The Hiring Process of a Faculty Member for the School of Management - Essay Example

The hiring process of a Faculty member for the School of Management: Knowledge, Skills and Attitude assessment of the candi s. This paper briefly describes the process of recruitment and selection for the role of faculty member at School of Management. A detailed job description paves the way to the recruitment and selection process followed by resume screening, short listing of candidates, telephonic interview. A few short-listed candidates will then be made to take the psychometric test to appropriately assess their knowledge, skills and attitude followed by face-to-face interviews by critical board members. This entire process reinforces the significance of recruitment and selection processes in organizational success. Introduction: Hiring the right candidate for the role is a complex and critical activity for the organization. Choosing the right candidate from thousands of applications is highly challenging and a time-consuming process. Hence, this process has to be taken up in a systematic manner so that the right person is hired. Hiring a faculty member for the School of Management would be similarly challenging and complex activity; yet, it is an important activity because the hired candidate will be responsible for teaching critical subjects in the school to hundreds of students. This work outlines specific activities to hire the right candidate for this role through a series of processes beginning with posting the job description, screening the resumes, a telephonic interview, conducting psychometric tests, face-to-face interviews, medical tests, references and selection. Job Description: The job description for the role of faculty member as an Associate Professor for Operations Management in the School of Management provides clear and concise idea about the responsibilities and tasks the job involves. The desired qualifications for this role include a Ph.D in Operations Management field in addition to MBA from a reputed business school. About 2-years of experience in operations management in product or service operations would be an added advantage. Moreover, exposure to diversified cultural groups would help the candidate to fair better than others. A minimum of 2-years’ teaching experience in undergraduate or postgraduate levels would be required. Other attributes like a liberal and open-mindedness to engage with talented students would be desired demeanor to carry out this role successfully. The candidate will be expected to work as full-time faculty member in the Operations Management that would not only teach students the set curricula but also identify, coach and mentor the underperforming students in an effective manner. The candidate is expected to be well-versed with operations management concepts. Desired skills for the job include effective teaching skills, ability to create and implement effective and innovative teaching practices; ability to work in a team and carry professional attitude; and possess the ability to effectively coordinate and collaborate with faculty members from other functions. Pay and compensation for this role will be decided based on their present earnings, ranking system based on current faculty salary scale keeping in mind all other compensation benefits being provided by the School. Candidates that fulfill these job requirements and wish to apply for the role can send their resumes to the email ID mentioned within next seven working days. Selection process: Hiring the right candidate for the role is one of the crucial practices for organizational success1. For hiring the right candidate, organizations need to follow a systematic process that enables attracting profiles form the right candidates; collecting suitable talent and matching their personality, experience and preferences with the job description, role and expectations; tracking the applications and following up with the applicants for further selection processes; selecting the best candidate for the role using most suitable selection practices. The first step in the hiring process is to invite most suitable applications, which can be done by posting the job opening along with job description on the school’s website. In addition, the same can be posted on hiring agency’s website, which is allied to the school. A communication regarding the opening can be cascaded to the existing faculty and administrative members of the school for referring their friends/family that would satisfy the job description and are interested in the job opening. Another additional option would be to represent the school and its job openings in the up-coming job fair. All possible methods to invite interested candidates can be used in order to invite maximum numbers of applicants besides the opportunity to choose people with wide ranges of skills, experiences and backgrounds. All resumes will then be screened by the human resources team, and most suitable will be shortlisted from the abundant numbers. Suitability of resumes will be decided on the basis of presence of all relevant information including candidate’s qualification, skills, experience, references, and contact information. The shortlisted candidates can be contacted over telephone for a short interview, which will assess the candidates’ suitability for the role; candidates’ willingness towards specific job and specific rules. This can also be used as an opportunity to take the selection process further, either through interviews or written or psychometric tests. For the current job, a psychometric test followed by a personal interview with the key panel members of the College would be the right practice to assess his/her knowledge, skills and abilities, which will enable selection of the most ideal candidate. Psychometric tests in selection processes help in assessing the candidates’ knowledge, skills and attitude with respect to specific job. These tests can be either aptitude or achievement tests, or combination of both. In the present context, a combination type would be best suitable, which will assess the candidates’ subject matter expertise as well as his/her personality character2. The current position requires the candidate to be highly knowledgeable on their subject and also possess general aptitude required for management subjects. Secondly, to fit with the institution’s frame of requirement, the candidate must have good and acceptable