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1. Members of management seeking to improve their effectiveness and relationship with employees as well as
optimizing the organization's performance, could utilize the appraisal process of: 
A. job rotation
B. upward feedback
C. mentoring
D. executive education

2. A U.S. post office branch choosing to hire an employee with no disabilities over a slightly more qualified
candidate restricted to a wheelchair, could be a violation of:

A. the Civil Rights Act of 1964


B. the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990
C. the Rehabilitation Act of 1973
D. B and C

3. Under most cases an employer can lawfully demand that a pregnant employee:

A. take a minimum of six weeks leave after delivery


B. supply medical documentation of pregnancy related disability requiring leave
C. work in a different capacity to avoid public or customer contact
D. do all of the above

4. An employer could be liable to litigation under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 if:

A. an employee is made to feel uncomfortable by a co-worker who tells jokes of a sexual nature
B. a manager makes demonstrative physical contact with a subordinate of the same sex
C. an employee is subjected to unwelcome advances, but no economic injury occurs
D. any of the above occur

5. When a manager is using personal involvement as a motivational strategy, the biggest risk is with those
employees who:

A. have low self esteem and cannot form high performance expectations
B. make only verbal commitments to their goals
C. make a public commitment as a group instead of as individuals
D. are overconfident in their performance abilities

6. Performance management is one method that can be substituted for:

A. merit pay
B. traditional appraisal systems
C. annual or quarterly bonus schedules
D. quota systems
7. Under FSLA, an exempt employee earning an hourly rate of $28.50 who works 45 hours would earn a
paycheck of:

A. $1285.50
B. $1353.75
C. $1710.00
D. $1923.75

8. Employers are required to complete an I-9 form on all employees to verify:

A. eligibility to work in the United States


B. criminal records
C. proper payment of income taxes
D. employees meet age requirements

9. Managers should ensure that all employees are provided with clear, accurate job descriptions, the lack of
which could expose the employer to:

A. sexual harassment claims by employees


B. lawsuits for violations of the ADA
C. increased payroll costs
D. all of the above

10. Managers can best address the vagueness associated with rating and ranking scales in employee
appraisal systems by supplementing standard company forms with:

A. forms and rating scales designed specifically by the manager


B. verbal appraisal of employee performance
C. written comments explaining scale ratings
D. preferable forms used by other companies

11. Management tendencies to skew an evaluation or appraisal positively in all areas due to high employee
performance in a few areas should be avoided and is known as:

A. central tendency effect


B. leniency bias
C. halo effect
D. recency effect

12. In conducting an employee evaluation, which of the following is a ³soft´ area to which employees are most
likely to take personal offense?

A. sales figures
B. absenteeism
C. teamwork
D. production quotas

13. A manager is most likely to have long term success in motivating an employee by focusing on:
A. performance based bonuses and incentives
B. reminders that job continuance requires successful performance
C. a better understanding of the employee's goals and interests
D. developing competition between employees

14. A manager who utilizes the Pygmalion Effect usually receives higher performance from employees by:

A. demonstrating that they are confident employees can deliver a high performance
B. building teams, instead of using individuals in a hierarchy, to handle most large projects
C. always attached financial incentive to job performance
D. offering ambiguous expectations to encourage employee originality and creativity

15. According to Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, a person will place greater importance on:

A. self-actualization
B. belongingness
C. physiological needs
D. cognitive needs

16. Although supervision of employee's productivity and daily actions is an accepted management role, a
balance must be maintained and micro-management can commonly result in:

A. lack of communication
B. stifling initiative
C. increased morale
D. improved performance

17. An active listener demonstrates all of the following traits except:

A. often completes the sentences of others


B. plans a response for after another is finished speaking
C. provides feedback without interruption
D. awareness and control of biases

18. When it comes to the personal lives of employees, a manager should:

A. be aware and show concern and empathy


B. stay uninvolved and recommend organizational resources for troubled employees
C. encourage other subordinates to address the personal issues of co-workers
D. ask questions regularly to determine problems

19. Under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, it would be unlawful for any employer to restrict an employee's
religious practices at work unless:

A. the employee's religious beliefs require grooming accommodations


B. the employee's religious practices create an unsafe work environment
C. the employer has a conscientious disagreement with the employee's religious beliefs and practices
D. the employer does not observe the holidays of the employee's religion
20. You have just started a new management job with over 500 employees working under you. You discover
that some company practices are not in compliance with the Equal Pay Act of 1963 and its subsequent
amendments. In order to remedy this, you could take all of the following steps except:

