HRM Blog Post 8
Last week in HRM we learned about the global aspects of human resources. We had a guest speaker from Tahitian Noni come and speak to the class to talk about it. His name was Gary Williams and he is the global HR director for the company. He talked a lot about what companies should be paying their employees. He said most companies want to be right at the market. For this reason on a global scale, companies need to research and investigate what the market pay rates are in other companies. The local markets vary greatly and the differences are multiplied on even greater scale when dealing with other countries. Also, things other than pay need to be considered. For example, severance packages, certain benefits, and even certain customs and traditions need to be considered. He said that in some other countries, certain holidays and traditions can really affect how much people work and get paid. Also things like work weeks need to be considered. For example in France, people work a lot less hours during the work week. This needs to be considered when deciding how many people to hire, what to pay them, and what you expect them to accomplish. He stressed the need of paying people the correct market value and providing the usual benefits or else many of the employees will leave the company. Also, you need to mix salary changes and other benefits to meet the market demands of the local places.
One of my friends often travels to Eastern Europe for work. He has told me about some of the cultural differences that affect the business. For example, having a business dinner at a restaurant. Here in the US we typically eat dinner and then leave the restaurant. Over there it becomes pretty much an all night event. When they have a business dinner, people stay at the restaurant for three or four hours and spend a few hundred dollars. This is something that would need to be considered when hiring a manager over there and determining how much money will be spent on the dinner and other things.
We had some good discussions about working conditions in other countries. We talked about American companies that operate plants or have offices in other countries. We discussed if those companies should have working conditions similar to the US plants or offices, or should they follow the sometimes lower standards found in other countries. We decided that ethically companies should follow the stricter standards to set an example and also to improve the image of the company. Consumers today are becoming more and more conscious of how the people who produce their products are treated. If the consumers found out that the workers in other countries were being treated better than other workers in the countries, consumers might be more inclined to purchase the products produced by those companies.
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
HRM blog post 7
This week in HRM we learned a lot about employee benefits. Jeff Weber from ancestry.com came and spoke about benefits. He spoke about compensation and told us that we need to know the laws concerning pay like fair labor standards, know if we are exempt or non-exempt, and know if we should be getting paid overtime. He also told us that people who get fired are legally entitled to get paid within twenty four hours of when they get fired. I had never heard about that issue before. Jeff also talked about how rewards are incorporated and told us that compensation is an investment. Also, companies need to decide if they want to be paying at, below, or above the current market value. Jeff spoke about compensation structures. He told us that the rewards programs are becoming more flexible and that they are more externally driven. The salaries are based on market demand.
The company I interned for over the summer had some interesting ways to compensate their employees. They had a lot of company activities like picnics, golf and baseball tournaments, and opportunities to learn new skills and methods. They also had a pretty extensive health benefit program. They had a point system set up on the company’s website. Different things like getting a checkup at the doctor, not smoking, not drinking, switching out healthy snacks for junk food, losing a pound, and exercising. Everybody would fill out this sheet and every six months the company would add up the points. Whoever got the most points was given some sort of a prize. Usually the top five point earners would gain something as well. This helped the company show that they care about the employees. I assume it also helped bring down their health insurance costs. This company also had a good health insurance program. They would pay for insurance for employees and their families. I don’t remember the exact numbers but I know that the company spent almost as much on health care as they did on salaries. The company also encouraged biking to work and built showers and locker rooms in the new building that they built to help do this.
I have never had a job where I have received real benefits. I did work for a city for a while and they set up some sort of retirement pay for me. To me benefits are a big deal, especially health insurance. I currently have to pay my own. Luckily it is pretty low because I am a student but after I graduate it will probably go up by about five times. I think companies should educate their employees more on the benefits that they are receiving. This will cause employees to be more satisfied and probably work more productively.
The company I interned for over the summer had some interesting ways to compensate their employees. They had a lot of company activities like picnics, golf and baseball tournaments, and opportunities to learn new skills and methods. They also had a pretty extensive health benefit program. They had a point system set up on the company’s website. Different things like getting a checkup at the doctor, not smoking, not drinking, switching out healthy snacks for junk food, losing a pound, and exercising. Everybody would fill out this sheet and every six months the company would add up the points. Whoever got the most points was given some sort of a prize. Usually the top five point earners would gain something as well. This helped the company show that they care about the employees. I assume it also helped bring down their health insurance costs. This company also had a good health insurance program. They would pay for insurance for employees and their families. I don’t remember the exact numbers but I know that the company spent almost as much on health care as they did on salaries. The company also encouraged biking to work and built showers and locker rooms in the new building that they built to help do this.
