Sumários
session 5 - compensation, motivation and retention
4 Novembro 2020, 18:00 • Rita Sousa
Course Summary - 5 th Class
We started by revisiting some performance management issues in the slide: weight for performance criteria, self-evaluation, quantitative workout, among others. Then we had the 3 rd group presenting the case of "The Road to Hell". The case is a classical failure of crucial conversation for a number of reasons: 1) "If you cannot measure it, you can manage it". The direct manager, Baker and his company did not have a performance management system in place and as a result, there was no data (e.g. KPI) recorded or collected for Rennalls' job performance. Therefore, Baker had no measurable performance data at hand except "some stories" from other colleagues, which made his performance feedback judgmental; 2) It would be essential to understand Rennall's self-evaluation (how he saw his own performance and behaivor) before having the performance meeting. Without the knowledge of Rennall's self-evaluation, the direct manager, Baker was blind in the process. 3) Baker's "plus and minus" strategy did not work in their meeting because it was one-way feedback in which Baker as a supervisor told Rennall how his opinion but not giving Rennall opportunity to present his perspective. Here it arises the importance of ILETS (Introduction-Listen-Emotional Handling-Talk-Solve). In other words, if Baker listened to Rennalls first and underhanded Rennalls perspective, the outcome of the conversation might be different. For a performance review meeting, it is important to have several solutions at hand so that you can solve the problem(s). The solutions may include pay raise, coaching/mentoring, and or executive development course. The focus is to develop his competencies to meet the promotion requirement.
For compensation and benefits, it is important to acknowledge that there are two types of relationships between employee and employer: economic exchange and social exchange. That means, your return of working for an organization is not only about money, but also relationship, career growth and sense of accomplishment. Benefits in the compensation package aim to highlight an organization's caring to its employees and strengthening the psychological contract between employee and employer (social relationship).
Motivation: Motivation aims at developing an employee's potential and productivities. The starting point is to consider your subordinate as "internal customer" and to identify his or her needs. When you understand his or her needs, you have an opportunity to motivate him or her for desirable behaviour that helps to achieve organizational goals. This means that the need is personalized, and motivation is customized. There are several theories under "needs-based theory of motivation", including Maslow's hierarchy of Needs theory, Herzberg's Hygiene-Motivator theory, Alderfer's ERG (Existence, Relatedness, Growth) theory and McClelland's 'Three Learned Needs' theory (needs for achievement, power and affiliation). These theories assume that people have different needs (or different level of needs). As a manager, it is important to understand and identify the needs of your colleague so that you can motivate him or her with the right reward.
I would take this opportunity to thank you all for your commitment to the course. The course is short, but the warm experience under this difficult time may last long. I hope the course may not only help you manage your team and your organization better, but also help manage and develop your career and your wellbeing.
Session 4 - Performance Management
2 Novembro 2020, 18:00 • Rita Sousa
Course Summary - 4th Class
Class 4 started with two groups presentations. As you may note, the case analyses are a good way to apply theoretical concepts/tools for problem-solving. I am happy with the two presentations. Indeed, the presentations challenge the general assertion that online teaching is less effective than traditional classroom teaching. I congratulate the groups for effective application of the relevant theory/concept and sound arguments for the case questions.
Group One's presentation of "Recruiting Manager for BRB, Israel" in which the group applied the recruiting process and competency model for a selection decision. The group did well in applying the relevant concepts with a justified recommendation of a candidate for the position in the case. In addition to applying job analysis, competency model for the case, I would like to draw your attention to the political aspect of human resource management. In the case, it is critical to consider the personal preference/personal style in the reporting relationship between the candidate and the direct report, which is not explicitly included in the job description. In the case, the number one factor to consider is to ensure that the candidate must work comfortably with the CEO who is very bossy with micro-management style (intends to control everything). The other important takeaway from the case is that you need to identify the must-have criteria (e.g. competencies, skills) as no candidate is perfect, and you need to give weight to each of the criteria so that you may have a more rational assessment outcome.
