SHRM Questions

How has the sustainability movement changed organizations' relations with their stakeholders?

A broader range of stakeholders is now considered, allowing for a more active role in shaping policies and goals.

Cultural Relativism

A global organization implements a clothing policy that sets general guidelines for a neat appearance and safety in the workplace but allows regional management to issue appropriate expectations for the local operations.

Which solution would best resolve a growing problem with absenteeism?

Administering the organization's attendance policy consistently

Which should be the first step in creating an organization's philanthropic strategy as part of its corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategy?

Aligning philanthropic activities with strategy and values

A CEO assigns employees to participate in fund-raising for a nonprofit school for students with learning disabilities. The company provides time off and covers the employees' expenses. Employee contributions and school accomplishments are communicated in newsletters and at annual meetings. How could this attempt at community involvement be improved?

Allow employees more voice in choosing the community involvement partner.

What is the benefit of analyzing an organizations value chain

Appreciation of relationships between contributors to value

How does HR support strategic management in a global organization?

By implementing processes to increase integration and knowledge exchange

Which initial step should an HR director recommend to best support a global pay-for-performance initiative?

Clear, meaningful, and challenging goal setting

A popular solution to the problem of the volume of data created by big data strategies?

Cloud Computing

A company opens a division in a geographical area where it has never competed before. It opts for a localization strategy, what would the local HR would develop, then submit them for headquarters to review?

Code of Conduct, Policies, and Procedures

An organization is considering restructuring its sales function to align its salespeople against key vertical markets. HR is charged with exploring this initiative. What should it do first?

Complete an environmental scan.

A manager approves a training course on the condition that it includes some way of ensuring that the training reinforces critical learning objectives. Which strategy should an HR manager employ to best meet the manager's needs?

Conducting a pilot program for a limited group

Team members argue continually about the best measurement for project success is an example of

Conflict Management

A municipality enacts certain employee benefit requirements. An organization operates in municipalities in regions all around the country. The HR director must decide how to address this situation. What legal concept does this situation represent?

Conflict of Laws

What recruitment metric can help to assess the economic value of filling an open position?

Cost Per Hire

What is the primary driver of aligning the HR business unit and functional area strategies to the organizational strategy?

Creating a line of sight between individual work and organizational results

What challenge to effective cross-cultural communication is faced by an organization that believes that its way is the best way and that lacks interest in other ways of reaching a goal?

Cultural ethnocentrism

Which type of HR structure allows organizations with different strategies in multiple units to apply HR expertise to each unit's specific strategic needs?

Dedicated HR

When designing training for any new technology system, which activities will have the greatest impact on knowledge retention?

Demonstration and structured exercises

What should HR Professionals do to prepare global assignee's for their international assignments

Discuss country specific risks

Which best describes the benefit of using an employee resource group (ERG) for an organization looking to expand global market share?

ERGs provide valuable insights into the needs of the organization's diverse markets.

Which occupation is considered nonexempt under the Fair Labor Standards Act?

Electrician

Coaching high-potential employees will result in

Employee's contributing more effectively to the organization

Which approach should help the change process go more smoothly?

Ensuring that employees have input into change alternatives

When administered in the same way in different countries, which assessment approach would provide the most consistent results in collecting information on job candidates?

Evaluation of Work Samples

Which factor is essential for the success of a diversity and inclusion initiative?

Executive Commitment

Finds that the primary reason employees leave is for better total rewards offered at other organizations.

Exit Interview

A new competitor entered the market and attracted many of a manufacturing organization's employees with higher hourly wages. The organization's HR team has revised the staffing plan. Which data could alert HR to the need for further revisions?

Exit interview

Which activity is critical to ensure that strategy is implemented effectively?

Feedback on strategic initiatives is obtained on a regular basis from all parts of the organization.

A manager has been assigned to lead a team of employees in organizing corporate-wide participation for a community event next month. The manager knows that in order to meet the goals of the effort, she must make sure that the tasks and expectations are clear and that she provides plenty of direction. What leadership theory is the manager following?

Fielder's Contingency Theory

Which position and in which situation would a stress interview be most appropriate?

For emergency room nurses, where behaviors can have life or death consequences

Which statement best describes how HR can enhance its social media policies?

Gather information from throughout the organization about possible risks.

Used in a large organization to understand the competitive position and value of each sector of the business

Growth-Share Matrix

Engagement drivers differ from country to country, making it important to understand cultural differences that may influence survey results. In a multinational organization, in which type of culture may employee surveys be less acceptable?

Hierarchical

A manager has lost several staff members to a competitor in the last quarter but continues to meet her team targets. Which type of report can HR share to ease this manager's dismay over losing staff?

Human capital value added

HR in an English-speaking location is planning to launch critical training in multiple languages. What is the strongest strategy for an HR professional trying to manage the risk of not meeting a training launch date?

