2.5 Making Human Resource Decisions Flashcards

1
Q

What is an Organisational Structure?

A

It is how a business is organised in terms of communication and decisions making. It identifies specific job roles

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2
Q

What are the 4 basic roles of staff?

A

Directions
Senior Managers
Supervisors or Team Leaders
Operational and Support staff

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3
Q

What is the role of Directors?

A

Responsible for the business’ strategy and overall direction
- decide on strategy and targets and regular board meetings

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4
Q

What is the role of Senior Managers?

A

Organise the playing the director’s strategy into action, using a team of middle and junior managers (ranked below) to help them

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5
Q

What is the role of Supervisors/ Team Leaders?

A

(ranked below managers)
Look after specific products or small teams of operational or support staff

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6
Q

What is the role of Operational and Support Staff?

A

Workers who aren’t responsible for any other staff, who are given specific tasks to perform by managers, supervisors or team leaders

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7
Q

What is a Chain of Command?

A

The chain connecting directors to operational and support staff

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8
Q

What is a Span of Control?

A

Number of direct reports to one manager

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9
Q

What are the features of a Hierarchical structure?

A
  • Long chain of command, more layers of management
  • SO communication between the top and bottom of the structure becomes difficult and slow as more people need to pass on the message
  • Each manager has a narrow span of control, making a firm more effective as managers can monitor the employees they are responsible for more closely
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10
Q

What are the features of a Flat structure?

A
  • Short chain of command, messages are passed on quickly
  • Each manager has a wide span of control, so they have lots of employees to manage at once, which can be difficult to do effectively
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11
Q

What are the features of a Centralised Organisation?

A
  • All major decisions are made by 1 CEO or a few senior managers at the top of the structure
  • Senior managers tend to have lots of experience, and can get an overview of the whole business. Policies are uniform throughout the whole business (adv)
  • If all decisions are only made by 1 or 2 people, it can slow down decision making and communications of the decisions can take a long time to pass to all employees-> so they react slowly to change (disadv)
  • Senior managers at the top of organisational structures can become powerful, BUT only depending on a few people too heavily can cause issues if they lack specialist knowledge or begin making poor decisions.
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12
Q

What are the features of a Decentralised Organisation?

A
  • Authority to make most decisions is delegated (ie more important decisions to regional managers, employees have more say etc)
  • (ADV) Employees can use expert knowledge of the sector to make decisions. They don’t have to communicate decisions with managers above them-> changes can be made more quickly. (IMPORTANT in a competitive environment, where firms need to respond quickly to changes or opportunities in the market faster than competitors)
  • (ADV) Senior managers are less responsible and make less decisions, so less need for a central office/headquarters, decreasing fixed costs
  • (DIS) Can lead to inconsistencies between departments/regions, furthered diversified by the fact employees might not be able to see overall needs for the business, so make decisions that negatively impact the business as a whole.
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13
Q

How does a business decide what type of structure to adopt?

A
  • Depends on size of business
    small business= flat structure, no need for any employees or managers
  • As a business grows, it employees more staff, so managers may be needed to organise and control things-> becomes hierarchical
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14
Q

When can a business decide to become decentralised?

A
  • The bigger the business, the greater number of managers needed-> so it might split into different parts (ie managed by department, region etc) to operate more easily
  • Business often start with a centralised structure, but decentralise when it gets to big to make all the decisions at the top OR its more efficient for different areas/locations of the business to be managed separately
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15
Q

Why is Effective Communication within a business important?

A

It allows different areas of a business to work well together, and ensures all employees understand their roles and why

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16
Q

How does Effective communication improve staff motivation?

A

Improve staff motivation as employees feel included in what is going on at the firm Employees feel more confident they are doing their job well

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17
Q

What are barriers that delay effective communication?

A

Noise- difficult to hold conversation in noisy environment (ie factory)
Personalities- some employees may feel uncomfortable communicating with others in the firm-> they don’t personally get along or find them unapproachable
Distance- many businesses operate across different sites, sometimes miles apart-> can be difficult to speak face to face
Jargon- technical language used in one department may not be understood by people in other departments
Type of communication- face to face communication includes body language, can ensure the message is properly received and understood, however hard to get across a tall structure. Written notes can travel slow through a tall structure, but ensures the correct message is received

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18
Q

What are the effects on a business of having insufficient communication?

A

Leads to Inefficiency
- People being slow to receive important information on what they should be doing, means time and money are wasted on incorrect acts
- Information may not be passed between different departments or teams, so tasks can be repeated, or not done in ways that are best for the business as a whole
Can demotivate staff
- They feel frustrated as a lack of communicated stops them from doing their job properly.
- Makes them feel unvalued as they aren’t told about things that happen in a firm

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19
Q

What are the effects on a business of having excessive communication?

