...Case Study: Treadway Tire Company 1 Case Study: Treadway Tire Company Case Study: Treadway Tire Company S. LaDuew GB520: Strategic Human Resource Management Case Study: Treadway Tire Company 2 Treadway Tire Company When Ashley Wall had just finished attending a meeting at work, the plant manager Brandon Bellingham stated “we have a serious problem” (Skinner & Beckham, 2008, p.1). Wall had just presented the figures for the plants projected turnover rates for foremen the year ending in 2007. Bellingham was not happy because they had 50 foremen at their Lima Plant and in 2007 23 of those positions were turned over. When the Treadway plant closed in Greenville, South Carolina in 2006 Ashley Wall was transferred to the plant in Lima where her position was going to be the Director of Human Resources, since she already had over 10 years of work experience in the Human Resource department with Treadway Company. Wall had decided to make it her top priority to do what she could to reduce the foremen turnover rate at the Lima Plant since it had the highest foremen turnover rate out of all of the other Treadway plants in their division. Wall planned...
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...During 2007 the Treadway Tire Company had produced approximately 25,000 passenger and light truck tires per day. About 1,120 people were employed at the Lima, Ohio location; 970 hourly and 150 were salary. The Lima Plant undergone $100 million dollar expansion and modernization which enabled the plant to increase capacity and utilize new manufacturing technology. Due to the modernization Lima had become one of the company top plants for productivity and quality ratings. In 2006 Treadway closed its Greensville, South Carolina plant, which were plagued by outdated equipment, and move all its volume to the Lima location. As a result Lima shifted to 24 hours a day, seven days a week, with four rotating shifts. Most employees work 12 hour shifts. The hourly production employees were supervised by 50 salaried line foreman. The foreman role was the largest at Lima; they were involved in the three phases of rubber component preparation, tire assembly, and curing/final finish. Line foreman also had to manage union and administration procedures. They documented employee disciplinary action and negotiated work standards with union reps. At the end of their shifts foreman spent time scheduling hourly employees, approving vacation requests, checking time sheets and solving payroll issues. Morale was a problem at the Lima Plant. Out of 50 line foreman 23 had turnover in 2007 at the Lima Plant. An employee satisfaction survey was conducted in 2007 and exit interviews of departing...
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...Transcript of Case study 2: The Treadway Tire Company Case Study 2 The Treadway Tire Company: Job Dissatisfaction and High Turnover at the Lima Tire Plant -The IT company in this movie has a terrible employee organization, as well as over pressured managers who tend to hassle lower employees, which causes main Character Peter Gibbons to be highly unsatisfied with his job and sabotage the company -Retail and Restaurant industry has some of the highest turnover rates. But the retail stores and restaurants that fully train their employees, are flexible and institute a culture that fosters loyalty are the ones that most overcome job dissatisfaction - Balance hiring policy by adhering to 60% internal hires, 30%college graduates & 10% company transfers - Implement rotating 8 hour shifts instead of 12 hour shifts - Re-institure the month long rotational training program for foremen - As they learn new task they gain higher pay so this month long training doesn't cost company too much - Start an internship program that brings in potential employees without having to pay them unless they are offered a full-time job -Assign area managers as formal mentors to expose foremen to the key processes in the plant as well as inform them on authority and Union issues -Then routinely assess job satisfaction and be ready to change plan when necessary Works Cited How to Keep Your Best Employees: Developing an Effective Retention Policy [and Executive Commentary] Terence R. Mitchell, Brooks...
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...QUESTIONS: 1) What is the relationship between line foreman at Treadway’s Lima Plant and other groups within the plant : General supervisors and areas managers, top management, the union, hourly workers, each other? Treadway Tire Company is one of the largest producers of tires. The Lima plant located at Lima in Ohio had 1,120 employees. 970 of them were hourly employees and 150 were salaried employees. They work in 12-hour shifts. Line foremen are salaried floor level managers who supervise hourly employees. 970 hourly workers were supervised by 50 line foremen. Line foremen didn’t have good relationship with hourly workers. They expressed concerns about their lack of authority and adversarial relations with the hourly workers. Several incidents highlighted tension between hourly workers and line foremen. Line foremen were supervised by 13 general supervisors. Line foremen are endowed with lot of responsibilities. General supervisors abused and threatened the line foremen with poor performance review if they are unable to meet the forecasted performance. This indicates poor relationship between them. The responsibilities of the line foremen include documenting the employee disciplinary actions and negotiating the work standards with union reps. The union reps on grievance committee sometimes provides cleared record the hourly employee without providing any explanations to the line foremen. There isn’t much...
