PRACTICE EXAM 2
Chapter 7—Recruiting in Labor Markets
MULTIPLE CHOICE
1. The limitations the U.S. government places on available visas for high-skilled foreign workers
a. protect U.S. high-skilled workers from the outsourcing of their jobs overseas.
b. make U.S. firms less competitive world-wide.
c. have resulted in fewer terrorist threats in the U.S.
d. have resulted in lower salaries for high-skilled U.S. workers.
2. Recommendations for successful recruiting include all the following processes EXCEPT
a. tracking the recruiting efforts of its competitors.
b. retaining all recruiting functions internally to ensure a good strategic fit.
c. promoting the company brand as a good place to work.
d. measures the effectiveness of its recruiting efforts.
3. Clement is the recruiting specialist for a catalog distribution company in a mid-sized Iowa town. He has used
every type of recruiting technique available to him to fill nineteen job openings. After all his efforts have
been exhausted, exactly nineteen applicants with the minimum qualifications have been found. In this
case,
a. Clement does not have to go through a real selection process.
b. applicants can be well-matched to the jobs.
c. Clement’s efforts have been successful because he managed to find an applicant for each
opening.
d. the labor market in this area can be described as “loose.”
4.
As director of recruiting for a large bank, Stacy has decided to restrict her recruiting efforts for loan officers
to placing advertisements on the web site of the American Banking Association. This will determine the
____ for the job of loan officer.
a. recruitment pool
b. labor force population
c. applicant population
d. talent pool
5.
A nursing home is opening in a mid-sized Northwestern city. It would be most logical for the organization
to recruit for patient aides (orderlies) in the ____ labor market. The job pays just above minimum wage.
a. global
b. state-wide
c. regional
d. local
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Chapter 8—Selecting Human Resources
MULTIPLE CHOICE
6.
When the Wynn Las Vegas was hiring over 1,000 employees for its resort opening, the Wynn HR
department selected applicants for formal interviews after the applicants completed an online
questionnaire. This is an example of a/an
a. structured selection process.
b. selection criterion.
c. pre-screening process.
d. multiple hurdles approach to selection.
7.
More than anything else, placement of human resources should be seen as a/an
a. public relations activity.
b. operating management responsibility.
c. matching process.
d. marketing tool.
8.
Jill graduated with her MBA during a severe economic recession in the region. The only acceptable job she
could find was in a bank officer training program for a major national bank. Jill was one of the top
candidates when she was hired by the bank. She has been with the bank for three months and has become
disillusioned with it. Jill feels that the individual bank customers are not valued, that the bank extends
home mortgages to borrowers who are poor risks, and that the bank engages in misleading advertising.
Jill is experiencing
a. poor person-organization fit.
b. a realistic job preview.
c. the result of negligent selection by the bank.
d. poor person-job fit.
9.
Mark is unhappy with his new job as a first line supervisor at the call center. He dislikes trying to motivate
his subordinates to increase their productivity. He is dreading having to give the upcoming performance
appraisals to his subordinates. Mark finds the job boring and watches the clock all afternoon, longing for
the end of his shift. Mark is experiencing
a. poor person-organization fit.
b. burnout.
c. the result of negligent hiring.
d. poor person-job fit.
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10.
Mary Ann is the recruiter for a large lighting products company, Northern Lighting, Inc. Not only does
Northern Lighting have retail stores, it also supplies lighting for new residential and commercial facilities.
Lighting designers for commercial facilities are scarce. Mary Ann and the company managers have
decided to hire an individual who has the ability to learn the field. They estimate it will be two years
before the new hire will be fully productive. Consequently, they are looking to hire a person who will be
with the company for at least four or five years. Mary Ann suggests that they only hire applicants who
have been with their previous employer at least two years, and who have not “job-hopped” in the last ten
years. Mary Ann’s suggestion is an example of a/an
a. KSA.
b. element of job performance.
c. selection criterion.
d. predictor.
11.
Beckenkall Consulting is a rapidly-growing management consulting firm. As it expands, it needs to hire
a number of new consultants every year. The failure rate of new consultants has been too high. The
director of HR has decided to see if the success rate of new hires can be increased by selecting applicants
who not only have all the technical qualifications, but also have the same personality as successful
consultants now working in the firm. Consequently, the HR director gives all the high-performing
consultants the MMPI. She sees that there is one dominant type of personality in this group. Now, she has
told the manager of recruitment to give the MMPI to applicants as one of the hurdles they must clear
before being hired. This is an example of
a. synthetic validity.
b. post-hoc validity.
c. a concurrent validity approach.
d. a predictive validity approach.
