Human Recourse Management and Personnel Issues - Essay Example

Human Re Management and Personnel Issues Part Mankind and human civilizations have both been evolved over the period of time. The overall pattern of the evolution is ascending. It means that there has been a gradual advancement in the human society, ever since it came into being. The advancement in science and technology, on one hand, is making our society a knowledge society and making the world a global village where physical boundaries are disappearing and more and more societies and culture are interaction. This interaction has resulted in a transfer of knowledge and various ways of working from different societies, which were adopted to make our existing processes better. This search and desire to enhance existing processes of working has been a key player in changing the way we work and perform different processes. Among such processes which significantly changed and provided new ways to perform it, the process of assessment is a major one. Assessment basically means matching one’s performance against some pre-defined standards. There are a number of occasions when assessment is done. Such as when a student is admitted into a high school, he is often required to take some test, likewise, during his educational, time to time, his educations is assessed under certain standards. Finally, when he wished to enter the professional life, there too, he is assessed for certain skills that the employer expects to be essentially present in an employee. Out of all these assessments, the pre-employment assessment is considered to be one of the crucial ones. This is so on the account of the fact that this test will enable him to enter into the professional life through the gate he wants. However, there is one complexity involved with the assessments. The complexity is that what factors should be tested in order to determine that who is the most deserving candidate is. This complexity is enhanced when it comes to the assessment for the recruitment. So far as the assessment for academic entry such as admission in masters is concerned, it seems quite logical that you primarily test the academic skills and a bit of Intelligent Quotient etc. But, when we talk about employment, the purpose is to find the deserving candidate and what factors make a person a deserving candidate differs from person to person. From organization’s perspective too, it is also essential to filter the right person so as to make their organization run more effectively and efficiently. There are a number of factors that can be tested to ensure that the right person is getting right job. Some most common factors that are tested are: Cognitive Abilities Personality and Interests Motor and Physical Abilities Achievement Tests Each of these tests has certain ethical and legal issues involved with it. We would analyze them separately. The word cognition has been defined by different authors differently; however cognition basically means thinking, in this particular context, cognitive abilities means that one’s mental abilities such as, judgment, memory, learning, comprehension, and reasoning. There are a number of tests developed to test the cognitive skills. Like other tests, this particular test is also subject to various ethical and legal considerations. First of all, it is argued that it is very difficult to rate one’s cognitive skills at just one point of time. As cognition is related to behavior and psychology, the environment and situation at hand has the greatest impact on one’s cognitive skills. So it is not considered ethical to judge one’s cognitive skills under one particular environment or situation, especially when the selection is about jobs. For example, if a case study is used to test one’s problem solving skills, there is a chance that an applicant having greater background of the domain of business studied will solve the problem better, but that does not signify that that applicant had greater problem solving skills that others. The law does not speak so much about this type of test. The personality and interest test is supposed to identify the character or the personality and interests of an individual such as what really motivates him, to what extent he is optimist or pessimist, how much aggressive he is and how much passive he is. It is performed by asking a series of questions and then developing some conclusions on the basis of the questions answered. The case study may also be used. However, here too, there is an ethical dilemma that Personality traits are very subjective in nature, thus it is not possible to judge them through a test. Moreover, when an applicant knows that he is being tested, he probably tries to show himself very much like the organization expects him to be, but the reality may be different. In such a case, a wrong decision is likely to be taken. The legal issue with this type of test is that the questions asked on the personality should not be intended to invade one’s privacy. It should not be biased and should take into consideration the culture and background of the diversified candidates so as to provide equal opportunity too all of them. Physical and motor ability test is supposed to check one’s physical abilities. Ethically, it should be there only for those jobs which really require the physical abilities. Otherwise, this would make the test male biased, as the physique of man is different from women. The legal consideration in this regard is simply that the physical test MUST be corresponding to the task. Achievement tests are actually the analysis of academic and co-curricular achievements. This type of test becomes a dilemma because, degree does not mean one’s efficiency, it becomes further difficult to filter on this basis, when the candidates are from diversified educational system. To overcome, the issue of diversified applicants, the organizations as well as states set various international standards, especially for higher posts. In my view, there cannot be any single best-for-all test. The test must correspond to the nature of work and there should be a hybrid test, with more weight age to the relevant area. For example, for the job of a brand manager, the achievement test should check his knowledge about concerned market; the personality test should check his approach to various aspects of organizational behavior, his physical abilities should be check only to the extent of his sound health etc. Using such hybrid model will help in enjoying the advantages of all tests and minimizing the disadvantages of all tests. Part 2 1. What issues with screening might this form of interviewing elicit? This type of interview may raise a number of issues. The first one is that of environment. As we know that one of the basic target of interview is to analyze the approach of an employees towards various aspects of organizational behavior. The organizational environment has profound effect on it. There are the chances that such a new environment with a number of people observing various candidates simultaneously will make the candidate confuse at that point of time or since he knows he has been observed, he would not have been able to behave normally, and thus the essence of this strategy will be lost. 2. Is this form of candidate selection likely to increase or decrease diversity at Tech Planet? This will reduce the diversity. It is so due to the fact that what qualities will be highlighted in such an interview is that of a marketing manager or an employee dealing public relations. A finance person is not supposed to essentially mingle with people around, yet his skills and academics are far important factor. If this method is applied for all sorts of jobs, most of the new recruits will be a marketing oriented nature. Thus the diversity in terms of responses to the organizational behavior will be lost. 3. Does this methodology raise concerns about reliability and validity? If so, how? As mentioned earlier, the concerns would rise. Because this is going to test only the public relation aspects of an individual, however, in certain jobs, the academic skills and physical abilities etc. do matter more than the public relation aspects. 4. What do you think would be a better methodology at Tech Planet and why? The strategy is good for selecting people for public relations related jobs, but not for all. Moreover, this strategy must not be the sole one, rather it must be supplemented with other strategies too. Works Cited 1. Bloch, F., (1994). “Antidiscrimination Law and Minority Employment”. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 2. Pieper, R., (1990). “Human Resource Management”. Berlin: W. de Gruyter. 3. Power, M., (2004). “A Quick Guide to Human Resource Testing”. Camberwell: ACER Press. Read More