In the 3 months since he began working for Alibaba Group Holdings, Ltd., Matt Shofnos, age 30, has improved his Mandarin, helped an American retailer target Chinese consumers, and donned a Captain America costume to meet the company’s chief executive. Alibaba has brought Mr. Shofnos and 31 other young workers from around the world to China for a year-long immersion in Chinese business and language and the company’s culture. The company’s executives are betting that the leadership program will produce China-trained, globally minded leaders able to make and manage partnerships with Western retailers, moving the e-commerce giant closer to its goal of earning 40 percent of revenue outside China in the next decade. Alibaba has committed to running the program for at least 10 years and expects enrollment to grow to 100 annually. Participants, all new hires, typically join after business school or a few years working in fields such as marketing and technology. More than 3,000 applied to the inaugural class. Finalists underwent several rounds of interviews, including a visit to the company’s Hangzhou headquarters. Recruits are paid competitively as they complete two 6-month rotations at Alibaba businesses such as shopping platform Tmall Global. They take classes on Chinese culture, politics, and economics and travel, visiting rural villages to observe how e-commerce has transformed local economies. Participants must learn how to navigate life in China, including finding apartments, commuting to work, and learning Alibaba products, many of which are in Chinese. Veteran Alibaba workers, called “life buddies,” greet arrivals at the airport and help them load useful smartphone apps. After their second 6-month rotation, graduates are expected to return to Alibaba offices in their home regions in places such as New York and Paris. Having been integrated into “the mothership,” the workers will help ensure an expanded Alibaba stays true to its Chinese roots and company culture. Program participant Anna Kim, 28, was scheduled to attend the annual meeting of Alibaba affiliate Ant Financial Services Group. She expected the typical recitation of graphs and PowerPoint slides. What awaited her was a massive party in a stadium. “When I go to work, I don’t know what kind of surprise is going to come my way,” she said. As for Matt Shofnos, he is still adjusting to life in Hangzhou, where something as simple as hailing a ride with the country’s version of Uber can befuddle an outsider. Earlier in his career, he realized that being “an American company’s China guy” wasn’t going to happen, thanks to lackluster Mandarin skills. With Alibaba, he said, “I can absolutely be a Chinese company’s American guy.” Requird: 1. Based on material presented in the chapter, critique Alibaba’s on-boarding and training program for young leaders. 2. What principles of learning has Alibaba built into its program? 3. Senior management wants you to develop a plan to evaluate the effectiveness of this program. How might you do that?
> What are some key obstacles in the way of true cooperation by labor and management?
> What role do benefits play, in your opinion, in attracting and retaining workers? Might that role be different for different generations or for employees at different stages of their careers?
> How might your preference for various benefits change as you grow older or as your family situation changes?
> Describe how technology has changed the ways that you live and work.
> Discuss the special problems that women face in overseas assignments.
> Do you think companies should provide a broader menu of benefits (e.g., child care, veterinary care, financial counseling) or improve the menu of core benefits (e.g., health care, insurance, pensions)? Why?
> Can you suggest alternative strategies for reducing the trust gap?
> What are some of the predictable consequences of a trust gap?
> To many people, a deep-seated sense of unfairness lies at the heart of the trust gap. How might perceptions of unfairness develop?
> What types of safeguards might you suggest to ensure fairness, transparency, and accountability in performance-management systems?
> Are there features of current performance-management systems that are worth keeping?
> It’s one thing to get rid of numerical ratings, but managers still have to decide whom to promote, perhaps whom to let go, the relative sizes of pay raises, and bonuses. Will the new systems help them do those things more effectively?
> What disadvantages or opportunity costs can you identify with this approach?
> Are some types of material or course work better suited than others to TDI?
> What are some of the key advantages of TDI?
> How does the effective management of people provide a competitive advantage to organizations?
> How might organizational culture affect the ways that employees deal with coworkers and customers?
> What might be the role of organizational culture in staffing decisions?
> What can a company do to communicate its culture to prospective new hires?
> How might a company measure the costs and benefits of social media in the workplace?
