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论文题目：回答问题 SCHOOL OF BUSINESS, LAW AND PSYCHOLOGY
Section B: Answer TWO questions from FOUR - essay and report questions (60 marks) – each question should be completed in no more than 1750 words each. Use “word count” and put the number of words used at the end of each essay. THE UNIVERSITY'S REGULATIONS CONCERNING CHEATING, COLLUSION AND PLAGIARISM APPLY TO THIS ASSESSMENT SECTION A The Beverage Report What is high-performance working? New research (see 'What are the attributes of a high performance company?’ below) has examined its constituents in nine organisations worldwide - one of which was South African Breweries. Rebecca Johnson describes how this organisation’s focus on people strategies has supported a decade of global expansion, innovation and performance improvement Date: 30 March 2000 Eighteen billion drinks is a lot of liquid. That's what South African Breweries (SAB), founded in 1896 ,now one of the world's top four brewers, sells in a year. In its home territory, the firm's "share of throat", as the drinks market is termed, is 98 per cent of beer and 57 per cent of all alcohol consumed in South Africa. In the past decade SAB has almost doubled its production in South Africa to 2.5 billion litres and halved its workforce to 7,000 following a switch to high-performance team working. New job structures and an emphasis on quality, performance management and social responsibility have formed the basis of major change and rapid expansion. Johan Nel, SAB's HR director, calls 1990 "a watershed time in terms of performance management. It was the start of a deliberate move towards world-class manufacturing and best operating practice, including international benchmarking." The business had been held back by apartheid, and international sanctions had forced it to pull out of some markets. It had concentrated on growth in the home market, building new breweries and expanding distribution capacity. But by the endhttp://www.ukassignment.org/daixieAssignment/daixieyingguoassignment/ of the 1980s these political constraints were disappearing, the company had started to think globally again and the board was able to refocus on aggressive growth strategies. This meant a reappraisal of SAB's direction, structure and management capabilities for the next phase of development. "We also felt that we weren't integrated," explains Denise Smith, organisational development manager. "We were very successful, but cluttered strategically."#p#分页标题#e# To help the organisation move forward, the company called in the Mac Group, a US consultancy, to review its strategic processes and identify core strategies for the four key functions of the business. It then used a customised version of MacLagan International's "integrated management process" (IMP) to set the ball rolling. IMP began in 1990 with a set of "value-sharing workshops" involving 6,000 employees from all levels, which resulted in the publication of 10 key organisational values. The workshops included discussions on apartheid and the need for shared values to create a sense of community. Among the values identified were customer service, quality, commitment to the environment, respect and equality of opportunity, health and safety and employee development. In practice, IMP is a sophisticated set of strategic plans for the entire organisation, consisting of business planning, communication and performance management processes. The plans make it easier to align the goals of individuals and teams, and are designed to enable a quicker response to change through the next stages of the company's growth cycle. In 1991 the company agreed its vision to be one of the top five breweries in the world by the year 2000 "while behaving in a progressive and socially responsible manner". And it went on to identify the core business values that would make that possible: people, growth and reputation. Jobs were initially redesigned in 1992-93, bringing in a four-tier team structure. This would consist of regional executive teams, departmental teams, unit or section teams and shift teams. These were multi-skilled, initially with members retaining formal reporting lines to "functional homes". The teams were to be self-sufficient in operating machinery, problem-solving, quality control and maintenance, and there was to be a new focus on "accountability at source". New skills and attitudes were required, and training focused on technical skills, problem-solving, teamworking (including setting goals and dealing with conflict) and quality issues, such as waste management. In 1997 there was a further shift in the team-working structures in the packaging side of the business. This was intended to upskill all team members and take the autonomous and multi-skilled working practices a step further, doing away with functional reporting lines entirely. The repositioning of roles has emphasised quality and maintenance, and is now being rolled out across the packaging lines. The training investment required to back up the new working practices was significant. "Whole teams were put on three months' full-time training to get the right skills and to work in different ways," Smith says. And Nel adds: "It makes each person holistically responsible for the total process, including quality.” Each team is now fully responsible for all its systems and the whole range of its products. Coaching and performance management elements are built into the team structure. Follow-up work has included nine to 12 months of training specific to individuals' needs.