Employee Resourcing in the UK - Essay Example

Employee Resourcing Recent years, labor market in UK is influenced by economic and social changes, new information technologies and innovations. The degree of discretion, or strategic choice, an organization has will be determined to a large extent by leadership style, national culture, commitment to past and continuing strategies, the success of certain symbolic actions, and the nature of its systems and processes. Labor market changes demand new skillful workforce able to fulfill different functions and duties. "The success of a business ultimately relies on the type of employees who work there, which encourages businesses to attract and retain good employees" (Blackman 2006, p. 367). Recruitment and selection procedures are influenced by ever-increasing internationalization of business and link it to the rising importance of human resources management within every corporation. The main recruitment trend in UK is an increasing demand for MBA students or graduates. "The report says that two out of five of new hires in 2005 had an MBA, suggesting that the qualification is valued by employers" (Anderson 2007). From the outset it is recognized that the needs of organizations in young people are different from those of the adult worker. Hiring MBA students, organizations place less emphasis on individual, relatively permanent jobs and more on collaborative groups, or teams. Choosing people to form teams or to join existing teams pose special problems, and different kinds of teams pose different problems. A decision-making management team may be formed for a specific project, its members chosen for specific areas of expertise; it may be disbanded at the project's conclusion, its members reassigned to new teams with other projects where their expertise will be useful; members are chosen for specialized knowledge or skill. Almost all labor markets demand MBA students, such as "real estate, marketing, investment banking and consultancy are all big contenders, with approximately 20 per cent of the class of 2006 opting for real estate, while marketing and investment banking secured about 19 per cent respectively" (Anderson 2007). The recruitment and selection of administrative staff and new managers (MBA) have been very crucial for senior managers who wanted only to have those who were ready to follow in their footsteps and to cover up their corrupt practices. Recruiting consists of advertisements and calls to prospective recruits in local schools, churches, or other promising sources of applicants. The new examination, even if an earlier one had been used, is developed during the recruiting period to reduce the chance that a security lapse gives some candidates prior knowledge of it; in any case, even a new exam must be carefully protected to assure even-handedness (Blackman 2006). In a truly large jurisdiction, the logistics of testing require extremely careful planning, both for test security and for the sheer mechanics of administration (Black, 1999). Another important trend in UK labor market is increasing important and role of online recruiting process. In general, "the recruitment process contains a number of steps, including corporate planning, human resource planning, job description and evaluation, and job advertisements" (Blackman 2006, p. 367). The Internet becomes one of the most popular tools for both employers and job seekers. "In 2006, 39% of businesses in the North West were actively recruiting new staff with 54% of job vacancies advertised with Jobcentre Plus and almost one in 10 turning to the Internet to recruit new staff" (Latest recruitment trends 2007). Today, only a limited number of enterprises use the familiar procedures of recruitment and selection such as advertising jobs in newspapers. Thus, online application is based on traditional procedures such as reviewing applications, holding interviews and testing candidates. The development of the Internet, and the world wide web system operating through the Internet, have resulted in the rapid growth of e-business and changes in all aspects of traditional business operations. The Internet provides greatly increased speed and lowered cost in communications. Internet opportunities are used by recruitment companies to reach their target audiences and increase response. Web facilitates becomes very popular, because there are much shorter and less expensive cycles of send and response, eliminating paper and mailing costs from the interaction. The result is a very low cost medium with the potential to be as subtle, flexible, pertinent and persuasive as good conversation, with a better memory than the most diligent salesperson, and no distaste for repetitive tasks (Beaver & Stewart, 2004). The online services are so popular today because they connect customers with selection agencies directly, thus potentially reducing the importance of intermediaries. In so doing, recruiting agencies can increase profits by dealing directly with the customer and saving on distributor margins (Stone, 2005). However, recruiting agencies now has to assume some functions which were previously performed by distributors including communications, warehousing, bulk breaking, providing assortment, financing and service. At issue is whether the producer can be more efficient than its distributors in carrying out functions previously performed by them. "This online trend is also being reflected by jobseekers themselves. In a single week in June, the Jobcentre Plus website http://www.jobcentreplus.gov.uk experienced a record 6.6 million job searches conducted by 2.2 million online jobseekers" (Latest recruitment trends 2007). It is expected that online recruitment market will be positioned to grow more quickly than other industries. Another trend in UK recruiting market is a demand for non-executive directors. The problems of fragmented ownership, a shift in power to the CEO, and suppression of large owners did not threaten the public firm as an organizational form because of several economic features. First, even if the structure had some bad features, its strengths were overwhelming (Stone, 2005). It facilitated economies of scale and professionalized management-advantages large enough to offset