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Examination Paper of Human Resource Management
IIBM Institute of Business Management 1
IIBM Institute of Business Management
Examination Paper MM.100
Human resource Development & Training
Section A: Objective Type (30 marks)
This section consists of Multiple choices and Short Notes type questions.
Answer all the questions.
Part one questions carry 1 mark each & Part Two questions carry 5 marks each.
Part One:
Multiple Choices:
1. HRD is the process of helping people to acquire
a. Competition
b. Completeness
c. Competencies
d. None of the above
2. Techniques of human resource development are also called
a. HRD methods
b. HRD instruments
c. HRD mechanism
d. All of the above
3. In India HRD began only in
a. 1970s
b. 1980s
c. 1910s
d. 1990s
4. BARS stand for
a. Behaviorally Anchored Rating Scale
b. Behaviorally Anchoring Rating Scale
c. Behaviorally Appraisal Rating Scale
d. None of the above
5. Levels of evaluations of training programmes are
a. 7
b. 6
c. 5
d. 10
Part Two:
1. Explain the ‘benefits of HRD’.
2. Briefly explain ‘on the job and off the job’ methods of training and development.
3. Explain the objectives of ‘Performance Appraisal’.
4. Differentiate between HRM and HRD concept.
Introduction to the organization:
XYZ Company was established 20 years ago, to manufacture gearbox components for diesel
engines. It employs around 250 people, having a head office, which employs a wide range of
personnel who are generally well educated and enthusiastic about their work, and a factory,
which
employs semi-skilled local people who are generally disinterested in the products of the
company
and who have an instrumental attitude to work, seeing salary as the only reward.
Brief Description of the Problem:
The performance of the Company has not been good and the records revealed the following
facts:
Wastage within the factory was costing the Company approximately Rs. 100,000 a month.
There was wide spread differences in individual work standards
Processes were non-standardized resulting in repeated problems
Management made all decisions and cascaded the result down to employees
The top management became concerned about the performance of the factory and they hired
Mr. Tanmoy Deb, an OD consultant to study the problem and suggest specific changes to
relationships and tasks with the following objectives:
To review and improve communication systems.
To restructure the organization and to review teamwork and quality practices.
To review leadership issues across all levels.
Mr.Tanmoy Deb carried out discussions, interviews and surveys and made the following
observations:
There’ and ‘us’ attitude was widely prevalent between head office and factory personnel
Production personnel lacked technical skills
Factory employees felt alienated from sharing the Company’s success
Production systems were adhoc and defective because of frequent variations in standards set
Many times raw material was found to be of inferior quality
rigidly defined job descriptions
Questions:
1. What in your view are the central human resources issues involved in this case?
2. What strategy should Mr. Tanmoy Deb develop and implement for improving the present
system?
Case let 2
Introduction to the organization:
XYZ Company is an existing profit making FMCG Company. The company has 600 personnel
and has branches all other the country. It has a separate training department with a Training
Manager, Mr. A.P. Mohan as its head who is supported by two qualified training officers. Mr.
Mohan has been in the company for the last 8 years and is very efficient.
Brief Description of the Problem:
Mr. Mohan wants to leave the organization. He is fed up with organizational politics. He is
dissatisfied and in fact frustrated. There are several reasons attached to it. First and foremost is
that he is not paid adequately despite the fact that he has brought 12% growth in revenue to
the
company. Second reason is that he is not consulted and constantly neglected while making
decisions on training aspects. Lastly, he considers himself to be a victim of politics played in the
organization. Production Manager is constantly hurting him and interferes with the work. Dr.
Ashok Sarao, boss of Mr. A.P. Mohan does not want him to leave the organization, as he knows
that the effectively will come down if he leaves. Dr. Ashok tries to convince Mohan that he
should adjust himself with the environment and also talk of how Mohan is constantly neglected.
He talks of how politics is played in the organization and strengths and weaknesses of Mohan
but
does nothing to convince Mohan. Rather he says that they have to adjust, as they are part of
family run business. In this setting, personal equation rather than merit works. Mohan is not
convinced, and says he is leaving.
