Assignment:
1. This question is about reward and pay according to the CIPD 2019 reward and payfactsheet. Pay may be divided into two categories. Which categories are referred to in the factsheet?
a) base (or fixed) pay / total earnings
b) Contingency and variable pay
c) Merit and skill-based pay
d) Base pay and spot rates
e) Base pay and pay for performance
2. An equal pay audit is an example of one of the following reward terms. Which one is it?
a) a business strategy
b) a reward policy or process
c) a reward strategy
d) an HR strategy
e) an employee benefit
3. Google worldwide has a reward strategy that includes all but one of the following objectives. Which is the incorrect objective?
a) to treat employees fairly.
b) to be innovative
c) to recognise individual contribution
d) to be market leader in pay and employee benefits.
e) cost containment.
4. Which of the following pay characteristics is most likely to appear in a ‘leading' private sector organisation?
a) collective pay bargaining
b) progression up scales by length of service
c) small performance rewards mainly to senior staff
d) widespread use of job evaluation
e) decentralised reward decision making
5. All but one of the following statements about a general pay review are correct. Which is the incorrect one?
a) increases often reflect what other similar organisations are giving i.e. the market rate
b) increases are often influenced by the cost of living indexes
c) increases are often agreed following negotiations with unions
d) increases reward an employee for his/her individual contribution or performance
e) general pay reviews are very common in the public sector
6. Decoupling pay from development is best described by one of the following statements. Which one is it?
a) having different pay scales for different job families
b) rewarding staff for acquiring new skills
c) not having appraisal ratings as the basis for competence based pay
d) managers discussing pay and development with their staff on different dates
e) staff in the NHS using team based bonuses for development purposes
7. One of the following statements about trends in job evaluation (JE) is incorrect. Which one is it?
a) many organizations are abandoning JE
b) there is a trend towards evaluating only benchmark jobs and generic roles
c) JE is the basis for many pay structures
d) JE has an important role in ensuring internal equity and providing a defence against equal pay claims
e) clearly defined and evaluated jobs are useful in making market comparisons
8. One of the following statements about tailor made job evaluation (JE) schemes is wrong. Which one is it?
A tailor made job evaluation scheme
a) is used by the NHS.
b) can have a choice of factors that truly reflect jobs within an organization
c) can have an allocation of points that truly reflects the importance of different factors to an organization
d) have total points which can be allocated to grades or bands
e) allows job size comparisons to be made with outside organizations
9. In the Hay Guide Chart job evaluation scheme the sub-factor Freedom to Act is part of one main factor. Which one is it?
a) Magnitude
b) Impact on End Results
c) Accountability
d) Know How
e) Problem Solving
10. Which of the following pay structures or types of pay is most commonly used forlocal council workerswho dig up roads?
a) a spot rate
b) a rate for the job
c) a pay spine
d) a job family structure
e) a narrow graded pay structure
11. Which one of the following statements about broad banded pay structuresis incorrect?
Broad banded pay structures
a) give more flexibility for individual pay
b) give managers more freedom to set pay
c) make job moves without promotion easier
d) are good for controlling pay costs
e) are good for mergers.
12. One of the following pay structures, or types of pay, is particularly suited to jobs or functions in companies which are filled by staff who are in short supply. Which one is it?
a) a rate for the job
b) a narrow graded pay structure
c) a pay spine
d) a job family structure
e)a spot rate
13. Which of the following is the least reliable source of market information? Assume all the sources are up-to-date
a) market surveys
b) consultant's databases
c) pay information given at leaver interviews
d) journal data
e) government data
14. Whichone of the following statements about translating market data into pay levels is incorrect?
a) overpaying is as bad as underpaying
b) comparing like jobs or roles can be difficult
c) surveys can quickly become out of date
d) the number of reward elements e.g. base pay, bonuses, salary scales, can make comparisons difficult
e) allthe companies in a survey can achieve upper quartile positioning.
