Recruitment, Selection, Psychological Tests, Interviews

Recruitment Process
Human resource is the only resource that increases in value overtime. Recruitment is searching for obtaining potential job candidate in sufficient numbers and quality so that the organization can select he most appropriate people to fill its job needs.

According to Flippo “ recruitment is the process of searching candidates for employment and stimulating them to apply for jobs in the organization.

Objectives Of Recruitment Process
1. The attraction and retention of the interest of the suitable applicants.
2. Projection of positive image of the organization those who come in contact with it.

Environmental Factors Affecting Recruitment Process:-
External Factors

1. Govt. & Union Restrictions- Govt. regulations prohibiting discrimination in hiring & employment have a direct impact on recruiting practices.

2. Lab Mkt. Conditions- Employment conditions in the community where the organization is located will influence the recruiting efforts of the organization.

3. Composition Of Lab Force- Demographic & economic factor in today’s society require employers to utilize more flexible & innovative recruitment methods.

Recruitment Methods : -
A combination of internal & external sources is used by most organizations for generating a sufficient no. of applicants.

Types Of Recruitment Methods:-
1. Internal Recruitment
Advantages
a) Provides greater motivation
for good performance.
b) Greater promotion opportunities
for present employees.
c) Less expensive.
d) Improves morale.
e) Enable employee’s to perform
job with little cost time.

Disadvantages
a) Creates narrowing of
thinking, stable ideas.
b) Creating political
enlighting & pressure to complete.
c) Requires a strong
management programme.

2. External Recruitment

Advantages
a) Provides new ideas.
b) Does not change the present
Original hierarchy as much.
c) Allows employees to make availability to fit with.

Disadvantages
a) Loss of time due to adjustments.
b) Destroys incentive of Present employee.
c) More information job changes.

Internal Recruitment

1. Personnel Records & Skills Banks- Examining may uncover employees who are working in jobs below their educational skill levels.

2. Job Posting & Bidding- Job bidding requires that mgt. post otherwise circulate & notify things available job openings & let current employees bid for the, should they be interested. Employees must tell that position will be given to those best qualified.

3. Informal Methods- Job posting is formalized process of advertising available positions to
Employees & a means by which employees can express an int. is being considered for those positions. In this case grapevine may provide necessary information and this may result in screening of candidates. Employee qualification will decide who receives a particular position.

External Recruitment

1. Advertising- Can use both print media & audio visuals are used, the most common of which are the daily newspapers help wanted ads.
a) Ads can be placed in media read only groups.
b) More info. About the co., the job, i.e. job specification can be included to permit self-screening. c) When time is limited, most effective method.

2. Employment Agencies- Additional screenings can be affected through the utilization of employee agencies, both public & private. Technical and professional areas the private agencies do the most.

3. Recommendations of Present Employees- When present employees are asked to recommend new, preliminary type of screening takes place.

4. Schools & Colleges- Jobs in business have become increasingly technical and complex to the point where high school and college degrees are widely added hence recruitment is carried out at campus itself.

5. Lab Union-
Through the lab union’s recruitment can be made.

6. Casual Applicants- Unsolicited applicants both at the gate and through nail constitute a much-used source of personnel. These can be developed through provisions of attractive employments.

7. Nepotism-The hiring of relatives will be inevitable component of recruitment programmes in family-owned firms. Loyalties to the enterprise are offsetting advantages.

8. Leasing-Leasing personnel by hour/day should be considered. In this case the firm not only obtains well-trained and selected personnel but also avoids any obligations in pension, insurance and other benefits.





Selection Process

Selection is a process of picking out men best suited for the organization. Selection is the process of securing relevant information about an applicant to evaluate his qualification experience and other qualities with a view to matching these with the requirements of the job.

Steps Taken In Developing Proper Selection Procedure
(1) Examination of the job having vacancies.
(2) Selection of criterion and predictor: involves choosing an indicator which measures the extent of how good or successful a worker is and choosing one to predict how successful a worker will be on job.
(3) Measurement of the performance: this can be done either by giving the predictor to present employees is simultaneously obtaining criterion measures.
(4) Relating predictor to the criterion: determining whatever a true and meaningful relationship exists between the employee scores on the predictor and the criterion.
(5) Deciding upon the utility of the selection device.
(6) Re – valuation

Steps In Selection Process
It varies from organization to organization and industry-to-industry depends on effective job analysis and recruitment. It involves;

(1)Preliminary Screening
It is sorting process in which prospective applicants are the necessary information about the nature of the job and also necessary information is elicited from candidates about their qualifications, skill, salary expected, etc.

(2)Application Blanks
Functions of application blanks;
(a)Provides pertinent information about employee which organization needs when individual is hired. Example: age, sex, mental status.

(b)Designed to gather information about job applicants which personnel officer feels pertinent to the hiring process. Example: work experience and references.

