SHORT CASES FOR DISCUSSION:

1.The town mayor of Sta. Catalina, where the plant of Ruiz Manufacturing Company is located, sent to
Mr. Ruiz, general manager, his private secretary the two former domestic helpers. They arrived at the
company compound in a police car, and the secretary told Mr. Ruiz that the two maids were
compromise recommendees of the mayor. What would you do if you were Mr. Ruiz? If you were the
personnel manager, what would you do if the general manager referred the maids to you?

The above case calls for a compromising situation on the part of Mr. Ruiz being the general manager as
against to the recommendation of the town mayor of Sta. Catalina. If I were Mr. Ruiz, I will accede to the
request of the mayor because in business there is some sort of a good will. Meaning, the company
should not only be a profit oriented but rather should a take little risk in order to establish a goodwill
among the officials of the town, in this respect the mayor of Sta. Catalina where my business is located.
Because I believe in the long run, I will benefit from it like in the processing of my business permit which
is the primordial concern of my manufacturing company. On the other hand, if I was the personnel
manager and Mr. Ruiz, the owner, referred to me the two domestic helpers, being in that position I
presumed that I have great responsibilities that are very vital to the success or failure of the
organization. My decision to whether accept or not is somehow a turning point to draw the lines. It is
more difficult to be a personnel manager than being a general manager because my discretion is very
limited. Here, I have to evaluate if the two compromise recommendees have meet the standard of the
company. If they do, there is no harm but if otherwise, then that is the problem because strictly
speaking I should not employ them if they do not meet the standard because that will pose
disadvantages on the part of the company. But on the other hand, turning them down will put the
company into bad light considering that I might insult the mayor of the town.

So, the best solution to the problem at hand is, I will employ the two maids according to their
qualifications. If they need training and seminar in order for them to be equipped with the necessary
skills needed I will send them. During the orientation process, I will give emphasis on the output base
since this is a manufacturing company and production is very essential to the survival of the company.

Organizations must focus on its Human Resource Strategies as these are less likely to be imitated by
competitors as these are not visible to competitors. Even if visible, it might not be favorable as different
organizations setting requires different strategies. The use of Human Resource Strategies to build
employees commitment and morale would result into providing excellent customer services by
employees. This would in turn generate profits and would help in obtaining sustainable competitive
advantage with high quality workforce.
The role of organizations cycle in the formulation of strategies is significant. To achieve successful
interaction between Business Strategy and Human Resource Strategy, Human Resource professionals
need to consider the lifecycle stages of their organization and each stage to be linked with Human
Resource Strategies such as: starting phase needs to attract the best technical and professional talent
with attractive compensation. Human Resource professionals in this phase need to define future skill
requirements and design career ladder map for their employees. Organizations in starting phase need to
set basic employee relations philosophies as well; growing phase needs to recruit adequate number of
employees with multi-skills so as to build up talent pool. In this stage organization has to meet external
market status and need to provide compensation and benefits to their employees according to that. In
this stage professionals need to mould an effective employee training and development programme as
well; maturity phase needs to encourage sufficient turnover to minimize redundancies and provide new
openings along with mobility of employees by shifting of jobs. In this phase organization needs to
control compensation structure and control labor costs with improved productivity; and decline phase
needs to plan and implement redundancies and reallocations with tight cost control measures. In this
phase employees need to be retrained and career counselling need to be provided.

It is necessary for organizations to choose appropriate strategy to encounter challenges and convert
them into opportunities to survive and flourish in todays hyper competitive business environment.
Human Resource Strategies must be matched to the Business Strategy with the same care as the
financial control systems or marketing plans are implemented.

Developing and implementing Human Resource Strategy ensures that actions in managing human
resource are aligned with competitive demands which need to be reflected in the strategic planning. The
integration between Business Strategy and Human Resource Strategy and planning is very closely linked.
As organizations human resources are utilized more frequently as a source of competitive advantage,
Human Resource Planning has become important to the successful formulation and implementation of
strategies. Through planning, organizations prepare to match resources with the requirements needed
for the implementations of strategies.