Recruitment and Selection Methods Practiced by Organizations - Essay Example

Recruitment and Selection Many businesses have entered into the globalization era which is mainly characterized with very competitive environment. The business environment they embedded encompasses challenges that impose on organizations. Many different business organizations are operating their businesses in various industries such as transportation industry, production industry, and so on. Among various industries, business organizations operating in the service industry faces more challenges than ever before. Among the challenges, most common faced include (1) unpredictable business environment, (2) managing diverse workforce, (3) dependence on the skills, abilities and knowledge of its employees, and (4) high turnover rates. To overcome and combat the challenges, many firms worldwide have recognized and paid immerse attention to the strategic importance of human resources and their contribution to the effectiveness of business firms. In what are human resources functions demonstrate that organizational performance is significantly related to the management of such human resource functions as planning, staffing, appraisal, compensation, and training and development. The results also indicate that successful firms are often those that adopt a highly effective approach to the management of their human resources. Human resources management functions include (1) planning, (2) recruitments, (3) staffing, (4) job design, (5) training/development, (6) appraisal, (7) communications, (8) compensation, (9) benefits, and (10) labor relations (Bohlander and Snell, 2004). Recruitment and selection function plays important and crucial role in effectively managing and securing the person-job-fit. There are many negative consequences organizations may face when recruitment and selection function was not effectively conducted. Some of them are recruiting unqualified and unskilled persons for the jobs, unmatched persons’ skills and job’s required skills, increasing training and development costs, high turn over rate, and reducing company’s performance. There are traditional recruitment and selection methods practiced by organizations. They include (1) resume, (2) application blanks, (3) reference checks, (4) newspaper/magazines ads, (5) company websites, (6) online job board, (7) skills testing, (8) biodata, (9) personality testing, (10) background checks, (11) online pre-employment tests, (12) jobs fairs, (13) referral from current employees, (14) jobs service centers, and (15) drug testing. In the study of Piotrowski and Armstrong, (2006), 151 firms in the US ranked their most frequently utilized recruitment and selection methods which are (1) resume, (2) application blanks, (3) reference checks, (4) newspaper/magazines ads, (5) company websites, and (6) online job board (see Table 1). Table 1. Rank order of major recruitment and selection techniques utilized (N = 151) N Yes (%) Resume Application blanks Reference checks Newspaper/Magazines ads Company websites Online job board Skills testing Biodata Personality testing Background checks Online pre-employment tests Jobs fairs Referral from current employees Jobs service centers Drug testing 148 146 146 145 134 133 76 38 29 16 14 13 10 8 7 98 97 97 96 89 88 50 25 19 11 9 9 7 5 5 Source: Piotrowski and Armstrong (2006) However, in education community, the recruitment and selection for qualified candidates to fill up the vacant positions of teachers and administrators is slightly different from the traditional recruitment and selection methods most frequently utilized by the organizations. O'Laughlin (2001) argued that there should be an urgent need and attention by the educational community to adopt and consider a comprehensive recruitment plan. Without a comprehensive plan, he asserted that the searching the available pool of candidates which is most frequently seen in the education community will never end and the search for quality educational professionals to fill large number of vacant positions for teachers and administrators cannot be met. Stewart (1999) stated that in United States, there is a real and in some cases drastic need for teachers. There are more incentives offered to teachers and administrators by State education departments and school districts. Incentives include hiring bonuses, paying off student loans and posting job opening on famous websites. Unmet demand of teacher jobs or inability to fill required teachers and administrators creates problems of shortage of teachers and administrators. In addition, it also creates problems of certain programs, and courses, to be closed. This in turn will affect the trend and supply of future workforce in the labor market in the United States. Elliot (2000) pointed out that the shortage of fully credentialed teachers in the last decades has led to decline in the demands of enrollment growth and class size. In addition, one out of six teachers is expected to retire within the next decade. Moreover, the new teachers exiting a credential program and entering the classroom often do not stay for long. According to the report by the California Department of Education, fully half of beginning teachers leave the profession within five