SHRM END-TERM EXAM

ANS 1.

The workforce planning of the company was not appropriate in my view.

Dr. Lalit Mahajan wants to build up a team of the best talents and people of high productivity
so he hired Dr. Basundhara, one of the brightest minds in medical diagnostics, and was given
full rein to construct her team by employing the best people regardless of cost. Ramesh
Dhumal, a chemical engineer from his alma institution, will oversee the production function
to assure the product's unrivaled quality in comparison to rivals. He was given the authority
to develop his core team by employing high-quality individuals at any cost. He required the
best talents from the industry at any cost. He acquired human capital which is valuable but
not unique. he did not provide any training or learning and development seminars to the
employees for making them valuable to the company. As a result, the competitive advantage
was not the single department but the collaboration of 3 departments.

After Lalit Mahajan, Jatin Mahajan also wants to build a professionally managed
company but was not able to acquire the right talent from the market neither he has talented
people left in the organization. In order to hire talented personnel, they have to pay huge
salaries, or they have to compromise with the less experienced ones.

To reduce the cost of hiring from outside they can develop internally by providing training
and development to the employees to achieve their goals. The production and R&D
department was the most important departments in their organization, and they were ignoring
the HR department which takes care of the needs of employees, they hired a low-experienced
employee as an HR professional to manage the employees with good experience. Instead,
they should invest in hiring a qualified HR who can ensure a low attrition rate.

ANS 2.

Company’s approach towards investment in Human Capital

Types of investment on Human Resource Assets

 Cost of Talent Acquisition

  Compensation, Benefits, & Rewards
 Training & Development
 Cost of Talent Retention

The J Mitra & Company’s approach towards human capital was limited to the cost of talent
acquisition And somewhat about rewards as it was given in the core values of the company
about the performance-based rewards and few people were given special training for the
production. Training and development were not given importance in the company as they
were not sourcing the employees internally. Investment as the cost of talent retention was
also not made. Milind opposed the proposal of increasing the salaries of the employees of the
production department and R&D department. This can further increase the attrition rate of
employees. the company score competitive advantage was not the employees but the
collaboration of 3 departments.

Employee turnover rate was high which indicates the fewer efforts by the company to retain
the employees.

Their main focus was on technological inventions for which they need employees with the
best productivity and imagination and creativity. The management philosophy of the
organization does not encourage the development of any strategy to prevent the depreciation
of its human capital.

ANS 3.

The collective level of human capital is the source of sustained competitive advantage
for this company. The combined and complementary effect of these key departments on a
collective level could only distinguish them from rivals. As a result, they used to operate as a
catalyst to encourage tight and ongoing contact between the teams of these three key function
leaders and their teams inside and between functions. These three teams' aggregate expertise,
experiences, and efforts are the basis of the company's long-term competitive advantage. The
three teams were production, Research and development, and quality assurance.

When a company "creates value for its consumers, picks markets in which it can succeed, and
presents a dynamic target to its rivals by consistently strengthening its position," it gains a
sustained competitive advantage.  Even in a crowded market, a firm that focuses on
innovation, high-quality production, and exceptional customer service is likely to establish a
competitive advantage. Employees' unique abilities, such as excellent performance,
productivity, adaptability, creativity, and the capacity to give exceptional levels of individual
customer service, are ways in which individuals contribute to the development of an
organization's competitive position. They are also known as firm-specific skills. But in this
case, the employees are acquired and more or less have the same qualities that competitors
have. So, to have a competitive edge J Mitra & Company collaborates with three important
departments to provide highly innovative products with the best quality.

Here the individual talent of employees is not seen as a competitive advantage, to convert the
human capital into a competitive advantage the company should provide firm-specific skills
and knowledge which is non-imitable by the competitors. Because firm-specific talents have
limited application to other businesses, there is a significant gap in the use value of workers'
firm-specific skills in the local firm and the use value of these same skills in rival firms. The
low use value influences the salaries that alternative enterprises are willing to pay for these
qualities in the labor market, resulting in a low exchange value for these skills. Therefore, if
universal human capital is widely applicable, it has a high use value to competitors and, as a
result, a high exchange value.

Collective phenomena develop in team environments because the nature of team tasks and
workflow necessitates collaboration, interdependence, and interaction among team members.

ANS 4.

Situation: Delima of increasing salaries of the departments with high attrition rate or not. If
senior employees discover that newbies earn as much as they do, morale will suffer.
Therefore, the only way to solve this situation is to pay long-term employees more than
freshly hired personnel. If market conditions demand to pay new employees more then we
need to pay older employees a bit more.

Recommendations to Jatin Mahajan:

1. Performance-linked hikes: based on their performance appraisal and their

achievements their bonus can be determined. Money motivates employees to perform
better and compete.
2. Learning and development sessions: creating rare talent for our company will help
in two ways: firstly, it will act as a competitive advantage and secondly the employees
will not leave voluntarily as they have some unique talent that is of no worth to other
firms.
3. Hiring fresh talents: fresh talents from colleges will be given fewer salaries and they
can be given the training to make them advantageous for the company.
4. Hiring experienced professionals: hiring people having more experience than
previously employed ones will not create issues related to salaries.
5. Strategic planning: having a proper blueprint of strategies, goals, core values and
competitive advantage will help in aligning the personal goals of employees with that
of the organization.
6. Including employee benefits: inclusion of benefits other than the financial ones that
will create belongingness for the company from employees.