Companys Gains through Human Resource Management in Recruiting, Selecting, and Appraising - Case Study Example

Human Resource Management at Company Y Student’s Name Institutional Affiliation Human Resource Management at Company Y Human resource management or simply HR is concerned with the management of individuals that form the employees of any given company (Price, 2011). It is mainly concerned with staffing of employees, their training and development of their roles into what the company expects them to be, and motivating and maintaining them to limit their turnover (Lengnick-Hall M., Lengnick-Hall C, Andrade & Drake, 2009). Company Y is one of the organizations whose HR strategies such as selection and recruitment techniques and the appraisal of its employee's performance are going to be critically discussed in this paper. Description of Company Y The Company layout Company Y was founded early in the 20th century in Queensland and is now one of Australia’s largest airlines domestically and internationally (QANTAS, 2014a). The company specializes in transportation of clients under two brands of airlines that work in unison. In addition to the primary transportation services, company Y also indulges in other affiliated subsidiary business such as in specialist markets (QANTAS, 2014a). The latter include Q-catering services also offered by the company. . The airway company is served by three distinct but affiliated mainstreams. These are the Qantascityflyer, Qantaslink and Jetstar (QANTAS, 2014b). Qantascityflyer offers domestic transport services between major Australian cities such as Sydney, Adelaide, Melbourne, Perth and Brisbane. The Qantaslink, a subsidiary, serves smaller outback routes for the company. It utilizes small planes that have limited facilities and commonly lack any form of entertainment. (QANTAS, 2014a). Jetstar, although fully owned by Qantas, It is administered separately as a cheaper cost airline (QANTAS, 2014b). Jetstar does not offer such frills as baggage transfer or free in-flight meals. In addition, points earned on the company's Frequentflyer, can be spend on this mainstream but Jetstar does not accord its clients a chance to earn those points (QANTAS, 2014a). The mainstream serves both local and international airways markets, but the latter is mainly on less busy routes. Company’s Employees As of mid-2014, Qantas had an estimated 30 750 employees with about 93 percent of these staff been Australia based. This included those employees permanently employed and those employed on part-time basis (QANTAS, 2014c). However, this represented a drop from the over 33 000 employees the company had consistently sustained in the previous four years (Colgan, 2014; QANTAS, 2013a). The drop followed an announcement by the company’s CEO that it was to lay off more than 3000 workers in an attempt to lower wages and expenses. This announcement came at a time when the company had foreseen end-of-financial-year losses that were later ascertained to be in the range of $2.8 billion (Mason, 2014). According to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) (2014), Qantas is said to have sacked 167 staff on 8 of July 2014 following an announcement of massive sacking to reduce costs incurred by the company. The 167 staff included 36 administrators and 131 engineers, a move that some have suggested may lead to safety problems (ABC, 2014). Human Resource Department and its effectiveness Company Y has a human resource department (HRD) that is responsible for the welfare of employees in the four major company departments, that is, the procurement, engineering and maintenance, flight training, and the center of service excellence departments (QANTAS, 2014a). The HRD at the company has had various achievements and still has plans in place to standardize and optimize the productivity of the company's vast workforce. In terms of enhancing diversity, the company had employed individuals from 102 nationalities that came with 51 language diversifications (QANTAS, 2012). The company’s HR department sets priorities and works on them for the betterment of the company’s HR. For instance, under priority area dubbed “listening, communicating and supporting employees” the company conducted an “Annual Employee Engagement Survey [AEES]” during 2011/2012 work year that enabled the company to evaluate their initial plan and assess the feedback (QANTAS, 2012, p. 36). Among its many application, the AEES allows employees to raise their concerns including opinion on how the company can better its way of activities; it enables the company understand the state of its employee and possible areas that can be improved; it’s a source of substantial information to guide the development of appropriate engagement action plan for specific departments in the company; and it’s a baseline for assessment of the effectiveness of employee engagement as a management initiative (QANTAS, 2013b) As of 2013, the survey indicated an 8% increase in points in comparison to the previous year demonstrating that the priority areas identified by the HRD are being actuated successfully (QANTAS, 2013b). Under the same priority, the company enhanced and empowered employee support programs including a partnership with ‘Expect A Star’ that culminated in the launch of a novel family support program (QANTAS, 2012, p. 36). Other priority areas identified by the company’s HR include diversity targets, and training and development (QANTAS, 2012). Diversity targets include ensuring women serve in at least 35% of senior executive positions by 2015 to be increased to at least 40% by 2018 (QANTAS, 2012). The targets are been implemented through the company's Group Diversity Council setup specifically for this purpose. Training and development priority area includes development of talent and employees beginning careers at the company. An updated Leadership and Management