Instructions to Candidates:

Time allowed: 24 Hours (Start: 10am on 26/04/2021 and Deadline for submission: 10am on 27/04/2021). (Please note that you can submit your answers anytime between the start and the submission deadline).

There are two compulsory questions which have equal weighting i.e., 50 marks each; please answer all questions.

Please note that this is a case-study-based TCA. Your answers should address the case study context.

Candidates are expected to make reference to relevant theory and concepts in their answers.

Candidates are expected to reference sources and include a bibliography.

Workforce Diversity at Roybit Solutions

Roybit Solutions is a leading IT and business services consultancy delivering consultancy and outsourcing services and technological business solutions.It currently employs 10,000 people worldwide.Established in the 1974 by three recent university graduates, it has risen to be one of Europe's most innovative consultancies. It currently has activities in over 40 countries and places great stress on its ability to understand and responds to the needs of its clients or 'partner' needs in any market in any country. Despite their size and origins in the UK where their headquarters remains, Roybit Solutions have sought to position themselves as a 'global in capability, local in application', combining the best talent from around the world to deliver tailored solutions to clients' problems. The CEO of the company is still Noah Lennox, one of the original founders of the company (the two other founders have long since left the company, one having had a falling out with Lennox, the other to pursue alternative business opportunities).

A key focus of Lennox's leadership - and arguably an integral part of the company' success

- has been to create a strong corporate culture centred around Roybit Solutions core values (innovation, integrity, respect, quality, value). The company stresses the importance of these corporate values when recruiting new members of staff. Europe and North America have been the main markets for Roybit Solutions in the past, but Lennox has recently unveiled ambitious plans for a stronger presence in both South America and the Far East. Integral to these expansion plans is the recruitment of a significantly increased number of graduate recruits on its graduate development programme.

Typically, Roybit Solutions has focused its graduate recruitment on redbrick universities, reflecting the long-held view that they are the best source of technical graduates. Most of their 200+ annual graduate intake typically comes from 20 universities, although occasionally outstanding candidates from newer universities are accepted on the graduate development programme. In line with the emphasis on the importance placed on person - organisation fit and the focus in induction of inculcating core values, Roybit Solutions has tended to prefer to recruit 'blank canvases' who can be moulded into 'Roybit Solutions people'.

Following feedback from clients that Roybit Solution's systems developers and designers can often lack the ability to convey complex ideas to non-experts, the company has begun to stress the importance of recruiting new employees on the basis of possessing both technical expertise (which has tended to be the pre-eminent concern) and interpersonal/communication skills. Drawing on this emphasis, Roybit Solutions has developed a competency framework to reflect the 'ideal employee' that provides the basis for HR decisions in the areas of recruitment, learning and development and performance management, which has been rolled out throughout the company. This framework had been based on assessing the characteristics and behaviours of corporate high-flyers.

At a recent meeting, however, one senior manager at a US client joked to Lennox that Roybit Solutions must have a corporate 'cookie cutter' which they use to produce identikit employees. This has concerned Lennox and he instructed HR to explore the issue of workforce diversity.Initial findings suggest a notable lack of diversity - particularly with regards to age and gender - among the grades of workers that are the visible face of Roybit Solutions and that spend considerable amounts of time at client's premises, often undertaking international assignments, and are responsible for designing technological solutions to client problems.

Questions.

You are to answer ALL questions; each question carries equal marks.

(1)Why should the CEO consider this lack of diversity to be a problem for the organisation? In your answer, you should consider the potential HR outcomes and wider business issues in managing diversity.(50 marks)

(2)What recommendations would you make to Roybit Solutions to help resolve this lack of diversity?In your answers, you should consider a range of processes which enable organisations to managing diversity effectively.(50 marks)