1. The focus on talent management has intensified in the last few years due to all of the following factors EXCEPT a. shortages of skilled workers. b. increasing global competition for employees. c. technology enabling the automation of talent management process. d. the obsolescence of baby boomers’ skills.

1. The focus on talent management
has intensified in the last few years due to all of the following factors
EXCEPT
a. shortages of skilled workers.
b. increasing global competition
for employees.
c. technology enabling the
automation of talent management process.
d. the obsolescence of baby
boomers’ skills.
2. ____ is concerned with the
attraction, development and retention of human resources.
a. HR planning
b. Training and development
c. The HR flow process
d. Talent management

3. Which of the following
statements is TRUE?
a. Because of the conversion of
the U.S. economy from a manufacturing economy to a
service-based economy, the need
for skilled manufacturing workers will continue to
decline.
b. U.S. employers will lose over
10% of their current workforce by 2010 as baby boomers
retire.
c. China and Brazil have rapidly
growing populations with increasingly high quality
education systems. Consequently,
these countries will be “exporting” their skilled labor to
the U.S. and Europe through
outsourcing.
d. The focus of talent management
is limited to key executives, high contributors, and high
potential employees.
4. Talent management includes all
of the following HR activities EXCEPT
a. training.
b. job design.
c. career planning.
d. performance management.

5. You have been hired by a
national accounting firm to lead the firm’s talent management program. In
order to evaluate the existing
talent management program and how well it is linked to organizational
strategy, you would seek data on
all the following issues EXCEPT
a. Do the employees feel that the
organization’s culture values people as individuals?
b. Does the organization have an
effective upward communication system?
c. Have the future staffing needs
of the firm been identified?
d. Is there a pool of talented
people who are ready to move into new positions as the
positions become open?

6. A common problem with talent
management information systems is that
a. they are often purchased
“off-the-shelf” from vendors and so are not useful for the firm.
b. they mainly provide the same
information as an HR planning system so that the extra
expense brings little additional
benefit.
c. few human resources
professionals are qualified to use them effectively.
d. multiple programs are not
integrated with each other.

7. As a tool for development
needs analysis, performance appraisals are most useful in evaluating
a. leadership style.
b. employee reasoning skills.
c. motivation.
d. job knowledge.

8. A good automated talent
management system could be expected to answer the question
a. Is the compensation for
regional sales managers competitive?
b. How many of the HR staff have
their PHR certifications?
c. Has the incidence of discrimination
complaints per employee declined over the last 10
years?
d. Which vendor’s proposed
training program will be most effective for teaching budgeting
skills to newly-promoted line
managers?

9. If talent management is
effective in a firm
a. the voluntary turnover among
the high potential employees will be essentially zero.
b. the quantity and quality of
the HR talent pool will be the deepest in the industry.
c. the cost of labor in the firm
will be the lowest of its direct competitors.
d. the firm will have the right
people with the right talents available at the right time in the
right places.

10. In comparison to people who
graduated from college twenty years ago, current college graduate
entering the job market can
expect all of the following EXCEPT
a. less job security.
b. fewer job opportunities.
c. a higher likelihood of being a
freelancer.
d. more frequent job changes.

11. Ernest has always been a
person who has said “People make their own luck.” Throughout his career he
has taken charge of his personal
career goals. But lately his industry has been rocked by bankruptcies
of major competitors and his own
employer has had several episodes of layoffs among the hourly
ranks. Now, managers are being
laid off and Ernest knows he will be in the next group to be cut.
Ernest is probably experiencing
a. some insecurity.
b. denial.
c. an enhanced sense of personal
control.
d. a sense of renewed
opportunities.

12. As the HR director of a small
speciality engineering consulting firm, you can expect
a. your most valuable engineers
to be the most likely to have frequent job offers from other
companies and likely to quit to
join other firms.
b. your most valuable engineers
to be the most difficult to manage because of their “prima
donna” attitudes.
c. the highest turnover to be
among average and below-average performing engineers
because the engineering skills
shortage assures them of finding another, better job
elsewhere.
d. you can retain talented
engineers even if the workplace is undesirable if you pay high
enough.

13. The result of flexibility in
careers is ____ for employees.
a. job insecurity
b. occupational security
c. high demand
d. work/life balance

14. The trend in careers is for
a. individuals to choose careers
based on life-time earning potential.
b. people to dedicate themselves
to achieving success in one occupation.
c. people to use them to satisfy
individual needs.
d. technical capabilities to be
more valuable in long-term success than purely management
capabilities.

15. A/an ____ is a sequence of
work-related positions a person occupies throughout life.
a. career
b. job ladder
c. profession
d. occupation

16. A sequence of jobs in which
an individual joins a national news magazine as a staff reporter, then is
promoted to technology reporter,
then to editor of the business department, then to deputy managing
editor, would be an example of
a. a non-traditional career path.
b. organization-centered career
planning.
c. job-hopping.
d. a series of career
transitions.

