Optimal Recruitment and Selection Process - Research Proposal Example

Recruitment and selection Introduction Organisations are physical ‘structures’, where varied employees with different educational qualifications, skills, experience from different locations with different culture, attitudes, etc, will accomplish their allocated work under the supervision of a leader, for organisation’s benefit as well as for their personal benefit. These employees will be recruited into an organisation after following various and optimal recruitment process. It is necessary that the leader or the management or Human Resource Manager (HRM) should ensure that there is sufficient quantity of efficient employees for the efficient performance of the organisation. So, this report aims at defining, designing, discussing and recommending an optimal recruitment process for the position of a management trainee in the marketing department. To fulfil that objective, the writer will assess the theories and practices including good practices from other organisations to inform his organisation about effective recruitment and selection process. To be more specific, he will first carry out a PEST analysis to subjectively weigh his organisation in the external context and then the SWOT analysis to demonstrate the state of the organisation internally and importantly about the need for an effective recruitment process. Thus, by discussing the process of recruiting two management trainees starting from designing the job itself to staging advertisements and interviews for the very purpose, the good practice will be formulated including recommendations on how to further optimize it. Research and Methodology In this report, the research required to analyse the key objectives are divided into primary research and secondary research. The company’s processes and data, which is the groundwork for all the aspects of methodology and the data originated from the company, and used for primary research is the primary data. Secondary data is the collection of the data of the researches done by other people in this field which will support the work done by the author. The primary research involved studying all the related organisational process through first-hand and by analysing the available organisational documents. The secondary research involved researching and collecting materials regarding the Human Resources processes, which is particularly relevant to Recruitment and selection. The research involved reading and browsing through books, journals and websites. PEST and SWOT analysis PEST (Political, Economic, and Social and Technological factors) is an important tool used for solving problems related to market decline and also understanding market growth thus helps determine the position, potential and direction of a business. As far as my organisation is concerned, it operates in the computer or Information Technology sector, so it faces that industry specific external factors, which directly or indirectly affects the recruitment and selection process. Political factors that impact the computer industry as a whole are stability of an economy and taxes levied on computer related services and hardware. An unstable economy will discourage growth of business as well as other institutional setup thus the demand for computers will decrease, which indirectly decreases recruitment and instead promotes layoffs. Economic growth of a country or even a region is an important factor deciding the demand for computers. Growing economies will have higher demand for computers as they as setting up new businesses and other institutional systems like education, social welfare etc. which would require computerization and hence higher demand for computers. Social factors determine the preferences of the consumers with regards to products and services. Based on these factors firms need to analyze the products to be introduced in the market, services to be provided and methods of marketing, advertising etc. All the organisational processes as part of covering the social aspects particularly the marketing process will necessitate the recruitment of new employees and that is quite relevant to my organisation, which customer centric. Organisations in the computer industry on the whole are highly impacted by the fast pace of technological innovations which makes products obsolete within months. This external technological threat will also lead to recruitment of employees. Although, it will mainly entail recruitment of technical staffs and management staffs minimally, technological factor could impact because the management trainees have to be recruited based on the new technological products in my organisation. After focusing on my organisation’s external factors, to focus on the internal factors, as mentioned above SWOT analysis can pitch in. Our business model of direct-to-customer products is a great strength of the company. This not only helps to provide true value to the customers as per his/her requirements, but also necessitates recruitment of marketing staffs to entice those customers. On the other hand, the weakness is, my company is not a manufacturer but a maker of computers. So, as it is highly dependent on its parts suppliers, it has to formulate marketing strategies accordingly taking into the suppliers’ interests as well. This incorporation of other stakeholders could dilute the effectiveness of the marketing strategy, with indirect impact on the recruitment process. When one looks at the opportunities, my company has diversified to non-core products like