20 Jul IF YOU ARE THE CONSULTANT SHE HIRED WHAT SUGGESTIONS AND BUSINESS SOLUTIONS CAN YOU PROVIDE?
Helen Bowers was stumped. Sitting in her office at the plant she pondered the same questions sh Show more Helen Bowers was stumped. Sitting in her office at the plant she pondered the same questions she had been facing for months: how to get her companys employees to work harder and produce more. No matter what she did it didnt seem to help much. Helen had inherited the business three years ago when her father Jake Bowers passed away unexpectedly. Bowers Machine Parts was founded four decades ago by Jake and had grown into a moderate-size corporation. Bowers makes replacement parts for large-scale manufacturing machines such as lathes and mills. The firm is headquartered in Kansas City and has three plants scattered throughout Missouri. Although Helen grew up in the family business she never understood her fathers approach. Jake had treated his employees like part of his family. In Helens view however he paid them more than he had to asked their advice far more often than he should have and spent too much time listening to their ideas and complaints. When Helen took over she vowed to change how things were done. In particular she resolved to stop handling employees with kid gloves and to treat them like what they were: the hired help. In addition to changing the way employees were treated Helen had another goal for Bowers. She wanted to meet the challenge of international competition. Japanese firms had moved aggressively into the market for heavy industrial equipment. She saw this as both a threat and an opportunity. On the one hand if she could get a toehold as a parts supplier to these firms Bowers could grow rapidly. On the other the lucrative parts market was also sure to attract more Japanese competitors. Helen had to make sure that Bowers could compete effectively with highly productive and profitable Japanese firms. From the day Helen took over she practiced an altogether different philosophy to achieve her goals. For one thing she increased production quotas by 20 percent. She instructed her first-line supervisors to crack down on employees and eliminate all idle time. She also decided to shut down the company softball field her father had built. She thought the employees really didnt use it much and she wanted the space for future expansion. Helen also announced that future contributions to the firms profit-sharing plan would be phased out. Employees were paid enough she believed and all profits were the rightful property of the ownerher. She also had private plans to cut future pay increases to bring average wages down to where she thought they belonged. Finally Helen changed a number of operational procedures. In particular she stopped asking other people for their advice. She reasoned that she was the boss and knew what was best. If she asked for advice and then didnt take it it would only stir up resentment. All in all Helen thought things should be going much better. Output should be up and costs should be way down. Her strategy should be resulting in much higher levels of productivity and profits. But that was not happening. Whenever Helen walked through one of the plants she sensed that people werent doing their best. Performance reports indicated that output was only marginally higher than before but scrap rates had soared. Payroll costs were indeed lower but other personnel costs were up. It seemed that turnover had increased substantially and training costs had gone up as a result. In desperation Helen finally had hired a consultant. After carefully researching the history of the organization and Helens recent changes the consultant made some remarkable suggestions. The bottom line Helen felt was that the consultant thought she should go back to that humanistic nonsense her father had used. No matter how she turned it though she just couldnt see the wisdom in this. People worked to make a buck and didnt want all that participation stuff. Suddenly Helen knew just what to do: She would announce that all employees who failed to increase their productivity by 10 percent would suffer an equal pay cut. She sighed in relief feeling confident that she had finally figured out the answer. Tasks for your consulting firm: Our case shows that Helen an inexperienced top manager is facing many business challenges. What are those challenges? Helen has great plans to improve her business. But the results are not as expected. Why? If you are the consultant she hired what suggestions and business solutions can you provide? Helen has a new plan at the end of the case. Do you think it will be successful? Why? Provide some recommendations that help Helen improve her business. You can provide a number of recommendations but please pay more efforts on one or two recommendations that are critical to the company. Beware your solutions should be practical for a mid-sized company. Illustrate your solutions in details. Show less
Our website has a team of professional writers who can help you write any of your homework. They will write your papers from scratch. We also have a team of editors just to make sure all papers are of HIGH QUALITY & PLAGIARISM FREE. To make an Order you only need to click Ask A Question and we will direct you to our Order Page at WriteDemy. Then fill Our Order Form with all your assignment instructions. Select your deadline and pay for your paper. You will get it few hours before your set deadline.
Fill in all the assignment paper details that are required in the order form with the standard information being the page count, deadline, academic level and type of paper. It is advisable to have this information at hand so that you can quickly fill in the necessary information needed in the form for the essay writer to be immediately assigned to your writing project. Make payment for the custom essay order to enable us to assign a suitable writer to your order. Payments are made through Paypal on a secured billing page. Finally, sit back and relax.
About Writedemy
We are a professional paper writing website. If you have searched a question and bumped into our website just know you are in the right place to get help in your coursework. We offer HIGH QUALITY & PLAGIARISM FREE Papers.
How It Works
To make an Order you only need to click on “Order Now” and we will direct you to our Order Page. Fill Our Order Form with all your assignment instructions. Select your deadline and pay for your paper. You will get it few hours before your set deadline.
Are there Discounts?
All new clients are eligible for 20% off in their first Order. Our payment method is safe and secure.