Deck 6: Person-Based Structures

Question 1

Leadership, customer orientation, and functional expertise are examples of which group of competencies?

A)Personal characteristics
B)Visionary
C)Organization specific
D)Team dynamics

Answer 1

C

Question 2

Which of the following is most likely to be a disadvantage of skill-based pay plans?

A)They are generally not favored by employees as it is difficult to see the connection between the plan, the work, and the size of the paycheck.
B)They discourage adaptability of employees to changing production needs.
C)They are expensive in the long run as the majority of employees become certified at the highest pay levels.
D)They dampen employee versatility.

Answer 2

C

Question 3

The majority of applications of skill-based pay have been in:

A)education industries.
B)manufacturing industries.
C)health-care industries.
D)service industries.

Answer 3

B

Question 4

Which of the following reasons makes competencies a risky foundation for a pay system?

A)Number of stakeholders and the lack of a global standard
B)Openness and non-quantifiable nature
C)Vagueness and subjectivity
D)Lack of motivation and objectivity

Question 5

Skill-based plans tend to work best in organizations using a(n) _____ strategy.

A)innovator
B)defender
C)laissez-faire
D)cost-cutter

Question 6

Employees in a multiskill system earn pay increases:

A)by increasing their productivity.
B)based on job content.
C)based on job assignments.
D)by acquiring new knowledge.

Question 7

The process of identifying competencies in person-based structures resembles identifying _____ as part of job evaluation in job-based structures.

A)compensable factors
B)job description
C)employee requirement
D)work flow outlay

Question 8

The roots of job-based pay structures is traced to _____.

A)Frederick Taylor
B)Karl Marx
C)Adam Smith
D)Ronald McFreyer

Question 9

A camper is an employee who _____ in a skill-based pay system.

A)tops out
B)is a jack-of-all-trades
C)does not want to rotate jobs
D)moves too quickly from job to job

Question 10

In today's organizations, in order to increase competitiveness and success, work is analyzed by separating transactional work from:

A)core work.
B)hygiene work.
C)tacit work.
D)system work.

Question 11

Competencies are derived from the _____ beliefs about the organization and its strategic intent.

A)executive leadership's
B)stakeholders'
C)competitors'
D)customers'

Question 12

The scheme used in the text for classifying competencies consists of three groups.Which of the following is NOT one of them?

A)Personal characteristics
B)Team dynamics
C)Visionary
D)Organization specific

Question 13

_____ are the observable behaviors that indicate the level of competency.

A)Competency sets
B)Core competencies
C)Competency indicators
D)Behavior scale points

Question 14

The certification processes in skill-based pay is analogous to the _____ in a job-based analysis.

A)classes
B)compensable factors
C)regression analysis
D)factor degrees and weights

Question 15

Which of the following is least likely to be used in establishing skill-based certification methods?

A)Tests
B)College degree
C)Peer review
D)On-the-job demonstration

Question 16

Routine work is also termed _____.

A)transactional work
B)hygiene work
C)tacit work
D)system work

Question 17

Compensable factors, skill blocks, and competency sets are used for:

A)assessing relative value.
B)collecting work content information.
C)determining what to value.
D)completely different purposes.

Question 18

_____ is a crucial factor that affects the perception of fairness of a skill-based plan.

A)The design of the certification process
B)The number of compensable factors
C)The extent of alignment with an organization's strategy
D)The number of weights and factor degrees

Question 19

_____ translate each core competency into action.

A)Competency indicators
B)Multifunctional skills
C)Skill-based structures
D)Competency sets

Question 20

Which of the following is an advantage of skill-based pay plans?

A)They guarantee a low rate of employee turnover.
B)They aid in deploying workers in a way that better matches the work flow.
C)They are less expensive than job-based plans.
D)They are viewed more favorably by courts than any other type of pay plans.

Question 21

Who among the following is examining the validity of a job evaluation?

A)Keira, who is measuring the degree to which the job evaluation plan matches an agreed-upon pay structure for benchmark jobs
B)Laila, who is measuring the effectiveness of a formal appeals process
C)Keith, who is surveying employee attitudes about the job evaluation plan
D)Rita, who is requesting the management for a reanalysis and a reevaluation of the required skills as she feels her job is evaluated incorrectly

Question 22

Most studies report that when different people rank-order jobs, the correlations are between:

A).15 and .36
B).35 and .46
C).55 and .66
D).85 and .96

Question 23

A disadvantage of a skill-based plan is that people cannot be deployed in a way that matches the flow of work, thus causing bottlenecks as well as idle hands.

