HRM 8010 Module 4 Final Project: An HR Plan for Inclusion in a Global Manufacturer Example

Who Gets to Supervise? An HR Plan for Inclusive Advancement at Kestrel Biologics

Student Name

Doctor of Business Administration, Thomas Edison State University

HRM-8010: Seminar in Global Human Resource Management

Mentor Name

Month Day, Year

Who Gets to Supervise? An HR Plan for Inclusive Advancement at Kestrel Biologics

Introduction

Over three years Kestrel will open three production lines and roughly twenty supervisory and management posts. Its earlier planning, hiring and training work, developed in Modules 1 to 3, addresses how to supply technicians. This final project examines a different weakness in the HR function: who advances from technician to supervisor. The analysis finds that the company's promotion process, which relies on managers nominating candidates informally, produces a supervisory group much narrower than the workforce it leads.

Organizational Analysis

Across the three sites, women make up about 45 percent of technicians but 22 percent of supervisors. At New Brunswick, employees from racial and ethnic groups underrepresented in management make up about 40 percent of technicians and 15 percent of supervisors. Engagement survey results show that technicians in both groups are less likely to say they understand how promotion decisions are made. Interviews with site HR managers found that supervisors are usually chosen from candidates whom current managers know well, often those who have worked on high-visibility projects, and that performance ratings vary widely between managers.

The area for improvement is therefore the advancement process itself: how high-potential employees are identified, rated and developed. The problem is not only one of fairness. Kestrel's growth plan requires twenty new supervisors; a process that draws from a narrow pool wastes talent the company already employs.

The evidence points to process rather than intent. Site managers interviewed for this analysis did not describe any wish to exclude groups; they described choosing people they had seen perform. But visibility is not evenly distributed. Night-shift staff, second-language speakers and people outside managers' informal circles rarely get the visible projects that lead to nomination. An informal process that rewards visibility will therefore reproduce existing patterns even when every individual decision is made in good faith.

The Cultural and Economic Environment

In the United States, the 2025 changes in federal policy and Ames v. Ohio Department of Youth Services, the Supreme Court's 2025 decision that applied the same Title VII standard to claims by members of majority groups, mean that inclusion efforts must rest on processes that treat every employee by the same rules. In Singapore, a culture that values deference to seniority can make employees reluctant to put themselves forward, which favors those whom managers already know. These differences shape how the plan is delivered at each site, while its principles stay the same.

The economic setting adds urgency at every site. In New Brunswick and Cork, Kestrel competes with larger pharmaceutical companies for experienced supervisors, and external hires command premiums and often leave within two years. In Singapore, government programs encourage employers to develop local staff into leadership roles. In all three places, developing supervisors from within is cheaper and more reliable than hiring them, which makes a wider internal pool an economic advantage as well as a matter of fairness.

The HR Plan

1. Open Promotion

Every supervisor opening will be posted at all three sites for at least two weeks, with written criteria based on the supervisor job analysis. Any certified technician may apply, and managers may also nominate candidates, but nomination is no longer the only route.

2. Structured Talent Reviews

Twice a year, each site will hold a talent review in which managers discuss every technician at the top career level against the same criteria, with HR facilitating and calibrating. Silzer and Church (2009) caution that identifying potential is often unreliable when it relies on informal impressions; defined criteria and group discussion reduce the influence of any one manager's familiarity.

3. Calibrated Performance Management

Performance ratings feed promotion decisions, so their consistency matters. DeNisi and Murphy (2017) reviewed a century of performance appraisal research and concluded that rating accuracy depends less on the form than on the context, including managers' motivation and accountability. Managers will learn to rate against written standards, compare ratings across teams in calibration sessions and check each year whether any group's ratings drift in a way that hints at bias. Performance management also needs to work across cultures. In Singapore, direct negative feedback from a supervisor may be delivered and received differently than in New Jersey, and self-assessments may understate achievements. Managers at each site will be trained to give specific, behavior-based feedback and to gather evidence of performance from production records and peers rather than relying on employees to promote themselves. The rating standards stay the same everywhere; the conversation around them is adapted to local norms.

4. Development Open to All

The leadership program from Module 3 will be opened to applications from any certified technician, with selection based on the talent review criteria. A mentoring program pairing technicians with supervisors at another site will be available to all, which particularly helps those who lack informal connections to managers.

Challenges

Four challenges could limit the plan. Managers may resist losing control of promotions; involving them in setting criteria and keeping a nomination route reduces this. Calibration takes time from busy production managers; scheduling it alongside existing business reviews limits the burden. In Singapore, employees may hesitate to apply openly; supervisors will be asked to encourage applications and HR will explain the process in team meetings. And legal requirements differ, so counsel at each site will review the process, and demographic data will be used only in aggregate to evaluate the process.

Kestrel will roll the plan out in three six-month stages. In the first six months, the supervisor job analysis will be updated, criteria written and posting begun; in the next six, talent reviews and calibration will start at each site; and in the final six, the mentoring program and the opened leadership program will run. Each phase will be reviewed against the measures below before the next begins, so problems found at one site can be corrected before the process spreads.

Measures

Success will show in the share of supervisor posts filled by open posting, the diversity of applicant pools and appointees compared with the technician population, the gap in survey scores on understanding promotion, and the time new supervisors take to reach full performance.

The plan contributes to strategic advantage in a specific way. Kestrel wins contracts by staffing new lines quickly and running them without quality failures. Supervisors chosen through a transparent process from a wider pool are more likely to be the best available leaders, and a workforce that sees a fair path to advancement is more likely to stay through the company's growth. The measures therefore include time to staff supervisory roles and retention of high-performing technicians, not only the composition of appointees.

Conclusion

Kestrel's advancement process draws future supervisors from a narrower pool than its workforce. An HR plan built on open promotion, structured talent reviews, calibrated performance management and development open to all widens that pool through processes that treat every employee by the same rules, adapted to each country's setting. The company gains the supervisors its growth requires and a workforce that sees a fair path to advancement.

References

Ames v. Ohio Department of Youth Services, No. 23-1039 (U.S. June 5, 2025).

DeNisi, A. S., & Murphy, K. R. (2017). Performance appraisal and performance management: 100 years of progress? Journal of Applied Psychology, 102(3), 421-433. https://doi.org/10.1037/apl0000085

Silzer, R., & Church, A. H. (2009). The pearls and perils of identifying potential. Industrial and Organizational Psychology, 2(4), 377-412. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1754-9434.2009.01163.x