LCD TVs and other computer peripherals. This provides an opportunity to diversify and enlarge the marketing strategies, and that will lead to recruitment of more management trainees. As discussed above, technological redundancy is a factor that poses a threat to my company. This fact could have impact on the recruitment process, but mostly technical staff and minimally on the management staffs. So, from the above PEST and SWOT analysis, it is clear that my organisation’s external factors and internal factors directly or indirectly impacts recruitment and selection process, with a large scope for recruitment of new staffs for the marketing department. Theories and Practices Recruitment part is one of the important roles of the Human Resource Department (HRD) or Human Resource Manager or HR Manager, which is encapsulated in the Collins’ Leadership theory. “They got the right people on the bus, moved the wrong people off, ushered the right people to the right seats - and then they figured out where to drive it” (Collins 2007). Based on Nankervis model, its clearly shows the link between the external factors, dynamic environment , stakeholders needs’, the vision of the organization and strategic business plan only necessitates the recruitment and selection process. Among the recruitment and selection processes, interview has been the commonly used recruitment and selection process from very early times. The interview is an extremely common selection method and has a high predictive validity for job performance (Robertson and Smith 2001), indicating many factors particularly whether the prospective person is “organisation fit” (Harris 1999). Interview can be classified as a controlled situation in which a personnel selector, through personal contact assesses the candidate's suitability for a post. (Robertson and Smith 2001). This was further validated by Farrington (2008) who stated that the objective of the selection interview is to predict the candidate's probable behaviour in a particular job situation and this is only done during the interview by obtaining a sample of his/her behaviour, sufficient enough to take it has basis for future forecasting. The website, HR Guide puts forward that Job requisites like knowledge levels, communicative or social skills, verbal fluency and many more things can be easily judged through an interview, thus clear predicting whether the employee will fit the organisation. "…enable a face-to-face encounter to take place so that the interviewer can a make an assessment of how the candidate can fit into the organisation" (Armstrong 2006, p. 441). However, the weakness with interviews is that while judging the prospective employees’ job potential face-to-face, employers could focus more on his/her ‘physicality’ than their mental abilities, skill, knowledge, etc. That is, interviewers with negative mind could focus more on certain non-job requisites like physical looks (for a job which does not need good looks), then whether he/she is belonging particular race, ethnicity and religion, whether he/she can be dominated, etc, etc and this will lead to biased and subjective judgements by interviewers. (Armstrong 2006, p. 441). Apart from this stereotyping, the interviewers could also stereotype the individuals concerning the characteristics required for success on the job, thus devaluing them. (hr-guide.com). While, the other strengths of interviews are it enables the employer or leader or manager to determine if there is compatibility between the applicant and the employees, and whether it can work for a long-term. It also enables to select the best candidates among many qualified applicants, thus positively predicting future employee’s performance. (hr-guide.com). Organisations and managers following Velasquez’s theoretical model of Caring personally care for the employees (whatever be their background), thereby developing their potential and importantly aspirations of them as well as sizable sections of the population. (Velasquez 2006). In addition, during interview, the key aspect of salary will be discussed and if the company offers good and expected salary pack to a prospective employee who performed well in the interview, the recruitment process would be on the way to reach the logical end. Financial aspects are the keys during recruitment and to elevate the employees’ performance. This perspective is fully supported by Herzberg theory. That is, according to Herzberg's two-factor theory, good wages are good motivational factor, which can accentuate the excellence level. “Salary strategies and job enrichment strategies were positively related to job satisfaction. Job enrichment strategies and job stability strategies were positively related to employee commitment” (Arocas & Camps, 2008). Equity Theory implies that employees decide in fairness by comparisons with others in similar situations. Only, if they decide that the financial packages are fair they will be interested to join the organisation and motivated to put best efforts into tasks (Beardwell and Claydon 2007). Theories and Practices in my organisation The first part of the recruitment process includes advertising the position. This is where the role of the HRD or HR manager comes into the picture. He/she has to take the leadership role as espoused by leadership theory and importantly based on Nankervis model, should look at the organisational targets and lack of apt employees, and then initiate the recruitment and selection process. First of all, the advertisement should mention certain features that are describes