MANAGING HUMAN RESOURCES

COMMONWEALTH EXECUTIVE

MBA/MPA PROGRAMME 

Term-End Examination

June 2010 

C-3: MANAGING HUMAN RESOURCES

Time: 3 hours                                                              Maximum Marks: 100

                                                                                              (Weighting 70%)

 

Note:          (i)  There are two Sections A and B..

                   (ii) Attempt any three questions from Section-A. Each question

                        carries 20 marks.

                   (iii)  Section-B is compulsory and carries 40 marks.

 

SECTION – A

 

1. 'Human Resource management is not the restatement of existing personnel practices, but it is a new managerial discipline'. Do you agree? Explain with suitable examples and justifications.

 

2. Why is demand forecasting considered as the most important aspect of Human Resource Planning? Briefly discuss various forecasting techniques with suitable examples.

3. Define and describe Industrial conflicts and Disputes. Briefly discuss methods of resolution of conflicts and settlement of disputes.

 

4. What is down-sizing? Discuss various approaches to downsizing. Identify and briefly describe various alternatives to downsizing, with examples.

 

5. Write short notes on any three of the following:

• Objectives and uses of Performance Appraisal


• Procedures of Grievance Handling


• Disciplinary process


• Work stress


• Selecting International managers

SECTION – B

6. Read the following case carefully and answer the questions given

at the end.

Microelectronics, a California-based electronics defense contractor, has enjoyed a smooth growth curve over the past five years, primarily because of favourable defense funding during the Reagan administration's build-up of U. S. military defenses. Microelectronics has had numerous contracts to design and develop guidance and radar systems for military weaponry.

Although the favourable funding cycle has enabled Microelectronics to grow at a steady rate, the company is finding it increasingly difficult to keep its really good engineers. Based on extensive turnover analyses conducted by Ned Jackson, the human resource planning manager, Microelectronics' problem seems to be its inability to keep engineers beyond the 'critical' five-year point. Apparently, the probability of turnover drops dramatically after five years of service. Ned's conclusion is that Microelectronics has been essentially serving as an industry college. Their staffing strategy has always been to hire the best and brightest engineers from the best engineering schools in the United States.

Ned believes that these engineers often get lost in the shuffle at the time they join the firm. For example, most (if not all) of the new hires must work on non-classified projects until cleared by security to join a designated major project Security clearance usually takes anywhere from six to ten months. In the meantime, the major project has started, and these young engineers frequently miss out on its design phase, considered the most creative and challenging segment of the program. Because of the nature of project work, new engineers often have difficulty learning the organizational culture — such as who to ask when you have a problem, what the general dos and don'ts are, and why the organization does things in a certain way.

After heading a task force of human resource professionals within Microelectronics, Ned has been designated to present to top management a proposal designed to reduce turnover among young engineering recruits. The essence of his plan is to create a mentor program, except that in this plan the mentors will not be the seasoned graybeards of Microelectronics, but rather those engineers in the critical three-to-five year service window, the period of highest turnover. These engineers will be paired with new engineering recruits before the recruits actually report to Microelectronics for work.

According to the task force, the programme is two-fold: (i) it benefits the newcomer by easing the transition into the company, and (ii) it helps the three-to-five-year service engineers by enabling them to serve an important role for the company. By performing the mentor role, these engineers will become more committed and hence less likely to leave. As Ned prepared his fifteen-minute presentation for top management, he wondered if he had adequately anticipated the possible objections to the program in order to make an intelligent defence of it. Only time would tell.

Case Questions:

• Based on the programme as described, who are the primary beneficiaries?

• If you were to study this turnover problem, how could you conduct a needs analysis? How would you evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed program assuming it was implemented?

• Is turnover necessarily bad for Microelectronics? How could they decide if their turnover is too high?

• Suppose that the President of Microelectronics responds to the proposal by asking how the first-line supervisors are involved in the program? In other words, the President fears that the mentors will only serve as crutches for first-line supervisors who are not doing their jobs in the first place. As Ned Jackson, how would you respond? Are there other negative aspects of Ned's programme? Explain.