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...* The second problem for The Treadway Tire Company is the lack of good leadership approach. The first source of this problem is the failure of management to provide adequate training to foremen. Whenever a foreman joins the company, he only receives informal training at the discretion of the general supervisor and area manager. One of the general supervisor, Herb Adams, is reported to have said that he tell guys to take control to survive on the plant floor and keep their eyes open for the trouble makers. The managers want the foremen to adopt the old tied-and-true management like they did in old days. This is an example of Laissez-fare leadership style which is characterized by having very little guidance from managers, complete freedom for followers (foremen) to make decisions and is expected to solve problems on their own. Notice that laissez fare only works best when the followers (foremen) have the necessary skills and knowledge to complete their task. This is a major challenge for foremen who are expected to perform best without having the mandatory training to enhance their skills and knowledge. The absence of proper training leads to job dissatisfaction. Exhibit 5 shows the Sample Exit Interview filled out by a line foreman, which states the clear reason for leaving job is job dissatisfaction. He also described that his supervisor would just say “Do it” without having received any training on how to do the job. This also leads to low morale in foremen and they were less...
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...The Treadway Case September 11, 2014 Relationship between line foremen at Treadway’s Lima Plant and other groups within the plant: general supervisors and area manager, top management, the union, hourly workers, and each other. The relationship between the Treadway’s Lima Plant foremen and other groups within the plant can only be described as insanity. One could easily say that insanity is repeating the same behavior over and over again and expecting a different result. The line foremen are required to work 12 hour shifts, solve a multitude of personnel, resource, and administrative issues and still meet daily production goals. Now add a union environment, no formal training for foremen, no chance of upward mobility, and a lack of communication between management (foremen, general supervisors and area managers), and you end up with a high turnover rate. According to the Plant manager, “Meeting performance goals is the most important duty of a line foreman.” This statement has caused the foreman to only focus on line metrics. Foremen have been threatened with poor performance reviews if production numbers are not met. This behavior has created a hostile work environment and isolated the foremen from the rest of the plant. They feel that their contributions are undervalued and their concerns ignored. There is no formal training process in place to familiarize foremen with the different aspects of their role within the plant. There was a month-long rotational training...
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...Foreman Turnover Improvement Plan Treadway Tire Company Lima, Ohio Plant Spring Semester, April 24, 2014 April 24, 2014 Treadway Tire Plant, Lima, Ohio Foreman Turnover Improvement Plan Treadway Tire Company Lima, Ohio Plant Spring Semester, April 24, 2014 April 24, 2014 Treadway Tire Plant, Lima, Ohio ------------------------------------------------- Table of Contents Overview……………………………………………2 Objective…………………………………………...3 Findings……………………………………………..3 Solutions/recommendations………………4 conclusion………………………………………..10 Referneces……………………………………….11 Treadway Tire Plant, Lima, Ohio Foreman Turnover Improvement Plan Overview The Treadway Tire Plant, located in Lima, Ohio, has a unionized workforce of 970 hourly employees’ and150 salaried employees. The hourly line-production employees are supervised by salaried and non-union line foreman. Directly above the 50 line foreman are 13 general supervisors who manage several line segments. Lima’s five area managers are responsible for everyone in their sector, including the hourly tire team, the line foreman, and the general supervisors. Oversight of the entire site is the responsibility of a single plant manager, Brandon Bellingham. In the past, the Lima plant has had great reputation for being one of Treadway’s top plants for productivity and quality. In 2000, The Treadway Tire Company made a significant $100 million capital investment in the expansion and modernization...
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...Propose a strategic HR action plan for Ashley Wall with justifications for your recommendations. From the case, the foremen are lack of support, guidance and tools to work with. Also, the company were facing a budget problem that they could not to establish a formal training program (Skinner & Beckham, 2008). Communication is also a severe problem for the company. The foremen seem to have no opportunity to express their ideas and feelings. Based on these problems, the strategic HR action plan is as followed: 1. Introduction of training or mentoring programs Many foremen think that they are not fully prepared for the job. The company did not provide the foremen with necessary support and guidance. Therefore, there is a need to establish an on-job-training. This training program can make the foremen feel more confident when they perform the job. The training program should cover required skills, problem solving and conflicts management. For newly appointed foremen, especially the graduates from college, the training program will help them understand the required skills and routine work. 2. Technological innovation From the case, the duties of foremen includes scheduling hourly workers, approving vacation requests, checking time sheets, and solving payroll issues (Skinner & Beckham, 2008). The introduction of technology will reduce foremen’s efforts and operating cost. 3. Setting common objectives and instituting regular meetings The foremen should set specific and tangible...
