Running head: CHANGE AGENTS
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Change Agents: Entry 5a, Educational
April Tuggle
McDaniel College
February 15, 2015
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Change Agents: The Treadway Tire Company
Change is the one thing that all organizations can depend on in this global economy.
Organizations must constantly assess and adjust practices in order to remain competitive. One of
the first steps in maintaining a successful organization is the recruitment, selection, and retention
of employees. The case study that I evaluated in HRD 502: Introduction to Human Resources
Management, “The Treadway Tire Company: Job Dissatisfaction and High Turnover at the Lima
Tire Plant,” by Wickham Skinner and Heather Beckham (2008), accurately portrays an
organization that struggles with the recruitment, selection, and retention of line foremen at the
Lima Plant. The business report I provided as my artifact reviews my findings, conclusions, and
recommendations for change at the Lima Plant. Therefore, this artifact demonstrates my mastery
of objective five, acting as a change agent to assist individuals and organizations through the use
of relevant interpersonal skills such as coaching, feedback, and negotiation.
Recruitment and selection of employees can be one of the primary functions of human
resources. According to Lloyd Byars and Leslie Rue (2011), “recruitment involves seeking and
attracting a pool of people from which qualified candidates for job vacancies can be chosen” (p.
111). Selection is “the process of choosing an individual who can successfully perform the job
from the pool of qualified candidates” (Byars & Rue, 2011, p. 125). One of the main recruitment
and selection issues at the Lima Plant was that 80% of the hires for line foreman were internal
hires (Skinner & Beckham, 2008, p. 3). According to Eric Krell, the debate of internal or
external hiring is summed up in a single quote “Do we build it or do we buy it?’ is a useless
debate in the 21st century because you have to do both” (2015). While internal hiring is not
necessarily a bad practice, in this case it was not serving the Treadway Tire Company well,
because in one year “out of a total of 50 foremen in the Lima facility, 23 of those positions had
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turned over in 2007” (Skinner & Beckham, 2008, p. 1). There are advantages to internal hiring
such as already having a strong knowledge of the culture, processes and methodologies, and
having many relationships throughout the organization (Krell, 2015). Internal hiring is also
typically a much cheaper and faster way to fill positions (Krell, 2015). However, with a turnover
rate of close to half, it was clear that focusing on internal hiring was not working to the
advantage of Treadway Tire Company.
However with perks, come disadvantages, like infighting and the inbreeding of ideas.
Therefore, I recommended that the candidacy pool draw more on outsiders, specifically those
with higher education in order to facilitate advancement within the organization. According to
Krell, “external hiring delivers advantages, too, including injecting fresh ideas and new skill sets
into a company” (2015). Drawing from both internal and external candidates is essential to
selecting the correct candidates for the line foreman positions at the Lima Plant. Recruitment and
selection were not the only cause for the high turnover of line foremen, it also lies in the lack of
training and development, communication from the top-down, as well as amiable relationships
with other employees.
The first and foremost issue is the training and development opportunities for line
foreman. One quote from a personnel manager accurately summarized the lack of training:
“I understand we have to do a better job of training our foreman. They are often working
with little knowledge of the correct way to handle labor situations. I like the idea of a
formal training program, but it is not feasible in the context of our current cost-cutting
mandate” (Skinner & Beckham, 2008, p. 6)
Clearly, training line foreman was not a priority for upper management because they did not feel
they had the time or the money to properly train their line foremen. Of course, what upper
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management does not realize is that training employees properly will cost much less than the rehiring process. Training and development opportunities both formal and informal must be
integrated at the Lima Plant in order to retain Line Foreman; otherwise they are bound to become
dissatisfied with their job because they have not been properly trained.
Another glaring issue that I identified in my evaluation is the lack of communication
from the top-down with line foremen. A line foreman has many responsibilities, including
maintenance of safety and health standards and investigating any violations, juggling to resolve a
variety of personnel, resource, and administrative issues (Skinner & Beckham, 2008, p. 3).
However, the foreman’s top priority was to meet performance goals for the day and ensure that
no technical issues would stop production during a shift (Skinner & Beckham, 2008, p. 3).
Therefore, it is inadvertently communicated to line foremen that the bottom line is all that
matters to executives. Basically, the only communication they will receive from their supervisors
will be negative, and that is if they do not meet performance goals. In order to resolve this lack
of communication, I recommended monthly managerial meetings with supervisors in order to
facilitate positive communication.
The other issue that led to high turnover for line foremen was their relationship with other
employees. According to Skinner and Beckham, “line foreman often felt pulled in different,
often conflicting directions by management, the workers, and the union” (2008, p. 3). Line
foremen were often put in the middle between management and the unions, it was also their
responsibility to negotiate terms with the unions about disciplinary actions (Skinner & Beckham,
2008, p. 4). In order to facilitate comradery, I suggested not only better management training for
the line foremen, but morale boosters like a company picnic to encourage socialization of all
levels of employees.
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All of the outlined recommendations above mean a vast change for the Treadway Tire
Company, Lima Plant. My recommendations may seem simple but could take years to properly
implement. Only with the full support of upper management and executives will these
recommendations for change be successful. My feedback and reasoning on the high turnover of
line foremen at the Lima Plant will enable the Treadway Tire Company to at least consider
implementing changes. Therefore, my feedback and recommendations for change at the
Treadway Tire Company prove my mastery of objective five.
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References
Byars, L., & Rue, L. (2011). Human resource management (10th Ed.). New York, NY:
McGraw-Hill Irwin.
Krell, K. (2015, January 7). Weighing internal vs. external hires. Retrieved from:
http://www.shrm.org/publications/hrmagazine/editorialcontent/2015/010215/pages/01021
5-hiring.aspx
Skinner, C. W., & Beckham, H. (2008). Treadway tire company: job dissatisfaction and high
turnover at the lima plant. Harvard Business School Cases, 1.
Waldman, J. D., & Arora, S. (2004). Measuring retention rather than turnover: a different and
complementary hr calculus. Human Resource Planning, 27(3), 6-9.