Ndikuriyo Pamphile

MBA - Beijing International Studies University

Chapter 1 Application Case

Jack Nelson’s Problem
As a new member of the board of directors for a local bank, Jack Nelson was
being introduced to all the employees in the home office. When he was introduced to
Ruth Johnson, he was curious about her work and asked her what the machine she
was using did. Johnson replied that she really did not know what the machine was
called or what it did. She explained that she had only been working there for 2
months. However, she did know precisely how to operate the machine. According to
her supervisor, she was an excellent employee.
At one of the branch offices, the supervisor in charge spoke to Nelson
confidentially, telling him that “something was wrong,” but she didn’t know what. For

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one thing, she explained, employee turnover was too high, and no sooner had one

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employee been put on the job than another one resigned. With customers to see and

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loans to be made, she continued, she had little time to work with the new employees

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as they came and went.

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All branch supervisors hired their own employees without communication with
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the home office or other branches. When an opening developed, the supervisor tried
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to find a suitable employee to replace the worker who had quit.
After touring the 22 branches and finding similar problems in many of them, Nelson
wondered what the home office should do or what action he should take. The banking
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firm generally was regarded as being a well-run institution that had grown from 27 to
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191 employees during the past 8 years. The more he thought about the matter, the
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more puzzled Nelson became. He couldn’t quite put his finger on the problem, and he
didn’t know whether to report his findings to the president.
Questions
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1. What do you think is causing some of the problems in the bank’s home office and
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branches?

Firstly, I think that high turnover is because nobody take care of the new employee. I
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mean that nobody from management, supervisors or colleague introduce them in their
environment, explain them their tasks, how everything functions. So, I believe that
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training is inadequate and the employees are less equipped with the knowledge and
expertise needed to be successful, which can lead to poor performance.

However, the company is considered as well-run for a reason that it has been growing
but it should not mean that it was growing because of well management of people.
Since the employees seem to have the skills needed (for instance Johnson precisely
knew how to operate the machine, but did not know the name of machine), the
problem here comes from the administration’s inability to help train the employees -
not so much the employee’s lack of human capital.

2. Do you think setting up an HR unit in the main office would help?

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 In my opinion, it will help to set up an HR unit in the main office for few reasons.
Firstly, HR unit can create a standards for whole company for hiring new people.
Also, creation of HR unit will improve communication between main office and
branches, which will help to avoid that all branch supervisors hired their own
employees without communication with the home office or other branches. Moreover,
lack of definition of requirements for every employe and better communication within
a company create disorganisation for a whole company. This improvement can lower
the turnover rate.

Secondly, an HR unit can help to supervisors to train new employees and also to give
attention to the employees which they need. On the other hand it will decrease the
time for supervisors which have been spending the time on looking for new
employees instead to focus on actual employees and company goals.

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3. What specific functions should an HR unit carry out? What HR functions would

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then be carried out by supervisors and other line managers? What role should the

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Internet play in the new HR organization?
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As I mentioned in previous answers, an HR unit should create standards for
employees that would fulfill the needs of the firm. Also, an HR unit can make
preselection of the resumes and candidates. Furthermore, it can carry out the
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interviews with selected candidate. In the second round interview it can cooperate
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with supervisors and other line managers under which candidate may work. So, it will
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be time effective for supervisors and line managers because they will have less
candidate to choose from and candidates will be qualified for a job.
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Furthermore, an HR unit can organise training procedure or orientation to inform

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newly hired employees of the company to get necessary information about company
and his knowledge. After the training, lines managers can train and explain the
employees their specific roles. The training is very important for new employe for fit
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and understand the workplace and company functions.

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At least, the internet can be useful for everyone. I mean that it can be use for
communications between an HR unit and supervisors and line managers by e-mail,
videoconferences, etc. Also it can be use for spread the informations by web page,
social media or other forms on different themes such as company policies, knowledge,
strategies, company's goals, moral conduct etc. Then, internet can provide training for
employees which will be available online. So everyone, every-time will have access
to the training, also it would be verifiable if employe passed the training for HR
managers. Moreover, the internet can be use for offering jobs and hiring the new
employer. Indeed, an HR can maintain a good image of the company by using social
media and internet.

