Case Example 1

British Airways and terminal five

British Airways (BA) has a troubled history including multimillion pound fines on both sides of the Atlantic for price fixing on passenger flights (e.g. £12 million by UK Office of Fair Trading; £148 million by the US Department of Justice). In March 2008 the new terminal 5 (T5), built at a cost of £4.3 billion, was launched but within days the new state-of-the-art baggage handling system had collapsed and 23000 bags had been lost. Because of the chaos this caused hundreds of flights to end up being cancelled at a cost of £16million. The reputation of BA was badly damaged by this incident. Reports indicated a range of inter-related problems had impacted on the new system, including: a lack of staff car parking spaces; only one security checkpoint was operating; some staff were unable to log onto the system; problems with the hand-held devices which passed instructions onto baggage handlers; poor communications on the ground; and conveyor belts that became seized up. Unions and BA staff claimed they had not been properly trained to operate the new baggage system although this was refuted by the company. Inadequate training was attributed to many of the problems referred to above. A representative of the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) claimed that the company had ignored requests for meetings before the launch to discuss and better understand work practices and contingency arrangements. It was claimed by two unions that senior managers in BA had been warned that the launch plans would result in chaos because some 2000 staff had not been properly trained. BA has sought to place some of the blame on the British Airways Authority (BAA). Despite the baggage problems the company announced it would transfer the lucrative Heathrow to New York services terminal 4 to T5 in June 2008. In May 2008 BA announced record pre-tax profits of £883million. The chief executive of BA, Mr Willie Walsh, decided to waive his £700 000 bonus. The company currently has a cash balance of £1.8billion.

 

Question 1

This case illustrates an apparent misalignment between business strategy and HRD in terms of training to support the new baggage system.

Discuss the importance of the alignment and integration of HRD and the strategy of the organisation especially in the case of BA

 

Question 2

Discuss the importance of aligning the HRD strategy horizontally with the HRM strategy of the organisation at BA

Case Example 2

All change at RUSAL

RUSAL is Russia’s largest producer of aluminium and the third largest in the world. The company was created in 2000 as a result of various mergers and now employs over 50000 people across 12 countries. RUSAL has focused on performance management and this has been credited with a doubling of productivity. During the Soviet Union era the original Siberian companies that now comprise RUSAL were characterised by low employee morale, poor levels of health and safety and corruption. As part of the change process new training initiatives have been implemented including: induction programmes, personal development plans, sponsorship for education courses, management training and e-learning. The company has also introduced new communications systems, a code of conduct based on a new set of core values and a corporate social responsibility programme.

 

Question 1

As illustrated in the case above, discuss how the integration of HRD and OD can ensure the effectiveness of performance improvement plans

 

Question 2

Discuss how you would lead the change process at RUSAL

 

APPLICATION QUESTIONS EXAMPLES

 

 

Question 1

To save training costs, Jetcom Insurance has adopted an e-learning approach. Discuss how you would go about implementing e-learning, justifying the benefits that e-learning will have for Jetcom.

 

Question 2

Discuss how you would design a learning organisation implementation plan for an organisation.

 

Question 3

Examine the role of human resources in risk management and the application of risk management to HR.

 

Question 4

Discuss the implications of the provisions of the Skills Development Act and the Skills Development Levies Act for your organisation’s strategic human resources planning.

 

Question 5

Identify and discuss the various HR metrics used to drive organisational strategy.

 

Question 6

How would you apply the steps in a training-needs analysis process in the identification of training priorities in an organisation.