...Performance Management at Vitality Health Enterprises, Inc. The Health and Vitality of Vitality Health Enterprises James Hoffman, the newly appointed vice president of Human Resources of Vitality Health Enterprises, was pleased when he saw an early preview of the earnings figures for the fourth quarter of 2011. But he knew better than to relax. Competition in the personal care products sector was cutthroat, and complacency was a recipe for obsolescence and loss of market share, particularly in cosmetics and nutraceuticals. Vitality was riding high on a six-quarter string of strong revenue growth that had surpassed analyst expectations. However, as emerging markets represented a growing portion of business revenues, the company was becoming increasingly exposed to volatility and uncertainty and, without prompt corrective action, would soon be poised to trip over its own feet. The cost of research and development continued to climb, and Hoffman feared that the chain of success was allowing employees to relax, leading to a culture of ineffective performance management. There were even whispers of discontent from the marketing team about a growing number of missed product launches. Hoffman knew that Vitality had recently struggled to maintain its position as an industry leader in innovation and he worried about the slow but notable increases in employee turnover, especially among the highly talented research scientists. Without their expertise, Vitality couldn’t remain vibrant...
Words: 1463 - Pages: 6
...POLYTECHNIC OF NAMIBIA HAROLD PUPKEWITZ GRADUATE SCHOOL OF BUSINESS Performance Management at Vitality Health Enterprises, Inc Case Report By Leonardo Imerne Strategic Human Resources Management (SHM910M) Date: 21 June 2014 2 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY This report will focus on the performance management at Vitality Health Enterprises, Inc, which is a cosmetics and beauty products oriented business. The business started off well with a fast expansion approach. As the company grows, performance management of its staff was necessary to reward top performers as a motivation factor, and also to identify poor performers so they could be trained further or relieved from their positions. The report will therefore highlight the problems associated with performance management and rewards appraisals at Vitality Health Enterprises Inc, such as failure to reward top performers accordingly, identify worst performers, and recommends solutions thereof. STATEMENT OF KEY PROBLEMS OR ISSUES Vitality Health Enterprises Inc was founded in 1987 in Ames, Iowa by an Fred Kikuchi who identified a market niche of health, wellness and beauty products in the Ames where he resided after he left Japan. The company at the beginning of its operations relied on importing re-branded beauty products from Japan until it established its manufacturing plant in the United States of America. As planned, the company grew rapidly and later acquired Herba Nutraceuticals to increase its market share and profitability...
Words: 1459 - Pages: 6
...Harvard Business Review Case study Analysis BY John Raphael Marty Vitality Health A better Corporate Performance Management System to Retain Top Talent Vitality Health Vitality Health Introduction Issues Beth Williams stepped in to fill the shoes of Fred Kikuchi in 2009 as the new CEO. Her primary stated purpose was to “find a better way to identify and reward top performers in order to keep ‘A’ players in their positions and accelerate company growth by attracting new top talent.” To do this, Beth created a new performance management team (PMET) to study the existing rewards & compensation, and uncover changes that needed to be made. With over 50% of the staff in Des Moines consisting of scientists and engineers, and a total R&D budget nearing 30% of total gross revenue in 2009; Vitality’s growth depended heavily on continued human resources for R&D, especially due to Vitality’s focus on emerging markets and the volatility that comes along with such growth. Beth’s prompt delivery of a new performance management system only eight weeks after discovering problems likely delighted Vitality’s board as well as some staff, but her no-nonsense approach must have also been a shock internally as she was “a notable contrast from Kikuchi’s more conciliatory management style.” The email sent to management to simply review the online guidebook of the new performance management system hardly created “buy-in” within the organization, that was seen clearly...