These are highly structured instrument in which questions have been determined in advance. Information requested is concerned with personnel listing, like, previous work and life history. Weighted application blanks can be prepared on the basis of information regarding personnel history items associated with job access. But, applicants tend to exaggerate their abilities, which maybe overlooked. This is quite effective.

(3)Reference Checking
Many times job applicants are required to produce some sort of documentary evidence that they performed satisfactorily in one or more of their past positions. Previous employers and schools provide useful information. Enquiries should be precise and specific. There are perhaps four major reasons for a letter of reference to be inaccurate in content;
(I) Knowledge of the applicant
(II)Ability to assess applicant
(III)Ability to desirable applicant
(IV)Willingness to be accurate.




(4) Psychological Testing
A test is a sample of an aspect of an individual’s behavior, performance or attitude. It can also be systematic procedure for comparing the behavior of two or more persons. A psychological test is standardized instrument designed to measure objectively one or more aspects of a total personality by means of samples of verbal or non-verbal responses, or by means of other behavior.
Purpose of psychological test; personal selection is that individuals differ in their job related abilities and skills and that these skills can be accurately and adequately measured. Tests seek to eliminate the possibility of prejudice on the part of the interviewer or supervisor. Tests may uncover qualifications and talents that would not be detected by interview or by listing of education.

Types of psychological tests

(a) Individual and group tasks
These are number of tests designed to be administered individually as they enter more deeply into behavior. They are costly and used to a lesser degree on the skill, sensitivity and friendliness of the test administrator. Group tasks are advantageous in situation that requires the testing of many people.

(b) Instrumental or paper and pencil tests
Instrumental tests make use of tools and usually are individual in character. Paper and pencil tests are usually group tests involving written responses. Questions are in printed form and answers are recorded on answer sheet.

(c)Achievement or intelligence tests
These are called as proficiency tests. They measure skill or knowledge, which is acquired as a result of training programme and on the job. These tests are useful if the candidates have prior experience of similar jobs. These tests are of two type:

(i) Test of measuring job knowledge – known as trade tests, they are oral tests consisting of a series of questions which are believed to be satisfactorily answered by persons who understand trade occupation

(ii) Work sample tests - these measure the proficiency with which equipment can be handled by candidate by giving him a piece of work.

(d) Aptitude or professional ability
Measures talent, ability of a candidate to learn a new job, to learn a job through adequate training if applicants don’t possess earlier job experience. These tests include;

(i) Mental tests – measures the IQ and enables to know whether a candidate has the mental ability and capacity to deal with new problems.

(ii) Mechanical aptitude tests – measures the capacity of a person to learn a particular type of mechanical work.

(iii) Psychomotor or skill tests – measure personnel ability to do a specific job especially in semi – skilled in respective jobs.

(e) Personality tests
These discover clues to an individual’s value systems, his emotional reactions, maturity and his characteristic mood. It helps in assessing a person’s motivation, his ability to adjust himself to the stresses of everyday life and his capacity for inter – personal relations and for projecting an impressive image of himself. These tests can be of following types;

(i) Objective test – measures neurotic tendencies, self – sufficiency, dominance, submission and self – confidence.

(ii) Projective test – a candidate is asked to project his own interpretation onto certain standard desires, wishes and feelings to give it some meaning.

(iii) Situation tests – measures an applicant’s reaction when he’s placed in a particular situation, his ability to undergo stress and his demonstration of ingenuity under pressure.

(f) Interest tests
Designed to assess individual predispositions, motivation and application motivation. Used for vocational guidance and are assessed in the form of answer to a well – prepared questionnaire. They include items about many daily activities and object form among which test taken select their preferences.

(g) Speed and power tests
When test is to complete as many items as possible in a short time, it maybe referred to as speed. In power test items can be difficult and the person is also given ample amount of time and his score is based upon his ability to answer questions correctly no matter how long it takes.

(h) Essay and objective tests
Essay test calls for the candidate to organize his thoughts clearly and logically recapitulated in event dates and relevant materials. Objective test try to check the powers of mental ability and reasoning and finds out whether candidate is clear in his mind 7 ahs understood and initialized the concept.
(i) Language and non – language tests
Tests, which require knowledge of knowledge of a particular language in order to understand either the instruction or the test items themselves, are called language tests. In certain areas tests have been made language free which are referred to as non – language tests.

(j) Computer aided tests
Designed for a large – scale group testing, computer assisted testing, is nevertheless an individual testing situation in which the person taking the tests interacts with a computer, immediate feedback is available.

(k) Thomas – profiling hiring techniques
It is a variant of psychological test and offers insight into how the candidate can be developed after he signs up. It facilitates best behavioral fit between person and the job. Devised by New York based Thomas, international management system in 1945, it can be adapted to suit different companies and employees career aspirations. It embodies two elements;

(i) Personal profile analysis (PPA) – which highlights the behavioral characteristics of the applicant. It indicates how the would – be employee sees himself, how he is likely to be perceived by others. Obtained by 24-point questionnaire, which can be completed within 10 minutes, by the applicant.

