Laura Jenkins is new to Company XYZ. She spent 20 years in academia teaching HR Management courses. She holds a number of graduate level degrees in Management, HR Management, and Leadership. Although she does not have a significant amount of experience working in HR, the hiring committee was impressed by her educational background and ability to apply the theory she used to teach to contemporary HR problems that Company XYZ is facing. As such, she was hired as the new VP of Talent Management. The first major dilemma she faced had to do with a noticeable gender gap at the organization. The CEO, Melissa Watts, was under the impression that women should dominate the workforce because women have higher levels of emotional intelligence. As a result, 75% of the employees at Company XYZ were women. Upon doing some research, Laura was able to persuade the CEO to balance the gender gap. They were able to create a plan for hiring more men to balance the gender gap. After a couple of years, Laura started to gain a lot of popularity at Company XYZ because of her innate ability to connect, persuade, and implement meaningful policies.
One day, as she was finishing a meeting, she noticed one of the new employees smoking a cigarette in his cubicle. Laura was shocked and had to investigate the situation. As Laura approached Mario's cubicle, she stated that, "it is against the law to smoke in the workplace" and that he needs to "get rid of that cigarette" otherwise there would be serious consequences. Mario laughed and told her that he was not smoking a "real" cigarette and that he was only smoking an e-cigarette (electronic cigarette)-which is a battery-powered device that provides users with inhaled doses of vaporized liquid. Laura was perplexed because she wasn't really sure how to deal with this new phenomenon. She told Mario that for the time being, he would have to put the e-cigarette away and that she would follow-up up with him in the morning.
She rushed to her office and decided to do some research on e-cigarettes. She learned that approximately 30 states have laws prohibiting smoking in the workplace, but most states do not specifically include e-cigarettes. She was asking herself if e-cigarettes should be regulated in the workplace. She decided to call her colleague (the former Dean at the university she used to teach at and a valued member of the Society of Human Resource Management) to ask for some advice. Her colleagues simply stated, "Laura, this is a great question and the answer is-in the absence of legal restrictions on e-cigarettes, employers are free to create their own policies to address their use." Laura thanked her colleague and decided to do some more research before she made a final decision.
Drawing on the material in the background readings and doing additional research, please prepare a 2-4 page paper (not including the cover and reference pages) in which you thoroughly answer the following questions (your paper should be in essay format where you address these questions in your essay):
Case Study Questions
Should actual work experience in a field be a requirement for higher-level positions? Can teaching HRM graduate courses be a substitute for actual work experience in HRM? Justify your response.
Generally speaking, should women dominate the workforce if they have higher levels of emotional intelligence? Justify your response.
Should e-cigarettes be allowed in the workplace? What are the pros and cons?
What are some of the health ramifications of e-cigarettes?
What are some solutions to this case study where employees are able to smoke e-cigarettes under certain circumstances?