#p#分页标题#e# Restructuring of jobs and teams has not been the only change. To become more competitive has inevitably meant streamlining the business and cuts in staffing levels. In a collaborative spirit, SAB and its trade union, the Food and Allied Workers Union, formed a joint manufacturing task force in 1995 to tackle this, with the understanding that "world-class manufacturing" was not negotiable, but the way in which it was implemented was up for discussion. The company and union undertook a joint study tour. They visited Volkswagen in Germany, Miller Trenton brewery in the US and Cadbury-Schweppes in the UK to investigate flexible working, multi¬skilling and its effect on staffing levels, and what was required to bring about the higher levels of skill needed to drive the business forward. Following that was a joint visit to the International Labour Organisation in 1996 for help in designing a support structure for "retrenchments" (redundancies). http://www.ukassignment.org/ This innovative scheme became known as Project Noah. SAB was keen on "soft landings" - voluntary redundancies supported by the organisation. "Because we were creating new jobs, some employees had to leave the company, but we strongly felt the need to avoid any forced retrenchments," Smith explains. "Much of the loss has been achieved through natural attrition." Exodus and genesis Another strategy was to outsource distribution to the company's lorry drivers in 1995. Following a careful selection and training process, including assistance with entrepreneurial skills, formerly contracted drivers became owner-drivers running their own businesses. The company supplies the lorries, and the drivers are free to take on additional contracts if they wish. "They have to serve a certain time to payoff their truck, but it is a winning relationship for the company and the drivers," Smith says. A number of HR strategies underpinned the business reorganisation. From 1992 to 1998 an annual organisational survey was conducted and the feedback used in planning strategy. Self-auditing systems were introduced in every region. There's a great emphasis on bottom-up communication as well as top-down, and goals are reviewed at monthly one-to-one meetings for managers and their staff, as well as in six-monthly performance reviews. And managers are subject to upward feedback as part of their own assessment process. There is also a strong career development and succession planning system in place, with a substantial emphasis on individual responsibility.#p#分页标题#e# In 1993, HR was drastically restructured to integrate it with the line, so that all managers are now directly accountable for personnel issues. Each regional executive team now has an HR consultant who is the custodian of functional excellence. Departmental teams have their own HR specialists, and cross-departmental learning is facilitated by a "ghost" HR team or forum, led by the regional consultant. "Managers are measured on all people aspects, so we get total ownership," Smith explains. A more formalised competency acquisition system was introduced in 1995 as the result of a bench marking visit to Australia. This is applied to all areas of the company to create learning solutions in line with business needs. SAB's training institute has become a corporate university to implement this system. It works in co-operation with local and international institutions, including the UK's Heriot¬ Watt and Brunel universities, to provide externally recognised qualifications. Management development is linked to programmes at Harvard, Stanford, Michigan, Wharton, Kellogg and Insead. Promoting equal opportunities has been a priority for the company - and for its relationship with the community - for the past three decades. Even at the height of apartheid in the early 1970s, SAB had a "race equity" project. "By the time the democratic government was elected in 1994, we had a great advantage in that sense," Nel says. The company is now on phase three of the project, with an emphasis on dignity and valuing diversity. The company monitors its performance on race and sex equality regionally. There has clearly been major investment in learning and development to support change. "It's not a one-off thing," Nel says. "For years we have invested heavily in training. It is ingrained in the culture of the organisation. It is not an issue that is questioned in the business, though obviously we monitor its effectiveness. There is a minimum annual investment of 5 per cent of total payroll, excluding on-the-¬job training. The belief is there that the investment is worthwhile. And for re-engineering it was essential in order to produce new work practices and attitudes." "It has become systematised over the past five or six years because of the benefits we've seen it produce," Smith says. "It is focused on achievement. We won't invest in something with no achievement, and the success factor is obvious," Underlining the fundamental importance of people strategies to SAB is the fact that their progress is measured and audited as thoroughly as any financial or technical aspects of the business. The "people balance sheet", equivalent to the bottom line for people management, is a crucial tool in the company's structured HR strategy. SAB has evidently achieved the targets it set itself back in 1990. "The results speak for themselves," Nel says. "We are the lowest-cost producer and we win awards for quality - just recently we won best lager awards in the UK. And we are a high economic-added-value company - exceeding 20 per cent. You can't get that without persistently investing in people." Nel is clear about the path ahead. "There will be no deviating from the kind of intensity and focus we give to people, because we believe it has been the platform of our success over many years," he insists. "In fact, we are likely to increase, rather than decrease, our activity and intent in terms of people management, both locally and from an international perspective." What are the attributes of a high-performance company? A high-performance company shouldn't be difficult to spot. Success is characterised largely by outputs. It is likely to achieve sustained and increasing market share. It delivers greater added value, profitability or shareholder value. It innovates, or differentiates its service from that of its competitors. Its customers return time and again. In short, it is likely to outperform others in its sector in one way or another. But what is high-performance