personality from team perspective; should have high levels of energy and enthusiasm to motivate students; should be willing to commit to the institution’s and its students’ overall development and growth; must possess the ability to think differently so as to focus and improve underperforming students. Hence, the psychometric test will judge these aspects of candidates’ personality. A psychometric test which is prepared by the college administration staff in collaboration with senior teaching staff, and customized to suit every specific job role will be administered to all the shortlisted candidates. Referential check will be performed as per the information given by the candidates. Candidates that meet satisfactory levels of job performance metrics on the tests will be called for a face-to-face interview with the key panel members. This interview will be in a structured form focusing on the core competencies of the job role. Interviewers will ask questions related to each competency, and all panel members will provide their scores on the sheet. Core competencies for the current role can be divided into five types: subject matter expertise, openness and honesty; commitment; innovative thinking; and teamwork. Questions focusing on these attributes will be framed and asked during the interview. Such format will be able to cover all aspects of the job. It will also provide a method to gather all facts related to the candidate. These questions will also help in assessing the candidates’ willingness and skills. Questions about the subject, i.e., operations management need to be framed in a manner that can assess the candidate’s depth of knowledge and experience. These are not necessarily questions, but the candidate can be asked to brief about his/her academics, interests, performance, any rewards won etc. Openness and honesty can be assessed by asking about reasons for looking out for other jobs; or questions related to any mistakes that he/she committed and wished he/she had not. Commitment of the individual has three perspectives: towards self development, towards his/her customers (students and college) and towards the job. Commitment towards self development can be assessed based on the candidate’s progressive career, acquired skills etc. However, it is very difficult to assess his/her commitment towards students and college, and towards the job. The candidate can be questioned about significant achievements and the way he/she arrived at those achievements. Candidates innovative thinking can be assessed by inquiring about few innovative practices already created; the candidate can be asked questions based on situations etc. The candidate’s team spirit can be assessed by asking questions related to challenges in teamwork and ways to overcome the challenges; secondly, situation-based questions can also be best for judging team skills. Final selection: Once the most suitable candidate is selected, he/she will be made to undergo medical screening test to ensure he/she is physically fit to take up the job. Once confirmed, the job offer in terms of pay and benefits and other points, if any, will be discussed with the candidate and offer letter will be provided. A background check regarding the candidate’s credentials, experience and other records will be performed by an external agency; if cleared, employment will be finally confirmed; if not, the employment may be terminated upon further investigations. Advantages and limitations of psychometric tests and interviews: While resume screening activity helps in identifying the most suitable candidates for the role based on qualifications and skills, this process will not identify the candidate’s attitude, skills, behavior and aptitude. Psychometric tests help in gaining better understanding of the potential candidate in shorter time than what interviews or even working with the person can give; however, only online testing or paper-based testing on the basis of few pre-formulated questions will not yield validated information, especially when the test-makers are from outside the context of the interview3. Face-to-face interviews are the most common type of selection methods used by most of the organizations worldwide. Such interactions have lower validity when unstructured. If the structured interview questions are inline with the concepts of questions in psychometric tests, then the validity of the outcomes can be more promising. Hence, the questions asked in the interviews were divided into specific categories, which were aligned, both, with the job description and also the psychometric test. However, the major challenge in interviews is that the questions must not sound offending and should be within the legal frame of thought. The interviewers must be well-trained on the legislative binding of interviews and also be careful not to ask or divulge any information that could have potential for misuse, misconception or be termed as illegal, which can prove advantageous or disadvantageous to the interviewer or the interviewee4. To avoid any such undesirable instances, structured interviews will suit the best. Conclusions: In conclusion, recruitment and selection are tedious and complex, yet crucial, activities that need to be conducted in the best phased manner, which will not pressurize the interviewee and the interviewer. During this process, the candidate’s fit for the role should be assessed thoroughly in terms of knowledge, skills, attributes, qualifications, and also on medical grounds. The most important parts of selection process are psychometric testing and final face-to-face interviews, which are difficult to assess and also important. Both these processes should be aligned to the job description and with each other, which helps in identifying and selecting the right candidate. Bibliography Bates, Sandy and Scherer, Keli. Not Another Interview!?! Indiana: AuthorHouse, 2005. Bohlander, George and Snell Scott. Employee Selection. Managing Human Resources. Ohio: Cengage Learning, 2009. Harris, Hilary, Brewster, Chris and Sparrow, Paul. International Human Resource Management. London: CIPD Publishing, 2003. Newell-Brown, Jane. The Complete Guide to Recruitment: A Step-by-Step Approach to Selecting, Assessing and Hiring the Right People. PA: Kogan Page Publishers, 2011. Sims, Ronald R. Organizational Success Through Effective Human Resources Management. Connecticut: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002. Read More