Chapter 9—Training Human Resources
MULTIPLE CHOICE
12.
Henry is scheduling a program on handling hazardous materials for production employees at the chemical
plant to comply with OSHA regulations. This type of program is classified as ____ training.
a. job/technical
b. required and regular
c. developmental
d. problem-solving
13.
Lyle has been hired as the first director of training at SISI, Inc. Lyle has been spending his first few weeks
meeting with operating managers and learning the business at SISI. Lyle has told the managers he wants
to partner with them to help solve their problems. Lyle
a. probably believes that training can solve most organizational problems.
b. is displaying a strategic training mindset.
c. is taking a tactical approach to training.
d. is focusing on knowledge management.
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14. The performance consulting approach to training
a. is a process in which a trainer and the organization work together to decide how to
improve organizational and individual results.
b. focuses exclusively on improving job performance by employees through training
programs.
c. uses outside vendors to design and implement training programs.
d. assumes that human factors are the major reasons for gaps between desired and actual
employee performance.
15.
Gloria is an HR professional who takes the performance consulting approach to training. Gloria is
meeting with Beatrice, a manager who is has a poor-performing subordinate. Gloria is most likely to work
with Beatrice to
a. identify the tasks in which the subordinate’s performance is low and send the subordinate
for training in that task.
b. investigate whether the cause of the subordinate’s problem is something about the
subordinate or whether it is caused by Beatrice or some aspect of the workplace.
c. determine whether the tasks being performed poorly are important to the organization’s
strategic goal.
d. give the subordinate a number of skill and psychological tests to assess the subordinate’s
level of competence.
16.
The New Heights Public School system has purchased an HR management software system from a major
software vendor. As part of the sale, the vendor has included training for the school system’s HR staff.
The vendor is doing this to help retain New Heights as a customer, making future sales to New Heights
more likely, and to
a. eliminate New Heights as a competitor for training other schools in use of this software.
b. allow New Heights staff to become certified trainers for the vendor’s software, thus giving
the school a new source of revenue.
c. to ensure that critical skills are not transferred to the school system’s HR staff, but kept
exclusively with the vendor.
d. turn training into a revenue source for the vendor.
17.
Providential Security, a firm specializing in protecting financial institutions, invests heavily in training its
staff. One of its training exercises (which the company refers to as its “war games”) involves actually
putting a high-rise office building of one of its clients on “lockdown” in reaction to a bomb threat. The
building is evacuated and secured, then all the Providential staff are debriefed. This is an example of
a. a simulation.
b. integration of performance and training.
c. a strategic mindset.
d. real-world gaming.
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18.
Which of the following statements is TRUE?
a. Globally, there is a decline in the supply of specialized skilled and technical workers
signaling a worldwide crisis in education.
b. The U.S.’s leadership position in innovation is threatened by the decline in specialized and
skilled workers in the U.S.
c. Despite its shortcomings, the U.S. educational system is generating an increasing supply
of specialized skilled and technical workers.
d. In a global economy, one country’s supply of specialized skilled and technical workers is
irrelevant to that nation’s success because labor is outsourced on a global scale.
19.
EarthShapers, Inc., a U.S. manufacturer of heavy construction equipment, maintains large sales and
support operations overseas. When sending new employees to its operations in Japan, the employees take
courses in Japanese history and culture so that the Americans can adjust more easily to living in Japan.
This training would apply to the ____ component of international competence training.
a. cognitive
b. conceptual
c. emotional
d. behavioral
Chapter 11—Performance Management and Appraisal
MULTIPLE CHOICE
20.
Although Jack Welch’s technique of “differentiation” in performance appraisal has been criticized by
some as being “mean spirited” and encouraging of “politics,” it has the advantage of
a. conforming strictly to the normal statistical distribution or bell-shaped curve.
b. being appropriate for use by a firm operating in multiple countries.
c. communicating to employees their exact standing.
d. being easily defended against challenges of discrimination.
21.
Research has shown that performance-driven organizational cultures
a. are based on non-discrimination and employee entitlement to equal rewards.
b. are unique to U.S. and Western European countries.
c. require behavior-based performance measures.
d. tend to have significantly higher financial results compared with other types of
organizational cultures.
22.