Questions:
1. Why a high performer like Mr. Mohan decided to leave the organization he has been long
part of?
2. Do you think Mr. A.P. Mohan took the right decision to leave the organization? What
Would you have done if you were in his shoes?
1. Discuss the basic concept of management development. What is the importance of
management development in the changing business?
2. What do mean by Quality of work life? Discuss various methods to improve quality of
work life.
Industrial Relations
6. As per payment of bonus act, accounting year for a company is ________
a. One year
b. Period for which balance sheet is prepared
c. Period for which cash flow is prepared
d. Period for which profit and loss account is prepared
7. WPM stands for
a. Workers’ Participation in Management
b. Workers’ Payment of Management
c. Well fare Payment of Management
d. None of the above
8. Causes of Industrial disputes are
a. Economic causes
b. Political causes
c. Technological causes
d. All of the above
9. Trade unions of workers in an organization formed by workers to protect their
a. Working condition
b. Interest
c. Both a & b
d. None of the above
10. A grievance causes in any organization are
a. Work environment
b. Supervision
c. Work group
d. All of the above
Part two:
1. What are the basic causes of ‘Grievances’?
2. What are the objectives of ‘Industrial Relations’?
3. Briefly explain the term ‘evolution of Trade unions in India’.
4. Explain the ‘workers’ participation in management’.
Case let 1
Star Automobiles Ltd. Pimpary is in the field of manufacturing of two wheelers. They
manufactureand market mopeds. These are available in the brand names ‘arrow’ and ‘double
arrow’ where ‘arrow’ is their traditional product and ‘double arrow’ is the improved version.
The company was started about 20 yrs ago. Their product ‘arrow’ enjoys a reasonably good
reputation and they were comfortable in the market. However, with the entry of the new
generation of fuel-efficient mopeds the company started loosing its market. They immediately
started developing the improved ‘double arrow’ but by the time they came out with this new
model the competitors had already strengthened their position in the market. The arrow model
was still acceptable by a segment of the market as it was cheapest vehicle. ‘Double arrow’ is
new generation vehicle. It was costlier than Jet but its performance was much superior. It is
compared favorably with the competitors’ products; however it was yet to gain a foot hold in
the market.
The company had to refurbish the marketing activities in order to get back their market share.
They employed young sales engineer to launch a strong sales drive. Mr. Ramesh Tiwari, Btech
and a diploma holder in marketing got selected and was put on the job. Mr. Ramesh Tiwari
started well in his new job. He was given a territory to contact the prospective customers’ andto
book the orders. The company had introduced a new financial assistance scheme. Under this
scheme, buyers were given easy loans. It was particularly advantageous for group booking by
employees working in an organization. Mr. Ramesh Tiwari was able to contact people in
different organization, arrange for group bookings and facilitate the loans. His performance was
good in the first year and in the second year of his service. The company had its own system of
rewarding those whose performance happened to be good. They usually arranged a paid holiday
trip for the good performer along with his wife. Mr. Ramesh Tiwari was accordingly informed by
the marketing manager to go to Chennai with his wife on company expenses. Mr. Ramesh Tiwari
asked him as to how much it would cost to the company. The marketing manager calculated and
told him that it would cost about 8000/-. He quickly asked him whether he could get that 8000/-
in cash instead of the trip as he hadbetter plans. The marketing manager countered this saying
that it might not be possible to doso. It was not the trading of the company, however he would
check with the personnel manager. After a couple of days, Mr. Tiwari was informed that it
would not be possible to give him a cash reward. Mr. Tiwari grudgingly went for the trip and
returned. On his return, he was heard complaining to one of his colleagues his little daughter
was also along with him. The marketing manager and the personnel manager thought he was a
bit too fusy about the money and some of his colleagues also thought so. During the subsequent
days Mr. Ramesh Tiwari’s performance was not all that satisfactory this showed his lukewarm
attitude towards his job and the subordinates.
1. Did the personnel manager handle the issue properly?
2. What is your recommendation to avoid such situations in future?
Case let 2
In 1950, with the enactment of the Insurance Act, Government of India decided to bring all the
insurance companies under one umbrella of the Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC).
