An engineering firm specializes in installing environmentally friendly

Question

An engineering firm specializes in installing environmentally friendly components, such as solar panels and green technology, on the rooftops of many different types of buildings in a large urban area. Each project is assigned to one of several installation teams. The owner, who is concerned with costs, is conducting an analysis of worker efficiency. Once he has completed the analysis, he plans to retrain the team that has the highest average projected completion time in order to improve that team's efficiency.

Which one of the following, if true, most seriously calls into question the owner’s plan for selecting the team to be retrained?

A. The installation fees that the firm charges its customers are lower than those charged for similar projects done by other companies.

B. If the time that the team takes to finish a project is not lowered significantly, the firm could lose business to competitors.

C. The team that has the highest average completion time tends to be assigned the most complex projects.

D. Retraining the team will substantially increase the short-term costs of the firm and thereby impact its profitability.

E. Maximum efficiency can only be achieved if the team with the highest average completion rate is terminated.

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aditya1818 · Answer

A. The installation fees that the firm charges its customers are lower than those charged for similar projects done by other companies.-  Incorrect: Do this option takes us anywhere with respect to the conclusion? the firm is charging less compared to other firms for installation maybe because of the long time one particular team is taking long time to install so the training will increase the efficiency and hence the plan will be profitable. I cannot think anything else.

B. If the time that the team takes to finish a project is not lowered significantly, the firm could lose business to competitors.- Incorrect: If this is so then it gives another reason for doing this efficiency plan.
 
C. The team that has the highest average completion time tends to be assigned the most complex projects.- Correct: This in the read itself tells us that if we tell them to lower the time would in fact may lead to degradation of work if done early.

D. Retraining the team will substantially increase the short-term costs of the firm and thereby impact its profitability. -Incorrect: I was thoughtful of this. It might increase the short-term costs of the firm but if the team takes lower time then they will be having more time to do more work in future and so they will be having bigger profits in long run.

E. Maximum efficiency can only be achieved if the team with the highest average completion rate is terminated.- Incorrect: This option strengthen the conclusion.

Dereno · Answer

There Is an Environmental friendly - engineering firm, which specialises in roof top solar systems and green technology in urban areas. To cater the needs of the customers, the firm has multiple teams for the installation process.

The owner has been given the freedom to choose the team of their liking. The owner wants to retrain the team to improve workers efficiency.

The criteria of choosing the team is one with the highest average completion time. The owner links worker efficiency with the time taken, more time means lesser efficiency and vice versa.

The owners plan for selecting the team to be retrained has to be questioned seriously. Choose an option which supports it.

A. The installation fees that the firm charges its customers are lower than those charged for similar projects done by other companies.

This could mean, the firm might get more business in the future and if it has a team with lesser average time of completion, would make the company more profitable. This strengthens the idea of retrain the team. Hence, Wrong.

B. If the time that the team takes to finish a project is not lowered significantly, the firm could lose business to competitors.

This may or may not impact the business profitability. The track record of completion, weather and other factors are to be analysed before jumping into a conclusion. Hence, Wrong.

C. The team that has the highest average completion time tends to be assigned the most complex projects.

The team that has the highest average completion time , might be considered as a team with the lowest efficiency. So, as per the owners view , this team needs to be retrained to improve performance and productivity. What if, the team which has the highest average completion time are the ones, who are extremely skilled and capable of handling any complex projects. That team, is allowed only the toughest of projects, so that their skills are effectively utilised and the time of completion is lowered also.

This challenges the perspective of the owner. Hence, correct.

D. Retraining the team will substantially increase the short-term costs of the firm and thereby impact its profitability.

This option speaks about the expenses incurred by the training of team, which is out of scope compared to the efficiency and time constraint being debated. Hence, Wrong.

E. Maximum efficiency can only be achieved if the team with the highest average completion rate is terminated.

This option is wrong in many ways, capability building, training and other options are usually available to uplift a poor performing team. This speaks about an extreme case, as well as an option which seems completely irrelevant to the question at hand. Hence, Wrong.

Option C

laborumplaceat · Answer

We have to find fault with the selection of team which the owner chooses to retrain. It chooses the team who takes most time to complete the project - looks logical as the team who takes more time to complete seems to be less efficient. But what if the team that takes most time to complete was given a complex project. Then the higher time taken is due to the complexity of the project and not because of inefficiency. This is that  C says - it is correct.

Bunuel · Answer

KAPLAN OFFICIAL EXPLANATION:

Since the question asks for a choice that seriously calls the owner’s plan into question, this is a Weaken question. The owner is concerned with costs, and the owner’s criterion for selecting the team to be retrained is the “highest average projected completion time.” Find a choice that casts doubt on using that particular measure as a criterion for retraining. Predict that the correct answer will probably indicate that the team that takes the longest to complete projects is either not actually inefficient or is so unskilled that retraining will not help.

(C) accords with this prediction : the projects that are the most complex would reasonably take longest to complete. If a team is repeatedly assigned complex projects, the team’s average completion time will inevitably be higher than that of other teams. If this is true, the owner would not be justified in concluding the workers are inefficient or in need of retraining.

(A) is an irrelevant comparison, because the installation fees that this company or other companies charge are not related to worker efficiency. While (B) would give the manager a reason to reduce inefficiency, this choice does not relate to his specific plan for selecting the team to retrain. (D) may call into question the decision to retrain any team, but the question asks you to weaken the argument for choosing the team that takes the longest to complete projects, and (D) does not challenge this criterion for team selection. How "maximum efficiency" could be achieved, as in (E), is irrelevant to whether retraining the slowest team would improve efficiency.

An engineering firm specializes in installing environmentally friendly

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