years. According to the study of Rodda (2000), it is estimated by the U.S. Department of Education that there is a need of more than 2 million teachers for schools to hire in the next decade. In California, it is expected the need will be up to 300,000 teachers in that time. This points out that the searching qualified teachers and educational administrators will be an on-going and constant struggle for many districts in the United States in the foreseeable future. To over come those challenges and problems in recruitment and selection of educational teachers and administrators, O'Laughlin (2001) proposed a comprehensive recruitment plan which includes (1) leadership, (2) increasing the quality and quantity of candidates, (3) contacting candidates, (4) selling your districts, (5) facilitating the application process, (6) screening the candidates, (7) employment process, and (8) induction into the district and profession. First, the leadership of organization is critical within the organization. Leaders must set the priority for need of teachers and clarify what are expected by the organizations and draw a plan for recruitment and selection plan. Once the plan is developed, necessary and required resources must be allocated and implement the plan effectively. Without an effective leader, an organization may lack effective and comprehensive plan for recruiting and selection. Second, the comprehensive plan must consider and include the quality and quantity of candidates. In order to attract the qualified candidates more, a series of strategies to aggressively seek out prospective candidates from schools, districts, universities and the population in general must be developed. The most important is marketing and selling the education profession as an attractive career choice with promising career advancement and attractive compensation packages. Third, the methods of contacting the candidates should be more effective and efficient so that the pool of potential candidates will dramatically increase. Relying on the traditional recruitment methods may not be sufficient. Organizations must now consider the information technology and take its advantages to reach all potential candidates for their teacher and administrator positions. This will lead to reaching more candidates and increasing the number of more qualified teachers. Fourth, comprehensive information on districts should be available at no cost to potential candidates. When certain district information is available, candidates in that district will be more attracted to stay with the schools. This leads to continuing stay for those who are in the district as well as potential candidates will be attracted to the certain district based on the information available to them and advantages of working in such district. Fifth, candidates should find the application process easy and convenient for them. Filing application for a teacher position should be as easy as buying a bottle of coke at a store. Therefore, the information technology should provide such advantage in online application system. Those online application sites and standards of application at Calteach.com and USTeach.com make application process much easier for candidates. Sixth, the process of screening the candidates must be efficient and effective. Use of technology will facilitate the screening process more efficient and timely. For example, video interviewing will provide more flexibilities and convenience for candidates who live in different state or district and who do not have available time to participate in the interviews. Seventh, the candidates must find employment process as efficient and candidate-friendly. It is necessary for districts to consider the need for comprehensive orientation and employment process. Eighth, new teachers must be provided with a high level of support. This will result in higher rate of retention in the teaching profession and reduces turnover. Support programs must be flexible in order to meet various and different individual needs of teachers. In addition, the support program must not be a burden for new teachers. With the comprehensive plan discussed above, a series of effective strategies must be considered in recruiting teachers. Allen (2002) has proposed strategies of (1) loan forgiveness, (2) regionally competitive compensation, (3) grow-your-own efforts, (4) effective hiring and placement practices, (5) allowing the return of retired teachers, (6) high-visibility recruitment campaigns with alternative preparation opportunities, and (7) relying on community colleges. First, loan forgiveness is found as one of the effective strategies for educational recruitment. Student loans are forgiven to be paid back by borrowers if they teach for a certain period of time in schools which faced difficulties in recruitment or shortage of teachers. Another incentive such as outright scholarships is also effective. However it lacks the mechanism to insure the recipients to teach in expected schools. In some cases, they ended up with teaching nowhere else. In many cases, financial incentives are more challenging in attracting teachers in isolated rural settings. Second, compensation must be regionally effective for schools. New comers may not consider compensation as one of the