A

Leads to Inefficiency
- Takes time to pass and receive messages
- If people uninvolved with the messages are involved in the communication, it wastes valuable time
- People start to take less notice of messages, and may miss out on ones important to them
-Leads to many people trying to pass on the same message, giving conflicting information, creating confusion over what is correct-> leads to wasted time to then find out the right information, or mistakes through misinformation
REDUCED EFFICIENCY AND PRODUCTIVITY-> REDUCES OUTPUT
Staff feel demotivated
- feel overwhelmed
- annoyed as it effects their ability to do their job well

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20
Q

What is a contract of employment?

A

A legal agreement between an employee and employer, that includes details about how an employee works (ie how many hours they do)

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21
Q

What is the difference between a full time and part time job?

A

Full time- 35-40 hours per week
Part time- 10-30 hours per week

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22
Q

Why might people prefer a full time job?

A

Financially benefitting

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23
Q

Why might people prefer a part time job?

A

Spend more time with family or on other interests

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24
Q

Why are Full time jobs good for a business?

A
  • easy to employ one person to do certain jobs
  • more control over the hours they do (only have 1 job)
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25
Q

Why are part time jobs good for a business?

A
  • makes Financial sense if business is seasonal
  • can fill in if other staff members are absent
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26
Q

What is Flexible hours?

A

When employees can choose working hours and patterns to suit them
ie full time worker can spread hours over 4 days a week rather than 5

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27
Q

What are the benefits of working Flexible hours for the employee?

A
  • Motivating, makes it easier for staff to fit other commitments in (ie childcare)
  • Lower stress levels
  • General improvement in wellbeing, employees have choice of work hours
  • reduced childcare costs, as hours are flexed
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28
Q

What are the benefits of working Flexible hours for the business?

A
  • increases staff retention
  • increased productivity
  • lower rates of absents
  • Help to match supply and demand more closely
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29
Q

What is a zero-hour contract?

A

Employer doesn’t have to offer any work at all + employee doesn’t have to accept the work offered to them

  • used in businesses with lots of fluctuation in demand
  • cheap
  • don’t waste money on paying unneeded staff
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30
Q

What is a permanent contract of employment?

A

Has no end date, the person stays employed unless
- they choose to leave
- dismissed for misconduct
- job is made redundant

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31
Q

What is a temporary contract of employment?

A

For a fixed period, at the end the contract can be renewed or they can leave the company

32
Q

What is a freelance contract of employment?

A

Self employed person is employed by the company, usually to work of a specific project
- hired and dismissed in short notice

33
Q

What is a benefit to temporary and freelance contracts?

A

Make it easier for the firm to employ people with particular skills for a certain period (without committing to a permanent contract)
- can easily adjust the number of staff according to the needs of the business?

34
Q

How has technology changed the way employees work?

A
  • working is more efficient (ie repetitive tasks can be done faster and more accurately by computers than staff)
  • Can work from home some days
  • ## Easier for employees to share information and communicate (ie access documents any time, communicate via video conference, email from different locations)
35
Q

What is recruitment?

A

The process of identifying the need for a job, defining the requirements of the position and the job holder, advertising the position and choosing the most appropriate person to fill the vacant post

36
Q

What are the steps to recruitment?

A
  • Job analysis
  • Advertisement
  • Selection
37
Q

What is Job analysis?

A

When a vacancy arises in a organisation, so the business collects and interprets information about the position
- this is used to create a job description and person specification

38
Q

What is a Job Description?

A

Description that details the role of the job
- Job title
- Purpose
- Duties
- Line manager/line management responsibilities
- Location
- Hours of work

39
Q

What is a Person Specification?

A

Lists the qualifications, experiences, skills, and attitudes needed for the job

40
Q

How does a business select during recruitment?

A

Go through the candidates that apply for the job and select the best one

41
Q

What is Internal recruitment?

A

Recruiting current employees into new roles, advertised within the company

42
Q

What are advantages of internal recruitment?

A
  • cheaper
  • post can be filled more quickly
  • candidate will already know lots about the firm
  • Bosses may know the candidate well
43
Q

What are disadvantages of Internal recruitment?

A
  • No new employees or ideas
  • Employee vacancy needs to be filled
44
Q

What is External Recruitment?

A

Recruiting outside the business, advertised in lots of places
- local, national press
- job centres
- trade journals
- employment websites

45
Q

What are the advantages of external recruitment?

A
  • Job advert will be seen by more people, can find someone really suited to the job
46
Q

What are the disadvantages of external recruitment?

A
  • expensive
  • only specialist or senior jobs are advertised nationally in the press as it is expensive
47
Q

What is a Curriculum Vitae (CV)?

