This mini-lesson covers AQA Topic 4 — Human resources: organisational structures, recruitment and selection, training and development, motivation (financial and non-financial), and retention.
Work through each screen, answer the questions as you go (some are wordy, some are calculations) and collect ⭐ stars. Press Start when you're ready.
Organisational structure
Organisational structures
An organisational structure shows who reports to whom.
Hierarchy & chain of command — the levels from top to bottom and the line of authority.
Span of control — how many people one manager directly supervises.
Tall structures have many levels and narrow spans; flat structures have few levels and wide spans.
Delegation: passing authority for a task down the hierarchy. It develops staff and frees managers, but the manager stays responsible.
Quick check
Span of control
?A manager directly supervises 10 staff. If the business removes a layer of middle managers so each remaining manager supervises more people, what happens to the span of control?
Calculate
Your turn — span of control
1A department has 1 manager and 12 staff reporting directly to that manager. State the manager's span of control (number of direct reports).
people
Hint: span of control = the number of people reporting directly to the manager.
Recruitment
Recruitment & selection
Recruitment is finding and hiring staff.
Internal recruitment — from existing staff. Cheaper, quicker, and you know the candidate, but no fresh ideas and leaves another vacancy.
External recruitment — from outside. Brings new skills and ideas, but is slower and more expensive.
Documents include a job description (the role) and a person specification (the ideal candidate). Selection uses application forms, CVs, interviews and tests.
Sort it
Internal, external, or a selection document?
Tap a statement, then the group it best matches.
🏠 Internal
🌐 External
📄 Document
Training
Training & development
Training improves staff skills:
Induction — for new starters, to settle them in.
On-the-job — learning while working (cheaper, relevant).
Off-the-job — courses away from work (broader skills, but costs money and time away).
Benefit vs cost: training raises productivity and motivation, but costs money and trained staff may leave for a competitor.
Quick check
Which training?
?A new employee learns to use the till by working alongside an experienced colleague during shifts. Which type of training is this?
Motivation
Motivating employees
Motivated staff are more productive, provide better service and are less likely to leave.