15. Which one of the following statements about market pricing (MP) is incorrect?
a) MP relies on the accuracy of market data
b) MP encourages easy movement between job families
c) internal equity can suffer with MP
d) staff who like regular pay increases can be demotivated
e) MP evaluatesinformation of similar pricing/products that are on the market
16. Which of the following statements about the UK 2010 Equality Act is incorrect?
a) an employer can justify unequal pay if that organisation has a genuine material factor defence
b) men are entitled to equal pay with women
c) a real difference in skill or productivity can be a genuine material factor defence,
d) the Act is only concerned with pay
e) red circling, for a limited period following job evaluation, can be a genuine material factor defence
17. The EOC/EHRC have given an example of discriminatory and non-discriminatory job evaluation factors and marking for a Maintenance Fitter and a Company Nurse. One of the pairs of marks below is thought to be discriminatory. Which one is it? 10 is high, 1 is low.
Maintenance Fitter Company Nurse
a) Physical Activity 8 5
b) Equipment Responsibility 8 5
c) Basic Knowledge 8 2
d) Training Required 5 7
e) Working Conditions 6 1
18. Which country has a civil rights act and minimum wage legislation?
a) USA
b) India
c) Japan
d) China
e) Germany
19. Giving a bonus and not a basic pay increase would be appropriate for one of the following situations. Which one is it?
a) where the external market is paying high basic salaries
b) to reward skills development
c) to encourage continued good performance
d) to motivate older staff who are in a defined benefit pension scheme
e) to help staff obtain mortgages (loans for buying houses)
20. Which one of the following statements aboutperformance related pay (PRP) is incorrect?
a) successful PRP requires a good performance management system
b) a discretionary retrospective award is more motivational than an incentive
c) bonuses are the norm in the private sector
d) poor implementation is the reason many PRP schemesfail
e) bonus amounts should be significant
21. Following bad publicity about the selling of inappropriate financial products to the public, some of the financial services industryhasstopped paying one of the following types of merit& variable pay. Which one was it?
a) commission
b) bonus for meeting business objectives
c) meritpay
d) profit related pay
e) incentives e.g. small gifts
22. Which one of the following statements about company financial participation is untrue?
a) share schemes are an important part of executive pay
b) John Lewis Partnership has acash based profit sharing scheme
c) certainorganisations want to share their success with their employees
d) an advantage of profit sharing is that staff become educated in what makes a business successful
e) an employee in ashare option scheme must take up that option.
23. Which would be the best sort of merit and variable pay for an electricianin a factory?
a) Performance related pay
b) A bonus
c) Team based pay
d) An incentive
e) Skillsbased pay
24. Which one of the following statements about BMW Oxford's 2014 pay agreement is untrue?
a) BMW's Jan 1st 2014 agreement ran for 2 years.
b) on Jan 1st 2014 a 3.5% pay increase was given.
c) on Jan 1st 2015 the pay increase matched the RPI in November 2014
d) a team bonus and a company bonus was paid dependent on team and company performance.
e) BMW's banked (annualised) hours scheme significantly increased the amount of overtime pay that employees receive.
25. Which one of the following statements about Director and Executive pay in large UK publicly listed companies is incorrect?
a) the pay of all directors has to appear in a company's remuneration report
b) there is a trend from Short term incentives (STI) schemes to Long term incentives (LTI)schemes
c) there is a trend towards assessing Director's performance against competitors rather than on share price alone
d) STI schemes always include share options and share ownership
e) shareholders can vote on a company's remuneration report
26. Which one of the following statements about employee benefits is wrong?
a) an organisation's reward strategy is a strong influence on the range and scale of benefits it offers.
b) 60% of public sector employers in the UK spend between 10 - 19% of payroll on benefits provision for their staff
c) employee benefits arehaving non-financial benefits such as a good manager and anice place to work
d) pensions are a very important item of employee benefits.
e) an organisation's benefits policy is often influenced by what the market is doing.
27. This question is about the Royal Bank of Scotland's flexible benefit scheme RB Select. One of the statements below is incorrect. Which one is it?
a) staff can make changes to any of their benefits at any time of year
b) staff can buy up to 5 days extra leave
c) all staff receive a total remuneration/reward statement
d) staff can check on-line the tax implications of their choice of benefits
e) RBS believe that RB select improves their brand image
28. Which one of the following benefits is the most costly for a company? Assume an employee has a salary of £38,000 p.a.
a) free meals throughout the year in the company's canteen
b) a leased company car
c) a transport to work, season ticket loan
d) private medical insurance
e) a defined benefit / final salary company pension
29. Which one of the following statements is incorrect regarding UK pensions provision?
a) there is no fixed age for retirement in the UK.
b) theproblem with pension provision is that people are living longer
c) a company defined benefit (DB) / final salary scheme funding is dependent on stock market performance
d) most employees make insufficient contribution towards their future pension
e) many companies are moving from defined contribution (DC) /money purchase schemes to defined benefit (DB)/ final salary schemes.