weakened incentives and weakened coordination between managers and shareholders. Following Stone (2005) managerial discretion is functional: for managers to build large complex organizations capable of coordinating nationwide production and distribution, they needed day-to-day discretion. Critics explain that: the initial biggest influencing factor on the smaller company board is the realisation by the other directors that a new, experienced, 'fresh pair of eyes' has come on the scene. This paves the way for improvements in boardroom performance and promotes a more prepared, structured and effective board meeting (Non-Exec Director, 2007). The advantages from economies of scale and complex organizational capabilities dwarfed the organizational costs. According to Neff (2002) firms with dispersed ownership survive because organizations adapted, solving enough of the governance problems of the large unwieldy structures that technology and capital needs created. No solution is complete and perfect; takeovers and proxy fights, for example, are blunt, confrontational, and costly. But each adaptation tends to help improve the firm's organizational abilities. Increasing demand for temporary workers and lack of candidates for these positions affects the market. The selection of most economic stream immigrants and nonimmigrants must shift away from the shortage-based, case-by-case certification system of the past years. Currently, the UK selects some workers on a case-by-case basis on a decades-old understanding of the UK economy and the role that foreign workers play in relieving labor shortages (Stone 2005). Many European countries use similar case-by-case methods. That concept is strikingly at odds with today's competitive realities, where firms choose workers because of small differences in qualifications (both in quality and, especially, in the specificity of skills). Reed (2001) explains that firms generally believe that such differences can, in turn, lead to substantial differences in their ability to compete without any loss in momentum. The main selection tools and techniques involve interviews and skills assessment techniques. The recruitment and selection practices are based on the interview structure and practical assessment of skills and knowledge of employees, his/her psychological peculiarities and ability to work in teams. The main types of practices are: "behavior-based interviews, training and experience evaluations, ability tests, biographical data, motivational fit inventories" (Armstrong 2003, p. 338). The practices are based on collecting, measuring and evaluation of the information about recruiters and their skills. Usually, the selection process is based on the interview method. Interview consists of two stages (HR manager's evaluation and interview with the department manager). During interviews, two distinct strategies for selection are used by UK companies (Knight, 2005). One strategy, used for managers and leadership positions, suggests that in an environment of rapidly changing job demands, selection based on general abilities such as intelligence, conscientiousness, or adaptability will contribute most to the overall effectiveness of the organization (Blackman, 2006). The second strategy, used for manual workers, suggests that effectiveness is enhanced when selection is based on evaluation of the applicant's ability to perform the behaviors needed to do the job for which he or she is being hired (Stone, 2005). During the interview, the company's staff assesses educational background and working experience, commitment to high performance and adaptability, ability to acquire new knowledge and skills, ability to work with others and a team member. In the changing world of work, employees at all levels will need to go back for formal training many times during their careers in addition to engaging in less formal learning in order to keep pace with workplace changes. Furthermore, many newly emerging jobs demand rapid acquisition of cognitively complex skills. Thus, there is a strong argument to be made that a test of mental or cognitive ability should be part of the selection battery for every job. The best available measures of interpersonal skills assess focused and job-specific competencies rather than general personal attributes. Measures of the Big Five personality characteristic of extroversion have been used successfully to predict job performance for managerial and sales occupations but not for others in which the interpersonal component is less dominant (Ross 2005). As more types of jobs require significant interaction with others, the validity of extroversion for predicting job success may become higher, and more general, but its use as an across-the-board assessment of interpersonal skills cannot be recommended on the basis of the current evidence (Armstrong 2003). Another practice used by the company is analysis provided by industrial-organizational (I/O) psychologists who are trained in selection and assessment. On the one hand, the I/O psychologists are asked to implement a recruitment and selection process designed by the client and are evaluated on the basis of how rigorously they followed the client's specifications (Knight, 2005). On the other hand, the I/O psychologists have received extensive professional training as independent professionals and may decide that in their professional judgment the client's procedures could be improved. As psychologists depart from traditional consulting roles, these questions will need to be confronted (Armstrong 2003). One of the most innovative applications of selection technology is in the use of live telephone call-centered role-play exercises to assess candidates for customer contact positions (for example, customer service representative, account executive, telemarketer, technical assistance provider). The Telephone Assessment Program (TAP) of Assessment Solutions, Inc. (ASI) is a state-of-the-art example of this type of system. In consultation with subject matter experts from the client organization, ASI designs job- and organization-specific simulations to assess candidates' abilities to perform key aspects of the target job. Each exercise is modeled directly on the job and simulates common types of