Selvam Tutorials HR management decisions

Read the following scenario and answer the THREE questions that follow.

Selvam Tutorials offers exclusive face-to-face evening classes from Monday to Friday for students who are preparing for various entrance exams. Selvam Dindigul, the owner, operates from his ancestral house, situated in the middle of the city. There are several instructors, but each teaches only one of the following courses: quantitative ability, verbal ability and decision making. Selvam usually recruits fresh graduates, or those instructors who are working with other tutorials and seeking a job change.

As Selvam Tutorials has been expanding aggressively over the past few years, managing it alone becomes challenging for Selvam. Hence, he recruits Kanmani Gunaa, his niece, who has an online MBA with specializations in Accountancy and HR, as a manager. He asks Kanmani to introduce modern HR practices at Selvam Tutorials while managing cost effectively.

Soon after Kanmani takes over, she discovers that every instructor is paid differently even though they teach for the same number of hours. Moreover, these instructors have been recruited locally, having similar educational background. As she is introducing modern HR practices, she wants to equalize the salaries of all the instructors.

Which of the following is definitely NOT an option for Kanmani?

One of the instructors meets Kanmani and urgently requests for a week-long leave because he needs to take care of his ailing father in a nearby village. Kanmani grants him leave. However, on the very next day, she is chastised by Selvam. He tells Kanmani, "while all instructors are legally eligible for leave, we cannot grant leave to instructors, given the tight schedule and continuous classes." Selvam instructs Kanmani to ensure that, when classes are on, leaves are not granted.

Kanmani wants to allow instructors to avail leaves whenever they need them; however, she understands that there should be contingency arrangements in place so that the deliverables are not compromised.

Kanmani is contemplating the following contingency arrangements for the classes that may not be conducted due to faculty leave.

Which of the following will be the BEST contingency arrangement at the lowest possible cost without compromising on the deliverables?

Kanmani meets Selvam and requests his permission to recruit three extra instructors, who would be on the regular payroll. They will only chip in whenever the regular instructors go on leave. Selvam, having been running the tutorial for quite some time, believes that this would not be the right way to solve the problem of managing classes when instructors go on leave. He shares the following data with Kanmani to help her understand that this problem cannot be solved by recruiting more people:

a) The number of days that instructors go on leave of absence is usually two days a month on average. b) Each instructor has a unique style of teaching that cannot be replicated by part-timers. c) Classes are held for 5 days a week, allowing enough rest for the instructors. d) Selvam tried with part-time instructors as back-ups previously but they were often unavailable when needed. e) The extra instructors must be paid a monthly salary, even when they might not be teaching the entire month.

Which of the following combinations of data will BEST convince Kanmani not to recruit extra instructors on the regular payroll?