2-2: Interview Reflections I felt that my interviewee understood that the job of HR needed to change to stay relevant. According to Grossman, being a “credible partner” is part of the competencies that are required in the new reality that is HR. With speaking to Joe, my interviewee, it appears that he recognized a long time ago that to survive, HR was going to have to make changes and become relevant to the business they are in, which is the moving industry. With doing this, they have looked for ways to outsource the “usual” HR functions and become involved with supporting the staff that they have, getting great talent, and being a source of knowable for the company. Taking an early lead in being a part of the development of their tariff has allowed Joe’s HR division to be taken very seriously within the company. They continue to evolve into the HR of today and even the future.  3.2 The Organizational Culture  After taking the survey, I realize that the organizational culture that I would want at my “Best Place to Work” would be similar to what I have now. My current company believes that HR is the responsibility of everyone. We have a benefits manager but recruiting top talent is such an important part of our cincture, that we receive a $10,000 bonus for recruiting staff. Credibility- It is important that staff and clients feel that they can trust us. We find that we have repeat customers within the client base and recommendations due to our credibility. Respect- Clients and staff are treated with prospect. The CEO understands that we make the company run. He rewards the staff with many different gifts and shows of appreciation. Fairness- Being fair is a hallmark of a good company. Nothing ruins moral faster than favoritism. Pride and Camaraderie- Staff are happy and proud to tell people they work for the company. This is due to the stellar reputation. 4-4: Leading Change With my industry, which is hirer education financial aid, change is driven by new policies and regulations that come from the federal government. These changes are inevitable and uncontrollable. Within my consulting firm, we stay ahead of the change by paying attention and participating in negotiated rulemaking, which allows the financial aid industry to have a say in the policies that re coming down the pipe. We definitely use the analyze/think/change model. The emotional reactions to change that I see very often is fear. Many times, staff is afraid that within the change, they will seem incompetent if they don’t take on the change as quick as other staff. During my current project, which is redesign of the student employment office, the staff involved went through all the emotions in varying levels. They eventual got to renewal and are fully vested in the process. It is import for HR to take a front seat when change happens. This helps staff to understand that they are supported. It is also important for staff to be able to have their negative feelings openly, .

1. 2-2: Interview Reflections
I felt that my interviewee understood that the job of HR needed
to change to stay relevant. According to Grossman, being a
“credible partner” is part of the competencies that are required
in the new reality that is HR. With speaking to Joe, my
interviewee, it appears that he recognized a long time ago that
to survive, HR was going to have to make changes and become
relevant to the business they are in, which is the moving
industry. With doing this, they have looked for ways to
outsource the “usual” HR functions and become involved with
supporting the staff that they have, getting great talent, and
being a source of knowable for the company. Taking an early
lead in being a part of the development of their tariff has
allowed Joe’s HR division to be taken very seriously within the
company. They continue to evolve into the HR of today and
even the future.
3.2 The Organizational Culture
After taking the survey, I realize that the organizational culture
that I would want at my “Best Place to Work” would be similar
to what I have now. My current company believes that HR is the
responsibility of everyone. We have a benefits manager but
recruiting top talent is such an important part of our cincture,
that we receive a $10,000 bonus for recruiting staff.
Credibility- It is important that staff and clients feel that they
can trust us. We find that we have repeat customers within the
client base and recommendations due to our credibility.
Respect- Clients and staff are treated with prospect. The CEO
understands that we make the company run. He rewards the staff
with many different gifts and shows of appreciation.
Fairness- Being fair is a hallmark of a good company. Nothing

2. ruins moral faster than favoritism.
Pride and Camaraderie- Staff are happy and proud to tell people
they work for the company. This is due to the stellar reputation.
4-4: Leading Change
With my industry, which is hirer education financial aid, change
is driven by new policies and regulations that come from the
federal government. These changes are inevitable and
uncontrollable. Within my consulting firm, we stay ahead of the
change by paying attention and participating in negotiated
rulemaking, which allows the financial aid industry to have a
say in the policies that re coming down the pipe. We definitely
use the analyze/think/change model.
The emotional reactions to change that I see very often is fear.
Many times, staff is afraid that within the change, they will
seem incompetent if they don’t take on the change as quick as
other staff. During my current project, which is redesign of the
student employment office, the staff involved went through all
the emotions in varying levels. They eventual got to renewal
and are fully vested in the process.
It is import for HR to take a front seat when change happens.
This helps staff to understand that they are supported. It is also
important for staff to be able to have their negative feelings
openly, as he are appropriate.
5-2 The Best HR Department Blog: Fairness and Comp
For employee training, I would first bring together a group of
staff from across all areas. When the group came together, we
would discuss the needs of each division or department. We
would also discuss the vision for the training and what we
would like the staff to take form the training.
We would design a training that also incorporated some team
building features and fun activities. Many times, I have been at
a training in which team building was part of the training but
many of the staff did not like each other so it became a chore.
Within the training, I would allow staff to sit together who
knew each other. Forcibly mixing in people up does not meet