17. The HR department at Cabildo
Utilities is planning an internal career day which will feature
workshops on various careers at
Cabildo Utilities, opportunities for work in Cabildo’s overseas
locations, and presentations by
HR staff on training and development opportunities available at
Cabildo. This is an example of
a. individual-based career
development.
b. an organization-centered
career planning tool.
c. career mapping.
d. training and development
outreach.

18. Over the past 15 years Bob
has held seven different jobs with three different employers, one of which
was in the non-profit sector. Of
the seven jobs, three were horizontal moves rather than upward moves.
Bob chose each job because it
would increase his skills and would be interesting and rewarding rather
than whether the job would
advance him up the organizational hierarchy. Which of the following
statements is TRUE?
a. Bob has had a dysfunctional
career because of his frequent changes of employers.
b. Bob’s job experiences can be
considered a career path.
c. Bob is in a career plateau
because he has not steadily risen in organizational hierarchy or
occupational status.
d. Bob has had a linear career
even though he has changed organizations because he has
remained in the same occupation.

19. The key activities in individual
career management include all of the following EXCEPT
a. self-promotion.
b. feedback on reality.
c. setting of career goals.
d. self-assessment.

20. Josh is 32 years old. He
worked for one organization for seven years after graduating with a bachelor’s
degree. He received three
promotions in that time. Since then, he was “downsized” out of the
organization, and is working
part-time at a video store while pursuing an MBA at night. Josh is
experiencing
a. a career plateau.
b. a career transition.
c. career sequencing.
d. career retrogression.

21. Web sites that list careers
in the organization
a. mainly target external
applicants.
b. tend to encourage unqualified
internal applicants to apply for jobs.
c. should tap both the internal
and external labor pool.
d. limit the number of applicants
for jobs because many people do not have access to
computers.

22. Individual-centered career
planning focuses on
a. the employee’s life and work
goals.
b. identifying the organization’s
future staffing needs.
c. succession planning for key
positions.
d. the logical progression of
people through jobs in an organization.

23. Clark has wanted to be a
broadcast reporter since he was a kid watching Wolf Blitzer’s war reporting.
He got a degree in broadcast
journalism and has been working two years as a reporter for the local
news in a medium-sized Western
city. Clark’s boss has given him discouraging performance
appraisals at the last two
evaluation periods. In addition, surveys show that the news show’s audience
gives Clark a mediocre rating.
Which of the following statements is TRUE?
a. Clark probably did not set
clear career goals with timetables and plans for getting the
training and experience he
needed.
b. Clark’s socioeconomic
background has probably set him up to fail. Successful broadcast
journalists usually come from
upper-class or Ivy-League backgrounds.
c. Clark has gotten feedback on
reality which he should use in his career planning.
d. If Clark took the Strong
Interest Inventory it would probably show that he does not truly
have an interest in broadcast
journalism.

24. In part, people choose their
careers based on their interests. ____ is/are tools to help people identify
their interests, what they do
well, what they like, and their strengths and weaknesses.
a. Performance appraisals
b. Self-assessment tests
c. Career goal-setting
d. Envisioning

25. Which of the following
components of individual career choice is most likely to change as a person
matures? This means that the
career the individual first selected may not be appropriate as time passes.
a. socioeconomic background
b. interests
c. self-image
d. personality

26. Ambrose is discussing his
college major with his best friend. Ambrose says that his parents want him
to be a CPA just like they are and
to join their prosperous tax practice when he graduates. “But,”
Ambrose says, “I just can’t SEE
myself as an accountant!” Which of the following statements is most
likely to be true?
a. Ambrose should take a
self-assessment test to see if he is really not interested in tax
accounting.
b. Ambrose’s self image is not
compatible with a career as an accountant.
c. Ambrose needs feedback on
reality because he is prematurely ruling out a desirable and
lucrative career.
d. Ambrose should not make a firm
decision to avoid tax accounting at this stage of his
education because his career
goals will probably change.

27. Which of the following is
TRUE?
a. Linear career paths are a
thing of the past. Most people will experience periods of
plateauing and career reverses
rather than steady advancement.
b. A person’s early career is
marked by stability, but his/her later career is marked by
frequent job changes as the
individual disengages from the work world.
c. In the U.S. the socioeconomic
class in which a person is born has little impact on his/her
eventual career.
d. A person’s interests are
stable over their lifetime.

28. If a person who is looking
for a job has a number of organizations to choose from and has quite of bit
of information available about
these organizations, the person will tend to choose to work for
a. the organization offering the
highest salary.
b. the organization that offers
the greatest opportunities for training and development in the
person’s occupation.
c. the organization that seems to
have the best fit between its climate and the individual’s
characteristics, interests and
needs.
d. the organization that offers
the greatest potential for career advancement within the
organization.

