Question

In: Nursing

Jack Hopson has been making wood furniture for more than ten years. He recently joined Metropolitan...

Jack Hopson has been making wood furniture for more than ten years. He recently joined Metropolitan Furniture and has some ideas for Sally Boston, the company's CEO. Jack enjoys working for Sally because she is very open to employee suggestions and is serious about making the company a success. Metropolitan is currently paying Jack a competitive hourly wage for him to build tables and chairs. Jack thinks that n incentive plan might help him and his coworkers to put forth additional effort. At Jack's previous employer, he was paid on a piece-rate plan. He was paid for each chair or table that he completed. Jack thought this plan helped him to work faster and smarter. Sally likes the idea, but she also feels that the workers must work as a team, and often times, this means pooling their strengths to complete an assignment together. She is concerned that a piece-rate plan might minimize the team concept she has incorporated into the organization. She has considered a team-based plan that provides a bonus payment when each set of furniture is completed on time. However, after speaking with Jack, she is unsure of which plan to take. Questions for review: 1. What are some of the advantages of offering a piece rate plan to the workers at Metropolitan Furniture? 2. What are some of the advantages of offering a team based plan to the workers? 3. If using a team based plan approach, how do you address underperforming workers so that the team incentive is balanced and fair? 4. If you were Sally, which approach would you take and why?

Solutions

Expert Solution

Advantages of piece rate plan:

1. Workers will try to focus on single piece of their work as their payment is based upon that.

2. They will try to as much as possible chairs and tables in a month so that they can earn more and more.

Advantages of team based plan:

1. New ideas can be shared among each other as they have to complete their task together within a time frame.

2. Team work means stronger support system and even maintaining a well communication between each other that is always beneficial for a company because any issues are rectified within time frame and it's become a team responsibility to work together and gives their best.

While working with team based plan definitely certain member maybe a slow learner and can take more time to complete their task and that makes an individual evaluation difficult. But again the advantage of team plan is that there is always members who will keep the work pace going and it's team hard work to perform better. Individual evaluation can be made by certain plans like giving small task per month for checking the individual integrity and quality of their work.

I would have gone with team based plan as for any company their team members are their strength as they work together and make to help the company grow. Individual work can limit overall performance as the person can either work very efficiently and gives you the best results or may he can not perform that well. But if you rely on team members you can guarantee the task will be completed within timeframe.


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