HR PRACTICE: RECRUITMENT AND SELECTION Flashcards
FACTORS THAT INFLUENCE RECRUITMENT
PAY- THE MOST IMPORTANT FACTOR?
Puzzling shrinkage: low unemployment levels, high inflation yet businesses struggle to fill vacant jobs.
UK only developed country with a rising share of people withdrawing from the workforce since the pandemic:
o Early retirement; long-term illness among the working-age population
o Choice not to work after the pandemic
“These shifting attitudes towards work deserve more attention […] [If] more companies can adapt to the needs of their exacting
employees, dormant workers can come back into the labour market.”
HR PLANNING: MATCHING SUPPLY/ DEMAND
- Firms compete in the labour market to access a desired pool or “stock” of employees
To fill vacancies, employers need to increase the number of jobs on offer, which is determined by the demand for the firm’s
goods or services, the organizational competencies needed to meet demand, and the productivity or experience of new and
existing employees.
On the other hand, the supply of workers who are looking for paid employment is determined by the number of people of
working age who are in employment or seeking employment (also known as “economically active”). The supply of labour is
affected by factors such as educational attainment, skills in the available pool, and conditions under which people are willing to
work (such as the number of hours and flexible working arrangements).
To ensure that there is a good match between labour supply and demand, HR planning involves forecasting future people’s
needs and the future availability of people. This requires analysing trends and projections related to the labour market and the
organization’s specific needs.
Steps involved in HR planning: - clarifying how the business strategy will be operationalized through HR to deliver an organization’s goals.
- Involves auditing how people are currently employed and developed to improve organizational effectiveness
- Matching resources (numbers, skills) to business needs.
Different Stages:
1. Strategy and business plan: this assesses the impact of strategy on future activity levels and the implications for
organisational competencies.
2. Resourcing Strategy, which involves assessing the requirements versus the availability of organization-specific
knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) and conducting a gap analysis and prioritization.
3. Demand/Supply Forecasting, which involves analysing whether the planned changes can be met with current resources
and assessing the cost and risk of a potential “mismatch.” Decision-support tools, such as scenario planning and
analysis of current labour turnover, organizational effectiveness, and work environment, can be used in this stage.
4. The output of these stages is the Human Resource Plans, which establish the need for recruitment, the “right” number
and skills required, and whether to target the labour market. The resourcing then goes back to the Strategy and
Business Plans stage to ensure alignment.
HARD HR PLANNING: THE LABOUR SUPPLY CHAIN
“Hard” HR planning involves using quantitative methods to anticipate surpluses and deficits in the labour supply chain. This
approach considers both the “stock” and “flows” of people within the organization and aims to balance feedback in the hiring
process.
Example of a quantitative approach
To use system dynamics modelling to predict labour shortages or surpluses over time. This involves constructing a model of the
labour supply chain, including factors such as workforce size, turnover rates, retirement rates, and hiring rates. By simulating the
impact of different scenarios, organizations can identify potential labour shortages or surpluses and take proactive steps to
address them.
In addition to modelling, “hard” HR planning may involve other quantitative methods such as trend analysis, regression analysis,
and workforce analytics. These methods can help organizations identify trends and patterns in their labour supply chain and use
this information to make data-driven decisions about hiring, training, and retention.
* Delays in the hiring process can result from the time it takes to fill vacancies and the physical stock of the firm’s labour
force.
* Production-inventory scheduling is a critical input and output variable for HR planning.
* Productivity can be expanded to include the impact of experience, such as learning curves.
The interconnected diagram provides a mathematical model of the labour supply chain, where the number of vacancies and the
labour force are integrated over time. The goal of the model is to identify the desired number of vacancies and labour force
necessary to meet production targets, taking into account factors such as hiring and attrition rates, time to fill vacancies, and
average duration of employment. By adjusting for vacancies and labour, the model seeks to achieve a balance between the
supply and demand of labour. The model also highlights the importance of timely and efficient hiring practices, as delays in the
hiring process can result in labour shortages and production delays.
THE RECRUITMENT PROCESS
The recruitment process involves several steps that ensure the organisation hires the most suitable candidate.
* consider which features of the workforce will influence the organisation’s future capabilities
* What observable behaviours and psychological traits can contribute to high job performance?
* The social process perspective highlights the importance of a two-way learning process to evaluate compatibility,
ensuring a good match between the organisation and the candidate.
1. Identifying Requirements: The organisation establishes the need for recruitment and identifies the job description and
competencies required for the role.
2. Attracting Candidates: The organisation considers labour market trends, employer perception, and recruitment
channels to attract suitable candidates.
3. Shortlisting and Selection: The organisation uses common techniques to shortlist and select candidates, such as
interviews, tests, and assessment centres. However, biases and personality traits can also influence the decision-making
process.
