Employee assessment
The Solid Waste Management Department (department) has 40 waste collection workers available for four different types of jobs: garbage collection, recycling collection, yard waste collection, and bulky waste collection. The management team wants to maximize operational performance by assigning these four jobs to the employees that perform the best at each job. Employees must have at least six months of department experience before they can be assigned to a bulky waste collection job. After performing an initial review of the skill set of each employee, the department has developed a performance matrix for all employees (see tab titled “Matrix”). To provide collection services citywide, each collection type will require the minimum staffing levels listed below. Additionally, through interviews with operations staff, the department has established maximum and minimum performance levels per position for each type of job:
Job Type
Minimum Staff Requirement
Minimum Performance
Maximum Performance
Garbage Collection
10 workers
0.5 tons per hour
2.0 tons per hour
Recycling Collection
8 workers
210 homes per hour
350 homes per hour
Yard Waste Collection
6 workers
75 carts per hour
160 carts per hour
Bulky Waste Collection
6 workers
2.2 tons per hour
6.0 tons per hour
Exercises 1-5:
1. Please create a pivot table that shows the average level of performance for garbage collection, recycling collection, and yard waste collection for two employee groups: those who have been employed for less than 6 months, and those that have been employed for 6 months or longer.
2. Because each job has a different performance metric (i.e., tons per hour, homes per hour, etc.), please create a new performance matrix with one standard performance metric across all job types.
3. Where should the department place these 40 employees to maximize the performance of all four jobs? (more tons, homes, and carts is better)
4. What changes would you recommend making to the constraints in order to increase performance (i.e., raising minimum standards, changing minimum experience levels)?
5. What financial, political, and employee relations issues should be considered prior to the implementation of these assignments? How would you identify and incorporate these issues within your recommendation? Be sure to fully explain your ideas.
