Week 1 of Human Resource Management

CASE STUDY: ALIGNING HR WITH THE BUSINESS AT SBC

1. Mitchell’s customers to him and his HR Staff were the workers of each department in SBC. When dealing with a position like Mitchell’s, the top managers of the each department are usually the people that are talked to; not the workers, so in the case study, he wanted to find out if the HR department was reaching out to them and meeting their needs as well.

2. The following items are the efforts Mitchell had to do with his staff to reposition and customerize:

• “The HR department was reoriented to be strategic and customer-oriented

• The HR department became a constant gatherer of information from the internal and external environments. By knowing the competition, the business strategy, and the current assets of the company, the HR staff could develop new HR activities, implement new ideas, and work to maintain the company’s competitive advantage

• The HR department identified the level of excellence it wanted to attain. The staff worked to make the department a strategic player while fulfilling their managerial and operational roles.

• HR managers and staff worked closely with the line managers to design systems to gather the needed services and information. They also worked with the line managers to develop contracts by which the HR department would be evaluated by the line managers

• The HR department was changing so that there was more of a generalist than a specialist orientation. A greater team orientation was built, (Jackson, 2009).”

3. Because of Mitchell including the line supervisors in with the strategic planning and change to the corporation, I do believe that the line supervisors will cooperate. I’m sure that the resistance (if any) would be expected; change to anything is always unwanted until people see that the change is actually a good thing and it is better for the company.

CASE STUDY: LEVI STRAUSS & COMPANY

1. Because of the Levi Strauss & Company values and business...