This class continued with the presentation of "Zhu Dandan (A): Promotions" by Group 2. Based on the case, we discussed the roles of "soft skills" (vs hard skills), managing upward, adaptability at a personal level and training and development policy and resources (e.g. coaching, mentoring, merit-based promotion) play in employee's career development. In particular, managing upward (your boss) is part of your job and you should put it on your agenda, by understanding your boss' needs, style, pressure and strength/weakness. When you do that, everyone wins. We also discuss the concept of social capital. So, who you know is more important what you know. Lastly, we discussed some useful tools, including, career decision wheel. All these suggest the dynamics of your career and the tools may guide you for your career decision.
We had a quick overview of performance management (why, who, what, how and when). "If you can´t measure it, you can´t manage it" is the basic argument for having performance management in place. From a strategic perspective, performance management help to align individual performance with organizational goals. At the operational level, performance management provides data for pay, promotion decision and training and development, aiming for improving future performance. It is important to involve subordinate in the performance management process, particularly setting the key performance indicator and performance feedback. In addition to measuring work output and business goals (quantitative or qualitative), it is also important to consider behavioural competencies which provide valuable data for training and development and future performance improvement. We closed the class with a discussion on the ILETS model. In performance feedback meeting, it is not always a pleasant experience because as a manager you need to give critical and negative feedback or even to announce a firing decision. Thus, in a meeting where stakes are high with different opinions and strong emotions, ILETS (introduction-listen-emotion handling-solve) model may help you to manage the process, by clearly introducing the topic and objective of the meeting, hear the other person´s story and perception, handle emotions, and then present your story and argument, close the meeting with solutions for the problems. When delivering bad news, reverse the procedure to speak first and listen second, in the ITELS model because you need to set the tone at the beginning and show the firmness of that decision.
In our next and last class, we will have group 3 to present a case from which we will revisit some of these concepts and techniques.
session 3 - training and development
29 Outubro 2020, 18:00 • Rita Sousa
In the first half of the class, we discussed the interview methods. First, I would like to stress again that interview is fundamental in the selection and it is very technical. An effective selection interview requires expertise and following the process. Behavioural Event Interview is a widely used and valid interview method. "Past performance is the best predictor of future performance". Therefore, a good way to predict the candidate's performance is to look at what he or she did in the past by seeking his or her behaviour data under critical events.
I would like to stress that interview involves lots of expertise and it is important to follow the process (from identifying competencies in the job description, designing questions by considering competencies and candidate's CV, conducting an interview with STAR approach and assessing the behaviour data from the candidate).
In the second half of class 4th, we discussed training and development. As we are now living in a knowledge economy, knowledge gets outdated easily. As I always say, the experience is a liability in many cases. Thus, it is important for both organizations and individuals to keep investing on training and development to sustain and grow human capital. As a manager, you need to recognize the rationale for training and development (why), identify the training needs of your subordinates and apply the right training methods to meet the training needs. We particularly discussed counselling, coaching and mentoring as effective methods to develop people on daily basis. In the next class, we will discuss Zhu Dandan (A): promotions. A very relevant question is "how organizational and personal factors contribute to Zhu Dandan´s career development in the company?".
We also discussed career development, including the context (external environment) and relevant theories. The implication from changes in the external environment is that managing career is your own responsibility, and it is more and more challenging to manage one's career because of longer working life, obsolescence of knowledge, gig economy (outsourcing and subcontracting traditional work) and global competition in labour market. To effectively manage your career, you need to follow the career stage theory and follow your inside (my favourite saying is "follow the call of your heart") which is your career interest. Holland occupational test is a very useful but simple tool to help you identify your career interest. Overall, the top 2-3 dimensions that you have the highest scored represent your occupational interest profile. Please note that the 2-3 dimensions work together (sometimes in a way of counterbalance). For example, if you are strong in "social" which indicates you care about others and relationship as an agreeable and nice person, and you are also strong in "enterprising" which indicates you are resulted-oriented with high achievement-orientation, as an aggressive guy to achieve your goal. In this case, the social type and enterprising type will counterbalance your behaviour. In addition, I would like to stress that it is no good or bad for your results. It only says who you are and you can always leverage your strength in the right context (workplace and position that values your types). So just accept and embrace who you are and leverage your types. Lastly, it is not only about you. You can apply the tool to understand your boss, colleagues and your family and then you will be able to improve your relationship with them and your work performance by better understanding who they are and how to work with them.