Identify and pre-certify multiple translation options

What do non-qualified deferred compensations plans provide?

Incentives for key executives to stay with the organization

Granting compensatory time off to a salaried employee for extra hours worked is the best example of

Indirect Compensation

How does HR make sure that organizational effectiveness and development (OED) interventions deliver value?

Intervention objectives link outcomes to organizational goals.

While training a new staff member, an HR manager emphasizes that the staff member should always confirm with a line manager by phone call or email when a request has been resolved. Why is this especially important?

It reinforces HR's service and value to its internal business partners.

Explicit Culture

Language, style of dress, food, or manner

Which is an advantage of blended learning over only instructor-led training?

Less expensive to deliver

Which is the most low-risk strategy for global market expansion?

Licensing

When designing a training program, what should a global HR professional first consider?

Local Differentiation and Stakeholder Support

Which best describes how management differs from leadership?

Management maintains order, while leadership produces and manages change.

An elder care service organization is challenged with retention of staff. Recently the service director left the organization with little notice. HR wants to prepare for future unplanned vacancies to avoid any disruption in client services. What is the best way for HR to mitigate this risk?

Managers can cross-train a subordinate.

HR conducts a workshop with other functions to identify potential upside and downside risks under the workforce management plan. What HR strategic role does this illustrate?

Managing Organization Risk

Which is the best method for an HR compensation manager to use to evaluate the jobs and salary ranges of the organization's key positions compared to those of its competitors?

Market-based evaluation to establish the worth of positions

An HR business partner (BP) knows that HR is struggling to improve its relationship with the operations function. The BP receives an e-mail from an operations supervisor who refuses to implement a disciplinary action that the BP has recommended. What should the BP do?

Meet with the supervisor and explain the rationale for taking disciplinary action.

An expatriate has transferred to another country for a temporary assignment. She assumes that her colleagues in the new location will value timeliness just as her colleagues in the home country do. Therefore, she interprets the slow response to e-mails and requests in the host country as unprofessional. She becomes frustrated with her colleagues, inhibiting collaboration and the development of relationships among her new team. This example indicates a lack of understanding and exploration of what type of culture?

National Culture

A scientist is hired to perform research for a new product at a pharmaceutical company. Which clause is most critical to include in the employment contract?

Non-disclosure of trade secrets and other confidential information

An organization with unionized and non-unionized workers negotiates a union contract that includes early retirement benefits and a 10% reduction in starting wages for new employees. Which should the organization likely expect as a result?

Non-unionized workers will expect similar terms.

A new division manager wants to terminate a new employee for borrowing work equipment for personal use, an act specifically prohibited in the employee handbook. This has happened before, but, in that case, the employee was not terminated. Which action should HR recommend the manager take?

Not proceeding with the termination because it may not be defensible

Which is the best action HR should take to gather information on competitive total rewards packages to potentially offer its employees?

Participate in an external remuneration survey to assess the competitiveness of the organization's current offerings.

What do challenging assignments have the greatest impact on?

Peak performance

How should an HR manager address an employee's concern about pay equity between his job and the job of another employee with a similar role?

Perform a job evaluation of the employee's position

How can HR support an organization's technological challenges during an acquisition?

Perform due diligence on HR information systems used in the acquired company

Balance Scorecard

Performance management tool that depicts an organization's overall performance, as measured against goals, lagging indicators, and leading indicators.

A HR business partner receives an e-mail from the director of finance, asking for tax documents for an employee who needs the forms promptly to obtain a mortgage. The business partner has never communicated with the director before, but the department policy is to respond promptly to internal customers. What should the business partner do?

Phone the individual's office and offer assistance.

Which is the best way for an HR professional to persuade a function to embrace changes in work processes that are part of an organizational effectiveness intervention?

Presenting the changes as necessary to maintaining competitiveness

An HR manager leads a three-person team that is designing new audit processes and tools. One member who is new to the organization argues forcefully for approaches that she used in her previous job. The other two team members complain off-line to the team leader, saying that the new member does not listen and just wants to do things in a familiar way. What should the team leader do?

Promptly and privately meet with the new member and discuss project goals and team ground rules.

What is encrypting employee computers and network communications is most likely to do?

Protect sensitive corporate data

An HR manager observes that a staff member spends considerable time following up on compliance questions from line managers and supervisors. How should the manager respond?

Provide positive feedback to motivate this type of behavior.

An organization has experienced rapid growth, hampering its ability to respond quickly to competitive threats. Which form of restructuring will offer the best opportunity to minimize response times?

Redistributing Decision-Making Authority

The HR department monitors the emergency response plans and updates them as needed, at least annually. Which is the best way to evaluate the plan as part of the annual review?

Rehearsing drills of the plan

Which factor differentiates successful training programs from unsuccessful programs?