calls the customer representative would receive. In a typical assessment, candidates (at testing centers sponsored by the client) are provided with written background materials, including a simplified set of procedures and guidelines on how to deal with customer queries, and are given time to review these materials (Stone 2005). "Generally, such realistic job previews have shown to increase the person-organization "fit" among new hires and decrease subsequent turnover (Ross 2005, p. 4). However, the amount of negative information should be small if a company wants to attract highly-qualified and motivated applicants (Bretz and Judge, 1998; for other issues related to Web log design, see Ross, in press).Advantages of this approach are that it can be conducted remotely with candidates virtually anywhere in the world, it provides a realistic preview of the target job, and it reliably yet relatively inexpensively captures actual samples of behavior using specially trained assessors (Armstrong 2003). The significance of environmental and contextual factors has been long acknowledged in shaping recruiting strategy, and in the ability of the company to realize these strategies. The growth of the concept of a strategic approach to managing people can be attributed to rapid environmental changes that have taken place over the last two decades. Changing economic conditions and impact of global economy on the UK market determine labor supply and demand (Latest recruitment trends 2007). These environmental influences operate at a general level, and at a more specialized level concerned with the organization's own significant environment (Blackman, 2006). The internal changes in structure and new approaches to management require MBA graduates able to cope with complexity and remain flexible in changing economic conditions. The more general influences operate in four main areas: at the societal level, particularly changes in demographics and the shape and education of the workforce; changes in technology, for example the profound impact of information technology on the way in which people work; changes in the structure of the economy, for example changes in the balance between the public and private sector, inflation, or the shift from manufacturing to service industries; and at the political and legal level, changes in employment legislation can also impact on human resource strategies (Knight, 2005; Non-executive directors, 2007). External pressure is explained increasing role of international companies which drives organizational capabilities and requirements and, in turn, generates the need for mobility. In smaller, export-orientated companies the dominant international business motivation is likely to remain opportunism; for international companies the dominant focus will probably be business control and technology transfer in selected markets. For truly multinational companies, the international business focus becomes management of the group's portfolio of businesses while the global corporation, by definition, is focused on managing a worldwide business (Stone, 2005). To function effectively in the new environment, most employees will have to be able to continually acquire new knowledge and skills; adjust successfully to a series of temporary assignments with varying demands; commit themselves to and achieve high performance on each job; and work well with a variety of other people, including customers, perhaps as part of a team. One result of the expanded requirements for success at work is that HR personnel are being asked to assess and evaluate a broader range of competencies than before (Neff, 2002). The effectiveness of these policies is explained by the fact that UK organizations accept many decisions on staffing practices within the context of external pressures. The practical developments of these areas provide the possibility of building more effective systems of HRM and likely assist in the future development of organizations. The existence of effective and innovative recruitment and selection policies is most strongly influenced by corporate strategy. In sum, the policies developed and followed by UK companies are very effective because they allow HR to recruit skillful staff able to meet organizational demands without additional training. The effectiveness of these practices is that these include clinical assessments of personality by unqualified interviewers or assessors, projective tests with questionable psychometric properties. Staffing experts would like to have job performance-related measures of a variety of personality characteristics that are hypothesized to contribute to success in the new workplace, particularly those associated with responsibility, self-management, adaptability to change, and ability to get along with others. However, despite psychologists' ability to obtain reliable, construct-valid measures of five major personality factors-extroversion, openness to experience, emotional stability, agreeableness, and conscientiousness- only conscientiousness has been consistently linked to job performance. Employees who are conscientious, that is, responsible, dependable, organized, and persistent are more successful than those who are not. This is certainly good for the selection business, but it also raises a problem. Although valid, cost-effective methods of assessing some of these competencies are widely available. This situation provides a golden opportunity for developing new selection tools, but the pressure to produce assessments whether or not valid instruments are available also provides fertile ground for charlatans peddling magic cures to all selection ills. Even well-trained and ethical HR professionals are caught between the need to be responsive to management and the limitations imposed by the current state of knowledge. Bibliography 1. Anderson, L. 2007, Recruitment trends: Brisk demand for graduates from across the board. Available at: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/37dacc64-ad5a-11db-8709-0000779e2340,dwp_uuid=991cbd66-9258-11da-977b-0000779e2340.html 2. Armstrong, M. 2003, A Handbook of Human Resource Management. Kogan Page. 2nd edn. Boston: Kent Publishing. 3. 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