Employee Recruitment and Selection - Essay Example

Human Resource Management Name Institution Human Resource Management This assessment will talk about Etihad Airways in United Emirates. It will describe the core Human resource practices employed by the company and will assess its HR processes and procedures. Description of the Organisation Etihad Airways is the leading Airline in UAE since its establishment in 2003. It is the national airline of the United Arabs Emirates and the fast growing airline company worldwide always seeking to expand its market base (Al-Ali and Ahmad, 2014). Etihad Airways stands out as the leading Airline in UAE and has it’s headquarter at Abu Dhabi. The airline operates by means of travel agents who act as their sales agents in more than 42 countries globally. Currently, the airline serves international market of over 64 destinations around the world. Markets served by Etihad Airways include North America, Europe, South Africa, South Asian countries, Australia, Africa to name a few. On average, Etihad operates around 147 flights daily and over 1,032 flights weekly (Al-Ali and Ahmad, 2014). Etihad Airways HRM Practices As the business environment has become more competitive and unstable, companies including Etihad have sought to boost their competitive advantage by use of innovative sources through Human resource practices (Agarwala, 2003). Etihad has a humanistic approach towards human resource management. Although the company emphasizes on the integration of human resource practices with the core strategic goals and objectives, it focuses more on competitive advantage that is achieved through job satisfaction, motivation of employees, adaptability as well as superior know-how. Employee Recruitment and Selection Due to the changing business environment, there has been a challenge of recruiting and retaining the best pool of talent. And for this reason, Etihad has development an approach to ensure it attracts the best employees for all its positions (Verma and Harsh, 2012). It uses a merit-based approach which is a combination of written application and behavioural based interview questions. Recruitment and selection entails shortlisting candidates and assessing them against the appropriate criteria. Since the interview is not enough to make employment decision, the company has established a work-related tests and assessments to ensure that it chooses the best candidates and refrain from unfairness (Verma and Harsh, 2012). In addition, Etihad Airways ensure that the recruiters and Human Resource personnel are well prepared and trained to ensure consistency and effective recruitment process (Verma and Harsh, 2012). Before any interview sessions, all HR personnel involved in recruitment and selection undergo a mandatory training to equip them with knowledge of choosing the best talents. The purpose of the recruitment and selection process in the company is to establish the behavioural characteristics of the workforce (Verma and Harsh, 2012). After an individual has been selected to occupy a specific open position, he or she is offered a contractual letter of agreement which acts as a contract between the company and the new employee. Equal Opportunity and Promotion Etihad has a diverse workforce with employees coming from different cultures, religions and backgrounds. The company has embraced cultural differences. This has been possible through cultural training (Etihad Airways, 2012). All employees in the company undergo cross-cultural training in order to ensure they are sensitive to cultural differences and are able to communicate clearly with each other. One major challenge facing Etihad is finding competent managers. In order to solve this challenge, the company has employed the concept of expatriation (Etihad Airways, 2012). Relocation of the expatriates can be troublesome due to diversity issues and cultural shock. In order to ensure success of the expatriates Etihad has introduced expatriate training program. Expatriates are required to undergo training in order to blend well in a new culture. Cross cultural training is very important as it ensures that expatriates understand other people’s culture and avoid passing judgment (Etihad Airways, 2012). In addition, the company prepares to negotiate a compensation package with a manager before sending him overseas (Etihad Airways, 2012). The compensation packages for expatriates is carefully evaluated and assembled to ensure their satisfaction and motivation. The effort of the company to ensure equal employment opportunity is affected by emiratization. The UAE has made an effort to increase emirates employees’ participation in both public and private sector through the concept of emiratization. The government have come up with ways to develop an Emiriti labour force that will be at per with the expectations of the local employers. And as such, like any other UAE company, Etihad is expected to increase emirate employees in the company (Etihad Airways, 2012). To do this, the company has come up with a system that ensures Emiriti receive equal promotions and opportunities just like other employees. Performance Appraisal Etihad’s performance appraisal system entails a vertical chain of dialogue and reviews. The company has established a system that offers gears for managers, employees and supervisors to plan, monitor and assess career development opportunities (Al-Ali and Ahmad, 2014). The system involves metrics and reviews done after every four months to establish employee ratings, development opportunities, attrition and promotions. This assists the company to achieve diverse workforce. Supervisors in the company are encouraged to develop career path for the employees especially those who are underestimated and discounted (Al-Ali and Ahmad, 2014). In order to have an accurate picture of the past, current and future employee performance, Etihad has established performance standards based on job-related criteria. The company’s performance appraisal system is based on vertical chain of conversation (Al-Ali and Ahmad, 2014). This means that the performance of employees is determined by the reviews from the supervisors and managers at every level of the company. Etihad is committed to supporting all its employees to be able to realize their full potential and achieve professional and personal goals which will assist the company achieve its objectives. The performance appraisal system in the company is supported by the Appraisal Policy (Al-Ali and Ahmad, 2014). In addition to quarterly review of performance, the policy has established a scheme whereby each employee and their manager meet annually to discuss their work. The meeting allows the manager and the employee to review the performance and achievements of the past year and set objectives and goals for the year that follows. The meeting