Capability Model and the company's graduate development program enabled a smooth recruitment of 26 new employees in 2011/2012 (QANTAS, 2012). Through its HRD, the company has allowed employees to raise their concerns that even bother on their benefits or entitlements. The latter has been effected through enterprise bargaining agreements (EBAs) that covers 70% of employees of the airway company (QANTAS, 2013b). As of the end of the year 2013, there was a total of 49 EBAs between the company and its employees and unions. The company also offers supportive services to employees via its employee assistance program that assists employees to manage a balance between their work expectations and life roles (QANTAS, 2013b). Such services include life assist that offers the employees counselling services at no fee; family assist that aids employees in getting child and aged care for parents with children aged less than 18 years and older retired employees respectively; health assist that allows company staff to seek and be involved in health and wellbeing activities; money assist that supports employees experiencing financial stress issues; manager assist that offers managers a variety of options to aid them in making decisions regarding practical action plans; and trauma assist that helps employees who may have experienced a traumatic event (QANTAS, 2013b). Environmental Issues The company faces environmental issues such as increases in carbon tax imposed by the Australian government that has raised the cost of fuel in addition to the ever increasing high fuel prices (Grattan, 2014). The carbon released when jet kerosene is burned is an environmental hazard that the company is striving to contain through its emissions and reductions strategies such as improving fuel efficiency (QANTAS, 2013b). However, the net emission is still high posing environment risk to the world. Recruitment and Selection (R&S) The right employees are integral to the success of an organization. The quality of such persons' services and the efficiency with which they perform their assigned roles shapes the company's fate (Arthur, 2012). Therefore, hiring, a function commonly associated with the HRD, should be strategically and systematically done for the best employee products. The hiring process also entails R&S. Recruitment involves a systematically organized process of identifying and attracting a pool of potential employees (Arthur, 2012). It includes highlighting requirements for applicants that would attract interested people who shall be screened and at the same time allow unqualified applicants to rule themselves out of the application (Compton, Morrissey & Nankervis, 2009). The process may take various steps but the basic ones include: first, a vacant position or a new role arises in the company; second, is the recruitment planning that entails outlining a comprehensive specification for the job that has a vacancy; third is the strategy development that involves devising an appropriate method for recruiting the candidate (Compton, Morrissey & Nankervis, 2009). Consideration under strategy development include preparation of the required candidate that may be done either by the company itself or by an outside entity, type of technique to be applied in recruitment, geographical area consideration if any and the systematic flow of recruitment activities. The fourth step is searching and it entails attracting potential candidates to the company or generation of potential candidates from a pool of interested applicants via the two common sources that may be internal or external; fifth is the screening process that may also be identified as a preamble to selection and it entails screening of applications for the purpose of shortlisting candidates meeting the outlined specifications (Compton, Morrissey & Nankervis, 2009). Lastly, is the evaluation and control of the whole process of recruitment to ascertain the costs incurred relative to the appropriateness, effectiveness and validity of the recruitment process. Selection is the process through which qualified applicants from a list of shortlisted or screened applicants so that they may fill or take up the initially advertised vacancies (Jackson, Schuler & Werner, 2012). It is a process that should be handled by the HRD. The basic selection criteria examine the candidates' formal education, physical characteristics, experience and previous performance and personality characteristics of the candidate (Jackson, Schuler & Werner, 2012). Commonly utilized selection methods include testing, interviewing and gathering information. Test types conducted during selection include cognitive, personality, physical, integrity, work sample, and drug tests. Popular intelligent tests such as the Wonderlic test can be employed (Arthur, 2012). Interviews can be structured or unstructured with the former further divided into situational and behavioral interview. At company Y, the recruitment process varies depending on the role or type of job therein exists a vacancy or an occurrence of a new position. Interested applicants are allowed to identify and apply for any position within the company or even notify the company of their interest in any future positions or vacancies (QANTAS, 2014a). Individuals seeking employment in the company can explore vacancies currently available through the company website via which they can also submit their resume via a button designated for job applicants labelled ‘apply now' and strategically located at the top of each position being advertised. Applicants are advised to update their CV and to include their skills and experience that would qualify them for the post listed. Role-specific answers may be required for specific questions asked regarding the job being applied (QANTAS, 2014a). However, the company does not comprehensively list the specifications that would qualify prospective