Task: Real-Life Creative Problem Solving
Come up with an original and creative solution for the following real-world problem:
The Upper Management of Acme Company has been holding wage increases to a 6 percent level. The decision to hold wage increases came about from an effort to reduce product twice in the past year due to increased shipping costs of materials, and upper management does not feel that Acme can remain competitive if there are any future increases in the cost of their product. Unfortunately, the engineering job market in the area stands at about 12 jobs for every one trained engineer. Because of this, recruiters are cropping up and are enticing Acme's engineers with better jobs and better benefits. As of late, turnover among Acme's engineers has increased and productivity has decreased. Also, there is a considerable grumbling among current engineers about Acme's policy on wage increases. Mr. Wentworth, an executive vice president, has directed Scott to improve the situation in the engineering department. Mr. Wentworth feels that much of the dissatisfaction is based upon the recruiters' enticements of better opportunities in other places. The concern at Acme is to maintain a quality group of engineers at a high level of productivity. Management at Acme does not know how to solve this problem..

Response: In this situation, it is necessary to compromise.  Acme must find a way to satisfy their employees so that productivity increases.  They need to try bigger and better benefits, and if this means being in debt and going through tough times for awhile, then they need to.  This way, as they start having more employees and productivity increases, there will be room for improvement (and debts can be paid off).
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 22

Response: Acme needs to lower their costs so that in turn, people will buy more from them, resulting in more pay for the worker.  If they lower the cost of their product they will also remain competitive.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 22

Response: Hiring foreign workers who are trained and willing to work for less in order to fill jobs.  This can fix acme‚Äôs wage problem as well as the engineering job market problems.  Acme could also offer current employees certain benefits to convince them to stay.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 10

Response: create an emotional attachment among engineers to help keep them to stay by providing a social life together for The engineers.  This can be done by encouraging care pooling, babysitter clubs, etc.  The company itself should not do This, but allow an upper manager to volunteer to coordinate some of these things.  Hopefully someone would be willing to volunteer their time for The social rewards. -make Acme a better employer than The others in other things besides wage increases, such as with benefits, hours, etc. -give periodic surveys asking the engineers on suggestions to retain them and use the suggestions -get their own ‚Äúheadhunters‚Äù to recruit bright new engineers - make The work environment more pleasant or hours more flexible - give the engineers more say in how things should be run
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 50

Response: You pay for what you get, if the workers have better opportunities elsewhere and are disastified w/ their job you can‚Äôt blame them for wanting to leave.  Either increase your wages for the employees you want to keep or continue to get mediocre performance.  Try listening to your employees needs then make the decision what to do.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 22

Response: I think that they should make the company smaller & not worry about how much they make. Eventually at the rate things are going the company is soon going to shut down or go out of business.  So in order for this not to happen the company just needs to stop being greedy & either go smaller or go out of business.  This way the other engineers that havent been with the company long can go to other companies & the ones  that have been around can stay & then soon the company can work back up to making their full profit once again.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 30

Response: Acme should hie more engineer‚Äôs so that there won‚Äôt be 12 jobs per one engineer.  That will first causeless stress.  They could also find a cheaper way to send materials, resulting in more money for employees; hoping they won‚Äôt go elsewhere.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 22

Response: Expand Acme into shipping its own materials instead of paying an outside place. They will an initial investment but if that is where the increases in costs is coming from, then taking care of your own business will save you in that area. Also, search for quality engineers instead of quantity. It is better to have 1 efficient worker than 10 pieces of shit. Talk to them individually to find what‚Äôs important to them in a job and then offer alternative benefits (i.e. child care, gym, etc.) In the meantime be looking for ways to produce the product more efficiently and resourcefully. If none of this works then pick up and move to Mexico like the rest of the world.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 50

Response: Cut back on as many upper and middle managers as possible. Then reduce any number of engineers whos jobs could be divided up or are not performing @ satisfactory levels. This should help create a base to increase the engineers salaries and  attract new engineers.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 30

Response: Acme needs to maintain a consistent supply of employees to decrease turnover. Since so many leave Acme in search of better benefits, that should be the primary concern. Acme should come up with some better benefits or ways to make working at their company more enjoyable.  If financial difficulties are preventing acme from doing this, they  need to find a way to get more funding for their company. They could possibly expand to other fields besides engineering or maybe merge with a larger, more successful company. They could try to be more economical with their expenses, waste, etc. or maybe try some fundraising, an engineering, bakesale could be quite successful. Another possible solution would be to concentrate on recruiting na√Øve college grads to work at their company fir less money, or better yet, offer internships for students and pay them nothing.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 50