I have never had a job where I have received real benefits. I did work for a city for a while and they set up some sort of retirement pay for me. To me benefits are a big deal, especially health insurance. I currently have to pay my own. Luckily it is pretty low because I am a student but after I graduate it will probably go up by about five times. I think companies should educate their employees more on the benefits that they are receiving. This will cause employees to be more satisfied and probably work more productively.
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Blog Post 6
During the last few weeks the most important thing I learned in this class was about the research resources in the library. I have never had to do any upper level research like this for any of my classes. I found the information to be very interesting and useful. I do quite a bit of research on my own about topics that I am interested in like sustainable building practices and renewable energy. I plan on using the resources in the library to study those topics more in depth. It seems to me like a good way to filter out all of the junk that you come across while doing research on the internet. It also seems fairly easy and the information seems accessible. I enjoyed the presentation we received in the library. It was something that I wish we would have got during earlier classes. This is my last semester so I won’t be able to use it as much as I otherwise would have been able to.
The other thing we learned about is pay scales. I found it interesting because of a situation that recently happened with my sister. She was working here in Salt Lake making around 40,000 a year working with a company that sells advertising space. She then moved to San Francisco and got a job doing the same thing but she is now making 80,000. This was partly because a couple of companies really wanted her to work for them but also just the cost of living is so much greater. The difference is pretty amazing just based on where you live.
We also had an interesting group discussion on minimum wage. One of the other students in my group worked as a waiter and made only about two dollars an hour. He was making about ten dollars an hour for doing the same thing in California. The restaurant industry justifies paying two dollars an hour because they say that with tips it evens out and the waiters make enough. The problem the student expressed was that the pay didn’t always even out because sometimes the restaurant was really slow and they wouldn’t make any money. Also, while it was slow they were asked to clean and tidy up the restaurant for two dollars an hour. This de-motivated the waiters at the restaurant. Also, some of the waiters weren’t scheduled to work during the time slots when the restaurant was busy. This made it even harder for the employees to make enough money. We discussed in our group that the restaurants around here should probably pay more money and if not, they should set up some sort of compensation plan for the times when the restaurant is slow.
The other thing we learned about is pay scales. I found it interesting because of a situation that recently happened with my sister. She was working here in Salt Lake making around 40,000 a year working with a company that sells advertising space. She then moved to San Francisco and got a job doing the same thing but she is now making 80,000. This was partly because a couple of companies really wanted her to work for them but also just the cost of living is so much greater. The difference is pretty amazing just based on where you live.
We also had an interesting group discussion on minimum wage. One of the other students in my group worked as a waiter and made only about two dollars an hour. He was making about ten dollars an hour for doing the same thing in California. The restaurant industry justifies paying two dollars an hour because they say that with tips it evens out and the waiters make enough. The problem the student expressed was that the pay didn’t always even out because sometimes the restaurant was really slow and they wouldn’t make any money. Also, while it was slow they were asked to clean and tidy up the restaurant for two dollars an hour. This de-motivated the waiters at the restaurant. Also, some of the waiters weren’t scheduled to work during the time slots when the restaurant was busy. This made it even harder for the employees to make enough money. We discussed in our group that the restaurants around here should probably pay more money and if not, they should set up some sort of compensation plan for the times when the restaurant is slow.
Monday, October 4, 2010
HRM blog post 5
Blog Post 5
Last week we had a good group discussion about feedback. During my internship over the summer I never really received any feedback. I was always kind of curious as to how I was doing. I wasn’t usually given too much responsibility so it was hard for me to judge myself on how I was doing. I learned through the reading that most companies usually do feedback once a year. Since I was only going to be at the company for 3 months this yearly feedback would not apply to me. My boss did sit down with me alone once and he asked me how the internship was going but this was more of a job satisfaction interview rather than a performance review. So the internship ended and I never really got a feel for how he felt about my performance. I had to have him fill out a sheet from the school for the internship. I got it about three weeks after I got done with the internship. On that sheet he reviewed my performance. He put a lot of things in the areas where he thought I could improve. I wish he would have told me these areas to work on while I was there so I could have improved those skills while I had the chance. I am now worried that he won’t give me a very good reference if he gets called by some other companies that I apply for. I felt like my boss didn’t care too much about what I did and wasn’t too concerned about my performance. This was probably because he knew I was a temporary hire but the reason I was doing the internship was to improve my skills and learn. I wish I would have asked him for feedback on how I was doing every couple of weeks while I was there.