Results showing transfer of learning

An American multinational corporation known for its big, premium-priced ultrasound scanners (designed for use in U.S. hospitals) introduces a cheaper and portable version in emerging markets. The portable scanner also creates new markets in the U.S., for example, in small hospitals and for immobile patients. What globalization force does this exemplify?

Reverse Innovation

A mature organization has relied on stable processes that supported its current success. One of these processes is succession planning. This HR team has followed a strategy of identifying effective higher-level managers and grooming them for leadership positions. If you were a new HR manager assigned to lead this team, what would you advise?

Review the succession planning strategy to ensure alignment with current business conditions.

What is the role of HR manager in an investigatory interview for a dis-chargeable offense

Risk manager for the organization

A company identifies a need for training on unlawful harassment for front-line supervisors as one aspect of an Organizational and Effectiveness and Development (OED) intervention. Which best describes the organizational impact of this activity?

Risk will be mitigated because front-line supervisors will be equipped to recognize, correct, and report harassing behaviors.

Which of the following employment practices would an HR director recommend to increase employees' behavioral engagement levels?

Select applicants with an interest in solving problems and ensure challenging work

The HR director and the management team of a small resort hotel have been working to solidify a union avoidance strategy. As this is occurring, they discover that a union's representatives are talking with the employees about organizing. Which action should the HR director recommend the resort take in response to the union activity?

Share the company's position and the union's strategy with the employees honestly.

A European employee travels to transfer company technology for a manufacturing process. The employee remains on home-country compensation and benefit plans while on assignment. Incentives include one trip home every 12 weeks to visit family that remained at home. What type of global assignee is this individual?

Short-Term Assignee

Front-line managers continue to perpetuate old ways of doing things and fail to address changing external forces is an example of

Strategic Drift

What is the difference between a strategic alliance and a joint venture?

Strategic alliances do not involve equity; joint ventures require that both partners contribute equity.

Two team members continually disagree about project decisions impacting work duties and tasks. The team leader meets with the employee relations director to seek advice on the best course of action to resolve this situation. Which is the best conflict management approach for the ER director to recommend?

Suggest that the team leader meet with both employees and mediate a mutually acceptable solution..

Under the system of codetermination, what approval is required by management prior to implementing strategic plans?

Supervisory Board

Technology automates many HR tasks, shrinking the HR department. Yet, as HR evolves from transactional to transformational work, the workload may increase and become more complex. Staff may complain about being overloaded. Which is the best way to solve this problem?

Support training to help HR staff make full use of available technology.

Which is the most advantageous outcome of employers treating employees with care and respect during termination of employment?

The employees may return to the organization, and they will require little training

How does the Global Integration-Local Responsiveness (GI-LR) matrix aid HR in developing policies and determining staffing needs?

The globalization strategy reflected in the matrix helps define HR's role at headquarters and subsidiaries..

What does machine learning chat-bot that answers benefit questions and gets smarter as it collects more information demonstrates?

The use of artificial intelligence in an organization

Which is an advantage of having job descriptions in a global environment?

They expedite forecasting of current and projected staffing

What is the primary reason to conduct stay interviews with employees?

To address issues that affect engagement and retention

What is the ultimate function of executive management?

To be responsible for all core business functions and their effect on the organization's performance

What is the primary reason for developing workforce diversity programs

To enhance productivity

Contrary to policy, disciplinary actions taken by supervisors in the last year were not documented and terminations within the past six months have not been reviewed. Which action should a new HR manager take after learning about this situation?

Training supervisors and monitoring to ensure compliance

An HR director is creating a talent acquisition strategy. What should the director do first to incorporate risk management into the plan?

Understand the organization's risk appetite and tolerance.

Implicit Culture

Values, world views and mental habits, which take time and experience to discover and understand

A new HR manager is eager to win support for her idea for a new employee benefit. Which type of colleague would be a good ally in this situation?

Veteran HR manager familiar with how decisions are made and with connections in other areas

An HR manager is preparing a risk management plan for a manufacturing floor. The manager has reviewed accident records from the past five years and talked with an insurer. Which approach to obtain additional useful information is best?

Walk through the area and observe conditions during work operations.

When is knowledge management most productive?

When it focuses on sharing organizational learning and reducing knowledge loss

Corporate Strategy of Differentiation

a company develops a product that is uniquely easy to use and charges a premium price is called

Benefit Corporation (B-Corp)

a corporate form for businesses whose stated goals are to combine making a profit with benefiting society and the environment

Culture

a set of beliefs, traditions, attitudes, values, and perspectives on how the world works by a specific group of people.

Data Analytics

can be used to improve employee recruitment and retention by predicting employee preferences and aligning HR practices accordingly

Heterogeneous

different, diverse

Employee Value Proposition (EVP)

explains why a talented person would want to work for an organization

Succession Planning

focuses on long-term global issues

Homogeneous

same, Similar, Standardized

When do Heterogeneous teams generally outperform Homogeneous teams

they are well managed