UPSC Mains 2020 Management Optional Paper I questions

28 questions from the Civil Services (Main) Examination 2020. Official UPSC paper (PDF) · All Management Optional PYQs

1. How does the Delphi technique of decision making work? Does it have relevance in contemporary organizational design?

2. Are being legal and being ethical same? Employees look at their employers in terms of distributive, procedural and interactional justice. How does violation of these affect industrial/human relations?

3. What are the differences between goals and objectives? How is management by objectives better? Discuss the improvements it brings about.

4. Adam Smith has stated that public interest is served best when, individual and business pursue self-interest. Milton Friedman in the same line has said that the sole purpose of business is to make profit. Explain and critically evaluate the implications of these ideas.

5. How has Freud classified and explained id, ego and super-ego? How do they shape our personality?

6. There is an old saying that "individuals do not live by bread alone". Explain its meaning in the context of employee motivation. Compare and contrast the motivation approaches that are likely to be more effective in industries employing knowledge workers and manual workers.

   20 marks

7. "Human resources management is a part of every Manager's job including that of Production Manager or President because 'getting things done and producing results is the name of the game'." Critically analyze the above statement. Why do big corporations require separate human resources department?

   5 marks

8. Enumerate and explain the different kinds of attitude measuring scales. What advantages does the Likert's scale have over Thurstone's or Guttman's scale to measure attitude?

   5 marks

9. "Pre-classical theorists emphasized more on developing specific techniques to solve some identified problems. However both scientific and administrative schools of thoughts given by classical theorists were more all pervasive in their approach to organizational design." Substantiate this statement highlighting pre-classical and classical theorists and their approaches.

   20 marks

10. What are the causes of formation of informal groups in an organization? Compare formal organization with informal organization. How could informal organization be detrimental to the working of formal organization?

    5 marks

11. What are the important types of interviews? Often interviews are affected by errors that creep in the process and undermine their usefulness. What are these errors and how can these be minimized? 5 What 3

12. What is the relationship between Government of India's initiative of 'Startup India' and entrepreneurship? Who is an entrepreneur and what kind of innovations does he or she create to create an enterprise?

    20 marks

13. Discuss the important trends in business. How are these trends shaping human resources management? Why is conventional human resources view being replaced by strategic HRM?

    5 marks

14. "Conflict is a naturally occurring phenomenon with both positive and negative effects depending on its management." In the light of this statement, explain the different conflict management techniques.

    5 marks

15. What are the common misconceptions surrounding cost of capital in practice? How would you dispel them?

16. Distinguish between leasing and hire purchase.

    10 marks

17. What is zero-based budgeting and how does it differ from traditional budgeting?

18. "Products differ in the way consumers buy them." Elucidate. Explain the different categories of products and relate them with the type of distribution approach that is most appropriate for their availability.

19. Customer satisfaction is necessary but not sufficient to survive and thrive in present-day markets. Is it true? Explain the relationship between satisfaction and loyalty by focusing on its marketing implications.

20. Briefly explain the concept of conservatism by giving suitable examples.

21. The selected financial data for X, Y and Z companies for the year ended March 3] are as follows: so 5000 ini te Re tc bea (i) Prepare income statements for X, Y and Z companies. (i) Comment on the financial position and structure of these companies.

    20 marks

22. Explain different types of market or competitive structures. Under which type of market structure, a firm has greater control over its pricing decisions? How does a firm gain control over its pricing decisions?

23. The financial books of a company show a net profit of 2,00,324 for the year ending 31st March, 2020. The cost accounts show a net profit of ¥ 2,04,868 for the same corresponding period. The following information was revealed as a result of scrutiny of the figures of both the sets of books:? fi) Factory overhead under-recovered, in Cost A/c 3,689 (ii) Administration overhead over-recovered in Cost A/c 2,857 (iii) Depreciation charged in Financial A/c 24,320 (iv) Depreciation recovered in Cost A/c 28,560 (v) Interest received but not included in Cost A/c 6,048 (vi) Income tax debited in Financial A/c 7,608 (vii) Bank interest credited in Financial A/c 3,520 (viii) Stores adjustment credited in Financial A/c 5,008 fix) Rent charged in Financial A/c 3,30 (x} Dividend paid recorded in Financial A/c,805 (xi) Loss of obsolescence charged in Financial A/c 9,807 Prepare a statement reconciling the profit as per costing records with the profit as per financial records.

    20 marks

24. What are Option Greeks and what is their significance?

    5 marks

25. What are the key stages that a product passes through its life cycle? Is managing a product during maturity stage difficult? Why? What strategies are to be recommended at this stage?

    5 marks

26. What purpose do the Baumol model, Miller-Orr model and Orgler's model serve? Briefly describe the similarities and differences between these models.

    20 marks

27. "Financial sector reforms in India were introduced as a part of the liberalization policy of nineties and subsequent reforms were a move in the right direction but inadequate." Explain. Identify the weaknesses in the present financial system. How can these be overcome?

    5 marks

28. What are the key differences between consumer and industrial (business) { markets? Explain the different types of buying situations in industrial markets. 5 2iBS—222..