INTRODUCTION

A well-thought-out compensation plan is essential in giving a company an advantage in competitive hiring markets to attract and retain a quality workforce. In this assessment, you will apply your knowledge of total rewards to create an organizational rewards structure. This structure should consider organizational strategy, HR strategy, and the external business environment.

SCENARIO

You are the human resources manager of Endothon Company, which helps its clients eliminate paper use by automating their business processes. Endothon is implementing a new software program and faces the challenge of hiring additional staff to help sell and support the program.

The company has been in business for five years and currently has 20 employees working on a variety of software applications for clients. Endothon will likely double in size during the next six months and add even more employees by the end of the year.

The first round of hires will include three new positions: one brand manager and two product sales representatives. Because Endothon is located in a geographic area in California where the job market is ultracompetitive, recruiting quality candidates will be challenging.

Also, the organization’s partners feel that the current job-value structure and pay policy as well as the lack of a formal system of variable pay are outdated. You must define the company’s compensation strategy to allow Endothon to be competitive in the workplace and to attract and retain a quality workforce.

REQUIREMENTS

Your submission must be your original work. No more than a combined total of 30% of the submission and no more than a 10% match to any one individual source can be directly quoted or closely paraphrased from sources, even if cited correctly. An originality report is provided when you submit your task that can be used as a guide.

You must use the rubric to direct the creation of your submission because it provides detailed criteria that will be used to evaluate your work. Each requirement below may be evaluated by more than one rubric aspect. The rubric aspect titles may contain hyperlinks to relevant portions of the course.

Note: You have been provided with the following attachments: “Brand Manager Job Description,” “Current Job-Value Structure,” “Market Rewards Survey,” and “Product Sales Representative Job Position.” These attachments must be used as you complete this assessment. It is also recommended that you consult the websites provided and integrate any relevant coursework resources into this assessment.

Tasks may not be submitted as cloud links, such as links to Google Docs, Google Slides, OneDrive, etc., unless specified in the task requirements. All other submissions must be file types that are uploaded and submitted as attachments (e.g., .docx, .pdf, .ppt).

• For this task, the file size of your submission must be no more than 200 MB. Your submission must be submitted as a Word, Pages, or PDF file. Your file name may only contain letters, numbers, spaces, and the following symbols: ! – _ . * ‘ ( )

A.  Revise the attached “Current Job-Value Structure” to enable internal reward equity by doing the following:

•   Update the salary information for the 20 current employees, as necessary.

•   Add in the three new positions, one brand manager and two product sales representatives, with their anticipated salaries.

 Note: You must base your revisions on the attached “Brand Manager Job Description,” “Market Rewards Survey,” and “Product Sales Representative Job Description.”

1.  Justify the salaries and placement of the three new positions, one brand manager and two product sales representatives, within the revised job-value structure.

B.  Create a pay grade and ranges table that addresses the current and new roles by using your revised job-value structure and all other attachments.

1.  Describe a strategy to address the original salaries found in the attached “Current Job-Value Structure” that might now be outside the proposed ranges.

Note: If the original salaries are not outside the proposed ranges in your pay grade and ranges table, describe a strategy that you would use if they were.

2.  Justify the pay grades and ranges in the table, commenting on attraction and retention strategies.

C.  Recommend one distinct variable pay option to motivate employees in three different pay ranges from part B, including a justification of why each  recommendation would motivate individuals in that particular pay range.

   Note: One distinct variable pay option should be provided for each pay range.

D.  Acknowledge sources, using in-text citations and references, for content that is quoted, paraphrased, or summarized.

E.  Demonstrate professional communication in the content and presentation of your submission.

For this Discussion, you examine a case study and explain the disease that is suggested. You examine the symptoms reported and explain the cells that are involved and potential alterations and impacts. 

Scenario:  A 16-year-old boy comes to clinic with chief complaint of sore throat for 3 days. Denies fever or chills. PMH negative for recurrent colds, influenza, ear infections or pneumonias. NKDA or food allergies. Physical exam reveals temp of 99.6 F, pulse 78 and regular with respirations of 18. HEENT normal with exception of reddened posterior pharynx with white exudate on tonsils that are enlarged to 3+. Positive anterior and posterior cervical adenopathy. Rapid strep test performed in office was positive. His HCP wrote a prescription for amoxicillin 500 mg po q 12 hours x 10 days disp #20. He took the first capsule when he got home and immediately complained of swelling of his tongue and lips, difficulty breathing with audible wheezing. 911 was called and he was taken to the hospital, where he received emergency treatment for his allergic reaction.

Post an explanation of the disease highlighted in the scenario you were provided. Include the following in your explanation:

• The role genetics plays in the disease.
• Why the patient is presenting with the specific symptoms described.
• The physiologic response to the stimulus presented in the scenario and why you think this response occurred.
• The cells that are involved in this process.
• How another characteristic (e.g., gender, genetics) would change your response.

*Must use 3 references with an in-text citation for each. 

  

Once you have reviewed the case study begin to put together a Project Management Plan and a Project Charter.

For the Project Management Plan remember to include the scope, requirements and other relevant sections to monitor and track the project’s progress.

THE BATHTUB PERIOD Case Study

The award of the Scott contract on January 3, 2010, left Park Industries elated. The Scott Project, if managed correctly, offered tremendous opportunities for follow-on work over the next several years. Park’s management considered the Scott Project as strategic in nature.

The Scott Project was a ten-month endeavor to develop a new product for Scott Corporation. Scott informed Park Industries that sole-source production contracts would follow, for at least five years, assuming that the initial R&D effort proved satisfactory. All follow-on contracts were to be negotiated on a year-to-year basis.