(ii) The human job analysis (HJA) – which indicates behavioral requirements of the job. It compares the skill sets and behavioral pattern demanded by the job with those of the candidates.
Combining the PPA and HJA we get, Thomas international profiling system (TIPS). Match the people and job to facilitate optimum job satisfaction and maximum productivity.


Advantages of psychological testing
1. Improve selection process
2. Provides insights about individual candidates
3. Less susceptible to biased interpretation
4. Great deal of information gathered in relatively short period of time
5. Measure of the aptitude of the candidate and predict their success.

Limitations of psychology testing
1. Tests cannot make prediction of chances of success of an applicant.
2. The usefulness of this program depends on the amount of time and money management is willing to invest in the necessary psychological research.

Development of tests
Following steps maybe undertaken to design employee tests for an enterprise:
1. Analysis of the job
2. Selection of test procedure
3. Preliminary tryout and requirement
4. Validation of test procedure
5. Combination of tests into a battery
6. Application of test

Precautions in use of tests
(1) Norms must be developed as source of reference on all tests used in selection
(2) Some “warm up” should be provided for candidates either by giving samples of tests or answering queries before the test begins
(3) Should be validated for the given organ and then administered
(4) Each test used should be assigned weight age
(5) Test scoring, administration and interpretation should be done by people having technical competence.








Employment Interview
It refers to conversation with a purpose. Face to face conversation for the purpose of obtaining factual information assessing the individual personality or counseling or therapeutic purposes. The purpose is three-fold:
(i) Obtaining information
(ii) Giving information
(iii) Motivation
It is artificial situation where candidates are putting their best face while panel is trying to find out real face. Each interview should be tailored to tap that uniqueness and relate the data to the ob competency requirements.

Types of interviews
The interviews differ according to their objectives. They can be;

(a) Unstructured interviews
Characterized by lack of structure or advance planning, Format and approach left to the discretion of interview. Basic weakness is lack of consistency in assessing candidates which in turn leads to extremely low in predictive accuracy.

(b) Patterned or structured interview
It uses a predetermined list of interview questions that are asked of every applicant in a particular job category. Rationale of this method being an individual’s past behavior is indicative of his future behaviour. Stress level on assessing personality, motivation and interests. It can be used in varied employment situations.

(c) Informal interview
They may make place anywhere and is not planned and is used widely when the labour market is tight and you need workers very badly.

(d) Formal interview
Here formal atmosphere in the employment office by the employment officer with the help of well – structured questions.

(e) Non – directive interview
Designed to let the interviewee speak his mind freely, it involves the minimum use of direct questions. The idea is to give complete freedom to the candidate to sell himself without encumbrances of the interviewer’s questions. Role of interviewer is of silent spectator.
(f) Aptitude interview
Designed to obtain information from the interviewee concerning, his attitude about his job, the company, etc.

(g) Depth interview
Designed to intensively examine the candidate’s background, thinking and to go into a considerable detail on a particular subject of special interest to the candidate.

(h) Group interview
Designed to see how the candidate reacts to and against each other. It is designed to assess leadership quality in the candidate. A topic is given to a leadless group of applicants and observers remain in the background to assess as to who assumes leadership how he does and how he is accepted by participants.

(i) Stress interview
It is designed to test the candidate and his conduct and behavior by putting him under conditions of stress and strain used where emotional balance forms an essential quality. It is useful to test the behavior of individuals under disagreeable and tiring situations.

(j) Panel or board interviews
It is done by members of interview board or a selection committee. Involves use if several interviewers collectively interviewing a candidate and making a rating on several traits.

(k) Situational interviews It is carried out by preparing a list of critical incident that differentiates between current successful and unsuccessful employees. The Supervisors determine benchmarks for scoring the incidents.

Principles of interviewing
1. Preparation
(a) Determine the specific objectives of interview
(b) Determine the method of accomplishing the interviewing objective
(c) Inform yourself as much as possible concerning the known information about the interview.

2. Setting
(a) Physical setting or the interview should be both private and comfortable
(b) Mental setting should be one of rapport
3. Conduct of interview
(a) Interview should possess and demonstrate a basic liking and respect for people.
(b) Questions should be asked in a manner that encourages the interviewee to talk.
(c) Listen alternatively and if possible

4. Close
(a) Interviewer should make some overt sign to indicate the end of the interview.
(b) Interviewee should be given some type of answer or indication of future action

5. Evaluation

Limitations of interviews
Failure of interviewers to agree
Failure to predict job success
Stress of the interview situation
Interviewers standards of comparison: contrast effect
Interviewers prejudices.