Introduction
Preventing accidents and ill health caused by work is an increasing priority for the owners and managers of businesses. Effective training in all aspects of health
and safety is one key way of limiting the number of such incidents by ensuring that employees undertake their activities competently and a positive health and safety
culture is put in place.
You have just been appointed as the Managing Director of a health and safety training company, Interactive Health and Safety Training (IHST). The company is well
established and has been operating in your region for the past twelve years.
IHST provides a wide range of training courses in the form of public courses, in-house courses, distance courses and e-learning products. Topics covered by these
courses are:
? Control of Hazardous Substances
? Ergonomics/Display Screen Usage
? Safe Handling Techniques
? Working at Heights
? Electrical Safety
? Conducting Risk Assessments
? Safety for Managers
? Development of Health & Safety Policies
IHST staff are responsible for the development of all types of courses, and for the actual presentation of both public and in-house courses.
IHST has three main customer sectors which are listed below together with the current year’s sales revenue for each sector.
? Chemical Industry ($400,000)
? Construction Industry ($1,200,000)
? Government Offices ($900,000)
IHST currently adopts a functional structure to the way in which it organises itself. The range of employees is as follows.
? A Management team of 1 Managing Director (yourself), 1 Finance Director and 1 Business Development Director
? A Training Development team of 6 courseware developers, 3 e-learning developers and 3 designers/graphic artists
? A Training Delivery team of 8 lecturers
? A Sales and Marketing team of 2 sales managers, 3 marketing assistants and 1 website manager
? A Finance and Administration team of 2 finance officers and 2 administrators
? A Human Resources team of 1 HR manager and 1 HR assistant
The total cost for labour, overheads and capital expenditure for the current year is $2,400,000.
The health and safety training industry has become very competitive and the profit margins of the public courses, in-house courses and distance courses offered by
IHST have dropped significantly as they have had to discount their prices. However the profit margins for e-learning products continue to be very attractive.
Understanding Business Organisations June 2013 Final ? NCC Education 2013
It is as a direct consequence of these rising costs and decreasing margins that you have been appointed as Managing Director to carry out a restructuring of the
business. Your remit is as follows.
? To consider the strategic direction for the company in terms of the products and services it develops, the markets it sells into and any new opportunities that
could be exploited
? To develop an organisational structure that maps against the planned strategic direction of the company
? To ensure that any resultant organisational change is managed as effectively as possible
? To develop an outline budget for the company for the coming year against which performance can be monitored
Assignment
The first stage of the assignment is to present the plans for the restructuring of the company to the members of staff. You have decided that the best way forward for
the company is to develop and implement a strategy that will focus upon the markets in which IHST operates. You are therefore proposing to introduce a divisional
approach to the organisation’s structure.
You are particularly keen to exploit new technologies in order to make the company more efficient and effective, so you will consider the potential for using both
intranets and extranets.
Effective communication with all members of staff will be a key requirement of the new structure, so you will need to demonstrate to members of staff that you have
considered how effective communications can be achieved at both a formal and informal level on an on-going basis.
You have also been asked to ensure that any resultant change arising out of your plans is introduced in the most effective manner and as part of this you need to
demonstrate how you will handle any possible staff resistance to this change.
Finally, you need to show an awareness of the main components of a corporate budget and how this can enable the performance of the company to be measured.
Task 1 – 6 Marks
You need to research the range of products and services offered by a health and safety training company. You should research not only the development of training
materials and training courses, but also the delivery of these to businesses of all sizes. Use a maximum of an hour to review the sources you find.
Write a brief summary of your findings and conclusions, noting the sources you have used.
Task 2 – 4 Marks
Produce a project plan for the way you intend to complete the rest of this assignment. For planning, use the timescale you have been allocated for this assignment
i.e. from the date you start to the date you submit your assignment. Submit a copy of your plan to your tutor before you proceed further with the assignment.
Understanding Business Organisations June 2013 Final ? NCC Education 2013
Task 3 – 22 Marks
Using PowerPoint, or a similar tool, put together a maximum of twelve slides that could be used as the basis of a presentation to the staff members of IHST. The
presentation should clearly show your proposals for a new divisional-based structure. This structure may include, if necessary, up to three additional members of staff
over and above the current levels and should reflect the size of the respective market sectors that will be served by the various teams/divisions. The structure should
clearly show the various roles and lines of authority. You should also specify THREE (3) potential benefits that this divisional-based structure can provide to the
company and THREE (3) potential benefits to the individual staff members.
Task 4 – 16 Marks
Produce a briefing note of no more than 400 words that describes the main features of an intranet and an extranet. The note should also include FOUR (4) examples of
how each of these different systems can be used to provide benefits for IHST.
Task 5 – 20 Marks
Put together a list of FOUR (4) potential barriers to effective communication that may exist when the new divisional-based organisation structure is introduced within
IHST. For each potential barrier you should describe one significant problem that may result from this and explain how you propose to address it.
Task 6 – 17 Marks
Produce a document of no more than 600 words that focuses upon possible resistance from the staff to your proposed changes. The document should do the following.
? Briefly explain why staff may be resistant to change.
? Give THREE (3) examples of what form this resistance to change might take.
? For each example, explain how you propose to address this resistance so that it does not impact negatively upon the proposed change.
Task 7 – 15 Marks
Produce a list of the main components of a corporate budget, briefly explaining what each component is intended to address. Briefly explain how a budget can be used
to measure performance and list TWO (2) actions that could be taken if the manager of a team or division consistently fails to achieve his/her budget.
