PASION, MARIA GIE-ANNELYN MANNYLYN H.

GMB 725 Human Resource Management

SAT 9:00 – 12:00

Human Resource Management - Case Study 1

GENERAL APPLIANCES: AN AGING WORKFORCE CASE STUDY
 Case Questions:
1. What role does culture play at GA? Why is it important to make decisions based on what a
company claims it stands for?

 The organizational culture plays a vital role in every company just like in GA. It is an invisible
but powerful force that influences the behavior of the employees at GA. The culture in GA
strongly influences the people in the organization and dictate how they act and perform their
jobs. It affects the company’s productivity and performance and provides guidelines on
customer care and service, product quality and safety, attendance and punctuality, and
concern for the environment.
 GA is proud and known for having an enormous care and concern for its employees by offering
generous benefits and salaries that reward their hard work. It is important for Mr. Swann, the
HR Director, to act and make decisions in a way that is consistent with what the company
stands for so that employees in GA will truly feel that the company puts its workers first, as it
claims. If GA does not act in a way based on what the company claims it stands for, it could
lose employees.

2. What tactics might Swann use to retain aging employees at GA?

The following are the tactics which I believe Swann might include to retain aging employees at GA:
 Older workers should have the same access to training, progression, mentoring or leadership
opportunities as workers of other ages.
 GA should provide opportunities to all staff with full and equal access to flexible working
arrangements, occupational health support and appropriate workplace adaptations.
 Recognize the contributions of long-time employees
 Generate visible programs that bring retirees back into the organization
 Redesign work to accommodate employees’ physical needs
 Focus on redefining roles to match employees’ motivations
 Propose phased retirement programs and contract work.
 Partner with support and affiliate groups for older workers
 Regularly telling the older workers that GA want them to stay

3. What should Swann do to ensure that employees are trained properly on the new equipment and
that they are emotionally and physically ready for the new technology?

 Swann should get an assurance from the manufacturer if the equipment has a training facility
where GA employees can train on the equipment before it is installed. If the manufacturer has
no training facility, Swann should clarify the manufacturer's plan for training GA employees, or
 training some GA staff to serve as the trainers. Swann should understand the physical
requirements of the new equipment as well as the technical capacity. He should ensure that
the training for the new equipment includes all safety features and considerations given to the
workspace and employee population. He should also make sure that there is more than
enough time on the schedule to allow employees to train. He should find out if the new
equipment can be installed in stages rather than all at one time, so there is less of an impact
on production. He should also assume that during the employee training period, little or no
production will occur. GA should also recognize that employees will be slower for a period of
time, so to maintain production schedules, employees may be required to work overtime.

4. How should health and safety concerns be addressed in light of the aging workforce?

 GA needs to be aware that accident is inevitable at times and workplace injuries are more
common in areas such as manufacturing. Swann also needs to be aware that although some
of their older employees report that their health status is good or excellent, physical declines
may contribute to aging workers having more difficulty doing a physically demanding job.
Swann must accommodate workers who can no longer do their jobs because of a disability.
For example, an older worker may not be able to lift heavy objects as easily as he or she used
to. In general, Swann needs to understand the physical demands of all jobs, especially those
involving operation of the new equipment. He must ensure that all employees are trained about
safety in general and about safety in their jobs in particular. Swann should engage the
assembly line employees to Basic Occupational Safety and Health Training. With that, training
should include the procedures for workplace injuries. Swann should form a safety committee to
assess safety in the workplace, track safety concerns and make recommendations for safety
improvements

5. How much should Bruney’s legacy affect Swann’s recommendations? Is it right for a manager to
be influenced by the vision of someone who is no longer with the company?

 For me, yes. Swann needs to make decisions that reflect the company’s value. Harold Bruney,
the founder of GA has built a corporate culture in his company that puts employees first and
treats them as assets, and that is a legacy he wanted to carry on. That fact is what should
affect Swann's decision-making the most. In doing so, he will likely be carrying out the same
plan Bruney would have.