Which of the following statements is TRUE regarding performance management in a global setting?
a. A well-designed performance management system will work in any cultural setting.
b. Every culture includes some type of formal performance feedback for employees.
c. U.S.-style performance management systems are becoming more widely used overseas
because of their effectiveness in increasing employee performance.
d. Performance management systems may not be suitable for use in some cultures.
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23.
At Safe and Green, Inc., there is little variation in pay among employees within the existing job categories.
Raises are essentially the same for average and excellent performers. Although performance appraisals
are performed regularly, everyone views the process as paper-shuffling. The from the point of view of its
performance appraisal system, the culture of Safe and Green, Inc., can best be described as
a. entitlement-based.
b. bureaucratic.
c. performance-driven.
d. benevolent.
24.
At Evergreen Cosmetics, the top executive team’s bonus is based on the profitability of the firm. Each
executive receives the same percentage bonus as the increase in profits over the previous year. This shows
a. a lack of ambition on the part of the executive team.
b. a disconnect between executive compensation and the compensation of regular employees.
c. the pervasiveness of an entitlement culture even into top management ranks.
d. executive commitment to performance management.
25.
The performance committee of Everyoung Physical Therapy Associates has identified: (1) the progress of
the patient according to medical guidelines, (2) patient satisfaction, (3) meeting treatment deadlines, and
(4) therapist presence at work as ____ upon which the committee will base the measure of physical
therapist performance.
a. job duties
b. performance measures
c. subjective criteria
d. critical incidents
26.
Clementine Import-Export, Inc., has a language-proficiency test for its sales representatives in Latin
America. Part of the test requires that sales representatives to be able to ask and answer in Spanish basic
questions about prices, quantities, shipping dates and product characteristics. This performance standard
can be classified as all of the following EXCEPT
a. the standard trait-based.
b. the standard is job-related.
c. the standard is observable.
d. the standard is non-numerical.
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Chapter 12—Total Rewards and Compensation
MULTIPLE CHOICE
27.
McDonald’s global rewards program has resulted in lower managerial and employee turnover. In this type
of total rewards system why would turnover decline?
a. All employees benefit from higher pay, and are less likely to quit.
b. Employees receive equal bonuses based on growth in McDonald’s profits, and this fair
treatment makes employees less likely to quit.
c. The increased in employee competition from varying reward levels based on performance
encourages high performers to stay.
d. Higher performers receive higher incentives than lower performers, so high performers
would be less likely to quit.
28.
Compensation is one of the organization’s largest expenditures. Compensation philosophies and systems
vary from one organization to the next. Why is that?
a. There is no “one right way” to compensate employees. Many systems will work equally
well in any organization.
b. Different organizations have different organizational objectives and strategies.
c. Legal requirements mandate different types of compensation systems depending on the
organization’s industry.
d. Organizations depend heavily on consultants to design their compensation systems, and
each consulting firm has its own system.
29. The goal in giving pay increases to average performers should be
a. to align their pay with the labor market.
b. on retaining and rewarding them.
c. on encouraging them to leave the organization.
d. on achieving a compra-ratio of 100.
30. A true cost-of-living raise
a. must be implemented both in times of inflation and deflation.
b. must be tied to economic indicators.
c. is the same thing as an automatic increase.
d. is the same thing as a merit raise.
31. As a young employee who consistently meets (but does not exceed) performance expectations, which
type of pay increase system would most likely be to your personal financial benefit considering that you
expect to stay with the company another 10 years?
a. broadbanding
b. lump sum increases
c. across-the-board raises
d. second quartile approach
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32. Cost-of-living adjustments are typically tied to changes in the
a. consumer interest rate.
b. prime interest rate.
c. Dow Jones Industrial Average.
d. Consumer Price Index.
33.
Wimsey Enterprises has announced that it will give all employees a 5% merit increase this year. This
increase should really be termed a/an
a. cost-of-living adjustment.
b. across-the-board increase.
c. lump-sum increase.
d. seniority increase.
34. Of the following, which type of pay adjustment has the most ability to reward employee performance?
a. cost-of-living adjustments.
b. seniority increases
c. lump-sum increases
d. across-the-board increases
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ANSWER KEY
1. B
24. C
2. B
25. B
3. A
26. A
4. C
27. D
5. D
28. B
6. C
29. A
7. C
30. B
8. A
31. C
9. D
32. D
10. D
33. B
11. C
34. C
12. B
13. B
14. A
15. B
16. D
17. B
18. B
19. A
20. C
21. D
22. D
23. A
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