Deck 13: Managing Change

Question 1

What are the two key questions that must be asked when considering the products aspect of resource integration in a new product launch?

A) By whom?
B) What quantities?
C) What products?
D) To whom?

Answer 1

B, C

Question 2

Which of the following are not an example s of integrated IT functions with new business models?

A) Information brokering e.g. search engines
B) Value chain integrator
C) Virtual communities
D) Collaboration platforms

Answer 2

A

Question 3

What would be a typical funding strategy for new product launches?

A) Venture capital
B) Debt and equity
C) Debt
D) Equity

Answer 3

A

Question 4

Many companies aim to provide customers with a high level of information before that customer then phones or visits the showroom. Which of the following strategies is this?

A) Differentiation
B) Mass customisation
C) Customisation
D) Routinisation

Question 5

Which of the following IT capabilities does not enhance product/service features that are valued by customers?

A) Lower prices
B) Lack of personal touch
C) Pre- purchase information
D) Product or service reliability
E) Shorter development times

Question 6

Which two of the following is an advantage of using external agencies to for tasks such as training or recruitment?

A) There are likely to be significant cost savings.
B) They may not have knowledge of the organisation.
C) They may have wider knowledge of best practice.
D) They may bring wider experience.

Question 7

What name is given to the ensuring that a sufficiently large pool of talent exists for future work requirements, rather than preparing people for particular jobs.

A) Succession planning
B) Recruitment- focused retention
C) Retention- focused recruitment
D) Training and development

Question 8

Amazon create virtual communities of authors, readers and publishers. What term best describes this business model?

A) Extended
B) As before
C) Transformational
D) Gatekeeper

Question 9

Many companies in consumer electronics aim to offer more features at the same price. Which of the following strategies is this?

A) Mass customisation
B) Differentiation
C) Customisation
D) Routinisation

Question 10

Which of the following is not an example of the concerns as to whether middle managers can do a good job on people management issues?

A) Lack of competence as HR professionals
B) Greater ownership and blending of people- related issues with business strategies
C) Lack of incentive to take on more formal HR activities e.g. pay or grade
D) Short term pressures to meet targets not conducive to taking strategic view of people- related issues

Question 11

Which of the following is the most important in developing new strategies?

A) Ensuring strong capability in separate specialist areas
B) Integrating divisions and business units
C) Integrating resources and competences across resource areas

Question 12

Which of the following is not an advantage of information as a key resource?

A) Increased ability to access and process information
B) Development of new and more efficient business processes
C) Development of new business models
D) Development of a skilled workforce

Question 13

Which of the following is not an example of change brought about by IT?

A) Interaction informed by a common database
B) Better informed decision makers
C) Flatter structures
D) Fewer gatekeepers - people who gained power from their control of information
E) Higher investment costs

Question 14

What is a 'tipping point'?

A) The stage where demand for a product or service means that the business begins to break even
B) The stage where demand for a product or service suddenly takes off or declines
C) The stage where the bank finally agrees to lend the money to fund a technological innovation
D) The stage at which good service is rewarded with a tip

Question 15

Which of the following is a way that IT contributes to the robustness of core competences?

A) By facilitating communications
B) By codifying and automating business systems
C) By embedding the competences in the way the organisation works as tacit knowledge leading to causal ambiguity
D) By developing automated systems which are easy to understand

Question 16

What is data mining?

A) The analysis of the structure of product, service and information flows and the role of the participating parties
B) Hunting through files and paper records to establish a knowledge management system
C) Evaluating the key value and cost drivers which most influence the cash generation capability of an organisation
D) The process of finding trends, patterns and connections in data in order to inform and improve competitive performance

Question 17

If a company is focusing on a portfolio of high growth, high risk investments what is likely to be its capital structure?

A) High debt, low equity
B) Debt only
C) High equity, low debt
D) Venture capital

Question 18

What is a business model?

A) A business model describes the structure of the organisation and the HR hierarchy.
B) A business model is a standard way of doing business which can be used as a template.
C) A business model describes the structure of product, service and information flows and the roles of the participating parties.
D) A business model is a beautiful girl who advertises the latest products.

Question 19

What are the two key questions that must be asked when considering the labour aspect of resource integration in a new product launch?

A) By whom?
B) At what cost?
C) What quantities?
D) What products?

Question 20

An organisation is considering bringing a new product to market. Which two of the following must be integrated when considering labour?

A) Products
B) Relations with customers
C) Manufacturing
D) Finances
E) Labour

Question 21

Which of the following do not help explain why strategy implementation is often difficult to achieve in the way intended?

A) The need for large scale re- training of staff
B) Poor understanding of the strategy by those implementing it
C) Changes in the external environment
D) The complex range of changes involved
E) The difficulties of planning for unintended outcomes

Question 22

Where are cost drivers and value drivers to be found?

A) Inside the organisation (value chain)
B) Inside and outside the organisation (value chain and value system)
C) Outside the organisation (value system)
D) In the manufacturing process

Question 23

Which one of the following is not one of HR's four broad roles?

A) Strategy developer
B) Change agent
C) Adviser
D) Regulator
E) Service provider

Question 24

Which of the following is not an example of the 'soft' side of human resource management?

A) Varying the style of managing change with differing circumstances
B) Succession planning
C) Understanding the difficulty and timescales in achieving behaviour changes
D) Being shapers of context rather than masterplanners

Question 25

Competitors may find it difficult to identify why an organisation is successful, and thus find it difficult to imitate it. What term is used for this situation?