employees for a specific vacancy. This may result in too many applicants applying for a given role making the recruitment process time-consuming and costly for the company. This may extend the duration which the vacancy still exists and even raise the cost of outsourcing personnel, especially for critical roles, for temporary performance of the roles left (Jackson, Schuler & Werner, 2012). Even though traditionally, recruitment has been believed to be a process that should attract huge numbers of applicants, it may be at the cost of the company. The company should, if possible match the needs, roles or requirements of the position been advertised to the needs of prospective employees to optimize the recruitment process. This can be achieved through a honest but comprehensive, realistic job previews (RJPs). Research demonstrates that utilizing RJPs has a lower rate of employee turnover and higher job survival (Earnest, Allen & Landis, 2011; Khattak, Rehman & AbdulRehman, 2014). RJPs provide comprehensive information related to the job including the possible advantages and disadvantages of the job to prospective employees. Although the technique may prolong the time for recruitment as it requires detailed filling of job details, the cost that might be incurred on rehiring due to high employee turnover is even more expensive. Successful applicants for Company Y positions are shortlisted by the company and invited for an assessment that may lead to selection of best-qualified applicants. The assessment includes “interviews, psychometric testing, or in tray exercises" that may be combined appropriately (QANTAS, 2014a). Number of interviews may vary depending on the role required of the applicant. The company employs both structured and unstructured interviews with the former also entailing situational and behavioral interviews. This is evident as the company utilizes "behavioral event interview questions" that form part of the situational and behavioral interviews widely advocated during recruitment (QANTAS, 2014a). Although details of the interviews are not provided by the company, the interview questions need to be appropriately designed and suitable for the needs of the company relevant to the job (Mecan, 2009). The company’s interview panel consists of HR representatives and line managers, an appropriate combination for effective skill and behavior determination of applicants. The company also employs psychometric assessment that may include, verbal, abstract and numerical reasoning, and tests to determine the applicants’ personality. Moreover, the company also does employment, background, and reference checks on the finalist to avoid employing applicants with criminal records or a history of poor or unproductive performance (Compton, Morrissey & Nankervis, 2009). Performance Management at Company Y Performance appraisal (PA) involves a systematic evaluation of employees about their performance or productivity and the prospects of further development of the employees (Heitmann & Roberts, 2009). It enables identification of goals and targets that are to be attained by an individual or employees, and how and when they are to be attained. It is aimed at further development of employees, motivating them and continuously improving their performance. Past and present job experiences are used as a foundation for making decisions regarding future employee training or development that would be beneficial to individual employees and the company as a whole. Obstacles are identified and solutions enacted to better productivity while achievements or successes are recognized and celebrated, relationships among company staff are strengthened, teamwork is enhanced, and responsibilities are elaborated (Heitmann & Roberts, 2009). PA also helps to relate an employee’s pay to performance, as s guide to any succession plan, and to abide by regulations or policies of quality standards. PA can be carried out using different approaches that may include the ‘top down approach’ that involves the management team evaluating the employees under them. This is the most common form of appraisal approach (Heitman & Roberts, 2009). However, it has the disadvantage of placing the employees being apprised on the defensive, thereby, skewing the results obtained. Self-appraisals is another appraisal option where employees appraise themselves and may reveal more significant details than in top-down appraisal. Consequently, an appropriate amicable environment for discussion is created after self-appraisal. Peer appraisal is also an efficient appraisal approach as the peers interact with one another and watch each other perform their work-related roles (Heitman & Roberts, 2009). Peers are, therefore, an appropriate source of independent judgments. Upward appraisal is another approach that involves subordinates appraising their seniors, supervisors or line managers. Like peer appraisal, it allows persons who are often in contact with the individual been evaluated to act as the appraisers, therefore, revealing more salient and reliable information. Various techniques can be utilized in PA but they are broadly grouped into past (POM) and future-oriented methods (FOM) where the latter entails assessment against future prospects or objectives set while the former entails evaluating based on past job-related outcomes (Hayes & Ninemeier, 2009). POM include use of rating scales, checklist, forced-choice method, forced distribution technique, critical incident method, behaviorally anchored rating scales (BARS), essay method, and comparative evaluation methods (CEM) (Hayes & Ninemeier, 2009). Future-oriented methods include 360-degree feedback (360-DF) and management by objectives (MBO). Rating scales utilizes five elements to rate an individual’s performance ranging from exceptionally excellent performance to poor performance. The elements include