Response: I would have a meeting with all engineers and explain the situation. If some disagreed with you, I would fire them and hire new college grad students. I would also give the remaining engineers a pay increase because ACME would be able to with new people. I would have a better program for the future of employees and the longer you stay the more benefits you receive.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 30

Response: My solution would be to offer them other benefits that the company cab get for free, or to sell them at a reduced price.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 22

Response: Under the circumstances, really Acme‚Äôs only choice is to present better benefit options to their employees. This would allow wages to stay the same and also entice current employees to stay and @ the same time attract new ones. To address the decrease in productivity, Acme could reward top achievers in the company.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 30

Response: The upper management needs to allow the engineers more freedom within their position and more benefits. People will stay with a company that they enjoy working at , and will do a better job and have more pride in their work.  Job satisfaction involves having a sense of worth and belonging within the organization.  Higher security and the fulfillment means more to most people than increased salary or benefits.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 30

Response: In a 12 to 1 market they are going to have to increase wages, benefits, and perks> People work because they have to not because they want to. More money and benefits are usually a good indicator of how badly a your company wants to keep you.  Maybe add a yearly bonus, more vacation, increase ‚Äúperks‚Äù. Let employees wear ‚Äúcasual‚Äù clothes. Flex schedules.  Whatever it takes to keep those employees . They could make up the difference by cutting production costs. Conserve on energy bills, replace inefficient equipment.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 10

Response: Upper management needs to conduct research  in its engineering department to determine the true cause of the dissatisfaction, and deal with that problem, once the facts are known. Market research will also show how current product is placed in the market, price-wise, to see if there is room for further price increases. If the above research shows that the price can not be increased, and the true cause f turnover and decreased productivity is an employee perception that there are better opportunities else where, upper management is either going to have to increase engineerings perception of there jobs in a way that doesn‚Äôt cost anything (Friday afternoons off, or casual dress code) or increase salaries and sell product as a loss until something else changes.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 30

Response: Acme, first, needs to increase their production. Maybe the hiring of more help. The engineers need incentives such as personal holdings and bonuses. Acme may also want to cut wages of CEO‚Äôs. Last, Acme can introduce better employee stock purchase plans.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 10

Response: If the benefits are not worth the stay or enough to make up for not increasing the salaries more engineers would be more likely to stay and product increase could be increased because of good benefit packages. It is hard problem to solve but I think this a start I think this would help to tart a basis for more engineers to want to work for Acme.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 22

Response: I have no idea.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 10

Response: Acme should increase pay and benefits for its employees. They should also create a caring work environment in which workers want to work. If workers feel that Acme has the best work environment and want to come to work, it will show in the quality of their work produce.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 10

Response: Employ appropriately ¬Ω of the current number of engineers and give them dramatic (30%) salary increases. Keep those who are more creative and ‚Äúquality‚Äù focused, let those most focused on quantity/production quoatas go.  Find an alternative method of shipping, or bring in an internal shipping company,  Change your products so it is worth what it costs, and market it so that it is more appealing.  Cut supply so that price will increase. If this fails, become Acme headhunting and focus on the growing supply of engineers.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 50

Response: Well, compare process of other companies‚Äô products and their shipping charges see if you should get a new company to ship products. If there is no difference, then I don‚Äôt know what to do.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 30

Response: You must spend money to make money. If productivity, which is directly related to profitability, goes down, so does the company. They must take the chance of dying quickly by paying the engineers or dying slowly as they fail to produce. By getting the engineers they need they have a greater chance to succeed when their productivity is higher.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 22

Response: First need to analyze how competing companies can afford to offer better opportunities. Also need to look into possibility of increasing benefits. Acme needs to look at various areas of possible waste to try and cut costs and possibly offer performance bonuses to those who operate at a high level of efficiency.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 30

Response: Obviously, the ‚ÄúHeadhunters‚Äù are the problem.  However the engineers have already heard about how crappy their lot is , so the need benefits. So,. Acme needs to entice it‚Äôs engineers and get rid of headhunters. One way to do this would be to give them a present that they will keep on them at all times such as a watch. This present will be bugged, so Acme can detect when they are talking to a headhunter. After that, they assassinate the headhunter . Eventually there will be no more headhunters . Also, they need to make the other companies look less attractive, so they could arrange catastrophic accidents in their engineering departments.
Human originality rating (0-100 scale): 50