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 Continuing Case
Carter Cleaning Company
Chapter 1
Introduction
A main theme of this book is that human resource management activities like
recruiting, selecting, training, and rewarding employees is not just the job of a central
HR group but rather a job in which every manager must engage. Perhaps nowhere is
this more apparent than in the typical small service business. Here the owner/manager
usually has no HR staff to rely on. However, the success of his or her enterprise (not
to mention his or her family’s peace of mind) often depends largely on the

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effectiveness through which workers are recruited, hired, trained, evaluated, and
rewarded. Therefore, to help illustrate and emphasize the front-line manager’s HR

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role, throughout this book we will use a continuing case based on an actual small
business in the southeastern United States. Each chapter’s segment of the case will

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illustrate how the case’s main player—owner/manager Jennifer Carter—confronts and
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solves personnel problems each day at work by applying the concepts and techniques
of that particular chapter. Here is background information that you will need to
answer questions that arise in subsequent chapters. (We also present a second,
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unrelated “application case” case incident in each chapter.)

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Carter Cleaning Centers

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Jennifer Carter graduated from State University in June 2005, and, after
considering several job offers, decided to do what she always planned to do—go into
business with her father, Jack Carter.
Jack Carter opened his first laundromat in 1995 and his second in 1998. The
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main attraction of these coin laundry businesses for him was that they were capital-
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rather than labor-intensive. Thus, once the investment in machinery was made, the
stores could be run with just one unskilled attendant and none of the labor problems
one normally expects from being in the retail service business.
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The attractiveness of operating with virtually no skilled labor notwithstanding,

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Jack had decided by 1999 to expand the services in each of his stores to include the
dry cleaning and pressing of clothes. He embarked, in other words, on a strategy of
“related diversification” by adding new services that were related to and consistent
with his existing coin laundry activities. He added these for several reasons. He
wanted to better utilize the unused space in the rather large stores he currently had
under lease. Furthermore, he was, as he put it, “tired of sending out the dry cleaning
and pressing work that came in from our coin laundry clients to a dry cleaner 5 miles
away, who then took most of what should have been our profits.” To reflect the new,
expanded line of services, he renamed each of his two stores Carter Cleaning Centers
and was sufficiently satisfied with their performance to open four more of the same
type of stores over the next 5 years. Each store had its own on-site manager and, on

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 average, about seven employees and annual revenues of about $500,000. It was this
six-store chain that Jennifer joined after graduating.
Her understanding with her father was that she would serve as a troubleshooter/
consultant to the elder Carter with the aim of both learning the business and bringing
to it modern management concepts and techniques for solving the business’s problems
and facilitating its growth.

Questions
1. Make a list of five specific HR problems you think Carter Cleaning will have to
grapple with.

1) Lack of communication with the company employee. Fail in clarifying the clear
goals and expectations. They are going to need to have a structure put set up so
they can talk with all the zones meanwhile. It needs to be sufficiently basic so the
directors at every store have the ability to send and get information to the general

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administrator so business can be coordinated effortlessly. Also, that employees can

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get the same information and present the indistinguishable information to all

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clients at different locations.

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2) Hiring and training system can lead to increase the operational costs, employee
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turnover, and morale problems. For instance that all staff are treated reasonably,
everybody is working same hours and is paid equally. Even it can non put on the
line engaging one group of the people, for example males and garbage females.
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Also it means prepare the criteria for different degrees of labour at each centre.
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3) Lack of health insurance compensation and poor salary that kept the employee
always unsatisfied with their work, that lead to high turnover and decreased the
companies ability to attract a new employee. They will have to controlling labour
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costs and the managing wages between those that work in dry cleaning side and
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the attendants (unskilled). Moreover Carter cleaning company should be focus on

worker dissatisfaction.
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4) Lack of setting the management performance standard by setting performance

standards, and support the employee by giving the feedback. High turnover makes
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broke working environment connections and an authoritative society that doesn't

energize long and beneficial working connections.

5) Lack of selecting the right people that could perform the job, employee selection
program should be improve. Jennifer, likely as a troubleshooter is to guarantee that
the staffing methodology is decently composed and focusing on the right blend of
abilities and capacities required among competitors. Since, workers are the heart
of the hierarchical exercises. Organization and preparation program for workers to
expand their working capacity.

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 2. What would you do first if you were Jennifer?

I will first improve communication because without good communication we cannot

find a problems which are in the company. Also, without good communication we are
not able to solve the problems. Also, they can be not only problem the communication
with all branches but also between Jennifer and his father because of generation gap
and new practices in the HR management. Also, communication means improving
with communications with the customer. So I will prepare structure and form how
employees will communicate with customers and how informations will be transfer
between managers and Jennifer.

Also, I will set a meeting between Jennifer and the managers and employees that she
can present her self and also listen them to know how the crew functions. Also, I will
suggest that she can ask her employees how they think to improve the customer
services and also for themselves. So, it will create cooperation and employees will
feel the part of the development of the company and that someone is taking care of

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them.

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