3. the goals that people expect. Many times, it means that staff is
at a place where they are uncomfortable and concentrate on
behaving, rather than the content of the training.
My trainings would involve the following topics:
Current Handbook and Procedures
Diversity- What that really means not just “Let me tell you
about minorities”.
E.Q.
Customer Service
We would also include the topics brought up by the training
staff. Training would happen during the day, as to not require
staff to be in the office after hours.
6-2 The Best HR Department Blog: Competencies
Being a HR manager in the process of changing form a “job
analysis model to a competencies model” is a daunting but
exciting challenge. Competency approach is a method that
identifies the necessary worker competencies for high
performance. This will allow the recruitment process to focus
on worker characteristics that will bring success to the position.
Many times, organizations have a hard time with this due to
being unable to separate the person from the position. The HR
manager could be successful by taking the human capital out of
the equation for a short time. This way, it would give them the
opportunity to truly evaluate the competencies needed for each
position.
These should be tied to the goals of the overall organization and
allow for:
· Enhances a manager’s flexibility in assigning work
· Lengthens the life of a job description
· Can allow firms to group jobs requiring similar competencies
under a single job description
Competency analysis also gives the organization of the
opportunity to look beyond “jobs” to “work that needs to be
completed. With looking at tasks and work that needs to be
done, it allows organizations to look at positions with similar

4. competencies and requirements for redundancies. It also allows
the organization to reassign tasks to others who are more suited
to complete due to the competencies they hold. It also allows
the originations to look at competencies within each position
and evaluate which are requirements and which are optional.
7-2 The Best HR Department Blog: Selection
The key to a successful hiring process is, accruing to
Development Dimensions International is one that “finds the
right people for the right jobs”. Institutions and companies that
they success have specific characteristics that are the same for
all of their searches:
· Job interviews in which candidates are asked to describe
specific examples of their skills
· Automated resume screening and search
· Assessments that predict whether candidates are motivated by
the factors associated with a particular job or a company's
values and ways of doing things
· Simulations that gauge specific job-related abilities and skills
Searches for human capital l have long passed the time when a
position is posted in the Sunday paper. Candidate searches now
involve social media. Social Media has now become the place to
find new talent. Within this search and selection process,
companies are still using some traditional methods of finding
out about potential staff like background checks and BCI
checks.
Once of the biggest but unspoken selection tools that many of
us use is “word of mouth. The industry that I am in is large but
so defined that “someone always knows someone”. Many times
it takes less than six degrees of separation to get some
information and opinions about a potential staff person. Within
these casual conversations, it is very easy to get information on
what someone truly understands within the industry, what they
actually did within their previous positions (not what their title
says they did), and reason they might have left. Using this type
of “word of mouth” can have its drawbacks, which include

5. getting biased information. I have found that in my experience
within my industry, the information I have receive dahs been
mostly accurate.
References:
The 4 Hiring Practices of Highly Successful Organizations. Inc.
Retrieved July 31, 2013.
http://www.inc.com/articles/2002/01/23815.html
8-2 The Best HR Department Blog: Retention
As an HR professional who was tasked with retaining Gen X
and Gen Y staff, the first thing I would do would be to look at
the characteristics of each group. According to About.Com,
Generation X was the children born between 1965 and 1980.
Many of the generation were latchkey kids of Baby Boomer
parents, so as such, relationships and collaboration are
important. Generation X is:
· Individualistic
· Technology Adept
· Flexible
· Value Work/Life Balance
Within Generation Y, which is children who were born in the
mid 1980’s to 2000, many are now entering the workforce. This
generation of children is:
· Tech-Savvy
· Family Centric
· Achievement Oriented
· Team oriented
· Attention-Craving
Within these two groups, typical retention models that worked
with Baby Boomers including promises of the corner office will
not cut it. These employees value having a work life balance
and being part of something greater. As such, as a HR
professional, the first thing I would do would be to solicit
feedback from the Gen X and Y staff. It would be important to
not assume that they all think the same, as the y is an

6. individualistic group. I would then institute polices that would
allow for flex time and working from home. This way, staff
would not have to choose between work/life when making
decisions about their career. It would also be important to allow
both groups to see how they contribute to the bigger picture. I
would also give opportunities for volunteerism and social
concerns.
Ways to retain Gen X and Gen Y staff:
· Offer flextime, telecommuting and other benefits
· Know how to manage Gen X and Gen Y- Command and
control do not work with these groups.
· Make the workplace fun
When it comes to both groups, Gen X is more self-sufficient, as
many were the product of divorce. Gen Y needs more
supervision and reinforcement, as children who grew up as the
main focus of helicopter parents.
Reference:
Shaver, Tim. Understanding Generation X and Y Employees.
Casagrandepress.com Retrieved August 8, 2013.
http://www.casagran
9-2 The Best HR Department Blog: Train and Develop
To create a training and development strategy, we would first
need to figure out what the goals are. This would need to be
done by a training analysis. The training analysis would be able
to tell the institution:
· Performance problems
· Anticipated introduction of new system, task or technology
· A desire by the organization to benefit from a perceived
opportunity
· Overall goals of the company or institution
Once the analysis was complete, it would need to decide what
would be the best delivery model for the training and
development needed. The options would include:
· Online training
· Hiring a consultant to train

