Passage 4
Human-resource Management
If sustainable competitive advantage depends on work-force skills, American firms have a problem. Human-resource management is not traditionally seen as central to the competitive survival of the firm in United States. Skill acquisition is considered an individual responsibility. Labor is simply another factor of production to be hired-rented at the lowest possible cost-much as one buys raw materials or equipment.
The lack of importance attached to human-resource management can be seen in the corporate hierarchy. In an American firm the chief financial officer is almost always second in command. The post of head of human-resource management is usually a specialized job, off at the edge of the corporate hierarchy. The executive who holds it is never consulted on major strategic decisions and has no chance to move up to Chief Executive Officer (CEO). By way of contrast, in Japan the head of human-resource management is central-usually the second most important executive, after the CEO, in the firm's hierarchy.
While American firms often talk about the vast amounts spent on training their work forces, in fact they invest less in the skills of their employees than do either Japanese or German firms. The money they do invest is also more highly concentrated on professional and managerial employees. And the limited investments that are made in training workers are also much more narrowly focused on the specific skills necessary to do the next job rather than on the basic background skills that make it possible to absorb new technologies.
As a result, problems emerge when new breakthrough technologies arrive If American workers, for example, take much longer to learn how to operate new flexible manufacturing stations than workers in Germany (as they do) the effective cost of those stations is lower in Germany than it is in the United States. More time is required before equipment is up and running at capacity, and the need for extensive retraining generates costs and creates bottlenecks that limit the speed with which new equipment can be employed. The result is lower pace of technological change. And in the end the skills of the populatio affect the wages of the top half. If the bottom half can't effectively staff the processes that have to be operated, the management and professional jobs that go with these processes will disappear.
According to the passage, the human-resource management strategie of American firms affect their competitive capacity.
A、True
B、False
【正确答案】：A
【名师解析】:根据文章内容，美国公司在人力资源管理方面的策略确实影响了它们的竞争力。文章指出，美国公司通常将人力资源管理视为次要，而不是作为公司竞争力的核心。在美国公司中，首席财务官通常是第二把手，而负责人力资源管理的职位则处于公司层级结构的边缘，很少参与重大战略决策，也没有机会晋升为首席执行官。相比之下，日本公司则将人力资源管理视为核心，其负责人通常是公司层级中仅次于首席执行官的第二重要人物。
此外，尽管美国公司经常谈论他们在员工培训上的巨额投资，实际上他们在员工技能上的投资比日本或德国公司要少，而且这些投资更集中在专业和管理员工上。美国公司在员工培训上的投资也更倾向于针对特定工作所需的特定技能，而不是基本背景技能，这限制了员工吸收新技术的能力。
文章还提到，当新技术出现时，美国工人学习操作新灵活制造站所需的时间比德国工人要长，这导致德国的有效成本更低。美国工人需要更多的时间才能使设备满负荷运转，而广泛的再培训需求则产生了成本并造成了瓶颈，限制了新设备投入使用的速度。结果是技术变革的步伐更慢，最终影响了人口的技能水平，进而影响了上层一半人的工资水平。如果底层一半人无法有效操作必须运行的过程，那么与这些过程相关的管理和专业工作将会消失。
因此，根据文章内容，可以得出结论，美国公司的人力资源管理策略确实影响了它们的竞争力，选项A是正确的。
