Instructions:
- Read the questions, case study or activity below
- Answer the questions in approximately 200 words
- Submit your answer in the appropriate week's discussion forum
- Respond and engage constructively with at least two of your peers
FreshFirst Canning
Canning Company, FreshFirst Canning is opening a new factory in the state of Queensland. The company has three other factories - two in Victoria and one in New South Wales. All employees in the existing factories are unionised, covered by a major manufacturing union. Those factories operate on the basis of traditional assembly-line organisation of work, with strong, centralised management control. Those factories have strict seniority arrangements for pay, promotion and redundancies.
The new Queensland plant is a green?eld site and will be organised around a high- commitment work system. All work in the administration section and on the shop ?oor will be organised on the basis of teams of multi-skilled workers. It is expected that performance levels will be higher and absenteeism and turnover levels will be lower than in the existing factories.
The HR department, based in the company's head of?ce in Melbourne, has advertised for 180 production workers for the new plant. The HR department is interviewing workers from the company's other factories around Australia to determine their willingness and readiness to accept employment in the new Queensland factory. They have also received a total of 500 applications from the external labour market.
The CEO has requested advice from the HR department on the best way to determine the terms and conditions of employment for employees at the new Queensland factory.
Questions
1. If you were part of the HR department, what advice would you give the CEO?
2. What will be the consequences of the various options for industrial relations and human resource management within the company?