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...Case Analysis The Treadway Tire Company: Job Dissatisfaction and High Turnover at the Lima Tire Plan April 10, 2012 Summary The case study is talk about job dissatisfaction and high turnover rate at the Lima Tire Plant, which is one of the 8 manufacturing units operated by the Treadway Tire Company. In 2007, more than half of the foremen at the Lima facility had turn over. The turnover rate is the highest one over the past 10 years at Treadway, and also the high foremen turnover rate is the major concern for Ashley Walls who is the Director of Human Resources in the Lima Plant. Her major objectives are cost cutting, increase productivity, and reducing turnover. The next I will directly show some problems which the Lima Tire Plant had from the case. And then I give the corresponding suggestions and solutions for them, Main Problems From the case we could know the exact job dissatisfaction and high turnover situation at Lima Tire Plant. In order to logical analyze these I would discuss from the individual (foremen) to the integration (company). The foremen: First of all, I think the daily production evaluations of the Lima Tire Plant were too strict. Some of the variations in the production quantity and quality were not under the foreman’s control, specifically as it relates to machines breaking down. But the executive leaders just focus on daily production. Such as the plant manager Bellinghan...
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...Case Study Unit 5: The Treadway tire company: Job dissatisfaction and high turnover at the Lima tire plant Strategic Human Resources Management April 20, 2014 Case Study Unit 5: The Treadway tire company: Job dissatisfaction and high turnover at the Lima tire plant Case Study Unit 5: Prepare a case analysis on the topic of Traditional versus Strategic HRM and Its Effectiveness for Organizational Success. Case Analysis Criteria: Your Case Analysis should consist of: * A brief analysis of the situation and pending-decision problem, as presented in the case, and as relevant to your answer. This should be exceptionally brief and you should assume the person reading the Assignment is familiar with the details of the case. * Identification of the major issues surrounding the organization or individuals involved with the organization. * Identification of alternate courses of action to address the issues identified. * The decision or recommendation for action, with the appropriate supporting arguments. * The Case Question is designed to guide the direction of your analysis in the case. Your analysis should address and ultimately answer the question. Analysis: The tire plant in Lima is going through some rough time as its profits and margins are declining due because of the rising cost of raw materials and also due to intense global competition. Not much can be done with the increasing cost of raw materials but to reduce the overall company’s cost,...
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...BECKHAM op yo The Treadway Tire Company: Job Dissatisfaction and High Turnover at the Lima Tire Plant tC “We have a serious problem.” The words of Brandon Bellingham, the plant manager at Treadway’s Lima, Ohio, Tire Plant, rang in Ashley Wall’s ears. She had just attended a tense meeting where she had presented the projected year-end turnover figures for the plant. Out of a total of 50 foremen at the Lima facility, 23 of these positions had turned over in 2007. Ashley Wall had transferred to the Lima Plant as Director of Human Resources when Treadway’s plant in Greenville, South Carolina, had closed down in 2006. She was a seasoned human resources professional with over 10 years of experience at Treadway. Wall knew the turnover rate of foremen was higher at Lima than at other plants in the division; reversing this trend was her top priority. It was now November 28, 2007—approximately one month before Christmas. The plant would be closed from Christmas to New Year’s for retooling and annual maintenance. By the time the plant reopened in January 2008, Wall intended to complete a thorough analysis of the problem and a plan of action to correct it. The Treadway Tire Company employed almost 9,000 hourly and salaried staff in North America. The company was a major supplier of tires to the original equipment manufacturer1 and replacement tire markets, selling Treadway Primo, Treadway Performance, and private tire brands. The Lima Tire Plant was one of eight...