most important factors, however they can be lured to districts where compensation packages are more attractive to them. Educational job market must be considered as regional market and thus the compensation must be regionally competitive to attract them. Third, searching local residents who are interested in teaching at schools may be effective and surest strategies for those schools which are hard-to-staff urban and rural schools. Teachers having a personal connection with the school or the neighborhood in which the school is located are more likely to be interested in teaching in that school. This provides advantage for school to attract the minorities into school. However the disadvantage is that the pool of potential candidates is limited to only local areas. Fourth, another strategy of effective hiring and placement practices must be incorporated into the pool of strategies for recruitment and selection for teachers and administrators. Use of online teacher recruitment clearinghouses and application procedures become more common for all districts. Such efforts are making more effective hiring and placement practices. This will enable the smaller district which does not have a lot of money or budget to spend on recruitment. However the educational institutions must ensure that teachers placed or hired in positions that match their level of experience and ability. Placing or hiring inexperienced teachers in a challenging position will lead to failure and frustration. In order to avoid this negative consequence, many states are making commitments for ending out-of-field teaching assignment. It means that teachers are assigned to teach subjects which are outside of their field of competence. However this practice still remains as common in many states and districts. Fifth, allowing the return of retired teachers is seen as one of the strategies for teacher recruitment and selection. With the problems of teacher-shortage, states are adopting policies to allow retired teachers to come back to school on full-time or part-time basic. Meanwhile, they still enjoy their retirement benefits. In some schools, the retired teachers are placed in mentor positions to guide inexperienced teachers. Sixth, another strategy of highly –visibility recruitment campaigns with alternative preparation opportunities receives attentions from many schools and districts. The efforts to recruit mid-career professionals have been successful in states and districts such as Massachusetts, Georgia, New York City, and Denver. In addition, schools also employ an alternative route program which is seen as highly attractive to mid-career professionals who cannot afford to enroll in a long-term preparation program and give up a full-time salary. Seventh, community colleges have become effective sources of teacher recruitment as well as preparation. Community colleges are integrated into the larger pool of potential teachers and teacher preparation places for those who begin their post-secondary careers in the community colleges. Conclusion Many organizations nowadays are facing more challenges and competition in this globalization era. Human resources management plays important and crucial role in combating the challenges and promoting survival and growth in the competitive and ever demanding environment. One of the functions of human resource management is recruitment and selection. This function must be effectively carried in order to ensure the entire human resource management process. Recently, many organizations still rely on traditional recruitment and selection methods and techniques such as resume, background checks, etc. However many organizations realize to take full advantage of information technology in order to facilitate recruitment and selection process. Unlike recruitment and selection process commonly found in other organizations, educational organizations face more challenges and problems in recruiting potential teachers and candidates. The entire United States country needs more and more qualified teachers in the next decades to come. Thus a comprehensive recruitment package is necessary for all districts and states. In addition, effective strategies must be employed to recruitment and selection of potential teachers in the United States. References: Allen, Michael. 2002. Improving Teacher Preparation, Recruitment, and Retention. Spectrum: The Journal of State Government, p 8-11. Bohlander, George W. and Snell, Scott A. Managing Human Resources (with InfoTrac), 14th Edition. NY: South-Western 2006 Elliot Hall, Marc. 2000. New tools for teacher recruitment and retention. Thrust for Educational Leadership; Jan/Feb2000, Vol. 29 Issue 3, p33, 1p O'Laughlin, Jim. 2001. Recruitment: a comprehensive approach. Leadership; Jan/Feb2001, Vol. 30 Issue 3, p14, 3p Piotrowski, Chris and Armstrong, Terry. 2006. Current Recruitment and Selection Practices: A National Survey of Fortune 1000 Firms. North American Journal of Psychology, 2006, Vol. 8, No. 3,489-496. Rodda, Cary. 2000. Searching for success in teacher recruitment. Thrust for Educational Leadership; Jan/Feb2000, Vol. 29 Issue 3, p8, 4p Stewart, Daisy. 1999. 10 ways to recruit teachers. Techniques: Making Education & Career Connections; May99, Vol. 74 Issue 5, p20, 3p Read More