IB Business Management HL 2.1.2 Human Resource Planning Factors Questions

Just before the Board of Directors voted on “RDB 2020”, Anna Holstein had a serious car accident. She would require years of physical therapy before working again. Board members now have two important decisions to make:  Whether to approve the “RDB 2020” strategic plan. Despite Valdemar Holstein’s opposition, some board members still supported it, especially because of a recent workforce planning study (Item 1). To help them decide, the board requested and received a decision tree and critical path analysis (Items 2 and 3).  Who would replace the 83-year-old Valdemar? The succession plan had always been to promote his daughter Anna to Chief Executive Officer (CEO).

Royal Danish Bearings (RDB) is a successful multinational company operating in the ball bearing industry. RDB was set up in 1915, in Denmark, by a Danish machinist called Henrik Holstein. Henrik was a visionary. He foresaw the expansion of the ball bearing industry in the twentieth century, which was largely due to the growth of the automotive sector. Ball bearing technology contributed to engineering progress throughout the twentieth century, especially in the secondary sector of the economy. Today, the outlook of the ball bearing industry is still promising: its market size is predicted to further expand over the next decades. “High-tech industries” such as computer software and artificial intelligence attract considerable attention and capital; however, most global industrial output continues to be mechanical devices. For example, ball bearings are found in all types of vehicles, such as in gearboxes and wheel suspension; there are even ball bearings in fighter jets and space shuttles. RDB has always operated in the business-to-business (B2B) market. Throughout the twentieth century, it expanded by internal/organic growth. Consistent with business thinking of that era, the company concentrated its manufacturing in three megafactories (very large factories) located in Denmark, northern Germany and Sweden, where the workforce had become highly skilled in operating machinery for industrial production. Benefiting from several economies of scale, RDB created thousands of jobs, supporting the “company towns” where they were the main employer, held in high esteem both locally and regionally.

RDB remained profitable and maintained brand loyalty. However, financially, gross and net profit margins were lower than previously, which Valdemar thought was unavoidable. Internally, some maintenance and technological upgrades were being delayed – but Valdemar did not pay attention to this. Externally, some environmental campaigners started to put pressure on RDB because of the high pollution levels in the vicinity of RDB factories – but Valdemar ignored their claims. Valdemar was proud of the company’s traditions. It remained privately owned by members of the Holstein family. Valdemar, like his father, had a paternalistic leadership style – though he could occasionally be autocratic, especially when the workers’ collective bargaining agreements were being renegotiated. Although there were few opportunities for promotion, the employees liked RDB’s corporate culture. They too were proud of working for a well-known, well-established and well-respected company. They were well paid, enjoyed working in a culturally homogeneous environment, and felt that their jobs were secure. Many of the workers’ fathers and, in some cases, their grandfathers, had worked for RDB. Work patterns and practices followed the northern European Christian calendar and local traditions. Getting a job at RDB was like “joining a family”. The employees all appreciated their job security, their high standard of living and their working environment. A cautious manager, Valdemar always tried to manage risks. He regularly consulted economists and other specialists in order to minimize the impacts of changes in the external environment. Over the years, these efforts proved worthwhile. For example, RDB remained largely unaffected by the 1970s energy crisis. Every year, Valdemar reviewed RDB’s contingency plans; this helped him avoid a possible technological disaster in 2000 with the so-called “millennium bug”. A crisis that Valdemar had not foreseen was the sudden collapse of Icelandic banks Kaupthing and Landsbanki in 2008; RDB had funds in saving accounts in those two banks. However, it later managed to recover most of these funds. In terms of operations, RDB manufactured standard-sized ball bearings in a flow production process. It sometimes used batch production for deliveries to established customers who used non-standard-sized ball bearings, and sometimes job production for one-off special orders, such as large ball bearing systems for power stations or mines. In all respects, from human resource management to operations, Valdemar felt that RDB was ready for the twenty-first century.