A. offer increased compensation to equalize pay for employees of different gender performing the same job
B. determine future pay increased for employees based on an established system of merit, seniority, or
performance quotas
C. reduce the compensation of some employees to equalize compensation for employees of all genders
performing the same job
D. refuse to agree to labor union demands or contracts that would violate the law

21. An easy and cost effective strategy for managers to utilize in order to reduce work related stress among
employees is:

A. create an open layout work space where all employees can easily hear and see other employees during the
work day
B. to practice a plan-ahead strategy that minimizes the need for crisis management
C. to emphasize competition among employees by increasing performance incentives to maximize productivity
D. providing employees with minimal responsibilities

22. When designing jobs, managers and employers can reduce job stress by giving consideration to all of the
following except:

A. applying ergonomic design to the employee-machine technologies


B. creating clear physical, knowledge, and skill requirements to facilitate hiring highly matched employees
C. establishing work hours and shift changes that are the most profitable for the organization
D. creating communication channels for immediate and future needs

23. Involving numerous people in an employee's evaluation such as co-workers, customers, the employee, and
supervisors is known as:

A. 360-degree feedback
B. Knowledge management
C. Job coaching
D. All in one evaluation

24. When interviewing a candidate for possible employment aptitude tests are often conducting early in the
process to assess:

A. specialized technical skills


B. intelligence or IQ
C. personality traits or character tendencies
D. general abilities in reasoning and written skills

25. Your company board has asked you to serve on an ad hoc committee to consider changes to the
company's benefits packages. This committee will most likely:
A. meet regularly until the changes are completed
B. become permanent to address all issues surrounding employee benefits
C. meet one time to address the issue
D. hold meetings in conjunction with regular board meetings

26. One of your employees has been complaining to about her problems with a co-worker and other employees
have reported that the two frequently clash at meetings. Your best initial course of action is:

A. leaving the employees to their own resources with an order to work it out
B. offering new ways the two could work together and monitoring the situation
C. immediately restructuring to place the employees in separate work environments
D. firing or transferring the least valuable of the two employees

27. Numerous psychology researchers including Abraham Maslow and Kurt Goldstein, have explored the
theory of self actualization. Which of the following would be the best example in support of that theory?

A. An employee deliberately sabotages a team project as revenge against a boss


B. An employee works for the same company for 30 years, rising from office clerk to Regional Vice President
C. An employee's performance appraisal rating drops due to alcohol abuse
D. An employee receives a bonus for achieving a sales quota

28. The study of human behavior, including both individual and group dynamics, in the workplace is commonly
known as:

A. industrial or organization psychology


B. applied psychology
C. educational or developmental psychology
D. social psychology

29. A company might be in violation of the provisions of Title IV of the Civil Rights Act if their hiring practices
include:

A. requiring educational achievements that are related to job performance or business needs
B. conducting aptitude testing for all employment candidates
C. coding resumes or applications by gender or race
D. limiting application for some positions to degreed candidates only

30. Psychologist Frederick Herzberg suggests a two part system for motivating employees in whom factors
contributing to motivation are divided into ³hygiene factors´ and ³motivators´. Which of the following is a
motivator that can succeed only if basic needs or hygiene factors are met?

A. salary
B. advancement
C. job security
D. vacation time
31. Some experts suggest managers can be divided into two types of styles labeled Theory X and Theory Y.
Theory Y, which is more motivating, stresses regular collaboration with staff and soliciting employee input and
feedback into decision making. This type of manager is most likely to:

A. publicly reprimand an employee for failure to encourage others to do better


B. rotate the chairperson position at regular staff meetings
C. regularly evaluate employees using a downward appraisal system
D. unilaterally establish department goals and objectives

32. You have assigned a six month project to an experienced team of employees. You want to reinforce task
ownership of team members. This could effectively be accomplished by:

A. countermanding any questionable decisions the team makes


B. delegating new tasks to team members to broaden their experience
C. requiring daily progress reports or meetings with team leaders
D. replacing team members who fail to meet goals

33. In which of the following situations would an employer be required to grant job protected FMLA leave?

A. John has worked in a individually owned car repair shop with sixteen employees for six years and requests
four weeks leave immediately following the birth of his child
B. Sue has worked for a large corporation of over 1000 employees for over two years and has requested two
months leave to care for her cancer stricken grandmother in another state
C. Dave has worked for several months at the main office of a large government agency employing hundreds
of people and requests a month leave for heart surgery
D. Casey has worked for almost a year as a manager for a national restaurant chain with ten restaurants within
fifty miles and requests three weeks leave after adopting a child

34. When considering applicants for position in your department, each of the following hiring practices would
comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act except:

