Recruitment and Selection

Key Concepts

It is a challenge for a company to hire suitable employees. Human resource planning is needed to achieve the required goal.

The hiring process consists of three steps: Recruitment, Selection, and Socialization. Every step is important for both sides, new employees, and the company. There are a lot of challenges in the hiring process, for example, determining the characteristics important to performance, measuring the characteristics and motivation factor. To meet the challenge of effective staffing, recruitment should take an Applicant-Centered approach.

There are several sources of recruiting, some of them are current employees, former employees, customers, employment agencies, and college recruiting. Each of them has advantages and disadvantages.

The selection of new employees is decision making based on job analysis. Two concepts important for selection tools are Reliability and Validity. Reliability is the consistency of measurement, usually across time but also across judges. Validity is the extent to which scores on a test/interview correspond to job performance. Validity can include content or empirical validity strategy.

A lot of tools as predictors are used in the hiring process, some of them are highly reliable some of them are not supported anymore. The most common are used application forms, interviews, and recommendation letters. The companies can also choose ability or personality tests, honesty tests, drug tests, reference or background checks, assessment centers, or handwriting analysis.

Three strategies can combine predictors: multiple-hurdle strategy (selection decision after completion of each method), clinical strategy (subjective evaluation all the information and coming to the decision), and statistical strategy (pieces of information combined according to mathematical formula).

Legal concern plays important role in staffing, particularly in selection. Discrimination laws need to be followed. Affirmative action and Negligent hiring need to be taken also into consideration.

It is also very important to hire people who share the organization´s priorities. Social responsibility plays important role in the hiring process nowadays.

To hire the best employees, the hiring policy should include a background check, verification of educational, employment, residential information. HR staff should also learn about applicants´ past work-related behavior, violence, threats, drug/alcohol abuse, carrying weapons. Behavioral problems should be investigated only in the context of the effect on job performance.

(Gómez-Mejíja, Balkin & Cardy 2016)

Case

In the article “What It Was REALLY Like Working As an Abercrombie ‘Model’”, Alicia Cook is describing in the article how Abercrombie company used to hire people just because of their ‘attractiveness’, not based on job requirements or personal profile at all. The same type of people was hired. Nowadays the company said it would stop hiring based on physical attractiveness.

What I think about it is, that it is not right to hire people just because of their appearance, without knowing the information about relevant experience, availability, skills, or personality. But I understand that the company, which is selling products for a certain group of people, wanted to represent themselves by that type of people. 

(HuffPost 2015.)

References:

Goméz-Mejía, Balkin & Cardy 2016. Managin Human Resources. 18th ed. Pearson education. Global edition.

HuffPost 2015. What it was REALLY like Working as an Abercrombie ´Model´. URL: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/Alicia-cook/what-it-was-really-like-working-as-an-abercrombie-model_b_7154042.html. Accessed: 20 September 2020