Words: 3093 - Pages: 13
...Harvard Business Review Case study Analysis BY John Raphael Marty Vitality Health A better Corporate Performance Management System to Retain Top Talent Vitality Health Vitality Health Introduction Issues Beth Williams stepped in to fill the shoes of Fred Kikuchi in 2009 as the new CEO. Her primary stated purpose was to “find a better way to identify and reward top performers in order to keep ‘A’ players in their positions and accelerate company growth by attracting new top talent.” To do this, Beth created a new performance management team (PMET) to study the existing rewards & compensation, and uncover changes that needed to be made. With over 50% of the staff in Des Moines consisting of scientists and engineers, and a total R&D budget nearing 30% of total gross revenue in 2009; Vitality’s growth depended heavily on continued human resources for R&D, especially due to Vitality’s focus on emerging markets and the volatility that comes along with such growth. Beth’s prompt delivery of a new performance management system only eight weeks after discovering problems likely delighted Vitality’s board as well as some staff, but her no-nonsense approach must have also been a shock internally as she was “a notable contrast from Kikuchi’s more conciliatory management style.” The email sent to management to simply review the online guidebook of the new performance management system hardly created “buy-in” within the organization, that was seen clearly...
Words: 3093 - Pages: 13
...Third Case Question 1. Vitality’s old Performance Management System presented some problems that were affecting some of its most talented employees. The analysis of those problems as well as the identification of their root causes will allow us to make a reflection about the company’s previous Performance Management System in the following paragraphs. Firstly, the old system was prone to central tendency error. It had 13 rating levels and lacked a described evaluation criteria. As one can understand, if the rating scale is large and the different levels are not sufficiently explained, the evaluators will be more likely to evaluate less accurately. In the case, one can read that managers gave almost to everyone a B or a C, provided few A or D ratings. This is a problem because it shows that the managers do not take the performance and evaluation system as a serious and fundamental tool, which consequently affects employees who are not able to receive valuable feedback on their performance. In our opinion this problem has two main root causes. The first one is that managers do not want to upset employees and the sense of teamwork and egalitarianism, so they give medium ratings to everyone. They might believe that a medium grading does not affect neither positively nor negatively employees’ performance. We believe that the other cause could be the lack of clarity in the rating levels description. The fact that the grading system is not clear for managers hampers a precise...
Words: 2944 - Pages: 12
...INDIAN INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT INDORE HRM Assignment Vitality- Case Analysis Section E - Group 1 Submitted By: Abhijeet Singh Dialine Lazar Manish Tuljapurkar Priya Parmar SudhanshuRanjan Vartika Agarval 2012PGP004 2012PGP103 2012PGP197 2012PGP277 2012PGP877 2012PGP423 Executive summary Management Concerns in 2011 Vitality Health Enterprises, a medium-sized firm that manufactures health and personal care products, has experienced six straight quarters of strong revenue growth. James Hoffman, the new Senior Vice President of Human Resources, fears that the chain of success is shifting the company's focus away from effective performance management. Recently, Vitality has been faced with increasing turnover among the company's talented research scientists that may be due to a performance management system that leaves top performing employees slighted by the practice of uniform ratings. In an effort to retain top employees, the company institutes a forced distribution model of performance rankings, moving from an absolute ranking system to a relative one. Hoffman and his performance management evaluation team must assess the practical and strategic effectiveness of the new system and present their findings and recommendations to the Board. Original Performance Management System (Till 2009) Due to decreasing earnings in 2009, the company decided to adopt a new business strategy that would focus on:- 1. Adopting cost-cutting...
Words: 1566 - Pages: 7
...Performance Management at Vitality Health Enterprises, Inc. 1.) Who should evaluate employee’s performance? What should leaders do when (individual, team, organization) performance is lacking? Every leader in an organization should evaluate employee’s performances, whoever a leader in an organization has it’s own sub-ordinates; their sub-ordinates’ performances should be evaluated. Once an individual, team or organization performances are lacking, leaders should either motivate or penalize the lack of performances. In real world, I think both works. Through a good rewarding system, one should be motivated for gaining a bigger paycheck or recognition form their senior. Everyone gets pay for their services, under a good rewarding systems, one who performed better than required can get a better pay or promotion always work in a real business world. Vise versa, one who didn’t pay less or layoff sounds fair. Employee evaluations can always be a positive, encouraging, and a good outline on how they are doing in the many categories of their job responsibilities. On the other hand, it can also be considered a waste of time and doesn’t work if neither leader nor their sub-ordinates take it seriously and just go through the motions. 2.) Should the new performance review system at Vitality Health be revised? What changes would you recommend to the new performance management system? How should the changes be implemented? Carefully consider the consequences of your recommendations...