my company, the environment in which it operates and the exact area of operations. This is a good practice because the standing or status of the organisation, its performance, its focus area, its successes, etc, etc could entice the prospective employees. Then, a good description of the job and the tasks associated with it are an important point, as such information will sort out inappropriate candidates from potential ones. After that, the educational qualifications required for the job need to be provided. This is very essential best practice because for the recruitment and selection process, all candidates who apply for the very position should have the qualifications proposed in the ad. Then importantly it should details about financial benefits and salary that the company has set for the post. As espoused by Herzberg theory and Equity theory, the useful strategy which will optimize the motivation levels and thereby retain them is an effective salary pack and financial reward program. Equity theory of motivation states “that people have to believe that their pay is equitable with others. If they believe their compensation is not equitable, they become very de-motivated and their work performance suffers” (Stockley). So, these details about financial benefits should be prominently provided in the advertisement. Coming to the actual interview and its preparation, the first thing the interviewer must note is the character and attitude of each applicant. More specifically, interviewers must note if the applicant is at ease or not and at which degree, the ability he or she has to communicate all messages, the traces of his or her personality and the dress code and overall appearance of the applicant. (Marketing Week). This need to focus on the attitude of the candidate apart from his/her educational qualifications, skills, experience, etc is a key best practice and every organisation including mine irrespective of the nature of the job, should practice it. The need to incorporate this best practice can be validated by looking at the best practices at Disney. At Disney, this recruitment, training and apportionment part are carried out in an optimal way, so that the employed persons provide excellent service to the customers. The recruitment process starts with interviews, when Disney takes people who are normally gregarious and trains them to be more so. Thus, the basic necessity is their character and their attitude. So, looks do not matter, only the person's attitude and personality is given prominence. The casting department puts more weight on interviews than resumes. The interviewer bases the hiring decision on more on personality than educational background (Lynch, 2001). So, this good practice of focusing on attitude is a key best practice that needs to practiced in my organisation while recruiting the management trainees. As far as the interview itself is concerned, it should be divided into three different stages (Lewis 2006). The first stage involves the introductory part where the applicant and the interviewer are introducing themselves. This is a very important part of the interview because as in line with the Velasquez’s theoretical model of Caring, the interviewer should proceed more gradually with caring and comforting words in order to put the interviewee at his/ her ease. So, at this stage, the interviewer or specifically the HR manager should not take any aggressive or intimidatory stance, and importantly should also not discriminate against the prospective employees on the basis of any physical, social, etc ‘handicaps’. For example, there have been instances of employers asking prospective women employees at the personal interview stage itself, whether she is pregnant or has plans to become pregnant. This is a clear discrimination, it is unlawful to refuse to interview or employ a woman because she is, or is suspected to be, pregnant… Employers should steer clear during an interview of asking when a woman plans to start a family (Miller 2005). In Dekker v Stiching IRLR 27 case, the European Court Justice held that the Dutch company, VJV was at breach of the Equal Treatment Directive for refusing to recruit Elizabeth Dekker for the post of training instructor in a youth centre run by VJV because she informed that she was pregnant in the interview stage. So, the best practice is not to discriminate or intimidate prospective employees on the basis of any negative aspects, and instead focus on making them comfortable and confident to face the interview questions. At the second part of the interview, there are various topics that should be addressed to in order for the interviewee to form a first impression of the candidate. First topic of conversation is the resume of the candidate. The interviewee must cover all information that are included in it, and must be more insisting on the qualifications and if relevant on the previous working experience that the applicant might have. In addition, some practical tests could also be included as part of the interview, constituting the best practice in recruitment and selection. For example, at General Motors auto plants, during interview candidates are asked to carry out sample tests. If the candidate has applied for the position in floor level then job tests are conducted to observe the ability of the candidate to manage the necessary equipment and the level to which the person can handle the equipment. (Lee 2008).These topics will play a significant role in understanding whether the prospective employee is mentally, skilfully and educationally