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...Introduction: - Based out of Lima, OH, and Treadway Tire Company operates a plant which supplies tires to leading tire manufacturers. Background: - The organization with a total of 1,120 employees had 970 hourly based and 150 salary based employees. As Lima Plant is the top rated among Treadway’s tire plants with modern equipments, the management closed out the Greenville plant as the equipment was outdate and moved the volume to Lima plant. Problem: - Management implemented cost cuttings by bring down no. of shifts from three to two by running them for 12hrs. Because of long working hours the employee’s turn in rate for everyday was alarmingly increasing. There are two reasons why many line foreman ended up leaving the company: 1) They didn’t have the proper training to do their job right, 2) There was tension between the line foreman and their superiors. Opportunities: - Given the recent expansions and up-gradation of the equipment and $100 million expansion recently took place at Lima Plant, the organization have a good chance of improving the production, if they were able to solve the Line foreman turnover issue. Recommendations: - The program should heavily concentrate on the a) Plant operations being carried out, and provide training, b) Interaction between employee’s and hourly workers, c) Not exerting more pressure on employee’s, d) Switching the no. of shifts from two to three with each running for 8hrs, e) Reorganization should be there and as well as appreciation...
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...Background Treadway Tire Company is a major North American supplier of tires to original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and replacement tire markets. They currently manufacture Treadway Primo, Treadway Performance, and other private tire brands. Treadway’s Lima Tire Plant, based out of Lima, Ohio is considered one of the company’s top plants for productivity and quality ratings. A continuous operations plant – operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week with four rotating shifts – the Lima Plant produced approximately 25,000 tires per day in 2007 alone. There are over 1100 employees at the Lima Plant location – 970 hourly and 150 salaried. The hourly employees are unionized by the United Steelworkers (USW) and are directly supervised by the salaried line foremen. The foremen possess a large bulk of the responsibilities at Lima, supervising all phases of production and quality assurance work as well as dealing with a variety of personnel, resource and administrative duties. They are often pulled in conflicting directions by the hourly employees, the union regulations and upper management. According to Brandon Bellingham, the plant manager at Lima, “Meeting performance goals is the most important duty of the line foremen.” However, the lack of proper training does not allow the foremen to successfully handle situations causing them intense pressure and a feeling of inadequacy. In the past year, the Lima Plant has experienced a high rate of foremen turnover...
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...MEMORANDUM The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co 200 Innovation Way Akron, Ohio , 44316-0001 phone: (330) 796-2121 Fax: (330) 796-2222 Date: August 05, 2013 To: Mr. Zilverstein, Head of Business Development From: Noam Hadass, Senior Analyst Subject: Analysis - Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. Dear Mr. Zilverstein , please find below as you requested: * SWOT analysis on the company * an issue that we believe will affect the company in the future * A visual for Goodyear’s revenue in the years 2010-2012. SWOT ANALYSIS Strength: * Loyal customers: When given a choice, customers are loyal to Goodyear Tires. Instead of targeting all customers, Goodyear Tires can invest most of its resources on new customers and only a small portion on the preservation of existing ones. Weakness: * 19th largest air polluter in the U.S: the manufacturing process of Goodyear tire is ineffective regarding the amount of pollution it creates. And as the world is advancing towards “Green” manufacturing in all sectors, being a major polluter can affect the positive corporate image Goodyear are trying to create. Also this makes the company sensitive to regulation towards pollution. Opportunity: * Penetrate new markets in China and India: right to this day Goodyear has a very little market share in these developing countries. With about a third of the world’s population, this market represents an opportunity for large growth...
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...Trammell The Organizational Structure of Bridgestone Corporation Bridgestone Corporation is a functional organizational, started in 1931in Japan by founder Shojiro Ishibashi, using an English translation of his surname for the name of the company. As Japan's automobile industry grew, The Bridgestone Group expanded its business to become Japan's largest tire manufacturer. The company also actively expanded overseas, particularly in Asia. In 1988, the company acquired The Firestone Tire & Rubber Company, a well respected global corporation with a venerable history of its own in America. This transformed Bridgestone into one of the world's largest tire and rubber companies, and created a global team dedicated to serving customers worldwide with the highest level of quality, service, and technology. Bridgestone Corporation is a flat divisional organization with geographic regions that only one CEO. Bridgestone has 143,124 employees and 16,019 non-consolidated employees; they have a board of directors which the CEO is a representative board member. They have plants in 25 countries worldwide. Bridgestone is dedicated to planning, manufacturing, sale, installation, lease, repair, and maintenance of the equipment and facilities related to tires, tubes for automobiles as well industrial general rubber products. Materials of natural rubber, synthetic rubber, synthetic fiber, synthetic resins, chemicals, ceramics, metals, liquefied gases, and those processed goods, materials for public...
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