Assignment

The Wentworth Corporation is a mid-sized manufacturing company located in the metropolitan area of Atlanta, Georgia. In business for ten years, it has become one of the area's largest producers of Widgets. James Henderson and three associates founded the company, which has slowly grown to employ 500 employees, primarily production workers, in its three existing facilities. Henderson is the President and CEO of the corporation, and Mike Johnson, the newly appointed Manager of Human Resources. Wentworth has not employed a full-time HR manager in the past.

Henderson is currently in the final stages of securing a major new account. If awarded to Wentworth, it would be a major accomplishment for the firm. However, the business would require setting up a new production facility in the state of Wisconsin and hiring 275 additional employees. Mike Johnson has had little experience in creating large staffing initiatives, and both he and Henderson are unsure of how to proceed.

Henderson and Johnson turn to HR Strategies, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in the functional areas of human resources. As a senior-level consultant in the staffing and recruitment division, you have been asked to head up the team designed to assist Wentworth in the development of a staffing initiative for the new facility. Your Stand-Alone Project responses should be both grammatically and mechanically correct and formatted in the same fashion as the project itself. If there is a Part A, your response should identify a Part A, etc. In addition, you must appropriately cite all resources used in your response and document them in a bibliography using APA style.

Part A Begin with an analysis of Wentworth Corporation. A meeting has been set for Henderson, Johnson, and you to outline the scope of the project. You have informed Wentworth that you wish to review the mission and vision statements for the company, as well as their operating strategies. At the meeting, the Wentworth executives ask you to respond to the following questions in writing.

1. Why do you need information about their mission statement?
2. What does their operating strategy have to do with their immediate staffing issues?

Part B

You have successfully responded to Wentworth's questions, and they have supplied you with all the information you need to evaluate their mission, goals, and objectives. You must now initiate the planning phase of the project. This phase involves forecasting the company's future employment needs at the new facility and developing action plans to fulfill those needs. For the Planning phase of the project, you will need to respond to the following questions.

1. To what degree will external influences, such as economic conditions, labor markets, and labor unions impact the staffing project?

2. Should Wentworth use a plan-based human resource plan (HRP)? If so, why?

3. What two techniques should Wentworth use in forecasting the staffing needs for the new division? Include both statistical and ratio techniques in your response.

4. What techniques should Wentworth use in forecasting the availability of talent needed for the new facility?

5. Discuss the four sequential steps in action planning that must follow the development of the HRP.

Part C

Having completed the Planning phase of the project, you now begin the Job Analysis to determine the specific type of personnel needed for the new facility. This involves the development of a job requirements matrix. Once you have developed the characteristics of the jobs required, you need to create the reward systems for these jobs. In order to successfully complete this phase of the project, you must address the following questions.

1. Discuss four types of jobs and determine the two types of jobs appropriate for the new manufacturing facility.

2. Describe how you would go about developing a job requirements matrix. Your discussion should include how you would collect the information needed for the project. You must discuss six concepts in your response.

3. Describe how you would go about developing a job rewards matrix; include a discussion of both intrinsic and extrinsic rewards. In addition, discuss how you would collect the information needed for the project.

Part D

As the consultant for the Wentworth project, you have now completed your job analysis and know the types of jobs required to staff the manufacturing plant. The next step is to determine whether to use an internal or an external recruitment process to identify and attract job applicants to the company. In either case, there will be organizational, administrative, and strategic decisions to be made. As you begin the recruitment phase of the project, you must respond to the following questions.

1. Should Wentworth use an external or an internal recruitment initiative? Why?

2. Based on your answer to the first question (Part D, Question 1), describe the following.

a. Describe the major organizational and administrative decisions to be made including recruitment efforts, requisitions, contact development, budget, and developing a recruitment guide.

b. Describe the strategic policy to be followed to implement the initiative; include the concept of targeted strategy, five possible targeted sources, and your opinion on the best solution for implementation.

c. Describe the communication methods to be used in attracting applicants to the jobs; include the concepts of message and medium in your discussion.

Part E

As we enter the final stages of the project, we have the results of our recruitment efforts and must now help Wentworth make the final hiring decisions for the new facility. The selection process involves the use of various assessment methods to evaluate the quality of our applicant pool. Consider and respond to the following questions.

1. How will you develop the selection plan to be used to make final hiring decisions? Consider and discuss three decisions you must make.

2. Provide an analysis of the most important assessment methods to be used for this manufacturing facility.

3. Discuss three methods to be used in making the final hiring decisions and determine who should be the decision makers within the Wentworth organization.