A. requiring each job applicant to have a medical exam to verify ability to perform physical aspects of the job
B. making pre-employment drug screening a requirement for all applicants
C. questioning an applicant about the limitations created by a visible disability
D. refusing to hire a candidate whose disability would require the department to lower production quotas

35. The Civil Service Reform Act of 1978, requires many government agencies and departments to consider all
of the following in merit pay systems except:

A. excellent performance
B. pay scales by private sector employers
C. local rates
D. marital status

36. According to the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978, a manager within specified government agencies would
be out of compliance for designing an employee appraisal system that:
A. encouraged employee participation is setting goals and standards
B. immediately terminated employees who received poor performance ratings on their evaluations
C. evaluated employees once annually
D. did any of the above

37. If you are managing a group of highly trained professionals with demonstrated creativity, motivation, and a
history of high performance, they might respond best to which of the following management styles?

A. laissez-faire
B. directive autocratic
C. paternalistic
D. passive autocratic

38. ³Which employee at your last job did you get along with the least and how did you handle it?´, is a question
that you might ask an applicant in an interview to gauge her:

A. performance in stressful situations


B. motivation level
C. genuine interest level in the position
D. suitability for the position's skill requirements

39. Your management team has decided that a Continuous Improvement Plan or CIP, such as the one
suggested by Edward Deming, is the best way for the department to meet its long term goals. As part of this
plan you will most likely:

A. avoid regular appraisal of plan status


B. design a document specifying actions to be taken
C. value quantity over quality
D. A and B

40. Under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, a decision not to hire an applicant because of a limited proficiency in
English would be a violation unless:

A. that person was a citizen of a foreign country


B. it was a key component of maintaining a safe work environment
C. the company had specific written policies requiring all employees communicate fluently in English
D. A and B

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1. B. Upward feedback is a reverse appraisal process where subordinates evaluate managers, often providing
insight into ways to improve management effectiveness and make policy change.

2. D. Both laws prohibit discrimination based on disability. The Rehabilitation Act is specific to hiring by the
Federal government. The ADA applies to private and government employment.

3. B. Under the Pregnancy Discrimination Act to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, employers must extend the same
protections to pregnant employees as to others and treat pregnancy related conditions as disability. Employers
can require medical documentation of the disability as they would for other disabilities. Employers cannot
require minimum leaves and must allow employees to work as long as able. Public, customer, or other
employee attitudes cannot dictate changes in employment situations for pregnant employees.

4. D. All situations could subject an employer to legal liability under federal law. Economic injury or loss of job is
not required to make a sexual harassment case.

5. A. Personal involvement can build deep commitment to success and high performance standards by
allowing employees a role in developing their own goals. Employees with low self esteem need managerial
support in improving their self image to create correspondingly high goals. Verbal commitments and public
group commitments have typical high success rates.

6. B. Performance management can replace traditional employee appraisal systems and focuses on the whole
employee picture from new hire to exit interviews.

7. A. An employee defined as exempt under FSLA is not entitled to overtime and would earn the hourly rate at
straight time.

8. A. This form has been required by the Federal government for citizens and non-citizens since 1986 to verify
eligibility to work in the United States . It requires the submission of proof of eligibility in several possible forms
including driver's license, social security card, or visa.

9. B. Job descriptions that are unclear can result in legal issues surrounding job performance and management
actions such as termination. Employers could be open to charges of discrimination under such federal laws as
the Americans with Disabilities Act.

10. C. Managers should avoid using documents not approved by company legal advisors and should always
use the paperwork specified by the legal or human resource departments. Managers should also avoid relying
on verbal exchanges to suffice and can supplement with written, explanatory comments.

11. C. Managers should be cautious to avoid the halo effect of evaluating employees positively in all areas
based simply on positive performance in a few areas.

12. C. Employees tend to respond reasonably to evaluations of black and white categories such as sales
figures. This is an area that is difficult to dispute. Employees might be disappointed in low numbers or make
excuses, but are not likely to take personal offense to the observations. Softer areas such as communication
skills, teamwork, or customer relations are less defined. Employees are more likely to take personally criticism
in these areas.

13. C. Financial incentives produce short term motivation, but are not the key to maintaining motivation.
Creating a work environment that is sensitive to employee interests and provides opportunities for employees
to work toward goals brings deeper, long term job satisfaction and motivation.

14. A. Pygmalion Effect refers to the concept that raising standards and expectations higher will produce higher
performance.
15. C. Maslow suggests that in understanding human motivation, we need to see the hierarchy in which needs
must be met. Physiological needs such as food, water, and shelter must be met before higher level needs can
be focused upon.