6. What should Swann’s plan be to address an aging workforce?

 Considering GA's corporate culture of putting their employees first, Swann should ensure that
all employees are aware of retiree benefits and that GA markets these benefits to all
employees. Also, if there are employees of the company who work for part time job only,
Swann may want to consider making them eligible for benefits if part-time employees are not
eligible for such. This policy change could encourage more long-term, full-time employees to
switch to part-time status, which would open up opportunities for new employees. Swann may
want to take the following actions:
 Swann should acknowledge the need to conduct a survey to all employees with more
questions. The answers to these questions will help Swann create a plan that is more
 detailed and specific to the situation at GA. Some questions could include the
following:
 Do you plan to leave GA in the next 3-6 months, 6-12 months, 1-2 years, more
than two years?
 What factors will determine when you will leave GA?
 What appeals to you most about working at GA?
 What is your greatest concern about your job and about GA in general?

 Create a recruiting plan to appeal to younger workers, so when positions become

available, there are more qualified younger applicants. Employers cannot discriminate
against older qualified candidates; however, the company can take steps to increase
the number of qualified younger applicants.

 Create career ladders for jobs, especially jobs on the assembly line. Jobs should
include two or three levels for each functional area. This will encourage younger
employees to come in at the lowest level. Older employees likely will not want to be in
the lowest-level job category, and all employees will see the natural progression based
on years of experience.

Additional Case Questions

1. What are the different issues and challenges the company is facing? Please identify and discuss.
- Based on my observation upon reading the case, the issues and challenges the company is
facing are the following:

 GA needs to develop a plan that addresses its aging workforce issues in a responsible
manner that takes employee satisfaction into account and without compromising the
company’s commitment to its employees.

 There is a large number of long-term employees specifically, 80 assembly line employees

who might possibly retire within a few months. The HR Director was faced with a tough
predicament on how he will handle the given situation if those 80 long term employees will
simultaneously retire in a few months. He is uncertain if the HR department would be able
to recruit enough people to fill the void and even if they could, what skills gap would they
be facing by allowing such a large number of new employees to work with such a little
experience? The HR Director, Mr. Mark Swann will need to come up with a plan that is fair
to the older, experienced employees but that also sets the company up for long term
success.

 There are still few of the older and experienced employees who are not yet ready to retire.

 Recognizing that the competitive environment is changing, and that the company needs to
make every effort to remain an industry leader, the company is planning to have a major
technological upgrade by introducing new technology into the assembly line that will
require more technical skills and that will raise new health and safety concerns. Mr.
 Swann, the HR Director is not certain how employees are going to respond to the
challenge of learning the new computer skills necessary to operate the machinery given
that he has a large number of aging workforce and he does not want this change to speed
up early retirements.

 Mr. Swann has worked hard to re-engineer line jobs to minimize heavy moving and lifting,
but many of the production jobs still require physical strength. Even the new machinery will
still not ease the physical demands of some of the jobs. Though accidents are inevitable,
Mr. Swann is concerned in employees’ welfare and about the injuries that may possibly
happen to employees.

2. What are the strategies you are going to apply to address issues and challenges apart from what the
company did or have done?
 In addressing the aging workforce, Mr. Swann should include the following in his plans:

 Make decisions based on the GA’s corporate culture of putting its employees first in order
for the company to avoid losing its employees
 Simultaneously retain valuable older workers and increase the number of qualified
younger employees for them to be trained while the experienced workers are still around
and willing to coach the young ones.

 In GA’s plan to introduce new technology into the assembly line:

 Swann should ensure that employees are trained properly on the new equipment and that
they are emotionally and physically ready for the new technology by conducting a Basic
Occupational Safety and Health Training specially for the assembly line employees. He
should ensure that the training for the new equipment includes all safety features and
considerations given to the workspace and employee population. He should also make
sure that there is more than enough time on the schedule to allow employees to train.
Swann should form a safety committee to assess safety in the workplace, track safety
concerns and make recommendations for safety improvements.