Part one:

You are one of the members of the Management Team for an organization that provides travel and service opportunities for college students. While you are based in Saint Paul, MN – you have offices in six other cities around the county. The organization employs about 100 people, with approximately 15 employees in each location (some as small as 10, others as big as 20). While the main office controls overall messaging and pricing for travel / service trips, each office runs somewhat independently in deciding what colleges to visit, how to recruit participants, and how to manage their own budget.

Over the past few years there has been increasing complaints about the differences in pay, benefits and working conditions at the seven different locations (Saint Paul, Atlanta, Dallas, Seattle, Boston, Denver and Baltimore). You (and your team) have been tasked by the VP of People and Operations to investigate these issues and make recommendations. To start, please answer the following questions:

What data will you look to collect to help inform your initial deliberations? What data will you look for internal to the organization, and what data will you look for outside the organization?
How might you explain some of the differences in pay, benefits and working conditions? To what extent might this be normal and healthy, and where might these difference be problematic?

Part two:

Now that each of your Management Team members has compiled your initial data and responses, you will now share what you have put together. In doing so, your group should work to answer the following:

In your report to the VP, how will you differentiate “normal and healthy” differences in pay, benefits and working conditions versus not so healthy differences?
How might your team, and the organization, work to better ensure consistency in pay, benefits and working conditions across the organization? How, specifically, might you link this to the organization’s mission, strategy and goals (think in terms of strategic HR).