29. Gerald is confused as to why
his 28-year-old daughter is changing jobs for the third time since she
graduated from college. His
daughter told Gerald that she’s learned everything she could from her
current job and that it’s time to
move on. Gerald’s daughter is in the stage of her career where most
people need to
a. gain competence and learn how
they can make a mark on the world.
b. focus on making a good income.
c. achieve personal integrity and
incorporate their values into their work life.
d. establish their political
power base within their organization.

30. Carla is 52. She has been
laid off twice in her life, once when her employer downsized, and once when
her next employer was acquired by
a larger rival. Now she has hit a career plateau after five years with
her current employer. Carla is
rather frustrated. Each time she has changed employers, she has
“retooled” and acquired more
skills and expanded her knowledge base. When talking to a career
counselor at her employer, the
counselor suggested Carla view her career as
a. a rollercoaster.
b. cyclical.
c. dysfunctional.
d. lateral.

31. A career plateau occurs when
a/an
a. employee cannot advance within
the organization.
b. working mother decides to use
job sequencing.
c. employee becomes burned out
and unmotivated.
d. employee’s skills have become obsolete.

32. Kevin is a member of the
board of directors for a non-profit organization that is engaged in
environmental causes. The group
does fund-raising, legislative lobbying, and publicizes the need for
action to reduce pollution. With
his knowledge of the general periods in the typical person’s career,
Kevin knows that the organization
should look to recruit new full-time employees
a. among people who are in their
early career stages because they tend to be idealistic.
b. among people in the mid-career
stage because they are open to changes in their lifestyles.
c. among people in the second
half of their life because they are more likely to be focused on
their inner values than on
external wealth and status.
d. among retirees because they
are looking for second careers that are both satisfying and
intellectually demanding.

33. For the organization, unless
a plateaued employee is a poorly-used resource, a major reason plateaued
employees may be a problem is
that
a. if they develop negative
attitudes, the plateaued employees may affect co-worker morale.
b. the turnover rate among
plateaued employees is excessive.
c. plateaued employees tend to
have higher compensation than justified by their contribution
to the organization.
d. plateaued employees are typically
poor performers.
34. Which of the following is
TRUE about career plateaus.
a. High-performers do not
encounter career plateaus.
b. An employee in a career
plateau can typically only move out of it if he/she changes
organizations.
c. Career plateaus are unusual
because most careers involve steady upward progression.
d. A career plateau can allow an
employee to learn new skills that will increase his/her future
marketability.

35. A pre-retirement planning
seminar for persons about to retire should address all of the following issues
EXCEPT ____ after retirement
a. anxiety about finances.
b. the need for self-direction
c. how to achieve a sense of
belongingness
d. effective time management

36. A significant portion of the
long-service employees at Anovator, Inc., is reaching retirement age. As
HR director, you realize that it
will be a significant loss for the firm as well as a succession-planning
nightmare if most of these
retirees actually leave the firm at age 65. You would like to implement a
phased-retirement program to
allow the firm to adjust more slowly. But, one of the major impediments
to successfully using this plan
is
a. few people want to work after
age 65, so not enough of your older employees would
choose phased retirement.
b. current pension law.
c. opposition to phased
retirement by the American Association of Retired Persons
d. phased retirement plans are
vulnerable to age discrimination lawsuits.

37. Paul has been in his first
job for two months. He is very dissatisfied with his unsupportive supervisor,
the lack of specific feedback,
the project deadline which is six months off, and the “vagueness” of his
job. While these are real
concerns, Paul may also be feeling
a. a sense of boundarylessness
b. failed orientation
c. new-job remorse
d. entry shock

38. Eva, a professional employee
in her 30s, has been offered a transfer to a new department. Although
this move is lateral, the
transfer will open up possibilities for advancement that were lacking in her
current job. Eva realizes that
a. she will be expected to
perform well immediately in this new job.
b. the transfer will probably
entail a significant raise.
c. this will be a stressful
transition, and she should be prepared to experience some
depression, anxiety and
nervousness.
d. should not accept a lateral
transfer because it will stifle her opportunity to learn new skills.

39. Which of the following
statements is TRUE?
a. Now that women are in the
workforce in nearly the same proportion as men, the
differences between men’s and women’s
careers are expected to disappear by 2010.
b. The population of women who
wish to work full-time has been almost completely tapped.
“Female-friendly” employment
policies will be needed in order to recruit women who are
interested in part-time work.
c. The average woman who has been
out of school for six years has worked 30% less time
than the average man who has been
out of school the same amount of time.
d. Job sequencing has proven to
be a successful career tactic for women wishing to combine
work and family, since impacts on
career advancement are minimal.

40. In order to reward talented
technical people who do not want to move into management, many
companies have established
a. dual career ladders.
b. portable career paths.
c. phased retirement plans.
d. job rotation programs.