now work at EFG Co. building their relational database. You have hit the ground running and are two weeks ahead of schedule. If you keep up this pace, you will be rewarded with a $2000 bonus for getting the project done far ahead of schedule. This is an example of what key element area of HR?

compensation

When Freddie Mac restated earnings due to an accounting error, they hired ________ workers to handle much of the extra work for the term of the project. Regular employees managed them and continued their own work.

contingent

The ________ has been matched by rising income inequality. The International Monetary Fund and some economists argue that this is cause and effect.

decline in union membership

Managers can help subordinates develop by

delegating responsibility rather than fixing problems before they arise

Cerritos College is advertising for a security officer to perform the general and usual duties carried out by a typical officer. The ad states that a successful candidate must be at least six feet tall and 190 lbs. This ad ________.

discriminates by gender because the work does not require extraordinary height or weight

Collective bargaining is the process where

employers work with union representatives to decide on policies, wages, and benefits

A formal onboarding process

improves the employee's performance by helping him or her to build skills and relationships quickly.

President Trump has demonstrated the pros and cons of ________. He directly reaches 30 million followers on Twitter, but his random thoughts are shared with the public.

instant communication

The Bureau of Labor Statistics tracks the number of quits and the number of layoffs and discharges each month. In May 2017, the rates were 2.2% per month and 1.1% per month. The rate of quits was twice that of ________.

involuntary terminations

Discrimination lawsuits that go to court are very expensive, averaging over $200,000, so a well-crafted ________ can save an employer a great deal of money.

job description

The Bureau of Labor calculates statistics "quit" levels by industry. The Accommodation and Food Services industry had the highest rate in May 2017 at 4.7%. At that rate, 56 percent of the employees quit within a year. The causes may be

job dissatisfaction, a family move, a better opportunity, or illness

Choose an example of benefits that a company might offer employees.

matching a 401(k) contribution

NPR's Planet Money reports that "Fifty years ago, nearly a third of U.S. workers belonged to a union. Today, it's one in 10." For corporations in general, fewer unionized workers means which of the following?

more ability to hire contingent and part-time workers, pay lower wages, ship jobs overseas to cut costs, and increase profits

In many cases, ________ employees are provided through firms who manage payroll, handle any disciplinary issues, and take care of finding substitutes should an individual employee be unable to fulfill his obligations.

part-time and contingent

Often, ________ are not included on all-staff memos, invited to events, or offered the same bonuses or perks offered to full-time employees. This creates a sort of caste system that can be frustrating and demoralizing.

part-timers

What are the most effective methods for understanding a candidate's fit for the job and the company?

phone interviews and situational interviews

An employee development technique that should be used with every employee is

providing meaningful, actionable feedback regularly

You are applying for a job at EFG Co. and are now interviewing with the HR representative. He tells you that the job requires programming skills in SQL and dBase and that the job is to build and maintain a relational database for the company. This requires attention to detail and efficiency. He then describes that this company highly rewards loyalty and hard work. He tells the story of when the entire company worked over a weekend to finish and test one of its software products. This is an example of what key element area of HR?

recruitment and selection

As a manager, you need to fill empty positions within your department. When interviewing prospective candidates for your retail company's customer service department, what would you ask about?

required skills and experience for the position

Fishermen take pride in staying awake for days while they haul in the catch. But they make more mistakes, losing fingers or hands, while sleep-deprived. The company's HR can improve safety by

requiring employees to use appropriate safety equipment such as goggles, gloves, and safety lines

Larger companies will nudge employees to save by offering to match ________. For example, an employee contributes 5% of his salary and the company will match it, with another 5%. The total is 10% of earnings, a respectable level. It is equivalent to a 5% raise except the money cannot be spent immediately.

retirement savings

Many companies choose ________ in areas such as discrimination law, cyber-security, software skills, safety procedures, or other technical skills.

self-paced online training

A ________ is a right to buy shares in a company at a fixed price, called the exercise price. This price must be fixed in advance. Apple mistakenly and illegally lowered the exercise price to make the benefit more valuable after the stock price fell.

stock option

Deadliest Catch is a documentary television series that portrays the real-life events aboard fishing vessels in the Bering Sea during the Alaskan crab fishing seasons. Crab fishing is one of the riskiest occupations. The fatality rate is 142 per 100,000 employees. To lower risk on the job, management and HR can work together in several ways. For example, they can

substitute less dangerous procedures or materials when both options can get the job done

Leader-led group training programs can be used to teach "soft" skills such as

team-building and customer service

Unions get much of their legal power from the Wagner Act of 1935, passed during the Great Depression. The Act set up

the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), which oversees the rules and policies related to collective bargaining

If a company is sued for discrimination in the hiring process, they will defend themselves with documents that show how the selected candidate was better qualified. These documents are

the job analysis, job description, and job specifications

Walmart said that inept shelf-stocking cost the company $3 billion in 2014. This is a clear sign that employees are not receiving appropriate

training

German society has taken a different approach to employer-employee relations. ________ allowed flexibility in wages and work conditions in exchange for promises for continued employment. Companies honored this in the recession, even paying employees to do public works projects.

unions

In the last century, Congress has passed laws on safety, hours, and benefits to cement the working conditions that unions brought to individual firms. Paradoxically, this has

weakened the support and the need for unions

When HR sets salary ranges, one factor is competitive analysis. This means

what people in similar jobs are making