apt and prepared for the job. This focus on mental aspect is the key in this section of the interview as well and is part of the best practice in other successful organisations as well. In the case of Southwest Airlines, its recruitment process is so foolproof, creative and efficient that only one out of four applicants would be interviewed and less than 3% would actually be hired. This high filtering of best candidates even for the interview gives SW Airlines the ‘cream’ of human capital. While recruiting its employees, Southwest look for certain intangible human assets like nature, characteristics, attitude, in total their mental thought process, in addition to their skill, knowledge, educational qualifications, etc. “The search is for something that Southwest considers to be much more elusive and important- a blend of energy, humor, team spirit, and self-confidence.” (Ginsberg and Freedman, 2003). That is, during the interview process, the HR executives at the SW’s People Department will put in extra effort and tests, to find out whether the candidate lacks the attitude of superiority and has the mental ability to treat co-employees with a lot of respect. This way SW will recruit employees who will have the ability to build positive relationship with their co-workers and importantly work with them as a team. Finally, during the last stage of the interview, the key component of salary and other financial benefits can be discussed; with the management trainees can be offered salaries quite up to the industry levels. As discussed above as part of Herzberg and equity theories, salary and other financial benefits could be a key factor for the employee to accept the job proposal. So, as part of the best practice, my organisation should offer good salary pack on line with the industry standards, because apart from making the employee, join my company, will also give optimum motivation to perform well. Provide details about appropriate financial rewards as well as non-financial praise for the employees’ performance during the interview, and it will lead to effective performance during the job (Armstrong 2006). Conclusion In this report, the author has provided a detailed review of the procedures in recruiting two management trainees starting from the job advertisement and importantly the interview process leading to the eventual selection process. Firstly, when the PEST and the SWOT analysis was done on my organisation to identify the external factors as well as internal issues, which could impact it, it was clear that my organisation needed recruitment of employees, particularly in the marketing department. The analysis of current theories and its application in the practices of my organisation clearly shows that my organisation needs to incorporate good practices during all the stages of recruitment and selection process. Starting from optimally planning the job advertisement to conducting the interview to judge the attitude of the employee along with their education and skills, every process is the key to select apt and effective employees. Recommendations Recommendations Short Medium Long Cost Benefits Time scale Job advertisement Could entice the prospective employees to apply for the job immediately, if they have required qualification 1-2 weeks Focus on the attitude of the candidate Candidates with positive attitude during the interview could perform optimally during the job. This attitude will also transfer to the work environment leading to high motivation and productivity Throughout the course of the interview Comfort and no intimidation The best practice of making the prospective employees comfortable and confident to face the interview questions, will translate into them giving optimum performance during the interview, thus enabling the interviewer to take apt and correct decisions Throughout the course of the interview Additional tests The tests will provide further insight into the employees’ skill level and attitude, leading to effective recruitment 1-2 days, even after the interview day Financial benefits Revealing the financial aspects during the interview, will make the employees decide in favour of the organisation During the interview or during confirmation of the job References Armstrong, Michael 2006, A Handbook of Human Resource Management Practice, Kogan Page, London Arocas, R & Camps, J, 2008, A model of high performance work practices and turnover intentions, Personnel Review, vol.37, no.1, pp.26-46 Beardwell, J and Claydon, T 2007, Human Resource Management: a contemporary approach, Financial Times, Prentice Hall, Harlow. Collins, J 2001, Level 5 Leadership: The triumph of humility and fierce resolve, Harvard Business Review, pp.66-76 Farrington, J 2008, What is a Selection Interview? viewed on May 12, 2010 http://www.eyesonsales.com/content/article/what_is_a_selection_interview/ Ginsberg, A and Freedman, R 2003, Managing Human Resources for Strategic Partnership, Edited by S.E. Jackson and R.S. Schuler, Thomson South Western, London. Harris, MM & Fink, LS 1987, A field study of applicant reactions to employment opportunities: Does the recruiter make a difference? Personnel Psychology, vol.40, pp.765-783. hr-guide.com, Personnel Selection: Methods: Interviews, viewed on May 12, 2010 http://www.hr-guide.com/data/G311.htm Lee, M. 2008, The Future of General Motors’ Brands, viewed on May 12, 2010 http://www.gracecheng.com/stocks/2008/07/07/the-future-of-general-motors- brands Lewis, C 2006, Employee Selection, Hutchinson, London. 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