A

Summary of person’s personal details, skills, qualifications and interests- part of a written application for a job
- written in standard format to give the firm basic facts
- almost all firms ask for a CV

48
Q

What is an application form?

A

Give firms relevant information about the people, can ask specific questions unanswered by a CV- part of a written application for a job
- quicker to process than open ended letters written by candidates

49
Q

Why do some firms use online application forms?

A

Easier to fill, can compare applications using computer software

50
Q

Why would staff need ongoing training when working for a business?

A
  • Retrain
  • Learn new processes
  • use new technology
  • develop, make sure they’re doing their job as well as possible
51
Q

What is Informal training?

A
  • employee learns how to do their job by being shown, and then practicing
  • no plan, usually given by other workers
52
Q

What is a benefit to Informal training?

A

Cost effective for employer, employees work and learn at the same time

53
Q

What is a problem with informal training?

A

Bad working practices may be passed down employees

54
Q

What is Formal training?

A

Involves a set plan with learning objectives and schedule
- learning in a training department or away from the workplace (ie in college)

55
Q

What is a problem with formal training?

A

more expensive than informal training

56
Q

What is the benefit with formal training?

A

higher quality, usually taught by people better qualified to train others

57
Q

What are Performance reviews?

A

Firms set employee targets, then review their performance to ensure they are doing as well as they should be

58
Q

What happens if employees meet or beat their targets set in performance reviews?

A
  • rewarded with higher pay or promotion
59
Q

What happens if employees don’t meet their performance targets?

A
  • Manager decides what training or support may be needed to help them improve
60
Q

What are the benefits to training and development?

A
  • make staff more productive, makes staff better at their jobs, work faster, lower business unit costs
  • Help staff stay up to date with changes in the business (ie understanding new technology used in the business)
  • Makes staff feel more motivated, shows firm is interested in how well staff are doing their jobs + are willing to help them improve, makes staff feel like they are progressing in the form, can increase staff retention
61
Q

Why is having motivated staff important?

A
  • they work harder, leading to high productivity
  • they want the firm to do well, so work harder to ensure this happens
  • more likely to stay at the firm (high levels of staff retention), less time and money spent on recruiting and training new workers, reducing costs
  • can attract new staff, recruiting new employees is easier, more applicants for vacancies
62
Q

What is examples of Financial motivation?

A

wages or a salary
- the more they are paid, the more motivated employees feel to stay at their jobs

63
Q

What is the difference between a wage and a salary?

A

wages are paid weekly or monthly, usually to manual workers. Based on the amount of work they do (in hours)

Salary is a fixed amount paid monthly- ie office staff

64
Q

What is the advantage and disadvantage of a salary?

A

The business knows exactly how much pay will be
BUT
doesn’t link pay to performance, so it doesn’t encourage employees to work harder

65
Q

What is an advantage of wages?

A

Links pay to performance so encourages employees to work as hard as possible

66
Q

What are examples of extra financial incentives?

A

Commission
Bonus
Fringe Benefits

67
Q

What is Commission?

A

paid to sales staff for every item they sell
- on top of their current salary

68
Q

What is a Bonus?

A

Lump sum added to pay, usually once a year
- commonly paid if the worker has met performance targets

69
Q

What is Fringe benefits?

A

Any reward that is not part of a worker’s main income
- staff discount
- company car
- gym membership
- daily meal allowance
- free health insurance

  • cost money for the business BUT save for the worker, motivates them
70
Q

How can Promotion boost motivation?

A
  • train employees to learn new skills, start to take on new tasks, have greater responsibility
  • can lead to promotion, likely to be paid more
  • promotion + opportunity to be promoted can be motivating
71
Q

How can Job Rotation motivate employees?

A
  • production jobs can become boring and repetitive (ie working on a factory assembly line)
  • Job rotation reduces this by occasionally moving workers from one job to another
  • Motivated them to be less bored
  • Learn different jobs- can cover if other workers are absent
72
Q

What is a problem with job rotation?

A

Replacing one boring job with another doesn’t increase job satisfaction

73
Q

How does Job Enrichment increase motivation?

A

When a worker is given greater responsibility, ie supervising the work of new staff
- as employees get better at their jobs, they become more productive, so do the amount of work in less time
- increasing responsibility can stop them feeling their increased productivity is being punished by continuous work
- gives workers new challenges so may motivate them to work harder

74
Q

What is a problem with Job Enrichment?

A
  • May expect a pay rise
75
Q

How does Autonomy increase motivation?

A

Means to give workers freedom to make their own decisions
ie told a goal but not told specifically how to achieve it
- responsibility motivates workers as it makes them feel trusted and that their contribution is valued