In our discussion group we talked about how often people should be receiving feedback. Someone in our group received it weekly at one of her jobs. This was because it was a sales based job and it was kind of like a motivator for the position. We came to the conclusion that feedback should be given as often as needed depending on the position.
We also had a group discussion about job rotation. My uncle works for a hotel. He was rotation through the different positions to better learn all of the aspects of running the hotel. This was to put him in position to be the general manager of one of the hotels eventually. Well when the economy tanked he got stuck in his current position which is lower than where he previously was. To me this is unfair. I think that the hotel should move him back up to his previous position or at least raise his pay back up for the time being. In our group we discussed that there might be a more effective way to help people learn all of the aspect of a certain company rather than just rotating around. We thought some shadowing and training could probably accomplish the same end result.
Last week we had a good group discussion about feedback. During my internship over the summer I never really received any feedback. I was always kind of curious as to how I was doing. I wasn’t usually given too much responsibility so it was hard for me to judge myself on how I was doing. I learned through the reading that most companies usually do feedback once a year. Since I was only going to be at the company for 3 months this yearly feedback would not apply to me. My boss did sit down with me alone once and he asked me how the internship was going but this was more of a job satisfaction interview rather than a performance review. So the internship ended and I never really got a feel for how he felt about my performance. I had to have him fill out a sheet from the school for the internship. I got it about three weeks after I got done with the internship. On that sheet he reviewed my performance. He put a lot of things in the areas where he thought I could improve. I wish he would have told me these areas to work on while I was there so I could have improved those skills while I had the chance. I am now worried that he won’t give me a very good reference if he gets called by some other companies that I apply for. I felt like my boss didn’t care too much about what I did and wasn’t too concerned about my performance. This was probably because he knew I was a temporary hire but the reason I was doing the internship was to improve my skills and learn. I wish I would have asked him for feedback on how I was doing every couple of weeks while I was there.
In our discussion group we talked about how often people should be receiving feedback. Someone in our group received it weekly at one of her jobs. This was because it was a sales based job and it was kind of like a motivator for the position. We came to the conclusion that feedback should be given as often as needed depending on the position.
We also had a group discussion about job rotation. My uncle works for a hotel. He was rotation through the different positions to better learn all of the aspects of running the hotel. This was to put him in position to be the general manager of one of the hotels eventually. Well when the economy tanked he got stuck in his current position which is lower than where he previously was. To me this is unfair. I think that the hotel should move him back up to his previous position or at least raise his pay back up for the time being. In our group we discussed that there might be a more effective way to help people learn all of the aspect of a certain company rather than just rotating around. We thought some shadowing and training could probably accomplish the same end result.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Blog Post 4
Last week I learned a lot about the hiring process. I graduate in December and will be looking for a job so I have been very interested in how companies go about choosing employees. I began my interviews for the first assignment. I interviewed the HR guy at a local large construction company. I won’t name names because this will be available on the web and there might be some confidentiality issues. He gave me a lot of good information about how companies hire but was new to the company. Since I only need to use two interviews and I have interviewed more people than that I don’t think I will use his interview for the assignment. He said that they usually hire people based off of referrals. If they need to hire somebody they have the project managers and superintendents ask around and see who they can get. They will then have interviews with the perspective employee. They usually have one of the managers sit in on the interview to judge the persons technical skills. They also usually will run a background check on the person. They have a problem with affirmative action and hiring minorities for a couple of reasons. Firstly, because most of the employees come from referrals and people refer people like themselves they don’t get a whole lot of diversity in potential hires. Also, not many women apply for jobs in the construction industry just because of the nature of the work. He is working on getting an application tracking system on the website because he thinks it will help bring in more diverse applicants. Something else he said that was interesting was his response to what he looks for on a resume. He said that he looks for what is on top because that is probably what the applicant feels is the most important. The interviews that I have conducted have been interesting and I feel like they will give me an advantage when looking for a job.
