Apple Diversity Initiative Discussion Questions
Description
1. You’re an HR professional at Pinnacle Pharmaceuticals. Currently, there is no succession plan or “bench” for the company’s current leaders. The CEO has not made this a priority for the HR department, but you feel strongly that she needs to have a second look. You will need a plan for speaking to the CEO if you’re going to get succession planning on the list of strategic priorities for the company. In order to take the lead on this, you’ll need to anticipate and plan ahead. Your answer should make reference to the knowledge you have acquired from the Study Plan module on this topic. Answer one of the following questions:
-On what best practices in people analytics will you rely?
-What kind of data do you think will support your position best?
2. In 2019, when reviewing a list of CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, less than 5% are women—in fact, there are more men named David that are CEOs of Fortune 500 companies than there are women CEOs.As we discussed, when leadership at the executive level is diverse, companies are more profitable. So why aren’t more companies making sure their senior team is diverse?
Take a look at 2019’s Fortune 500 list and choose any company that has a CEO who is part of a minority group. This could be Tim Cook at Apple, or Mary Dillon at Ulta, or anyone else of your choosing. Then, go out to that company’s website and determine the diversity of that company’s senior team (hint: any publicly traded company is likely to list information on their top three executives in the shareholder’s section).
Write a short paragraph about the company’s diversity initiatives and if you feel they are benefitting the business. How did your company do in 2019—did they perform better than in 2018 and 2017? Do they have any space on their careers page dedicated to diversity?
3. O*Net Online is “the nation’s primary source of occupational information.” We’re going to use it to help the leader of our operations department hire a new employee!
A national retailer is growing to the point where they have decided it would be wise to have some regional meetings a few times a year with their store managers, and perhaps even a national meeting that all store managers would attend. With 500 stores and counting, this would mean a lot of people in attendance. They’d need to look at hotels or convention centers to provide space. They would raise funds from the company’s vendors to pay for the event.
As the manager of the operations department, Litong has decided that an event manager would be an excellent addition to the operations team and has approached the company’s human resources department to get started.
You, as a human resources professional, should perform a job analysis on event managers (code 13-1121.00) using O*Net Online and the O*Net Resource Center. What tasks should you look to complete (note: for this discussion, you do not need to complete these tasks, simply identify what information you need to find).
4. A candidate can have every skill you are looking for in a position, and yet still might not be successful at the job. Bringing a new employee into the organization means matching skills to job requirements and matching personalities to workplace culture.
Your HR team has worked hard to build a culture that supports the company’s brand and goals. The organization prides itself on open-door discussions between leaders and subordinates; they provide flexible hours and telecommuting; they’ve established core values and “work lingo” that support their employment brand. Your employee value proposition boasts that working for your company is like having a second family.
You’re an HR manager working with a recruiter to bring a new executive on board in the finance department. As a new leader, this executive will be driving workplace culture as much as he or she will be blending in with it.
What type of interview questions would you ask candidates to ensure that they are a good fit for the company culturally? And what answers to those questions would prompt you to make the candidate an offer of employment? Write one or two questions and their “correct” answers to submit. Then, review the answers of two of your classmate and provide comments if you wish.