Jerry Dunlap was selected as project manager. Although he was young and eager, he understood the importance of the effort for future growth of the company. Dunlap was given some of the best employees to fill out his project office as part of Park’s matrix organization. The Scott Project maintained a project office of seven full-time people, including Dunlap, throughout the duration of the project. In addition, eight people from the functional department were selected for representation as functional project team members, four full-time and four half-time.

Although the workload fluctuated, the manpower level for the project office and team members was constant for the duration of the project at 2,080 hours per month. The company assumed that each hour worked incurred a cost of $120.00 per person, fully burdened.

At the end of June, with four months remaining on the project, Scott Corporation informed Park Industries that, owing to a projected cash flow problem, follow-on work would not be awarded until the first week in March (2011). This posed a tremendous problem for Jerry Dunlap because he did not wish to break up the project office. If he permitted his key people to be assigned to other projects, there would be no guarantee that he could get them back at the beginning of the follow-on work. Good project office personnel are always in demand.

Jerry estimated that he needed $240,000 per month during the “bathtub” period to support and maintain his key people. Fortunately, the bathtub period fell over Christmas and New Year’s, a time when the plant would be shut down for seventeen days. Between the vacation days that his key employees would be taking, and the small special projects that his people could be temporarily assigned to on other programs, Jerry revised his estimate to $200,000 for the entire bathtub period.

At the weekly team meeting, Jerry told the program team members that they would have to “tighten their belts” in order to establish a management reserve of $200,000. The project team understood the necessity for this action and began rescheduling and replanning until a management reserve of this size could be realized. Because the contract was firm-fixed-price, all schedules for administrative support (i.e., project office and project team members) were extended through February 28 on the supposition that this additional time was needed for final cost data accountability and program report documentation.

Jerry informed his boss, Frank Howard, the division head for project management, as to the problems with the bathtub period. Frank was the intermediary between Jerry and the general manager. Frank agreed with Jerry’s approach to the problem and requested to be kept informed.

On September 15, Frank told Jerry that he wanted to “book” the management reserve of $200,000 as excess profit since it would influence his (Frank’s) Christmas bonus. Frank and Jerry argued for a while, with Frank constantly saying, “Don’t worry! You’ll get your key people back. I’ll see to that. But I want those uncommitted funds recorded as profit and the program closed out by November 1.”

Jerry was furious with Frank’s lack of interest in maintaining the current organizational membership.

In this course we have examined many different social identities, as well as the ways in which these identities are tied to social inequalities.  However, individuals have multiple identities, and oftentimes more than one of their identities are connected to social inequalities. Sociologists account for this by examining identities within an intersectional framework. The theory of intersectionality states that we must look at the relationships among multiple dimensions of social identities in order to understand the lived experiences of discrimination and inequality.  For example, the theory of intersectionality would state that an African American woman would not experience sexism in the same way that a white woman would, and would not experience racism in the same way that an African American male would. Rather, the intersecting identities of female and African American create a unique identity, and thus a unique experience.

For this discussion, watch this short video (Links to an external site.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2kUpKP18z8 for a comprehensive discussion of intersectionality, and read this article  (Links to an external site.) https://www8.gsb.columbia.edu/newsroom/newsn/2214/gender-and-race-how-overlapping-stereotypes-affect-interracial-dating-leadership-selection-and-athletic-participation that explores several real-world consequences that can arise when racial and gender stereotypes overlap. Finally, watch this short clip of the TV show What Would You Do (Links to an external site.). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ABRlWybBqM 

Use these resources to address the following:

• In your own words, describe the theory of intersectionality and why it is important to understanding the multiple social identities of an individual.
• Describe an example from your own life where you have experienced overlapping identities and ensuing inequalities. If you haven’t experienced this, explore why you may not have.
• In the clip from What Would You Do, how did the reactions of people to the “bike thief” differ by his/her race/gender? In particular, in what ways do society’s stereotypes of young men differ by race? 

Your initial post should be at least 250 words in length. Support your claims with examples from the required material(s) and/or scholarly resources, and properly cite any references

Budget Prayer

For this discussion consider this prayer, the author of which is unknown:  

We are your money managers, Lord.  We are stewards, doing our best to make a budget that feeds and clothes your servants and that plants the money where you can use it best.  We try to bring in as much money as we can and use it as shrewdly as we can. We never get it exactly right, but help us come close enough for an orderly operation and a good harvest.

The budget affects every person and every program, so getting it right is extremely important.  Every budget line is someone’s sincere request, wrapped in our mission and tied with their hopes.  I love these people and pray for them. How I wish we could do it all for them! How many wonderful benefits have we needlessly killed because of our budgeting errors?  I claim your forgiveness, Father. Teach me how to do it better this time.

God, somehow this budget has to give us both a present and a future.  If I don’t budget a strong present, I will have no platform to reach the future.  If I don’t manage well, I won’t have anything to lead with. It is so hard to choose between what to do now and what to try later.

What powerful tyranny the urgencies of the present have!  We must put the money where we say our true values are, but what is the right balance?  After we care for all the current requirements, how will we pay for our future?

If we make a stingy investment in our future, we can expect a stingy harvest.  Yet if the budget puts too much into preparing for our future, we will starve our chances for excellence now.  Everything we plant for the future is something we cannot eat to be healthy right now. It is so hard to save for the future when we feel so poor. Somehow, by your grace, we must.  Oh Lord, give us wisdom and courage!

I know you have a bright future for us, but we will miss some of it if this budget does not help take us where you want us.  Help me shape this budget into a wise leadership plan for an exciting future.

Everyone needs all your money for right now, Lord.  Help us invest in our future.

Amen.

Required:

For this discussion write a prayer which in some way considers the finances of your organization, or another organization such as a church, you are associated with. Initial posts should be 250-300 words.