Despite the monopoly of LIC, the insurance sector was not doing well. Till 1995, only 12% of the
country’s people had insurance cover. The need for exploring the insurance market was felt and
consequently the Government of India set up the Malhotra Committee. On the basis of their
recommendation, Insurance Development and Regulatory Authority (IRDA) Act was passed in
parliament in 2000. This moved allowed the private insurers in the market with the strong
foreign partners with 74:26% stakes. XYZ-Moon life was one of the first three private players
getting the license to operate in india in the year 2000. XYZ Moon life Insurance was a joint
venture between the XYZ Group and Moon Inc. of US. XYZ started off its operations in 1965,
providing finance for industrial development and since then it had diversified in to housing
finance, consumer finance, mutual funds and now its latest venture was Life Insurance. Its
foreign partner Moon Inc. had its presence in Asia since the past 75 years catering to over 1
million customers across 11Asian countries. Within a span of two years, twelve private players
obtained the license from IRDA.IRDA had provided certain base policies like, Endowment
Policies, Money back Policies, Retirement Policies, Team Policies, Whole Life Policies, and Health
Policies. They were free to customize their products by adding on the riders. In the year 2003,
the company becomes one of the market leaders amongst the private players. Till 2003, total
market share of private insurers was about 4%, but Moon Life was performing well and had the
market share of about 30% of the private insurance business. In June 2002, XYZ Moon Life
started its operations at Nagpur with one Sales Manager(SM) and ten Development Officers
(DO). The role of a DO was to recruit the agents and sell a career to those who have an
inclination towards insurance and could work either on part time or full time basis. They were
very specific in recruiting the agents, because their contribution directly reflected their
performance. All DOs faced three challenges such as Case Rate (number of policies), case size
(amount of premium), and recruitment of advisors by natural market, personal observations,
nominators, and centre of influence. Incentive of offered by the company to development
officers and agents were based on their performance, which resulted in to internal competition
and finally converted into rivalry. In August 2002, a branch manager joined along with one more
sales manager and ten development officers. Initially, the branch was performing well and was
able to build their image in the local market. As the industry was dynamic in nature, there were
frequent opportunities bubbling in the market. In order to capitalize the outside opportunities,
one sales manager left the organization in January 2003. As the sales manager was a real
performer, he was able to convince all the good performers at XYZ Moon Life Insurance to join
the new company. In april 2004, the company faceda grave problem, when the Branch Manager
left the organization for greener pastures. To fill the position, in May 2004, the company
appointed a new branch manager, Shashank Malik, and a sales manager, Rohit pandey. The
branch manager in his early mthirties had an experience of sales and training of about 12 years
and was looking after two branches i.e., Nagpur and Nasik. Malik was given one Assistant
Manager and 25 Development Officers. Out of that, ten were reporting to him. He was given the
responsibility of handling all the operations and the authority to make all the decisions, while
informing the Branch Manager. Malik opined that the insurance industry is a sunrise industry
where manpower plays an important role as the business is based on relationship. He wanted to
encourage one-to-one interaction, transparency and discipline in his organization. While
managing his team, he wanted his co-workers to analyze themselves i.e., to understand their
own strengths and weaknesses. He wanted them to be result-oriented and was willing to extend
his full support. Finally, he wanted to introduce weekly analysis in his gameplan along with
inflow of new blood in his organization. Using his vast experience, he began informal
interactions among the employees, by organizing outings and parties, to inculcate the feelings of
friendliness and belonging. He wanted to increase the commitment level and integrity of his
young dynamic team by facilitating proper channelization of their energy. He believed that
proper training could give his team a proper understanding of the business and the dynamics of
insurance industry.
Questions:
1. If you were Malik, what strategies would you adopt to solve the problem?
2. With high employee turnover in insurance industry, how can the company retain a
person like Malik?
Section C: Applied Theory (30 marks)
This section consists of Applied Theory Questions.
Answer all the questions.
Each question carries 15 marks.
Detailed information should form the part of your answer (Word limit 200 to 250
words).
1. What are issues in labour policies in India? Comment with relevant justification.
2. Discuss the wage policy in India with reference to detailed evaluation of the act.
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