30. One of the following statements about UK Workplace Pension Auto-Enrolment(WPA) is wrong. Which is the incorrect statement?
a) WPA only applies to organisations that do not already have a qualifying pension scheme
b) Employers without a qualifying pension scheme can opt out of WPA
c) Employees can opt out of WPA
d) If you move jobs, your WPA pension contribution moves with you
e) There is no refund to the employee of already made WPA contributions
31. One of the following statements about home based expatriate systems is incorrect. Which one is wrong?
a) It is the same system regardless of nationality
b) It preserves an employee's standard of living
c) It makes repatriation easy
d) It can be very costly
e) It promotes fairness with local employees and international staff doing the same jobs at the same location
32. Which one of the following statements about host based expatriate remuneration is incorrect?
a) there is a clear link to local pay
b) it only works when moving staff to higher paid countries
c) it is suitable for assignments that become permanent transfers
d) it often results in lower costs for the organisation
e) repatriation from a high paid country is easy
33. Which one of the following statements about international and expatriate remuneration is incorrect?
a) a tiered approach is a common strategy for multinational companies i.e. the top 100 executives have different policies from those who report to them
b) the gross pay of managers in Denmark is higher than the gross pay of managers in the UK
c) the net pay of managers in Denmark is higher than the net pay of managers in the UK
d) in 2010 UK manufacturing hourly costs (pay) was lower than in Germany
e) in 2010 China manufacturing hourly costs (pay) was lower than in Western Europe
34. Which country passed a gender quota legislation for the boardroom in 2015?
a) Germany
b) The USA
c) India
d) China
e) India
35. Which country still has a lower proportion of female managers?
a) Japan
b) China
c) The USA
d) Germany
e) India
36. Select the correct answer. The constitution of India in 1950...
a) ensures equal pay audits in the public sector
b) encompasses Article 15 which prohibits discrimination of nationals based on religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth.
c) incorporates the Civil Rights Act of 1964
d) comprises of Article 16 which relates to collective bargaining by industry sector
e) embodies pay, bonuses, benefits and reward processes for all employees
The next 4 questions apply to the following mini case study. Read this study and then answer questions 37 to 40
Mini case study
The organisation is a hospital in North London. The hospital management wants to improve staff skills and standards of patient care. Reward is determined locally and the hospital wants to contain employment costs. Nurses are mainly female, many with young families. Nurses at the hospital are very motivated as they find their work very interesting and worthwhile. A new reward system is being developed. Hospital management want a pay structure which is ‘transparent' and can be published, and where promotion increases are fixed amounts. They want a progression up salary scales which will meet the hospital's aims and be appropriate for the nursing profession. The hospital is very proud of its equal pay policies. The hospital has an immediate problem ofrecruiting certain essential staff such as radiologists who are in short supply. The management wants to provide benefits which will not be too costly, but will be particularly valued by the staff.
37. Which of the following pay structures would be most appropriate for the nurses at the hospital?
a) a narrow graded pay structure
b) a broad banded pay structure
c) a job family pay structure
d) a spot salary
e) a pay spine
38. Which of the following pay alternatives would be most effective for recruiting staff who are in short supply e.g. radiologists?
a) giving a market supplement
b) doing nothing
c) applying market pricing for that particular group of staff
d) reducing the pay of other staff
e) giving all staff a 5% increase
39. Which of the following ways of pay progression up a salary scale would be most appropriate for nurses at the hospital?
a) using management discretion
b) pay by age
c) pay by length of service
d) competency related pay
e) merit pay based on performance
40. Which one of the following benefits would be most appropriate for retaining nurses at the hospital, as well as incurring only moderate costs for the organisation?
a) a leased car
b) very generous redundancy pay
c) a defined benefit (final salary) pension
d) a company share option scheme
e) subsidised childcare (5% discount on actual childcare costs)