enables the employee align their goals with those of the organisation. The rhythm of the appraisal process is governed according to the workflow demand and authorisation from the CEO of the company (Al-Ali and Ahmad, 2014). Employee Motivation From the views of Emirati in UAE, it seems that remuneration plays a fundamental role in motivating the employees and ensuring that they are engaged and committed to achieving organisational goals (Verma and Harsh, 2012). This is why Etihad has employed performance-related pay approach as a means of motivating its employees. Pay linked to performance rewards employees with consolidated or non-consolidated financial payments with regard to the assessment of their performance and achievement of goals and objectives. When an employee performs well in his duty and satisfies the pre-determined performance measures, he receives pay bonus as an acknowledgement of good performance (Etihad Airways, 2012). In addition, managers constantly provide employees with regular feedback with regard to both their productivity and job performances. This enables them to build an employer-employee relationship which encourages greater communication and teamwork in the work projects (Bratton and Gold, 2003). Also, Etihad provides training and development opportunities to their employees. This motivates them to pursue any job position they are interested within the company and minimize employee attrition and turnover. Employees are offered opportunities for career development and enhancement through regular promotions (Al-Ali and Ahmad, 2014). Compensation and Benefit The amount of remuneration that employees receive in Etihad Airways depends on factors such as employee’s value, job type, position, employee performance etc. (Etihad Airways, 2012). However, the company is considered one of the companies in UAE that offers competitive salaries and compensation. Employees also receive bonus pay for over-time working, good performance and as holiday pay. This gives the employees morale and motivation in achieving the set goals and objectives (Etihad Airways, 2012). Generally, Etihad has adapted compensation policy that ensures equality and fairness in terms of wage administration and remuneration rates. It has established clear salary ranges for each job description, decision-making criteria for pay increase and time frame for review (Etihad Airways, 2012). In addition to salaries and compensations, employees in the company enjoy other benefits such as annual leave of about 30 days and travel benefits including generous travel discounts for families and personal travel at special rates (Etihad Airways, 2012). Also, employees received incentive pay. This form of compensation is linked to performance result against pre-determined objectives of employee’s performance. The criteria for deciding who will receive the incentive pay depend on both the quantitative and qualities measures like the quality of service rendered to clients. In establishing the incentive scheme, Etihad employs a balance scorecard strategy. This involves assessing the financial, human resources as well as customer results (Etihad Airways, 2012). Staffing Policy International businesses are more complicated than local businesses. In order to survive, human resource managers must choose the right staffing policy with regards to the needs of the company (Jing and Huang, 2005). The HRM staffing that is implemented by Etihad Airways is the polycentric staffing where the home country individuals are assigned the top positions as this facilitates organisational learning of the foreign market and offer an opportunity for local individuals to improve their careers. Most control often remains with the home office and expatriates are sent to other countries to take over the management (Etihad Airways, 2012). However, the staffing policy does not apply to every employee; it is limited to specific positions and does not encompass corporate top positions. Corporate top positions are offered to the best qualified individual irrespective of the country of origin (Etihad Airways, 2012). Enhancement of the Existing Practices In order to boost their competitive advantage through effective HRM practices, Etihad should improve its expatriate program. In order to be able to prepare and motivate employees to work overseas, Etihad should redefine mobility strategies and programs and should also make sure it meets deployment demands such as access to medical care and substantial living standard for employees. As the company expands to areas around the globe with unstable political factor, employees may be unwilling to work in such places. Therefore, appropriate security measures should be placed in order to ensure employees are secure and safe (Agarwala, 2003). In addition, equal opportunity should not be based on background alone but also on gender. Women should be given the same priority as men to occupy the top management position. Etihad should focus on increasing the number of women in the top positions. Every individual expect to receive certain benefits in order to be motivated to perform well in an organisation. The key to developing successful motivational strategies is to understand how different people view work among countries (Agarwala, 2003). People working in different organisations located in different countries do not give the same priority to the same needs that they want to be satisfied in order to be more motivated. Therefore, this means that not every employee or group of people from different countries are motivated the same way (Agarwala, 2003). Etihad should customize its motivational strategies to meet the needs of different countries and people. It should focus on other motivational strategies to ensure all the employees across its operations are motivated equally. References Agarwala, T. (2003). ―Innovative human resource practices and organizational commitment: An empirical investigation‖, International Journal of Human Resource Management, 14(2): 175-197. Al-Ali, H. and Ahmad S. (2014). Etihad Airlines: growth through successful strategic partnerships. Em Mkts Case Studies, 4(5): 1-17. Bratton, J. & Gold, J. (2003). Human Resources Management Theory and Practice, 3rd edition, New York: Palgrave Macmillan Etihad Airways. (2012). Code of Business Conduct: Human Resource Management in Etihad, Retrieved 16th Dec 2016 from http://resources.etihadairways.com/etihadairways/images/E_Book/HTML/Code_of_Business_Conduct2014_English/assets/common/downloads/Code%20of%20Business%20Conduct%202014%20English.pdf Jing, W. and Huang, T. (2005). Relationship between Strategic Human Resources Management and Firm Performance. International Journal of Manpower, 26(5): 434-449. Verma, and Harsh V. (2012). Services marketing text and cases. New Delhi, India: Pearson Education/Dorling Kindersley. Read More