Polytechnic University of the Philippines

College of Accountancy and Finance

DEPARTMENT OF FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT
A.Y. 2019-2020

CASE STUDY

DELL EMPLOYEE RELATIONS: HUMAN RESOURCE PROBLEM

(EMPLOYEE RELATIONS MANAGEMENT)

Punut, Milanisa I.

BSBA-FM 2-6

March 14, 2020

I. ABOUT THE COMPANY
 Dell Inc., which operates under the brand name Dell, is an
American multinational computer technology company that develops, sells,
repairs, and supports computers and related products and services. Named after
its founder, Michael Dell, the company is one of the largest technological
corporations in the world, employing more than 145,000 people in the U.S. and
around the world.

II. PERSPECTIVE

 This case study is divided into two perspectives, the authors’ perspective and the
reporter’s perspective. The authors’ perspective comes from Human Resource
Department of SEGI University, one of the largest private higher education
providers in Malaysia. Their perspective includes the time context, short
historical background, current situation that leads to the problem. On the other
hand, the reporter’s point of view includes the statement of the problem, area of
consideration, alternative course of actions, conclusion and lastly the
recommendation.

III. TIME CONTEXT

 2010

Dell is a huge company that running around business globally it filled with all
sorts of the positive and negative issue surrounding the company brands in all
aspect. Dell as a strong company that doing very well in providing solutions for a
customer around the world yet it faced several issues when it comes down to
employees’ matters.

IV. SHORT HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

 Dell humble beginning started in 1984 by a student named Michael Dell at the
University of Texas. With the aim of selling a compatible computer to the then
 computer giant, IBM PC, he created his own personal Dell in his off-campus
dormitory room. From that point, Michael started selling personal computer
systems directly to customers to better understand customers’ need and to
provide the most effective solutions. Later on with 1000 dollar in expansion
capital, he dropped out of school to focus full-time on his business. In 1988, Dell
goes public and raised a capital of 30 million and its market capitalization
skyrocketed from 1000 dollar to 85 million dollars. Until today, Dell earned the
rank of 41 among all 500 companies around the world on the famous fortune 500
billboards.

V. CURRENT SITUATION THAT LEADS TO THE PROBLEM

 Dell employees have been shown to several cases for their misconduct as being
dishonest in their own company position.

 Apart from that, Dell also reportedly having an accounting scandal that their
employees hid an amount of 150 million dollars using accounting means.

VI. STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

 How Dell can address the serious issues about wrongful actions and behavior of
their employees in order to discipline them?

VII. AREAS OF CONSIDERATION (SWOT ANALYSIS)

Below are the Strength, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats Analysis of DELL Inc.

Strengths:

 One of the biggest PC maker in the world.

 They design the computer to the customer's specifications.
 Their assembly is done at a fairly inexpensive cost.
 They offer their customers the ability to track their delivery.
  They are the number one PC provider for medium and small businesses across
the US for 10 straight years.
 They ship around one hundred and forty thousand computers in a day.
 They have very good branding and are one of the most known computers in the
world.
 Dell is an innovative brand and invests in innovation for continuous expansion of
its product line.

Weaknesses:

 Dealing with a large amount of supplies from many different countries can cause
a large issue when products are recalled.
 They build computers, not develop them.
 Their supply orders are so large that they become limited to dealing with a small
few supplies that can handle the volume.
 They have weak business relationships with many computer retailers.
 They do not have unique technologies to offer the market.
 High operating expenses
Opportunities:
 The introduction of new and enticing products to the customers.
 Branding their lower cost, lower priced computers that are sold anonymously
throughout the world to open other avenues of branding opportunities.
 Maintaining and expanding the one stop shopping abilities that are offered to
their customers.
 Continuing to market on the internet to gain larger market bases.
 Broadening their scopes in Europe, and in Asia Pacific Markets like India and
China.
 Invest in AI and emerging technologies.
 Expand into government and education markets.
Threats
  Increasingly popular brand names in the competition like HP, Lenovo, Asus,
Apple etc.
 Strong relationships that are held between competition and the retailers.
 Competition can basically create the same computers since Dell builds
computers, not designs them.
 Fluctuations in the currency markets can make global business operations more
open to losses in certain areas of the supply chain.
 Tariff trade barriers affecting their positions in multiple countries.
 Increasingly lower prices for products amount their competitors.