A) Cultural embedding
B) Complexity
C) Customisation
D) Causal ambiguity

Question 26

Enabling success is concerned with the relationships between:

A) Overall corporate strategies and the different competitive strategies of the SBUs
B) Strategy and implementation
C) Top managers and employees
D) Overall business strategies and strategies in separate resource areas such as people, information, finance and technology

Question 27

There has been a move to involve middle managers in HR tasks. Which three of the following are problems that can occur as a result?

A) Managers may lack an incentive to become involved in HR activities.
B) It may not be realistic to expect line managers to be competent in that role.
C) HR staff may gain more time to carry out roles of greater long- term importance.
D) Short- term pressures to meet targets may make it difficult for line managers to focus on longer- term personal issues.

Question 28

Which of the following is not one of the four broad roles that an HR function could fulfil in enabling successful business strategies?

A) As an advisor on issues of HR strategy
B) As a symbol of change
C) As service provider e.g. of recruitment and training
D) As a change agent
E) As a regulator, setting the rules e.g. on pay

Question 29

Which of the following is a major disadvantage of debt financing?

A) It is too readily available and so firms may take on too much debt.
B) High levels of borrowing may be an impediment to future investment.
C) It affects the ownership structure of the business.
D) Debt servicing costs may rise with interest rates irrespective of company performance.

Question 30

Which of the following features valued by customers may result from the enhanced capabilities of IT? Choose all that apply.

A) Ease of handling the organisation's payroll
B) Lower prices
C) Personalised products
D) Improved pre- purchase information
E) Shorter development times for new features

Question 31

Which framework is useful for helping to understand cost drivers and value drivers?

A) The value chain
B) The SWOT analysis
C) Porter's 5 forces
D) The directional policy matrix

Question 32

Where would the funding of new technologies normally come from and where would they be located?

A) Funding at corporate level and location at divisional level
B) Funding at corporate level and location at corporate level
C) Funding at divisional level and location at divisional level
D) Funding at divisional level and location at corporate level

Question 33

Which of the following is not an example of the 'hard' side of human resource management?

A) Reward planning
B) HR audits
C) Understanding the relationship between behaviours and strategic choices
D) Training and development
E) Goal setting and performance assessment

Question 34

Which of the following would not require capital expenditure?

A) Enhancement of office environment
B) An new manufacturing unit
C) Sourcing cheap raw materials
D) Development of new product features

Question 35

If a technology is key to competitive advantage which is the most likely development route?

A) In house
B) Alliances
C) Acquisition

Question 36

Which two gaps may be identified by gap analysis when trying to ensure competitive advantage through people?

A) Between current leadership development and current capability
B) Between long- term people trends and long- term people strategy
C) Between long- term people trends and short- term business strategy
D) Between current capability and short- term business strategy

Question 37

Which of the following is not one of the three broad issues faced in managing finance to enable strategic success?

A) Funding strategies
B) Managing for value (value and cost drivers)
C) Financial expectations of shareholders
D) Working capital management

Question 38

What are the two key questions that must be asked when considering the manufacturing aspect of resource integration in a new product launch?

A) By whom?
B) What capacity?
C) Where and how?
D) What products?

Question 39

Which of the following does not determine the pace of diffusion of innovation?

A) Experimentation
B) Observability
C) Degree of improvement in performance above current products
D) Strong financial management
E) Market awareness

Question 40

Which of the following is not an example of strategic advantage attained through technology?

A) Differentiated personal service
B) Technical novelty of product
C) Technical novelty of process
D) Legal protection of intellectual property
E) Robust design

Question 41

Organisations that want to support current strategies or develop new ones should realise that capability in separate resources is generally sufficient. Aiming for integration is a luxury that few organisations can afford.

Question 42

An organisation is considering bringing a new product to market. Which three of the following must be integrated with Research and Development?

A) Manufacturing
B) Products
C) Labour
D) Relations with customers
E) Finances

Question 43

Market knowledge involves analysing the subtle differences between customer needs in different parts of the market and building product or service features to meet these needs.

Question 44

IT increases value for customers, enables firms to outperform competitors but has little impact on making a firm's capabilities difficult to imitate.

Question 45

Which of the following is not a cost driver?

A) Capital investment
B) Operational costs
C) Revenue
D) Cost of capital

Question 46

Which of the following is not one of the ways in which IT has an impact on innovation and complexity?

A) By replacing physical or paper- based processes with electronic processes
B) By developing transformational business models which mean that business can only be done electronically
C) By extending the functions that traditional business models can offer
D) By replacing straightforward manual processes with complex IT systems

Question 47

Which three of the following best describe useful applications of data mining?

A) Building up customer purchase histories to target promotions
B) Credit risk assessment in financial services
C) Creating address- merge mailing to specific customers
D) Accurately and rapidly carrying out payroll calculations
E) Identifying underlying drivers of demand (e.g. demographic factors)

Question 48

Gatekeepers are individuals or groups who gain power from their control of information.

Question 49

What is meant by the term 'capital structure'?

A) The relative amounts of different capital assets owned by a business
B) The balance between ordinary and preference shares
C) This refers to the organisational structure employed at headquarters.
D) The balance between debt and equity finance employed by a firm