4. Monitor and Evaluate: The organisation evaluates the effectiveness, efficiency, and fairness of the recruitment process
and makes necessary adjustments.
REQUIREMENTS
- Identify job activities required: there may be gaps from planning that need to be filled.
- Outline of what a job will entail: can be developed through job analysis and job description.
- Criteria for selection and what contributes to high job performance should be specified: which can include knowledge,
skills, qualifications, observable behaviours (from job analysis) and competencies (from job skills). Competency
frameworks can be used to provide a more objective assessment of competencies based on frameworks and past
examples.
ATTRACTING CANDIDATES
When developing a strategy to attract candidates, several factors must be considered:
* Labour market trends, such as increased global labour mobility towards high-income countries and skills shortages in
markets with near full employment, can affect the availability and quality of potential candidates.
* Employer perception, including labour market power and organisational intelligence, as well as the employer brand,
such as effective pay and benefits and offering hybrid/remote working options, can also influence the attraction of
candidates.
* Recruitment channels are also essential in attracting candidates.
o company’s own corporate website
o professional networking sites such as LinkedIn
o and recruitment/search consultants
o Internal advertising to existing talent pools
o other methods such as professional/employee referral schemes, social network sites like Facebook, industryspecific job boards, and speculative applications/word of mouth can also be effective in attracting candidates
SELECTION
Selecting candidates is an important step in the recruitment process
* shortlisting those who have the necessary skills to proceed to the assessment stage
* assessing them against the advertised job specification.
To attract a pool of candidates, recruitment channels such as corporate websites, professional networking sites like LinkedIn,
and recruitment/search consultants are often used. However, many employers still face difficulties in recruiting senior and
skilled roles.
Efficiency in fact-checking and screening is important in the shortlisting process. Some employers use AI/ML to help with this,
although it is not yet widely used.
Selecting the most suitable candidate(s) involves various methods such as interviewer judgment, references, psychometrics, and
work samples. These methods can help to predict job performance and overcome subjectivity and biases. There is widespread
use of technology for interviewing candidates, such as video interviewing tools, which can help employers to conduct interviews
more efficiently and overcome geographic barriers.
The selection process in recruitment commonly involves several approaches to identify the best candidates and predict their job
performance.
1. Interviews, which provide a two-way opportunity to engage with the candidate and assess their suitability for the role.
Structured interviews, which focus on competencies and use behavioural or situational approaches, can help reduce
the scope for subjectivity and bias. Digital technologies, such as video interviews, are increasingly used to facilitate the
interview process.
2. Psychometric testing is another approach that is cost-effective for filtering large pools of candidates, as it is quantifiable
and standardized. However, candidates may tend to portray themselves in a positive light, and their personality traits
and abilities may affect their work and pay.
3. Work samples, such as role-plays, group exercises, and presentations, can assess how candidates “actually” perform the
job. Candidates tend to perceive this approach well, but there is a drawback in that they may tend to “act” and confuse
what is being assessed.
4. Assessment centres are a multi-method approach that can assess selected competencies more than once. The results
of an assessment centre are associated well with performance ratings, but there may be lower consistency across
exercises than within exercises
RECRUITMENT PROCESS EVALUATION
- The effectiveness of a selection method is measured by its validity, which refers to how well the method measures
what it claims to measure and associates with future job performance. - Reliable selection methods give consistent results across applications, which is not the case for unstructured
interviews. - The elements of the selection procedure should be objective and balanced to ensure fairness, with a focus on
information that is relevant to the job. - Efficiency is also an important factor in recruitment evaluation, as the median cost of recruitment in 2021 was £1,000
and increased to £1,500 in 2022, with a cost of £3,000 for senior managers. The cost of a wrong hire is estimated to be
$18,000 per year per hire, which could be avoided with higher-validity selection methods. Therefore, it is essential to
assess the effectiveness, reliability, fairness, and efficiency of the recruitment process to ensure that it is cost-effective
and selects the best candidates for the job.
ARE WE BAD AT HIRING?
The illusion of validity
This refers to the tendency to overestimate our ability to predict future performance based on limited information. In the case
of evaluating candidates for officer training, the evaluators formed coherent and clear impressions of soldiers’ leadership
abilities based on a single group exercise, which led to confidence in their evaluations. However, this confidence was misplaced,
as there was conflicting evidence that the evaluations did not predict recruits’ success after entering officer-training school. This
is an example of how our cognitive biases can lead us to rely on subjective impressions rather than objective evidence.
The halo effects
This refers to the tendency to let our overall impression of someone influence our judgments about specific traits or abilities. In
the case of matching draftees to branches in the army, interviewers focused on forming general impressions and let their
favourable first impressions influence their later judgment. This can lead to biased decision-making, as the interviewers may
overlook negative information or fail to collect objective information about the candidate’s relevant personality traits or past
experiences