VIII. ALTERNATIVE COURSE OF ACTION

1. Due to several cases of misconduct of employees, Dell HR should strategically

redesign discipline policy comprehensively so that their employees know
what is expected and what will happen if they do not meet expectations.

Advantage:

 This will make easy to HR manager on disciplining the employees

 Employees are willing to abide by company rules and executive orders

and behave in the desired fashion

 It will help to assist employees in changing their performance, attendance,

or behaviour.

Disadvantage:

 Employees may be unwilling to abide the policy.

 Additional time, efforts, and money needed.

 Employees may feel deprived and pressured since the policy may limit
their actions in their workplace.
2. Since employee attitude may affect the productivity quality, and morale;
collegiality, cooperation, and cohesion; employee development; and retention, as
well as turnover of the company. Good employee attitudes drive positive results.
Bad employee attitudes put a negative result. So, Dell should undergo their
employees into attitude/character training and development program.

Advantages:

 Improves morale of the employees.

 Increase efficiency and productivity.

 Reduce cases regarding employee’s misconduct.

 Lessen the burden of HR Manager.

 Promote safe and sound workplace

Disadvantage:

 Additional time, efforts, and money needed.

 This may be useless if the problem is on the management itself.

3. The company may have monthly counselling to the employee to keep track
on their behaviour in the company.

Advantages:

 Employee’s behaviour is monitored.

 HR manager may give advice to employee whose having problems in

his/her work or to his/her workmates.
  HR manager will easily keep track if there are problems between
employees and resolve it before it cause bigger issue.

Disadvantages:

 Another burden given to HR Manager.

 Additional time and efforts is needed.

 This may not sustain in long-run.

 Employees may be unwilling to cooperate and did not disclose issues they
facing in the manager.

IX. CONCLUSION

According to Human Resource MBA, employee relation is the relationship that is

shared between an organization and its base employee. It even highlighted that even
though employee relations sound broad yet it is crucial for an organization. So giving
importance on building the employee relations in order to maintain the success in long-
run. This will not only benefit the company but also the employee itself as they able to
practice self-discipline. A strong employee relation and proper employee discipline will
result of absence of chaos, irregularity and confusion in the behaviour of a worker.

X. RECOMMENDATION

To DELL Inc. Human Resource Management:

In order to address the serious issues regarding the employees in making

wrongful action, I recommend for Dell Inc. HRM the alternative courses of action #1 and
#2 which are strategically redesign discipline policy comprehensively and undergo
their employees into attitude/character training and development program. Dell
has 157,000 employees as of Feb 2019, if they fail to monitor and give importance on
building a right behaviour of their employees, this may greatly hurt the company’s
reputation and productivity.

The company should not tolerate any misconduct of their employees and they
should properly investigate the issue before giving a disciplinary action to those
employees failed to meet the expectation. So, Dell Inc. should make a discipline policy
that easily understand by the employee in order for them easily adopt it. This will make
easy to HR manager on disciplining the employees and employees will orderly behave
and more importantly will help to assist employees in changing their performance,
attendance, or behaviour. Since employee is very important asset of the company, they
should focus on improving their employee behaviour by let them undergo
attitude/character training and development training program in order to increase the
working efficiency or morale of the employees so that their productivity is stepped up
and the cost of production brought down and the quality of production improved. In this
way company create a safe and sound workspace for their employee and attract
qualified applicants.

Source of Case Study:

https://www.coursehero.com/file/34575566/Employee-Relations-of-Delldocx/