Words: 1264 - Pages: 6
...one unified compensation plan for both sales forces will be discussed, stressing the importance of a meticulous implementation of well-defined multiple customer value source plan into Arck Systems’ business strategy. Finally, we will conclude the paper by briefly reiterating the key details of the case, our analysis and recommendation. Background: Arck Systems and Lux Software Inc.’s Compensation Plans Arck Systems acquired Lux Software Inc., who enjoyed faster growth and higher margins, in an effort to grow market share through the expected synergies the two companies would experience once completely integrated. The acquisition resulted in Lux’s EVP of Sales, Chris Snyder, leaving the company. Snyder also recruited most of his sales management team with him leaving only Lux’s key salespeople. Bryan Mynor, EVP of Worldwide Sales at Arck, was assigned to manage the sales department for Lux. Initially, Mynor believed that the sales incentive plan at Lux was similar to Arck’s only to realize that Lux’s incentive program was much more lucrative to its top performing salespeople. Upon further investigation, Mynor discovered that Lux salespeople were able to manipulate the sales system to obtain higher pay outs. The...
Words: 1982 - Pages: 8
...MARKET SCOPE Asset performance management Addressing the root cause A properly and adequately designed asset performance management framework can bring a cohesive approach to manage assets, monitor equipment health, and ensure the compliance of critical operational & business processes. Such a framework has to leverage the established asset management capabilities provided by the best-in-class systems. Courtesy: PCM Ltd n the 1980s, the world was awakened by two major disasters that signified the vitality of engineering assets and the importance to manage their performance. The first event was a lethal methyl isocyanate (MIC) leak in Bhopal on December 2, 1984, and the second the catastrophic Chernobyl nuclear disaster on April 26, 1986. Over 20,000 were killed, and half a million victims maimed, disabled or otherwise affected in the Bhopal gas tragedy. Criminal cases were filed against the then corporate Chairman. In the Chernobyl reactor, the accident happened because of a combination of basic engineering deficiencies in the reactor and faulty actions of the operators (as per UN Chernobyl Forum report, the safety systems had been switched off, and the reactor was being operated under improper, unstable conditions, a situation which allowed an uncontrollable power surge to occur). More than 20 years have passed since the tragedy occurred, and it is difficult to tell precisely the number of deaths – past and future – attributable to the Chernobyl accident. Since the...
Words: 1405 - Pages: 6
...& Specialty Papers, Packaging, Agri-Business, Branded Apparel, Packaged Foods & Confectionery, Greeting Cards and other FMCG products * ITC's diversified status originates from its corporate strategy aimed at creating multiple drivers of growth anchored on its time-tested core competencies: unmatched distribution reach, superior brand-building capabilities, effective supply chain management and acknowledged service skills in hoteliering. * ITC's FMCG businesses have one of the largest retail networks in the country, consisting of over 2 million retailers. ITC employs over 31,000 people at more than 60 locations across India * ITC has powerful brands like Wills, John Players, Hotel Grand Maratha, Sunfeast. * ITC have a very successful CRS activity called ‘e-choupal’ VISION ANA MISSION STATEMENT OF ITC VISION » Sustain ITC's position as one of India's most valuable corporations through world class performance, creating growing value for the Indian economy and the Company's stakeholders MISSION » To enhance the wealth generating capability of the enterprise in a globalising environment, delivering superior and sustainable stakeholder value...
Words: 907 - Pages: 4
...achieving, building and creating. Human recourse department is a crucial role in the amazing mechanism. In general, training refers to a planned effort by a company to facilitate the learning of job-related knowledge, skill, or behavior by employees. From company’s perspective, training is strategic for business goals related to human resources as well as productivity, costumer service, and motivation. The following case study spends time on talking about special training programs in HSBC, particularly on in-house training and external training. 2. Objectives of Training Plan in HSBC 1. Training plan should be relevant and focus on a specific task. 2. The training plan should match with the standardization measurement in the job performances. 3. Maintain the training objectives always follow the business objectives. 3. Importance of Training Training is the one of the most important activities in human resource. It is essential to put the right worker ant the right place with the trained employees in today’s global market. As human resource is the blood of all the organizations, only well-trained employees can an organization really achieve its goals. Nowadays, training has played a significant role on maintaining and improving interpersonal and intergroup collaborations. A good training matters productivity, customer service and successful operation in an organization. Generally, training works well at many different areas, but significantly at these five...
