Discussion 1

How Organizations can use employee information to gain competitive advantage.

Organizations can benefit from information regarding its applicants, current and past employees using tacit knowledge management by making it more easily accessible, transferable and relevant throughout the organization as majority of what an employee knows is never captured. By having these information handy, organizations can use it to gain competitive advantage.

One example of how a company used its present employee behaviors and skills to gain competitive advantage is Netflix. Netflix values nine core behaviors and skills in its employees. The management believes a great workplace should have those nine behaviors and skills thus the Netflix model is to "increase employee freedom as we grow, rather than limit it, to continue to attract and nourish innovative people, so we have a better chance of long-term continued success." Netflix has only two types of rules: those designed to prevent irreversible disaster and those designed to prevent moral, ethical and legal issues. Netflix does not track time, it focuses on what to be done and not how many hours or days are worked. It has a freedom and responsibility culture which is to grow with high performance people and not with rules.

Two specific user requirements that help achieve competitive advantage for a company are the use of questionnaires and tracking applicant status

With the use of questionnaires, companies can get more useful information about an applicant which goes beyond what is obtainable in resumes. CIC for instance may need developers for a certain job role and resume alone may not be enough criteria to select the applicant for a job interview. The new hiring system should have detailed questionnaire that can help narrow the candidate pool more quickly and decrease the need to go back and forth requesting for information about an applicant.

Secondly, another user requirement that will achieve competitive advantage is tracking applicant status. With a lot of candidates applying for a position, it may be impossible to track how all the candidates are moving through the stages but with this feature included in a hiring system, each applicant status can be easily identified so as to avoid bottlenecks and identify stages which are going according to plans

Discussion 2

1. Organizations benefit greatly from using information about their applicants and current employees to tailor the organizations level of service and gain competitive advantage. When an organization operates under a policy that centers on obtaining high caliber employees and keeping those employees happy, the organization will likely enjoy high returns on customers.

One example from the reading of how an organization used the knowledge of its applicants to shape a highly intelligent and experienced workforce to satisfy customer needs was the MITRE Corporation. The MITRE Corporation operates under the policy that by obtaining highly skilled and experienced employees, it will be able to use that knowledge to provide a one of a kind experience to its customers. This is backed up by the fact that MITRE's employee base consists of scientists and engineers that are leading subject matter experts in their technological fields. These employees are not only responsible for maintaining their current knowledge, but are also tasked with staying abreast of leading edge practices and technologies to help further the corporation's goals. This and the added fact that the bulk of MITRE's workforce holds advanced degrees exemplifies the organization's strategy of using the highest level of knowledge management to obtain competitive advantage (MITRE Corporation, 2007).

The next example of how an organization can use information on its people to attain competitive advantage is through keeping its employees highly motivated. Ensuring an organization keeps its people happy and motivated will go a long way in maintaining staff drive to perform at their highest capacities to achieve competitive advantage for their bosses and the company (TimelessTime, 2012). An example of this practice is how the company Blue Rubicon used its budget to fund employee training that would empower them to achieve higher levels of job and personal knowledge. As a result, 87% of the company's employees reported to The Sunday Times' study on the 100 Best Small Firms to Work For that the firm was good for personal growth and considered the experience valuable for their futures (TimelessTime, 2012). When a company sees feedback like this, it knows that its practice of helping employees grow and gain new knowledge to boost their motivation and performance is working. This enhanced drive to perform will then in turn boost employee customer service, and greatly increase the likelihood of gaining repeat customers.

2. Two specific user requirements that an organization would need from a hiring and employee management system to satisfy the above benefits would be applicant profiles and employee feedback/communication features.

The applicant profiles that a hiring system has would enable an organization to see what types of knowledge and experience an applicant can bring to the team. This would facilitate the hiring team and upper management's ability to only hire the best suited candidates to fill the needs of the company.

The requirements for employee appraisals and feedback features would enable transparent dialogue between supervision and the employee. This in turn would make it easy for supervision/management to see what areas the employee is strong in, and in what areas there was room for improvement. Supervision then could shape the employee into the more well rounded asset the company needs. Furthermore, the employee would be able to communicate to his/her supervision/management as to what types of training and responsibilities he/she would like to have. This would enable supervision to see additional areas that the company could capitalize on that may have not been visible through an appraisal. These two aspects combined would help improve employee motivation and growth and help make the employee feel like they are a valued member of the organization. Work performance would likely improve, thus bolstering the organization's competitive advantage through maintaining high performing personnel.