> How can organizations manage the risks associated with social media?
> From your own perspective, what is the main appeal of social media in recruitment?
> As board chairperson, how might you overcome the resistance of a CEO to plan for succession?
> What sort of leadership-development process would you recommend?
> If planning for leadership succession is so important, why don’t more organizations do it?
> Based on EEOC’s guidance, what changes in company policies might be necessary?
> It has often been said that people don’t leave bad companies; they leave bad bosses. What can managers do to enhance employee retention?
> Is there additional information beyond the information presented here that you feel is necessary to make the business case for diversity?
> What is the ethical rationale for building and managing a diverse workforce?
> What can an employer do to avoid liability for retaliation?
> What effects do you think the U.S. Supreme Court decisions have had on the number of retaliation charges filed with the EEOC?
> Why is it that work groups that hold these beliefs are 50 percent more likely to achieve customer loyalty? What might be the link?
> What can a manager do in his or her everyday behavior to encourage these beliefs?
> What kinds of organizational policies might help to support these beliefs?
> How has ubiquitous computing changed the way you live and work?
> What advice would you offer a young person about the effects of technology on his or her career?
> How can managers maximize the positive effects of technology at work?
> The pace of developments in new technologies is becoming faster than the abilities of workers to adjust to them. What recommendations would you make to high-level policymakers in organizations and government to address this issue?
> What might governments do to cushion the blow from job losses?
> In the United States, about 6 million manufacturing jobs disappeared in the first decade of the 21st century. What factors other than free trade and foreign competition might explain that?
> What are some of the benefits of increased flows of digital information and knowledge?
> Do simulations like Motorola’s “travel well”? That is, do you think they will work in different cultures?
> How accurate are such workplace simulations? In what form might results show up?
> Can you identify any differences between managing domestically and managing internationally?
> General Motors (GM) manager Courtland Kelley had been the head of a nationwide GM inspection program and then the quality manager for the Chevy Cavalier and its successor, the Chevy Cobalt. He found flaws and reported them, over and over, and repeatedly
> As you have seen in this chapter, many employers are offering company-sponsored savings programs known as 401(k) plans. While expert’s advice that workers need to save about 15 percent of their annual salaries each year to be able to retire comfortably,
> Forging a Winning Workforce Nucor’s egalitarian culture places a premium on teamwork and idea-sharing between frontline workers and management. Result: A highly profitable partnership. Pay-for-Performance On average, two-thirds of a Nucor steelworker’s p
> The gold medal performance of the U.S. ice hockey team in the 1980 Winter Olympics has been described as the “Miracle on Ice” The “miracle” was the product of an effective performance-management system implemented by the U.S. team’s head coach, Herb Broo
> How can effective HRM contribute to sustainability?
> Arguably, the bottom line of recruiting success is the number of successful new hires. Organizations know that it is important to measure the outcomes of recruitment, but, unfortunately, most focus on measures that show how efficient they are: time to fi
> Merrill Lynch, like many other financial companies, was caught in a bad situation during the Great Recession. Sub-prime lending woes and a downwardly spiraling housing market resulted in enormous financial losses. The company benefited from high returns
> Talk, talk, talk. As Ken Hartman, an African American midlevel manager at Blahna Inc. recalls, that’s all he got from the white men above him in top management—despite the fact that Blahna had long enjoyed a reputation as a socially responsible company.
> ONO Inc. is an auto-supply company with 11 employees. In addition, there are two supervisors and Fred Donofrio, the owner and general manager. Last year, ONO did $7 million in business and earned $355,000 in profits ($525,000 before taxes). The auto-supp
> The robots are coming! The robots are coming! Well, not so fast. According to a 2017 study from the McKinsey Global Institute, only 5 percent of all occupations are at risk of being entirely automated by 2025. Even when the technical potential exists, th
> When appointed CEO of PepsiCo in 2006, Ms. Indra Nooyi was only the 11th woman to run a Fortune 500 company. Since then, Ms. Nooyi has been ranked in the top 10 of Forbes magazine’s list of the world’s 100 most powerful women. In 2016, she ranked #2 on F
> Skyline Machine Shop is a medium-sized firm located in San Jose, California. It employs almost 1,000 workers when business is good. Skyline specializes in doing precision machining on a subcontract basis for several large aerospace companies. Skilled mac
> Your company wants to encourage more employees to participate in work site wellness programs. Would you recommend rewards for participating or punishments for not participating?