Words: 2274 - Pages: 10
...[pic] | | |Introduction | |Organizational Study | | | |About the Company | |History | |Company Profile | |Objective of the Company | | | |Mission and Vision | | ...
Words: 8338 - Pages: 34
...A) The name of the company is Apple. The reasons of choosing this company to explore its experience using the concepts of International Business are as follow: Global pattern of trade * Apple is the global company in the retail industry. 43,000 of Apple employees in the United States to work in the 30,000 Apple stores. Apple retail store employees to do more than the average wage of employees, and provides money for universities, as well as a gym membership, 401K plans, health care plans, product discounts and lower prices for the purchase of shares. * Apple has 453 retail stores (such as in March 2015) in 16 countries and 39 countries in the online store. Each store is designed to meet the requirements of the position and the regulatory authorities. Apple has received numerous architectural awards for its store design, especially its location on Fifth Avenue in midtown Manhattan on. Competitive advantage * Before the company advertised its products are being made, the late 90s of the last century the United States; however, as a result of the outsourcing plan in 2000, almost all of the manufacturing process is now abroad. According to a report the New York Times, Apple insiders "that huge overseas factories, as well as flexible, diligent and industrial skills of foreign workers have to make more than their American counterparts that" Made in USA "is no longer a viable Alternatively, for most Apple products. " * The company's production, procurement and logistics...
Words: 1506 - Pages: 7
...Department of Business Management NIT Kurukshetra 136119, Haryana E-mail: digvijay.singh572@gmail.com Author 2: Aakriti Mittal Affiliation: Student of Department of Business Management NIT Kurukshetra 136119, Haryana E-mail: aakriti21@gmail.com Author 3: Vaishali arora Affiliation: Student of Department of Business Management NIT Kurukshetra 136119, Haryana E-mail: vaishaliarora1@gmail.com *Author to contact in case of any query. Social entrepreneurship Entrepreneurship is a topic of interest to academics, business people, and governments around the world. The dynamism and vitality of entrepreneurship research is reflected in the flow of new ideas and themes in the entrepreneurship literature. For many, mainstream entrepreneurship is inextricably bound with the creation of new technology firms, however, this is only part of a wide and varied terrain. The focus of this paper is social entrepreneurship - those activities associated with the perception of opportunities to create social value and the creation of social purpose organisations to pursue them. Social enterprises adopt financially sustainable strategies to pursue social aims, and address a wide range of social problems, such as unemployment, inequalities in access to health and social care services...
Words: 5337 - Pages: 22
...OF HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT IN ORGANIZATIONS: LINKING GLOBAL PRACTICES WITH LOCAL PERSPECTIVE Akbar Ali, Faculty of Management Information System National University of Sciences & Technology, Pakistan ABSTRACT Present study aims to link the global HRM in local context. HRM deals with the responsibilities, functions, behaviors and importance of employee. Hence the significance of HRM in organization is marvel. Previously not much attention had been given to manage employee in an organized manner, but with the passage of time need were felt to shift to formalization. The level of HRM practices do not show the formalized structure, therefore it is found mandatory to focus our country so that a step towards the identification and filling of gaps is initiated. HRM role is supposed to be very inclined towards humanitarian factors. In Pakistan the issue of traditional management is required to be addressed to transform it to HRM conceptualization in true letter and spirit. In Pakistan context this article is being written with the confidence that it will help managers to link the global HRM practices in local context in their organizations. Keywords: HRM, Organisation Pakistan. International Refereed Research Journal ■ www.researchersworld.com ■ Vol.–IV, Issue–1, January 2013 [78] ResearchersWorld INTRODUCTION: -Journal of Arts, Science & Commerce ■ E-ISSN 2229-4686 ■ ISSN 2231-4172 IMPORTANCE OF HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT: Human resource management is the part of the...
Words: 6658 - Pages: 27