Anna had big ideas for RDB. A scientific and analytical thinker, she had carefully studied the external environment in which RDB operates. She knew that demand for ball bearings was slowing down in Europe, whereas it was growing substantially in countries such as Brazil, China and India that were going through a phase of strong industrialization. From her research, she also concluded that manufacturing in the twenty-first century would be accomplished in smaller, more flexible factories, instead of the huge modernist structures typical of the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Time would be the critical factor; having factories close to customers’ locations would reduce response time and improve logistics, including distribution and delivery. This would also shorten the working capital cycle – an important benefit for RDB. Given her international experience, working at RDB made Anna realize that her colleagues in the Engineering Department, and even the entire RDB workforce, needed a better cultural understanding of their customers. The best way to achieve this, she thought, would be through a workforce that resembled RDB’s customers, and increasingly they would be from Asia, India and South America. She was also convinced that RDB had to focus on “green” technologies and its corporate social responsibility. The company would have to significantly increase its spending on research and development (R&D) and also examine its impact on the environment and on its customers’ carbon footprint. The two are linked, Anna reasoned: the ultimate aim of innovation in the ball bearing industry is to save energy, which is fundamentally what ball bearings do by reducing friction. For users, better ball bearings mean less friction and, in turn, less friction means that less energy is wasted. Thus, less energy is needed. Anna’s vision for RDB was to make the world’s most technologically advanced, energy-efficient ball bearings in small “green” factories located near its customers. This would require selling the two megafactories in northern Germany and Sweden, and significantly downsizing the one in Denmark. RDB’s production would be offshored to 12 small factories to be opened around the world, mainly in Brazil, China and India. In terms of workforce planning, each of those new RDB factories would be jointly managed by one experienced RDB senior manager from Europe and one local manager familiar with the language and culture. Some machinists from RDB’s European factories would be offered key positions. Most of the existing jobs in Europe would be made redundant, as most of the new workers would be recruited locally on lower wages. Northern European countries have generous redundancy payments, largely funded by the employers, and these costs would be significant in the short term. In the long term, however, RDB would lower labour costs. Marketing would also play a major role in the new RDB that Anna imagined. RDB’s marketing department had always been “sleepy”, with a small budget and unchallenging objectives. Advertising and promotion were limited to some trade journals and trade shows. Anna thought that this should change. She believed that RDB should advertise in a wider range of publications, including e-zines (online magazines) and professional web sites for industrial design and architectural robotics. She wanted to use information and communication technology (ICT) to communicate to a wider range of external stakeholders. That way, RDB would create brand awareness in the design community, and not just in the manufacturing community. The marketing department should start carrying out market research, both primary and secondary. Anna also pictured groups of RDB “engineers-turned-salesmen” calling on major manufacturers to generate orders, whilst other staff would pressure politicians for more legislation and incentives to support environmentally-friendly products.

Anna wrote all the details of her ideas in a strategic plan that she named “RDB 2020”. She calculated that the transition costs for such a large-scale restructuring would be enormous. In order to generate 50 % of the funds required, RDB would need to sell the two megafactories in northern Germany and Sweden. For the rest of the funds, Anna would list RDB on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange: RDB would become a public limited company, with funds generated from the sale of newly issued shares. Anna was very pleased with her overall strategy for RDB; she found it coherent, consistent and forward-looking. Valdemar’s counterproposals Valdemar was stunned when Anna explained her “RDB 2020” strategic plan to him. Although he recognized that manufacturing was shifting away from Europe, and that RDB had to become more environmentally conscious, he had major objections. “RDB is a Danish company”, he insisted, “we managed to expand significantly after the first world war thanks to a major contract from the Danish government”. He felt a moral obligation to provide jobs in Denmark. At times, RDB had also formed public-private partnerships with the Swedish and German governments for various projects. The workforce was local and loyal; Valdemar felt like a father to them; a major retrenchment would be a violation of the “social contract” he implicitly had with them. He also despised the idea of RDB going public. Despite Anna’s assurances that the Holstein family would still be the major shareholder, he did not want to answer to shareholders who were not family members and had no sense of the company’s history or traditions. He had a bad feeling about this. He also did not like the idea of the relocation of the factories. A lifelong industrialist, he loved to see his three megafactories in northern Europe. Their scale of operation was so vast that expansions had been coordinated with the local urban planning authorities; the Swedish factory was so large that railroad lines had been installed in order to deliver supplies and to transport finished products. It was beyond his imagination that small factories operating in industrial parks on the outskirts of Mumbai or São Paulo could accomplish the same as the European ones. Despite Valdemar’s objections, Anna told him that she would speak to other shareholders in the family and could collectively force the company to change. He asked her for time to come up with an alternative proposal that would incorporate “some” of her ideas. A month later he suggested the following to her: • Rebrand the company, changing its name from “Royal Danish Bearings” to “Green Bearings, an RDB Company” and adopt Anna’s marketing strategy. Green Bearings would be “green” in name only. • Remain in northern Europe, but divide each of the three megafactories into autonomous cells, each assigned to serve a region of the world and each with its own strategic and tactical/ operational objectives. Local salesmen would be hired, paid low salaries, but with high commissions as an incentive. This would make the company look more international, but the current workforce in Europe would not change. • Form strategic alliances with ball bearing companies in Brazil, China and India.

Anna’s vision for RDB was to make the world’s most technologically advanced, energy-efficient ball bearings in small “green” factories located near its customers. This would require selling the two megafactories in northern Germany and Sweden, and significantly downsizing the one in Denmark. RDB’s production would be offshored to 12 small factories to be opened around the world, mainly in Brazil, China and India. In terms of workforce planning, each of those new RDB factories would be jointly managed by one experienced RDB senior manager from Europe and one local manager familiar with the language and culture. Some machinists from RDB’s European factories would be offered key positions. Most of the existing jobs in Europe would be made redundant, as most of the new workers would be recruited locally on lower wages. Northern European countries have generous redundancy payments, largely funded by the employers, and these costs would be significant in the short term. In the long term, however, RDB would lower labour costs.