working? What are the inputs, in terms of strategy and people management practices, that contribute to this success - and how do they do so? Are there core and consistent working practices that underpin these achievements? Do they remain constant across industrial sectors, even across national boundaries? How do working practices interact to produce high performance? What is the secret to delivering sustainable success? There are too many questions here for any single research project. But case-study research by the International Federation of Training and Development Organisations (IFTDO) and the InternationalLabour Office (ILO) has identified some key factors that, acting together, form the core of a successful approach. The key messages to emerge are: develop a strong, strategic vision; work through project teams to address future differentiation; and underpin your strategy with learning. The IFTDO and ILO identified 30 organisations that met the profile outlined above, nine of which are the subject of a report to be published later this year. All the organisations were highly regarded. For instance, Hong Kong's Mandarin Hotel has been voted "best individual hotel worldwide" by Business Traveller, UK, with the Oriental, Bangkok, from the same hotel group, in second place. The US Social Security Administration achieved the top ranking in an assessment of the performance of government agencies. The Laiki Bank has won seven product and service awards from the Cyprus Bank Marketing Association, as well as recognition for its retail schemes in the US.#p#分页标题#e# The case studies show how each organisation sought to turn an ambition - "be the best" - into practical steps to achieve this. What was most interesting is the way in which those organisations that have innovated and renewed what they offer to the customer have done so by project-based, devolved business development integrated with learning. All the organisations had a starting point that included leadership, vision and benchmarking. They fostered a sense of direction and constantly measured progress. They managed change based on decentralised, devolved decision-making and the development of people's capabilities through learning. There was particular emphasis on self-management and team capabilities. These were supported by performance, operational and people management processes aligned to organisational objectives of building trust, enthusiasm and commitment to the direction taken by the organisation. Their vision was as much about "how to do it" as it was about what would delight the customer. For instance, Motorola's development of its corporate university is based on three key principles: that learning and change go hand in hand, that innovation is much more likely when people participate in the solution, rather than having it handed to them, and that there has to be a proper tension between a single-mindedness of purpose within the organisation and a broader frame of reference extending beyond the organisation. Motorola bases its use of self-managed teams on the perceived need for customers to have "seamless" responses to their requests. The aim is to "have every employee serving on five teams". The university is used for job-related study, but it also acts as an agent of change. It provides a resource centre, supporting performance development in the workplace at 99 sites in 23 countries. It supports action learning and learning "beyond the organisation". One of the university's roles now is to raise questions "where the answers do not exist". The teams and the university provide a basis for taking the business forward. At the other end of the employment scale is Comfort Driving Centre in Singapore, with only 130 employees. It has also put the application of learning theory by instructors and computer-based learning and simulation at the heart of its processes. It has a client driving test pass rate of 53 per cent, more than twice the rate of its competitors. It maintains a flat hierarchy below senior executive level and teamworking is becoming the main means of organising work - a change that required considerable preparatory work and will not be completed until later this year. Membership of project teams is open to all staff on the basis of individual initiative and enthusiasm. Much of the innovative work of the organisation is carried out in project teams established to tackle The ILO/IFTDO research on which this case study is based was conducted by David Ashton, head of the Centre for Labour Market Studies at the University of Leicester; Tony Twigger at the ILO; John Stevens, the IPD's director of development and public policy; and 8arry Oxtoby, an independent researcher. Answer all of the following questions for Section A, Question 1. Clearly complete each answer separately.
2) You have been invited to a management discussion forum with an invited audience of general managers. The theme is ‘Creating a performance culture in organizations for success ‘. Your role is to present the case that HR systems can make a difference to the creation of such a culture. Prepare a case for this that also addresses problematic areas of performance management systems. 3) Prepare a briefing paper for an organization that wishes to overhaul its training and development activity which is primarily dependent on external courses that it makes available for some of its management staff when they consider the need to acquire some new ideas or develop a particular personal professional interest. Advise the organization as to how it might strategically integrate HRD at the heart of its organizational development objectives. 4) How does a strategic approach to the management of reward support the wider SHRM? You should make reference to relevant course materials and case examples. 5) What do we mean by an employee relations strategy? Reviewing the choices available to organizations and trade unions, assess whether employee relations can really fit the SHRM model.
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