Sample essay 2: comments on structure

Transcription

1 Academic writing skills for postgraduates: masters coursework Sample essay 2: comments on structure Topic: Who is responsible for the maintenance and development of vocational skill- employees, employers or both? Why is such training important? Support your answer with reference to the literature. This essay received quite a high mark because the content is good. It would have achieved a much higher mark if it had been better structured so that the reader could easily see where the argument iis going. The comments on the essay itself (following pages) refer to the structure of the essay only. There are several other aspects this student could work on to improve the essay. 1. Nuisance errors. Although they do not really impede understanding, the essay would read much better if these grammatical errors were fixed up. The errors are mostly poor choices in tense definite or indefinite article, singular and plural agreement of verb and subject.. Permission to reproduce without alteration, provided source is acknowledged.

2 2. Referring to sources The student has relied too much on De Ceiri et.al. and a couple of others as a sources. Avoid having whole paragraphs reporting what one source has said. Instead of saying X says, Y says, try to synthesise the information by summarising what several writers have said on the same sub-topic. ( see Module 3, section 2 for ideas on how to do this). 2

3 Academic writing skills for postgraduates: masters coursework Australian economy is becoming more and more a part of the world s economy and it results from the effect of globalisation process (Marles, 2003). De Ceiri et, al (2003) showed that globalisation has impacted considerably on many Australian organizations and they must compete with foreign competitions at home and overseas. Comment [91]: This paragraph has good content, but it reads like an introduction to an essay on globalisation. I suggest that this whole paragraph be included later as support for an argument about competitive advantage. As a result, the Australian organizations must develop global market, use their practice to improve global competitiveness and better preparation for employees for global assignments. Higley (2004) indicated that competitive advantage exists not just in differentiating a product or service or in becoming the low cost leader but in also being able to extend the company s special skills or core competencies and rapidly respond to customer s needs and competitor s moves. Furthermore, there is greater recognition that distinctive competencies are obtained through highly developed employee skills, distinctive organizational cultures and management processes. He argued that this is in contrast to the traditional emphasis on transferable resources such as equipment. Moreover, it is being recognized that competitive advantage can be obtained with a high quality workforce that allows organizations to compete on the basis of market responsiveness, product and service quality, differentiated products and technological innovation. For that reason, an effective human resource management practices is useful for organizations, especially for small and medium firms, to achieve competitive advantage. According to Noe, et, al, 2003, human resource management practices consists of six menus and they are: job analysis/ design, recruitment/ selection, training and development, performance management, pay structure/ incentive/ benefits and Permission to reproduce without alteration, provided source is acknowledged.

4 employee relations, from which company can choose the ones that are most suitable and efficient. Although each aspect has specific role in maintaining organization s competitive advantage, employee development is a key element because of developing a human capital pool that gives the organization the unique ability to adapt to an ever- changing environment (De Ceiri et, al, 2003). They suggested that a structured and suitable training program would result in the improvement of employee s quality and firm s competitive advantage. Therefore, this essay will discuss the role of training in gaining competitive advantage and responsibilities of employer and employee for the maintenance and development of employee s vocational skill. According to De Ceiri et,al (2003) training refers to a planned effort by a company to facilitate employees learning of job related abilities. These abilities include knowledge, skills or behaviours that are significant for successful job performance. They noted that Australian companies are starting to recognise the important role that training plays in improving productivity, quality and competitiveness. Kramar et, al (1997) demonstrated training has a positive impact for the individual and the organization. Firstly, training increases the earnings and opportunities open to every employee. Many organizations prefer pay for the Comment [92]: I suggest you make this your first paragraph. You have identified three key parts of your argument: 1. Competitive advantage, 2. Responsibilities of employer and 3. Responsibilities of employee. You could also build in a thesis statement which predicts your point of view. Comment [93]: This is a good section on What is training? You could insert your original first paragraph on competitiveness before this section, as it gives a rationale for training. Comment [94]: Break up these long paragraphs. Here is a good place to start a new subtopic. employees based on the skill levels they achieved rather than for job title their hold (Dessler, 2003). Skill- based pay encouraged employee to learn several skills and selfimprovement up to date their skill to gain higher earnings. De Ceiri et,at (2003) argued that the highest wages are earned by employees who have the highest skill. Skilled and qualified workers also tend to retain their earning differentials more effectively than non- skilled worked. They showed that in the US that high school dropouts saw their average earnings decrease by up to 40 percent in 1980s while those with a college 2

