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Case Study Scenario: Socat Media Ltd
Catherine started a social media agency Socat Media four years ago and has been going from strength to strength till now. Socat is judged in the marketplace for its ability to be creative and deliver results to customers. Catherine is wary of growing Socat any more without making it a more professional organization. She has engaged you as a business consultant to advise how she can make this happen.
Catherine sees little problem in getting enough work for her agency, and sees the industry contacts she has built up as key to getting contracts. However, delivery is becoming a problem as the workload has increased. A key employee has left the company recently and doesn’t want this to be the start of a trend. She sees many good people working in the industry on a contractor basis and she has engaged some of them recently but with mixed results, especially when they have had to work as part of a team with Socat’s employees.
Catherine employed a friend part-time at an early stage to do “HR” that she worked with at a previous company, but she describes the approach they have been using as “old school” and is mostly just administration. The strategy for the company over the next five years is to develop its reputation for creativity and delivery. Catherine wants to understand how she can develop HR to help make this happen. The three main concerns she has are:
* Having the right people to do the job
* Making sure they are motivated to work for the company’s interest and want to stay
* Ensuring the company is fair to workers, and is seen to be, to ensure her and her company’s reputation
Catherine has read some things recently on HR and is keen for Socat to have a “system” that is going to allow them to fulfil orders to customer satisfaction while staying profitable. Resourcing/ talent management and performance management/rewards have been identified as areas where the company could improve.
You are charged with compiling a report that critically evaluates how using more recently developed approaches to these areas will help Socat to grow in a sustainable way, but also how other areas of HR practice may affect how effective these approaches will be. The report should summarise the advances in the areas of HR identified above, how these may help address the concerns outlined by Catherine compared to more traditional thinking, and clear recommendations about the policies and practices needed to complement the organisation’s strategy.
The submission deadline is 12 midnight on Sunday 20th Dec.
Completing the required reading and attending lectures is essential so that you will be prepared to turnaround the assignment task within two weeks.
Your essay should be no longer than 2000 words (-/+ 10%). Word Count excludes reference list but includes all other tables, quotes etc.)
Please follow the below guidelines when preparing and formatting your submission:
* Please ensure your assignment is structured around headings and sub-headings.
* Please present your document using Arial or Times Roman Numeral, Font size 12, and at least 1.5 line spacing.
* Ensure to include page numbers. * Use Harvard Style referencing. Please visit the Learning Development ServiceLinks to an external site. for tips on how to reference appropriately.
Assessment and Feedback:
Students will be awarded an individual mark out of 100 for this assignment. It will contribute to 60% of your final mark. Feedback will be returned to you individually in January via Canvas. The essay will be assessed using the University’s standard qualitative assessment criteria for undergraduate students.
Please view this document to see the importance of:
* Knowledge and Understanding
* Application of relevant theory and concepts
* Independence of thought and originality
* Evidence of additional reading and other investigation
* Sources adequately acknowledged and referenced
* Use of relevant figures, tables and other exhibits where appropriate
* Logical Structure and organisation
* Fluidity and quality of writing, grammar and spelling
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ADDED 12th DECEMBER
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The aim of the assignment is to assess you ability to apply the knowledge covered over the course, but most focused on the second half of it.
Particularly important is knowledge of Strategic HRM-how HRM is linked to Organisational Strategy, and the main practices areas mentioned in the brief (and outlined towards the end of our module homepage on canvas.
From the assignment brief, you are charged with considering a set of HR practice areas.
The assignment involves acting as a consultant, considering the circumstances of the organisation and advising on the type of policies and practices they should consider adopting, based on current practice especially in the areas of resourcing, talent management, performance management and rewards management
There is no prescribed way of structuring this report, but I would likely organise my discussion as follows
-Executive Summary (very short)
-Introduction (short)-communicating understanding the position of the company and its problems, articulating what the report is going to address, .
-Resourcing and Talent Management
-Performance Management and Reward Management
-I would then have at least one, perhaps two more paragraphs on a theme mentioned in the brief and often in lectures by me
Then, conclusion and final recommendations
All the while, I would be constantly cross-referencing (reading)
.doc file