7. · Sending staff to an onsite training
· Creating a in house delivery model
Once it was decided which kind of model or model that would
use, the training content would need to be established to fit with
the models being used. Within the training, I would also try to
ensure that staff was engaged in the trainings with contact
feedback form the staff. It would be important to change
midstream if needed to ensure that staff would get the most out
of the training. Within the training delivery systems, it would
also be important to have breakout sessions based on function.
This way, you would be able to offer targeted training by
functional area, rather than trying to train the whole group in
irrelevant topics.
Once the trainings were complete, it would be important to use
measures to evaluate the training. This could be feedback from
staff, output measures, and ways to measure if the trainings
were effective. This information can be sending to tweak the
training, so that every time it is offered it will become better
and more relevant to the staff. The training could also be
offered ad-hoc to new staff coming in, so that they do not have
to wait for the training to happen on the schedule.
9-3 The Best HR Department Blog: Performance
Within my performance management initiative, I would use the
Net Promoter (NPS) approach for performance. Within my own
company, we use NPS score to evaluate performance. NPS is a
metric used to evaluate if your customers will be loyal. It is
believed that staff can be broken into three groups:
Promoters (score 9-10) are loyal enthusiasts who will keep
buying and refer others, fueling growth.
Passives (score 7-8) are satisfied but unenthusiastic customers
who are vulnerable to competitive offerings.
Detractors (score 0-6) are unhappy customers who can damage
your brand and impede growth through negative word-of-mouth.
This question would be answered by asking how likely a client

8. would recommend a consultant to other companies. Within this
model, scores that are below 8 are considered zeros for
averaging purposes. Within using this process a company must
then use the net promoter score for raises and other performance
based management. I would give a bonus to ever staff that had a
100 % score at the end of the year. We would also use the
scores to look at which staff needed additional help or even
potentially needed to leave the company. Within the scores, t
was also important to utilize the staff members who displayed
consistent scores to promote the company overall.
It would also be important to train staff on how the score are
formed, so they understand ways to improve the scores and
strategies for improvement. I would institute Best practices
breakout sessions every month and allow the staff with the
highest NPS to discuss what they are going at a client site. As
the staff would all be if defend experiences and segments, it
would more be a manner of reviewing what types of interactions
that are happening within the client, rather than the actual
working getting done.
10-2 The Best HR Department Blog: Total Rewards
In creating a wellness program, Human Resources must
sometimes convince management that taking care of the human
capital is important. Within the wellness program, a company
or institution must look at what types of needs are most relevant
to the population as a whole. It would not make much sense to
have Weight Watchers come in and do a program, if the office
was full of health contentious individual.
Once the overall needs on the institutional population were
taken into consideration, a HR professional could reach out to
the professionals that work in partnership with the institution,
(like the health insurance company) to see if they would be
willing to offer the wellness program at a reduced rate or for
free as part of their commitment to keeping their clients happy
and healthy. Once easy to create program that would touch
many in the organization would be a healthier option within the
institution and at home. The company could work with their

9. dining company to assist with having healthier options.
The company could also work with the health insurance carrier
to provide literature and communication to the employees. The
communication should be done in a way that shows employees
that the company cares about their health and safety. The
company could also set up healthy cooking demonstrations as
part of a total package. I would also like the company to go as
far as to offer discounted memberships to a CSA. This way,
they can ensure that’s staff received healthy foods on a regular
basis outside of the office.
To add fun to the program, the company could add incentives
that include an end of the year celebration of healthy food, in
which the best dish that the healthiest and tastiest will be added
to the menu and the person who creates wins a prize or some
type of reward.
Your answer for each question should be a minimum of 150
words (half page). Please number your answers and print the
number of the question you are answering above your answers.
Identify subsections accordingly and cite sources in APA
format.
1) Blood isolated from an emergency room patient contains
antibodies against the measles virus. Please explain whether or
not the patient should be quarantined immediately because they
are infected with the measles virus and why? What are the other
plausible explanations for anti-measles antibodies in the
patient’s blood?
2) Describe how the clonal expansion theory explains the more
rapid production of antigen
specific antibodies, Helper T-cells and Cytotoxic T-cells, during

10. a secondary infection.
3) Positive diagnosis of AIDS is made when a patient has
antibodies against the human
immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Please explain why the patient
has an immune deficiency
if he or she is making antibodies?
4) Characterize the differences and similarities between innate
and adaptive immunity in
form and function.
5) What is the effect of discharging primary treated sewage on
the biochemical oxygen demand
(BOD) and dissolved O2 (DO) of the receiving body of water?
What is the effect of secondary-
treated sewage on the BOD and DO?
6) A newspaper headline reported "Algal Bloom Kills Fish." As
you read, you find that the algae did not produce toxins. Please
explain what actually caused fish death, given that the algae are
not toxic? What could have caused the algal bloom?
7) What is fermentation and how can it be used to preserve
foods? Please give specific
examples in your explanation.