My discussion topic for chapter six had to do with the tests that are often administered to potential hires. I have taken a few of them and found them to be rather ridiculous. One I took at Home Depot asked me hundreds of questions about honesty. It was obvious about which answer should be put down but I wouldn’t have been dishonest if I answered them all in the way it wanted me to. This makes it an interesting test. In theory the more honest the person, the lower they would score on the test. If I were in charge of hiring somebody I don’t think I would use those types of tests.
The discussion topic I chose for chapter seven had to do with diversity training. I have never received training in that area and I found it interesting. I wonder how somebody becomes qualified to teach and train about diversity. I feel like it would have to be somebody of the culture being learned about to be effective.
My discussion topic for chapter six had to do with the tests that are often administered to potential hires. I have taken a few of them and found them to be rather ridiculous. One I took at Home Depot asked me hundreds of questions about honesty. It was obvious about which answer should be put down but I wouldn’t have been dishonest if I answered them all in the way it wanted me to. This makes it an interesting test. In theory the more honest the person, the lower they would score on the test. If I were in charge of hiring somebody I don’t think I would use those types of tests.
The discussion topic I chose for chapter seven had to do with diversity training. I have never received training in that area and I found it interesting. I wonder how somebody becomes qualified to teach and train about diversity. I feel like it would have to be somebody of the culture being learned about to be effective.
Monday, September 20, 2010
Blog Post 3
Last week in HR class I learned a lot about downsizing. My dad has been laid off from his job a number of times. Often times this was because of downsizing so this topic is close to home with me. I have always wanted to put myself in a position so I can avoid being laid off during downsizing. My major is construction management and construction is very cyclical. I know a lot of construction companies have downsized recently. This has saturated the market with qualified applicants, which is bad news for somebody like me who is looking for a job. It also makes me worry that in the future I will be laid off when the market takes a turn for the worse.
Something else that was very interesting to me about downsizing is that it doesn’t really work. I am surprised how many companies still resort to it. It is obvious that it has a negative effect on the performance of employees and also on the public image of the company. When a company begins to downsize to it looks as if it is going out of business. Also, when employees feel the threat of losing their job, they are afraid to take risks and make changes, even if they are positive. These issues remind me of one of my best friends. He worked for a company that recently started to do some downsizing. Although my friend was not laid off he was still concerned about what was happening in the company. This caused him to look for another job. He eventually found on and quit his job. He was the company’s regional manager for Eastern Europe which accounts for a large portion of the company’s business. These regions are now short of a manager that the company will have to replace. It won’t be easy to replace him because he didn’t train anybody to take his place. Also, speaking Russian is a requirement for his job so that narrows down the possibilities. This means that business will probably significantly decline in that region which will cost the company thousands of dollars, probably more than they saved by others at the company go.
We had an interesting discussion about downsizing in my group discussion. We discussed what else can be done instead of downsizing to help a company save money. Things like offering early retirement, employing temporary workers, and outsourcing seemed to be good alternatives to downsizing. The only problem is that they require planning and they also take a little longer to produce results. Downsizing can produce immediate financial results but in the long run will cost the company.
Something else we discussed in our groups was how much time is wasted while people work in the office. I know personally I have had jobs where more than half of my time was spent just sitting at a computer. I have often thought that there is probably a better way to do things. I think if people were hired to complete certain jobs rather than spend 8 hours a day in the office, employees would be happier, and work would be done more efficiently.
Something else that was very interesting to me about downsizing is that it doesn’t really work. I am surprised how many companies still resort to it. It is obvious that it has a negative effect on the performance of employees and also on the public image of the company. When a company begins to downsize to it looks as if it is going out of business. Also, when employees feel the threat of losing their job, they are afraid to take risks and make changes, even if they are positive. These issues remind me of one of my best friends. He worked for a company that recently started to do some downsizing. Although my friend was not laid off he was still concerned about what was happening in the company. This caused him to look for another job. He eventually found on and quit his job. He was the company’s regional manager for Eastern Europe which accounts for a large portion of the company’s business. These regions are now short of a manager that the company will have to replace. It won’t be easy to replace him because he didn’t train anybody to take his place. Also, speaking Russian is a requirement for his job so that narrows down the possibilities. This means that business will probably significantly decline in that region which will cost the company thousands of dollars, probably more than they saved by others at the company go.