outstanding, good, satisfactory, fair and unsatisfactory (Hayes & Ninemeier, 2009). The raters usually assess the ratees’ quantity and quality of work, dependability, cooperativeness, judgment and attitude. Since the tool is simple and can evaluate a large number of employees at a cheap cost, it can be employed by company Y to facilitate frequent appraisals at minimal cost. However, the subjectivity of the tool may result in biases in the appraisal (Murphy, 2008). Checklist method incorporates descriptive statements about productive and unproductive behavior about an employee that the rater may agree to (Yes) or disagree to (No). Thereafter, the HRD undertakes the actual evaluation (Heitmann & Roberts, 2009). This method can be applied to company Y because of its significant size as the method allows easy standardization of the rating across a department or the company. However, biases while differentiating the positive and negative checklist questions, high cost and inability to assign relative scores are the method's shortcomings. Forced choice method employs several statements that the rater indicates by making a forced choice whether the statement is false or true (Heitmann & Roberts, 2009). Since the rater is compelled to choose, it limits the occurrence of personal bias. However, the method is heavily dependent on the wordings of the statements and may give inappropriate feedback in poorly structured statements. Forced distribution technique ranks employee via a forced allocation method where clusters of high, average and low performing employees are formed (Hayes & Ninemeier, 2009). It may be applicable in company Y for managers who find it difficult to rate their employees to enable them do so easily and unbiasedly. However, the method poses the risk of perpetuating stiff unhealthy competition and limit teamwork among employees as employees shall be competing to be in the highest cluster level Critical incident technique focuses on critical incidents in employees’ performance period that the appraiser has been recording for each employee (Hayes & Ninemeier, 2009). The method can be applied in the evaluation of superior’s performance in company Y, and it has the merit of limiting recency biases. However, chances of prioritizing adverse incidents more that positive ones are high, and a series of negative incidents highlighted during a major performance review occasion may associate individuals with more negativities (Cintron & Flaniken, 2009). BARS ranks or rates behaviors in seven scales from exquisite to extremely poor with equivalent points. The points accrued are an indicator of the efficiency or inefficiency of performance (Tziner, Joanis & Murphy, 2000). However, the technique may be difficult to prepare since it may not be easy to rate behavior relatively due to an absence of a standard reference. Essay method entails the appraiser noting down a detailed description of the employee based on categories such as qualifications, strengths and flaws, and overall impression (Hayes & Ninemeier, 2009). It is significant in getting comprehensive information about an employee that may be overlooked in structured checklist. However, its effectiveness is pegged on the ability of the appraiser to recall details about the employee that may be affected by memory lapses. CEM ranks employees in terms of their merit or compares an employee with another in a similar capacity (Haitmann, & Roberts, 2009). The method can be applied to company Y where there are no set standards for comparison as in newly created departments. The method can be easily and cheaply administered. MOB involves assessing performance against given SMART objectives outlined by the management team (Tziner, Joanis & Murphy, 2000). Actual goals set are compared to those achieved by employees, acknowledgment of achieved goals, and strategies are identified to achieve goals not previously achieved. The technique is applied to company Y by managers in most lines of work. However, using the technique, especially merit pay, tends to focus on short-term goals ignoring more salient long-term goals of the company. 360-DF involves collating performance information from a source of stakeholders such as peers, managers, customers and even self (Hayes & Nenemeier, 2009). It provides a multi-source feedback that is more comprehensive. Company Y may employ this technique in ascertaining customer satisfaction, relationships between stakeholders, and in improving the overall functionality of the team. Conclusion HR management is a vital function in any company. HR helps in ensuring that the employees performance is maximized to sustain high productivity while also providing an employee friendly environment to foster employee loyalty and commitment to the organization. Company Y has achieved substantial gains through its HRD in recruiting, selecting, and appraising its staffs. It has a systematic R&S process that however may be enhanced by a re-evaluation to include more refined R&S methods for better outcome post-recruitment such as lower employee turnover and higher job satisfaction. PA is significant in evaluating and enhancing the performance of the company’s staff. Although, the company does not reveal much about its appraisal techniques, various methods or a combination of methods can be applied depending on the line of work. References Arthur, D. (2012). Recruiting, interviewing, selecting & orienting new employees (5th ed.). New York: Associates Management Consultants, Ltd. Australian Broadcasting Corporation. (2014, July 8). Qantas Sacks 167 staff, engineers' union warns of flight delays. Retrieved from ABC News: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-07-08/qantas-lays-off-167-staff-as-part-of-cost-cutting-program/5582404 Cintron, R. & Flaniken, F. (2009). Performance appraisal: A supervision or leadership tool. 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