5 degree suffered only an 11 percent decrease in earnings over the same period. Secondly, Comment [95]: Here is another place to start a new sub-topic. for organization, the importance of training lies on its links to performance and competitiveness. Training provides employees the basic skill to work with new technology and helps employees understand how to work effectively in team to contribute to product and service quality (De Ceiri, et,al, 2003). Consequently, training has the potential to improve labour productivity, improve the quality of output and improve the ability of the organization to manage with change. M& M Cables in NSW Comment [96]: This is a long example, give it a new paragraph is an illustration that had some positive changes resulted from training (Education and Training, 1999). M &M Cables cooperated with a local technical college to give operations employees training in machine maintenance in order to operate in highperformance work system. The training was carried out but no strategic plan was devised to have the operator s take on maintenance task. Some employees stated that there were insufficient numbers of employees to operate the machinery and a few of college courses do not make operatives into tradesman. And then HR department must convert the training to an attributed mentoring program, where skill maintenance employees worked beside college staff to deliver and assess the operatives training in house. Many employees said that self-paced training on the job was more practical and easier to understand than college- based training as they were learning on the machine they used everyday and the training was neither aggressive nor mandatory. As can bee seen from the situation of M& M Cables, training led to the improvement the quality of employees and distribution the increase the quality of product. It is undeniable that training can bring some benefits for both employee and employer. Therefore employee and employer are responsible to perform an appropriate training program to maintenance and development the vocational skill of employees. Comment [97]: This looks like the introduction to the second part of your essayanswering the question, Whose responsibility is training? Comment [98]: This looks like your thesis statement- you could have used this in your introduction to set the overall tone. 3

6 First, it will discuss the role of employer in terms of providing a structured training and budgets for training policy. De Ceiri et, al (2003) stated many companies were increased their expenditure on structured training. HR focus (1999) pointed out that Comment [99]: You have a paragraph here of one and a half pages! This is much too long. I suggest you break it into sub sections as indicated below. after a steady decline in training expenditures, Australian organizations are spending more on training, especially in the human resources department, according to the latest HR Benchmarking Annual Report, released by the Australian-based HRM Consulting. The survey of 190 organizations found that training investment jumped to $705 (Australian dollar) in 1998, up from $454 the previous year, which was the lowest level of training since HRM launched the survey in In a new feature of the latest report, HRM measured HR training and investment per employee and found that organizations are spending about $1,024 on training for HR staff. According to a recent survey by the Nierenberg Group, New York, 72% of employees said that they get enough training from their employers (Rodger, 2001). Employers offered employees the opportunity to add new skills will probably be more successful in attracting new hires and retaining existing ones than employers without such programs. On the one hand, a structured Comment [910]: Here is a good place to start a new paragraph. training is an initial step, which led to the successful of training program. A structured training should be designed base on organisational analysis to point out the strengths and weaknesses of employee and then employer will choose training as the solution to any pressure point (De Ceiri et, al, 2003). They suggested employer should give needs assessment to show what is necessary if training needed. Needs assessment includes organisational analysis, person analysis and task analysis. Organisational involves determining the appropriateness of training, given the company s business strategy. Person analysis helps to recognize who needs raining and task analysis consists of identifying the important task and knowledge, skill and behaviour that need to focus in training for employees to complete their task (De Ceiri, et, al, 2003). On the other 4

