Category: Archive

Boeing and Bristol-Myers Squibb offerred two different views of outsourced training at a February 9 conference on training in Anaheim, California.

A new Towers Perrin report finds “further evidence of the ongoing shift in corporate America from traditional pensions to hybrid plans and defined-contribution programs.”
 
The report finds that 29 percent of organizations with traditional pension plans (called “defined benefit” programs) have eliminated them for future hires. Another 27 percent of companies have reduced or frozen accruals for current employees.
 
Many organizations are considering hybrid plans, sometimes called cash-balance plans, which feature some aspects of a pension plan and some aspects of a 401(k). Still, the fate of these hybrid plans is in the hands of legislators and regulators in Washington. Employers want the U.S. Congress to lay out some rules as to whether hybrid plans discriminate against older employees.

Dear Tension:



Your question deals with two different kinds of issues, both which can be approached in several ways. Let’s deal with the piece-rate pay system first.

There is nothing inherently wrong or unfair about a piece-rate system–one in which employee performance and pay is based on the number of items produced in a given period of time. Problems do arise when the production quota is set unnecessarily high, or when meeting the quota results in a decrease in quality or attention to safety, or when the pay for reaching each production standard changes without reason.

I would ask for a meeting with HR and with management to understand 1) what are the production standards and how were they set, and 2) why a piece-rate system is preferred over other methods of pay. Provided you can give management some level of comfort that productivity would not suffer (and may in fact improve) under a different pay system, you should be able to discuss alternatives to the existing pay system.

As for the autocratic manager, it’s unclear from your question whether he or she is your workgroup’s direct supervisor or someone higher in the organization. If you do not want to confront this manager directly, the best thing to do is approach your HR representative, one of the manager’s peers, or else the manager’s boss. Do it in as constructive a manner possible. Gather your facts, including specific descriptions of this person’s autocratic behavior. Be prepared to explain why that behavior is both demoralizing and a threat to the success of the organization. Most organizations have manager-development resources, including ways to assess and train managers in leadership. I would keep the pay and the autocratic manager discussions separate–the two don’t go hand in hand, even if this particular manager instituted or defends the pay system.

SOURCE: Frederick D. Smith, Buck Consultants, Detroit, Michigan, Feb. 12, 2003.

LEARN MORE: ReadWhen Fear Strikes the Workplace.

The information contained in this article is intended to provide useful information on the topic covered, but should not be construed as legal advice or a legal opinion. Also remember that state laws may differ from the federal law.

You may have seen the McKinsey Global Institute report that for each dollar the United States sends to India in the form of offshore jobs, the U.S. economy gains $1.14. A more unlikely voice in favor of offshoring arrived this week in the usually liberal magazine The New Republic. The New Republic article argues that “while offshoring may displace some workers in the short term, in the medium and long terms it represents a net benefit for both domestic businesses and their workers.” Both the magazine and McKinsey, as well as some economists from the Brookings Institution, the Institute for International Economics and others, want to require companies to buy insurance to help employees recover part of their salaries when their jobs are offshored.

Borders announced on Thursday that it has reached a tentative settlement of an overtime lawsuit, which would result in a non-operating, after-tax charge of $2.2 million, or $0.03 per share. According to an SEC filing from December 10, 2003, the suit involves assistant managers in Borders superstores in California between April 10, 1996, and March 18, 2001. The employees allege that they “worked hours for which they were entitled to receive, but did not receive, overtime compensation under California law, and that they were classified as exempt store management employees but were forced to work more than 50 percent of their time in non-exempt tasks.”

Nonprofits could take after universities and get more alumni to volunteer, share expertise and contacts, and even do staff work, according to a new McKinsey study. McKinsey says that alumni efforts are most successful when the nonprofit is selective; participants have a lot in common; and the program was lengthy and intense. The Girl Scouts, for example, could get the biggest payoff by tapping into the enthusiasm of their senior Girl Scout alumnae, because they have a closer bond to each other and to the organization than Girl Scouts in general. Also, the nonprofits that get a lot of value from their alumni, such as Teach for America and Coro Northern California, don’t skimp when it comes to allocating time and employee resources to alumni efforts.

America’s largest auto dealers, including AutoNation, Hendrick and Sonic Automotive, are placing a growing emphasis on employee education, according to Automotive News.