We had an interesting discussion about downsizing in my group discussion. We discussed what else can be done instead of downsizing to help a company save money. Things like offering early retirement, employing temporary workers, and outsourcing seemed to be good alternatives to downsizing. The only problem is that they require planning and they also take a little longer to produce results. Downsizing can produce immediate financial results but in the long run will cost the company.
Something else we discussed in our groups was how much time is wasted while people work in the office. I know personally I have had jobs where more than half of my time was spent just sitting at a computer. I have often thought that there is probably a better way to do things. I think if people were hired to complete certain jobs rather than spend 8 hours a day in the office, employees would be happier, and work would be done more efficiently.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Blog Post 2
This week in class I learned a lot of things. First off, I enjoyed our guest speaker. I have never really considered human resources as a career. Although I don’t really see myself in that occupation, I felt it was good to understand the background and the daily schedule of somebody who works in that career. I enjoyed the stories he told. I have had some similar strange things happen in some of the companies that I have worked for and it is good to know how those issues are dealt with.
For my discussion topic we discussed the view of OSHA in the workplace. Most people view OSHA as an annoyance that makes the job take longer and can also make it cost more because of fines. I was wondering what could be done to help employers and employees have a different attitude towards OSHA. Even in companies that value safety, OSHA still seems to be a pain. The conclusion that we came to as a group is that employers needs to have a better safety attitude and train their employees on proper safety practices. As this happens, hopefully they will feel different about OSHA and realize that they are there to help keep people safe and alive. I am studying construction management so safety is always a hot topic for discussion.
I used to have a job doing lighting maintenance for commercial buildings. We often worked with live power and up high on ladders. We would have weekly safety meetings where we would be rewarded for being safe and taught some safety principles but as soon as we left the office things would change. It was more about getting the job done quickly instead of focusing on being safe. Because of this we did some very unsafe activities. Often we weren’t provided with a safe way of doing things. For example repairing lights in stairwells presents a challenge because you can’t set up a ladder on stairs. We often ended up rigging up things that were not safe to accomplish the task. On the other hand, if we were to try to do everything as safe as possible, we probably wouldn’t get enough work done and the company probably wouldn’t be able to succeed. This presents a struggle for employers. There is a definite balance between safety and making money. Usually doing things the safe way adds time to the project.
Another topic that this brings up is the cost of being unsafe. Aside from having to pay workers comp if an injury occurs, OSHA can impose some hefty fines. One of my friends was doing something unsafe and his employer was fined over on hundred thousand dollars. I don’t think this changed my friend’s attitude toward safety. It probably prevented him from doing the unsafe thing again but probably only to stop from getting fired. It did change his attitude towards OSHA. I wonder if OSHA could do something more effective than imposing fines like suspending workers or something. This might change the attitude people have.
For my discussion topic we discussed the view of OSHA in the workplace. Most people view OSHA as an annoyance that makes the job take longer and can also make it cost more because of fines. I was wondering what could be done to help employers and employees have a different attitude towards OSHA. Even in companies that value safety, OSHA still seems to be a pain. The conclusion that we came to as a group is that employers needs to have a better safety attitude and train their employees on proper safety practices. As this happens, hopefully they will feel different about OSHA and realize that they are there to help keep people safe and alive. I am studying construction management so safety is always a hot topic for discussion.
I used to have a job doing lighting maintenance for commercial buildings. We often worked with live power and up high on ladders. We would have weekly safety meetings where we would be rewarded for being safe and taught some safety principles but as soon as we left the office things would change. It was more about getting the job done quickly instead of focusing on being safe. Because of this we did some very unsafe activities. Often we weren’t provided with a safe way of doing things. For example repairing lights in stairwells presents a challenge because you can’t set up a ladder on stairs. We often ended up rigging up things that were not safe to accomplish the task. On the other hand, if we were to try to do everything as safe as possible, we probably wouldn’t get enough work done and the company probably wouldn’t be able to succeed. This presents a struggle for employers. There is a definite balance between safety and making money. Usually doing things the safe way adds time to the project.
Another topic that this brings up is the cost of being unsafe. Aside from having to pay workers comp if an injury occurs, OSHA can impose some hefty fines. One of my friends was doing something unsafe and his employer was fined over on hundred thousand dollars. I don’t think this changed my friend’s attitude toward safety. It probably prevented him from doing the unsafe thing again but probably only to stop from getting fired. It did change his attitude towards OSHA. I wonder if OSHA could do something more effective than imposing fines like suspending workers or something. This might change the attitude people have.
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