The Value of a Truly Sustainable Business Strategy - Essay Example

The HR Assistant position is created to achieve the objective of building the college on the basic values of sustainability. Unless the right person is recruited in that position, the objective can not be fulfilled. It is one of the toughest jobs for the HR Director. In the words of Story,

“Successful recruiting can be a Catch-22 scenario: the best people want to work for a company with an excellent reputation, but the only way a business can achieve a good reputation is by attracting the best people”. (Sorry. 2005)

            Undoubtedly it is the best people that make the organization the best one. The first thing that should be done is to “identify the need before you begin recruiting, you must establish the positions you're looking to fill and identify the community in which new staff will work.” (Schultz, B. 2008) This will go a long way in the selection of the best candidate. As the need has already been identified, it is clear what sort of person should occupy the new HR Assistant position. The objective behind creating this position should be made clear to the prospective candidates to the position. In this regard, networking expert Diane Darling says, “People don’t know what you need. They just can’t read your mind.” So it should be clearly mentioned in the job advertisement regarding what sort of person and experience and qualification is desired to fill the post.

            There are several ways in identifying the candidate for the position. An advertisement on the opportunities page of a popular news magazine or electronic media attracts the attention of hundreds of potential candidates. But the problem is how to identify the person we need. It will be a very complex task to identify the person out of hundreds of applicants. It involves a lot of time and cost in eliminating the unwanted and the less skilled people. Hence, “the traditional recruiting methods usually fail small companies.” (Tozzi. 2008)

            The recruitment process should start with inviting resumes from the eligible people. The resumes provide some vital information about the candidates. Schultz asks a pertinent question. He says, “If prospective employees can't sell themselves, how can they represent your business?”  

He strongly suggests that many of the candidates should be eliminated by seeing the mistakes, even though they are very small, like spelling or grammatical errors or sloppiness in presentation.

            After shortlisting the candidates sending them a questionnaire about the job they are going to fill and how do they manage in a particular context will be helpful in screening further. By seeing their answers to the given case study, people with the right attitude can be selected. Schultz suggests a rather practical approach in screening the candidates. He prefers to have a series of steps instead of a single interview. He says the next step should be a telephonic interview which should be fixed through an email. He points out that if a prospective candidate misses checking his email, he is not the ideal candidate for the position. The HR Assistant should be ever vigilant in communication. In the telephonic interview, says, Schultz, if the candidate appears to be energetic and his answers reveal good common sense, then he should be called for a face-face interview. Though it seems like a long process it is the most appropriate way of selecting the ideal candidate for the crucial position. The interview is the most crucial one. Story says,

“A key to successful recruiting is to know how to interview people. Good interviewers know what to look for, what to ask, how to elicit the kind of information that would indicate that this candidate is a solid match for the organization” (Storry. 2005)

            The references provided by the candidate also will be useful in cross-checking the candidate’s claims for the position. In addition to all these steps in the process of selecting the candidate, Schultz prescribes some ‘personality assessments like the Management for Success (MFS) Style Analysis Response Form-Sales Version and Personal Interests, Attitudes and Values (PIAV)’ These tests help us in assessing the candidate’s attitude finally.

            The process described above is the best method for recruiting the HR Assistant as the position involves key responsibilities.

The other methods like going to the colleges to tap the potential graduates are also useful especially when the recruitment is done in big numbers. Just keeping one position, will be time-consuming and unnecessary effort. Networking in the form of utilizing the services of present employees to find the best talent among the people they know will be useful to some extent but it can not always give the best candidate with the right skill set.

The process of calling for resumes, sending them a questionnaire or a case study, screening the candidates from them, mailing the candidates about the telephonic interview, conducting the telephone interview, having a face-to-face interview, and finally going for a personality assessment test is the ideal and cost-effective method of recruiting the ideal candidate for the position.