"Surprising" Phenomenon
Why did corporate employees not perceive their job security to have changed appreciably from the beginning to the end of a decade during which their jobs were less secure?
Objective
The correct answer must fail to identify a reason for employees in 1994 to be as confident in their job security as employees in 1984. Every wrong answer, meanwhile, will provide a good hypothesis suggesting that the employees’ jobs were equally secure in both years, or that employees in 1994 were more likely than employees in 1984 to say their jobs were secure for a different reason.
A
A large number of the people in both surveys work in small companies that were not affected by mergers, reengineering, and downsizing.
This explains the consistent confidence measurement. The workers surveyed were largely not the ones at risk, so they did not perceive their job security to have changed much.
B
Employees who feel secure in their jobs tend to think that the jobs of others are secure.
This does not explain why employees remained apparently overconfident in their own job security. The author does not imply that employees were asked about other employees' jobs.
C
The corporate downsizing that took place during this period had been widely anticipated for several years before the mid-1980s.
This makes the consistent job confidence less surprising. If employees in 1984 were expecting downsizing, and employees in 1994 had experienced it, then employees in both years responded to the survey based on similar outlooks.
D
Most of the major downsizing during this period was completed within a year after the first survey.
This makes the consistent survey results less surprising. If the survey was conducted in years before and well after significant downsizing, employees in both years were likely not expecting it.
E
In the mid-1990s, people were generally more optimistic about their lives, even in the face of hardship, than they were a decade before.
This contributes to an explanation of the survey results. Employees in 1994 had an optimistic outlook that countered the effects of their declining job security to keep the survey results roughly consistent.
Summary
The stimulus says that decentralization allows different parts of a large institution to function autonomously. Autonomous functioning means that the same people are making decisions and implementing policies, which in turn allows more realistic planning and encourages innovation. Finally, decentralization lets the institution’s administrators focus on big-picture issues instead of daily operations.
Strongly Supported Conclusions
The stimulus supports these conclusions:
An institution whose divisions cannot function autonomously is not decentralized.
In institutions whose divisions do not function autonomously, planning is not always as realistic as possible.
If an institution’s central administrators are not able to focus on big-picture issues instead of daily operations, then the institution is not decentralized.
An institution whose divisions cannot function autonomously is not decentralized.
In institutions whose divisions do not function autonomously, planning is not always as realistic as possible.
If an institution’s central administrators are not able to focus on big-picture issues instead of daily operations, then the institution is not decentralized.
A
In large institutions whose divisions do not function autonomously, planning is not maximally realistic.
This is strongly supported. Based on the facts, when divisions function autonomously, planning becomes more realistic. That means that institutions without autonomous divisions could improve how realistically they plan—in other words, planning is not maximally realistic.
B
Innovation is not always encouraged in large centralized institutions.
This is not supported. Sure, decentralization encourages innovation, but that doesn’t mean that centralized institutions don’t encourage innovation. Maybe every type of institutional structure encourages innovation! We don’t know.
C
For large institutions the advantages of decentralization outweigh its disadvantages.
This is not supported. The stimulus discusses some advantages of decentralization, but we never learn about disadvantages at all. That means we can’t compare whether the advantages or disadvantages are more significant.
D
The central administrations of large institutions are usually partially responsible for most of the details of daily operations.
This is not supported. We know that decentralization allows administrators to not worry about daily operations, but that doesn’t tell us anything about how operations are usually managed. We don’t even know if most large institutions are decentralized or not!
E
The people directly involved in implementing policies are always able to make innovative and realistic policy decisions.
This is not supported. Based on the facts, this style of decision-making and implementation leads to more realistic planning and more innovation. But “more” is a comparison, not an absolute judgement. Even if planning gets more realistic, it might still be not very realistic.