Applied Human Resource Management Competence (HRM3701)
Exam (elaborations)
HRM3701 Assignment 1 Semester 2 2024 | Due 26 August 2024
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Course
Applied Human Resource Management Competence (HRM3701)
Institution
University Of South Africa (Unisa)
Book
Fundamentals of Human Resource Management
HRM3701 Assignment 1 Semester 2 2024 | Due 26 August 2024. All questions are answers.
HRM3701 Assignment 1 Semester 2 2024 | Due 26 August 2024. All Questions Answered. Read The Following Case Study And Answer The Questions That Follow.
Operational Context
NOVA Economics Is A Specialist Econom...
Applied Human Resource Management Competence (HRM3701)
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Read the following case study and answer the questions that follow.
Operational context
NOVA Economics is a specialist economic and development consulting firm which employs 120
people, the consultants are all economists, financial analysts and computer scientists. Most of the staff
are between their 30s and mid-40s many with master’s degrees and some with PhDs. Founded in 2002,
NOVA Economics provides clients with the in-depth expertise and analysis necessary to make the
right choices. The consultants combine a deep understanding of the Southern African business and
policy context with specialist skills in international trade, public policy and regulation, competition
economics and climate change. The work is very technical, involving large amounts of data analysis.
Where NOVA Economics does not have specialist skills in-house, the consulting firm was able to
draw on a network of local experts and academics as well as their strategic business partners in
Australia and Europe.
Before lockdown, staff were used to remote videoconferencing with clients, and company policy
allowed working from home one day a week, but this wasn’t particularly commonplace. The
Managing Director Yash Ramkolowan commented that ‘even if once a week someone would work
from home, the rest of the team would be in the office, so it did have the feeling that most people were
in the office most of the time.’ In terms of flexible hours, there was already a culture of flexing the
start and end of the day, both for work–life balance needs and to enable meetings with “THEIR”
clients in different time zones. While some staff made use of this, many also worked traditional office
hours, and core hours of 11.00 to 15.00 were in place.
The type of knowledge work done by NOVA Economics could hardly be better suited to working from
home, or indeed to flexing hours; as Yash commented:
‘In terms of our client needs, there isn’t any specific need to be in the office or producing from very
set hours. A lot of the work that we do is quite internally focused.’ The consultants’ work is also
mostly highly plannable: they speak regularly to clients but have a good deal of autonomy over when
those calls take place. However, when the pandemic enforced total, five-days-a-week homeworking,
something was lost from team communication.
Head of HR Kate Dabula commented:
‘There is no substitute for that soft social interaction that happens by default, when you are in the
office together. There’s something that just isn’t the same, and we haven’t found that magic button to
replace it yet.’ Even for extremely motivated, high-performing knowledge workers who are ‘really
engaged in the subject matter’ Kate said, ‘Some of that energy that you get from being together as a
team, it’s much harder to replicate when you’re at home. However, I am surprised that it is not
impacting on their work. The deadlines still get met, the quality of work is there, but there’s a sort of
energy around it, an excitement, a feeling, when you’re in the office. We noticed a slump. There was
also an impact on brainstorming. The informal dialogue and information-sharing that happens
naturally when employees are together takes a lot more effort when employees are working
remotely.’
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