16. B. Micro-management can be perceived as a lack of confidence in employee ability and can lead to
employee resentment and lower morale. It can also limit employee creativity, resourcefulness, and initiative.

17. A. An active listener does more listening than talking, allowing full opportunity for others to express and
complete thoughts and ideas.

18. A. Employers and managers cannot ignore the personal lives of employees as they are bound to impact
their work lives at some point. Managers should be concerned, helpful, and empathetic without prying, although
maintaining the appropriate tone for a managerial-subordinate relationship is important.

19. B. This portion of the law bans employers from any type of religion based discrimination in the hiring and
employment process unless the employer can show that accommodating religious beliefs or practices would
place an undue hardship or burden on the employer or other employees, would violate a law or regulation, or
would create an unsafe work environment.

20. C. The act specifically forbids the reduction of any employee's wages in order to be in compliance.

21. B. Living in crisis management mode is very stressful for everyone in the workplace. Open layouts can be
noisy and distracting to completing tasks, minimal responsibility can make employees feel insecure in their
jobs, and excessive competition increases stress.

22. C. When designed work hours and shift changes, consideration must always be given to potential
employee stressors, fatigue, health concerns, etc. in addition to profitability.

23. A. 360-degree feedback is an evaluation system that operates on the premise that an employee can be
best evaluated by hearing for all parties who know them in a work capacity.

24. D. Aptitude tests are generally used early in interview processes to determine general skills in basic areas
such as math, reasoning, verbal, and written communication.

25. A. Ad hoc means for a specific purpose meaning the committee would meet until its purpose had been
served. It is unlikely this could happen in one meeting. It is also not in the nature of ad hoc committees to take
on permanence. Boards often use these committees to take some of the burden from the board.

26. B. A logical first step is to mediate and offer solutions, while monitoring the situation. Firing or transferring
an employee can require proof of just cause which may be unclear if two parties are involved. Immediate
separation can have a negative impact on the entire department and send the wrong message to employees
about resolving conflicts.

27. B. Supporters of self-actualization propose that it is instinctual for humans to rise to the highest levels of
their abilities.

28. A. definition
29. C. Coding or organizing candidates by race, gender, national origin, religion, or any other protected
category could be construed as supporting discriminatory practices in hiring.

30. B. Salary, vacation, and other benefits, job security, and working conditions are all examples of basic needs
at work. These factors do not necessarily motivate, but an employer's failure to meet these needs leads to lack
of motivation. Advancement is not a basic need and can be used to improve workplace motivation.

31. B. Theory X managers command from a distance, make most decisions without serious staff input, and
generally view subordinate employees as lacking ambition and drive. Theory Y managers collaborate with staff,
value input, guide others to success, and function as a team with their subordinates.

32. B. Giving a team or individual ownership through delegation requires a hands off approach in which the
manager oversees through the roles of advisor and coach.

33. D. Basic FMLA requires up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave for employees of companies with more than 50
employees within 75 miles of the worksite, for the birth and care of a child, after adopting a child, to care for an
immediate family member (not grandparents) with serious illness, or for a serious illness of the employee.

34. C. The ADA requires employers to make reasonable accommodations for disabled employees and
applicants, but not those that place an undue hardship such as lowering production standards. Required
medical exams that are job specific are allowed if every applicant must participate. Drug screening is not
considered a medical exam and can be applied to any applicant. Employers cannot ask an applicant a question
about a known or unknown disability, but rather only questions about his ability to perform job requirements.

35. D. The act directs that race, religion, age, marital status, etc. cannot be factored into pay scales. The act
directs consideration of the other factors.

36. B. The law stipulates that employees with poor evaluations must be given time to improve performance.
The law also states only that employees must be evaluated regularly and actually encourages employee
involvement in the design process.

37. A. Laissez faire or a hands-off approach can work well with this type of employees if it is a deliberate choice
and not simply lack of management. This type of professional might not respond well to an autocratic style
which would limit employee decision making and control and a paternalistic style, however well intended, would
also be viewed as dictatorial.

38. A. This question requires the applicant to analyze a past stressful situation and also places some stress on
the applicant during the interview as this is not an easy to answer question.

39. B. A CIP usually involves a highly specific written plan of goals and intended actions. It involves regular
feedback, monitoring, appraisal, and modification. It also emphasizes quality. Deming's model is Plan, Do,
Check, Act.

40. B. Employers cannot discriminate based on language abilities unless those abilities are key to specific job
performance or maintaining a safe workplace.

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