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ACCA Strategic Professional · Strategic Business Leader · Enabling success: talent management

Altessa Pharma is restructuring and expects a surplus of 120 production staff in one division while another division faces a shortage of skilled technicians. The CEO wants to protect employer reputation and preserve knowledge while managing costs. Which combination is the most appropriate response?

The best response is a hiring freeze, redeployment with retraining of suitable surplus staff into technician roles, and voluntary severance for those remaining. This resolves the skills mismatch internally, conserves knowledge, controls costs and protects the employer's reputation, unlike compulsory redundancy alongside external hiring.

  1. AImmediate compulsory redundancy of the 120 and external hiring of technicians
  2. BHiring freeze, redeployment with retraining of suitable surplus staff, and voluntary severance for the remainderCorrect
  3. CPay cuts across both divisions to avoid any job losses
  4. DOutsourcing the technician roles and dismissing the surplus staff without notice

Explanation

Matching a surplus in one area with a shortage in another points to redeployment and retraining, supported by a freeze on external hiring and voluntary severance for residual surplus. This preserves knowledge, limits cost and protects reputation. Compulsory redundancy while hiring externally wastes talent and harms reputation; blanket pay cuts do not resolve the skills mismatch; dismissal without notice is unethical and likely unlawful.

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