> Identify three preventive steps that an employer might take to avoid incidents of workplace violence.
> How can effective HRM contribute to improvements in productivity and quality of work life?
> Should organizations be willing to invest more money in employee wellness? Why or why not?
> You observe a coworker threatening another employee. What should you do?
> If the benefits of EAPs cannot be demonstrated to exceed their costs, should EAPs be discontinued?
> Explain how a disease-management program might be used to address substance-abuse problems.
> Discuss the relative effectiveness of engineering versus management controls to improve job safety and health.
> What can firms do to encourage all employees to behave safely on the job?
> Should OSHA’s enforcement activities be expanded? Why, or why not?
> How does the imposition of employee discipline for poor performance (or conversely, the failure to discipline) serve as a signal to other employees?
> What might explain the finding that across cultures, employee-voice systems are associated with judgments of fairness?
> Discuss the similarities and differences among employee voice, interactional justice, and informational justice. Can you give an example of each one?
> What difficulties do you see in shifting from a hierarchical, departmentalized organization to a leaner, flatter one in which power is shared between workers and managers?
> In the course of your job, you learn that someone is “cooking the books.” Discuss the steps you would take to resolve the issue.
> What are some guidelines to follow in determining a reasonable compromise between a company’s need to run its business and employee rights to privacy?
> How can a firm avoid lawsuits for employment at will?
> Is it ethical to record a conversation with your boss without his or her knowledge? If yes, under what circumstances?
> What advice would you give to an executive who is about to negotiate an employment contract?
> Discuss the similarities and differences in these concepts: procedural justice, workplace due process, and ethical decisions about behavior.
> In performance reviews, why is it more important to focus on the future than to dwell on the past?
> Google’s Project Oxygen found that technical skill is the least important characteristic of a good boss. What kinds of other skills are more important?
> Why is it so difficult to compare industrial relations systems in different countries?
> Your company has just learned that it is the target of a union-organizing campaign. How will you advise managers about what they can and cannot say to employees?
> Considering everything we have discussed in this chapter, describe management styles and practices that will be effective for your country’s businesses in the next decade.
> Why is it in the best interests of management and labor to work together? Or is it?
> Compare and contrast mediation, interest arbitration, and grievance arbitration.
> What are the key features of the U.S. industrial relations system?
> Why is it so difficult to be effective at both distributive and integrative bargaining in the course of the same negotiations?
> Discuss the rights and obligations of unions and management during a union-organizing drive.
> Are the roles of labor and management inherently adversarial?
> What might be some advantages and some disadvantages of cafeteria-style benefits?
> How do voluntary benefits programs allow smaller companies to offer a wider array of benefits than they otherwise would be able to?
> A major problem with benefits is that many employees don’t know much about them—until they need to use them. What can organizations do to deal with that problem?
> Your company has just developed a new, company-sponsored savings plan for employees. Develop a strategy to publicize the program and to encourage employees to participate in it.
> How will demographic changes and increasing diversity in the workplace affect the ways that organizations manage their people?
> What can large firms do to control health-care costs? What about small firms?
> In terms of the “attract-retain-motivate” philosophy, how do benefits affect employee behavior?
> The new world of employee benefits is best described as “sharing costs, sharing risks.” Discuss the impact of that philosophy on the broad areas of health care and pensions.
> What should a company do over the short and long term to maximize the use and value of its benefits choices to employees?
> How do tight versus loose labor market conditions affect wage rates?
> If you were implementing an employee stock-ownership plan, what key factors would you consider?
> Distinguish profit-sharing from gain-sharing.
> In your opinion, why are more firms tying executive incentives to long-term (3 years or more) company performance?