Question 24

Managers whose employers use _____ plans focus on placing the right people in the right job.

A)person-based
B)skill-based
C)competency-based
D)job-based

Question 25

Compared to an on-demand review of certifications, scheduling fixed review points makes it easier to budget and control payroll increases.

Question 26

Who among the following is most likely to be working for a company that uses a competency-based pay plan?

A)Julia, who focuses on getting promoted to get a pay increase
B)Faiza, a manager, who focuses on choosing the employees best suited for job roles
C)Juan, a manager, who focuses on controlling costs through budgets and work assignments
D)Carlos, who focuses on obtaining certifications in her field to get a pay increase

Question 27

A study of 400 compensation specialists revealed that:

A)job evaluation data had a larger effect on pay decisions than market data.
B)current pay data had a larger effect on pay decisions than market data.
C)job titles had a larger effect on pay decisions than job evaluation data.
D)market data had a substantially larger effect on pay decisions than job evaluation data.

Question 28

By encouraging employees to take charge of their own development, skill-based plans may give them more control over their work lives.

Question 29

A _____ approach controls costs by paying only as much as the work performed is worth, regardless of any greater skills the employee may possess.

A)performance-based
B)competency-based
C)job-based
D)skill-based

Question 30

Lisa is a manager at Trell Inc.When she hires her employees, she focuses on finding the right job for the right person.Which of the following pay plans is her employer most likely using?

A)Skill-based pay plan
B)Competency-based pay plan
C)Aptitude-based pay plan
D)Job-based pay plan

Question 31

Person-based plans have the potential to clarify new standards and behavioral expectations.

Question 32

Skill-based pay plans can focus on both the depth and breadth of work.

Question 33

Transactional work is typically paid more than tacit work.

Question 34

Reliability of job evaluation techniques is measured by:

A)determining if different evaluators produce the same results.
B)asking the question "What does the evaluation measure?"
C)determining hit rates.
D)surveying employee attitudes about the evaluation.

Question 35

Skill-based plans become increasingly economical as the majority of employees become certified at the highest pay levels.

Question 36

A potential disadvantage of skill-based pay is that labor costs can be a source of competitive disadvantage.

Question 37

Which of the following sentences regarding skill-based structure is FALSE?

A)Employees have control over their own development.
B)Training is a source of complaints.
C)Less supervision is required in comparison to all other pay plans.
D)Training costs are the lowest in comparison to all other pay plans.

Question 38

Which of the following is the reason why skill-based pay plans have maximum flexibility?

A)They pay employees for the highest level of skill they have achieved regardless of the work they perform.
B)They focus on placing the right people in the right job.
C)They only pay as much as the work performed is worth, regardless of any greater skills the employee may possess.
D)They encourage employees to focus on how to get promoted rather than on how to get the required competencies.

Question 39

Skill-based plans are generally well accepted by employees because it is easy to see the connection between the plan, the work, and the size of the paycheck.

Question 40

Scaled competency indicators are similar to degrees of compensable factors.

Question 41

The main appeal of competencies is the direct link to the organization's strategy.

Question 42

Basing pay on race or gender seems appalling today, but basing pay on someone's judgment of another person's integrity is considered the norm nowadays.

Question 43

Defining the compensable factors and scales to include the content of jobs held predominantly by women is one of the methods to ensure that job evaluation plans are bias-free.

Question 44

How are organizations redefining the original definition of competencies?

Question 45

What is the relevance of certification in a multiskill system?

Question 46

Recent research shows that the use of online job evaluation by independent managers is more reliable than traditional job evaluation committees.

Question 47

Advocates of competencies say that by focusing on optimum performance, rather than average performance, competencies can help employees maintain their marketability.

Question 48

How do skill-based plans motivate employees?

Question 49

What is relevance of flexibility in skill-based plans?

Question 50

Competencies provide guidelines for behavior and keep people focused.

Question 51

One approach to both improving and measuring the level of acceptance of job evaluation is to establish a formal appeals process.

Question 52

In virtually all the studies on job evaluation, job-based evaluation is treated as a measurement device.

Question 53

How do modern organizations analyze work processes?

Question 54

Validity refers to the degree to which an evaluation assesses the relative worth of jobs to an organization.

Question 55

As experience with competencies has grown, organizations are placing greater emphasis on business-related descriptions of behaviors.