session 2 - recruitment and selection
27 Outubro 2020, 18:00 • Rita Sousa
At the beginning of the class, I showed you some slides to illustrate the link between HRM and strategy or organizational competitive advantage with some hard evidences. While financial capital is easily accessible and changeable today, human capital is an importance source for sustainable competitive advantage. It is hard to find any great company that does not treat its employees well, isn't it?
Then we started our discussion on the recruitment and selection subject. The starting point is job analysis which results in a job description. To do a job analysis, you need to identify the job responsibility and scope, and then analyze what requirement/qualification is needed for each of the job responsibility. The requirements are not only about education, experience, skills, but more importantly, personal traits and competencies. The flight attendant job analysis gave you an opportunity to understand the process and appreciate the focus on attitude rather than appearance and skills.
The competency iceberg model illustrates the importance of invisible underwater "competencies" (e.g. motive, traits, social roles) which plays more important role in one's performance than the visible (above water) knowledge and skills. In recruitment and selection, a classical mistake is called "hire for skills and fire for attitudes". It is because skills and knowledge are more visible and easier to assess and test, but attitudes (motive, traits etc.) are hardly visible and difficult to assess. In addition, you can improve one's knowledge and skills by training, but you can't change one's attitude with training. I hope with this course, you will avoid such mistake. Competency is the characteristics for outstanding performance (not just getting the job done). Therefore, different function and position requires different mixture of competencies, as we discussed the position of marketing and accounting. So here it is the idea of person-job fit. Therefore, in job analysis, it is important to understand the key competencies for the position, and in the selection interview, it is important to assess those must-have competencies (while you as a management master student, it is important to prepare your interview by identifying the key competencies of the job you apply before going to interview).
We will have the first group to present a very interesting case of recruitment. You will see the complex of the process and selection decision. I would encourage you to read the case even though you don't need to present the case.
Next class, we will discuss training and development, please do a free online career interest assessment at https://www.truity.com/test/holland-code-career-test and bring your report to the class.
1st class - course overview
26 Outubro 2020, 18:00 • Rita Sousa
The class started with self-introduction of professor and students. Your introduction was very informative and inspirational which may lead to some interesting observation: 1) HRM is not playing a significant role in most organizations, compared with marketing or finance department; 2) Managers need HR knowledge and skills! Following your introduction, we discussed the overview of the course (why what and how). So the course is not aiming at preparing you to be an HR Specialist or HR Manager, but a line manager or general manager with effective HR knowledge and skills. As you may see from the course outline, we have a number of cases to give you the opportunity to apply the theoretical tools for problem-solving. As case discussion and teamwork are an important part of the learning process. At the end of the course, the exam is also case-based which requires you to provide "solutions" for HR issues in the business organization.
Then we had a discussion on the roles of the HR department, line manager and general manager. I liked your comments on the case of HRD and CEO fight in the COVID-19 epidemic which illustrated how they both failed to play their role in HRM. Based on that, we don't see any future of the company at all!
Lastly, we explored the challenges of HRM faces in the constant changes in the external environment. Ageing society, "gig economy" and "soft skills, hard skills and digital skills", among others are upcoming challenges that you need to prepare to deal with. While we have little control on the challenges on organizational part (which in fact will transfer to every one of us), we need to get prepared for a longer career life (probably retired at 70 years old), obsolescence of knowledge and skills (experiences become liability), borderless career, global competition and constantly changing work environment by life-long learning (making learning part of your daily life), increasing adaptability and global competence.
Next class, we will discuss recruitment and selection.