7 hand, it is necessary to identify whether company has time and budgets for training. Comment [911]: Here is another place to start a new paragraph. Noe et,al (2003) pointed out that the training program often launched when the organizations want to improve their competitive advantage by investing on new technology and manufacturing equipment. Chappell (2004) showed a situation, which occurs when Honda Motor Co started the move toward more flexible auto factories. Although Honda s North American production volume grew rapidly now, it was frustrated in the late 1990s because they were not able to respond quickly to market changes. Therefore after company running, Honda is plotting its next step: bettertraining worker to keep its competitive edge. According to Chappell (2004), training developed Honda s employee skill to utilize its equipment and ensure that managers and assembly workers can run some of the industry s most versatile auto plants. COE of Honda America Manufacturing In.c said that every company now seemed to have good equipment therefore our company could not achieve those successful without a strategy training for employees. It is very clear that many companies recognised the value of training in gaining their competitive advantage and increase their expenditure on training. Although the employer is responsible for maintenance and development employee s skill, a successful training needs a contribution from employees. Noe et, al (2003) indicated that employee must know why they should learn and they needed to have opportunities Comment [912]: This section is about the responsibilites of employees nice pair of topic sentences. to practise what they learnt. They argued that employees must know their skill strengths and weaknesses and the link between the training programs to improve their weaknesses. And employee will learn best when they understand the objectives of the training program. A good training objective provides a clear idea of what the trainees are expected to do at the end of the training. Moreover, skill- based pay is a reason that 5

8 motivates employee to take part in the training program. Plenert (2000) showed Comment [913]: Give this long example a paragraph of its own. Precision Priters Inc (PPI) as such a successful company with training employee s skill when the company moved from a focus on quantity to quality. He said that the most important thing is that the employees had to know what was expected of them and what they could do to ensure that the transition became a reality. He introduced a training program that focused on reducing the amount of inventory held. The employees were told that quality improvements came from them and not necessarily management. He also pointed out that in order to improve quality product, the employees were introduced to the ideas of teamwork, goal setting and empowerment. They were allowed to pull apart machinery, move anything and meet with anyone in order to produce perfection product in training period. According to Plenert, after eight months the shift in emphasis from quantity to quality at PPI obtained remarkable changes. Although defect rates increased in certain periods, overall the rate of defect decreased. Similarly, customer complaint began to go down and the amount of volume sales also increased (Plenert, 2000). It can be recognized that training program is necessary for PPI s employees. It provides new skill, knowledge, and abilities to the employees to improve quality of product in order to satisfy the customer needs. In addition, working in-group is the most popular method to encourage employee responsibility, control and help raised employee s productivity. In conclusion, it can be seen that competitive advantage can be obtained with a high quality workforce that allows organizations to compete on the basis of market responsiveness, product and service quality, differentiated products and technological innovation. An organization could achieve its competitive edge by performing a valuable human resource management practices and training was one solution, which is, 6

9 chose to improve the quality and productivity of employee. A successful training program means a structured training program and having the participation of both employer and employee. The responsibilities of employer are providing a suitable training program and the budgets to perform it (De Ceiri et, al, 2003). And employee has duty to participate in the training process and give the feedback to employer. According to Education and Training (1999), the full benefit of training will be realized if the learning process is seen as an ongoing part of people s job and employers go out of their way to ensure that employees get the chance to practice the skills they acquire. Moreover, training and development employee s vocational skill should be performed continuously in order to improve the quality of work force, which led to the increase of the organization s competitive advantage. Comment [914]: A nice strong conclusion. You should not be referring to the literature at this stage- all these ideas should have been in the body. Here you can just summarise them without references. 7

10 Reference List Anonymous, Training budgets fattened in Australia. HR focus. 76( 9), 5 Anonymous, M&M Cables connects training with employment. Education and Training. 41 (2), Chappell, L., Worker training is next Honda frontier. Automotive News. 79 (6111), 43. De Ceiri, H and Kramar, R et, al., Human resource management in Australia: Strategy, people, performance. Australia: McGraw Hill. Dessler, G., Human Resource Management. 9 th ed. US: Prentice Hall. Higley, J., Companies refocus on training. Hotel and Motel Management. 219 (13), 1. Kramar, R et, al., Human Resource Management in Australia. 3 rd ed. Australia: Longman. Marles, R., Working Hours and Work Intensification Presentation, 19 August 2003 Melbourne. Australia: ACTU. Noe, G.L et.al., Human Resource Management: Gaining Competitive Advantage. 3 rd. Australia: McGraw Hill. Plenert, G., In black and white. Human Resource Management International Digest. 8(4), Rodger, S., Training to succeed. Credit Union Magazine. 67 (12), 8. 8