Recruitment and Selection at Sainsburys - Essay Example

? Human resource management A group report on recruitment and selection at Sainsbury’s Table of Contents Introduction 3 J Sainsbury Plc 3 Methodology 3 Findings 3 Recruitment methods 4 Selection methods 4 Discussion 5 Conclusion and recommendations 7 References 1. Introduction: Recruitment and selection (R&S) processes lay the foundation to a successful business. These are the human resource (HR) strategies that require involvement from HR team and operations in order to be effective. This report evaluates the R&S procedures adopted by J Sainsbury Plc, while identifying their advantages and challenges. Learning from literature will be adopted for obtaining a direction to this study and findings from various relevant sources will be assessed before providing recommendations, if required, and concluding with key remarks. 2. J. Sainsbury Plc: J. Sainsbury Plc. is more than a century old retailer with more than 1000 supermarket stores throughout the UK. It employs more than 150,000 staff in all of its stores and back office locations. Their unique values and business strategies indicate their historic presence and strength in the business world. Some of these values and strategies certainly consider their recruitment and selection procedures, which ensure right candidates are hired for their jobs that in turn prove to be of high significance for their growth and sustenance (J Sainsbury plc, n.d). 3. Methodology: Literature study concerning R&S procedures has been performed to understand the impact of these HR processes on the firm’s success. Most of the information related to Sainsbury’s is obtained from sources such as the company website, published journals, few text books etc, and the key findings are noted. 4. Findings: In large firms, R&S are a part of HR planning, unlike the ad hoc activities followed in smaller firms (Marchington & Wilkinson, 2008); and, HR function can help create more value through its strategies of which R&S is a critical one (Hill & Jones, 2010). In their study, Delery and Doty (1996) asserted that sophisticated methods of recruitment and selection form a part of their competitive strategies in larger firms. This point can be examined in the case of Sainsbury. 4.1 Recruitment methods: According to information from their website, Sainsbury’s offers career opportunities in areas such as supermarket staff, store management and support centres, logistics, pharmacy, finance and accounting sections etc (Sainsbury’s.Jobs, n.d). They hire fresh graduates, experienced staff and specialists for various roles based on the job requirements. They offer job opportunities to various categories of students including both European nationals and international students throughout the UK. Interestingly, Sainsbury does not entertain collecting CVs from interested candidates; instead, they encourage applications through their website for all available positions that are also made visible through their website. In order to attract the best candidates, Sainsbury’s offers a detailed online application process that also recruits the most suitable candidates through various questionnaires; these include key requirements questionnaire, motivational questionnaire, situational judgment questionnaire and application form. Recruitment and selection strategies are also important facilitators for other HR initiatives such as diversity management as these strategies help in attracting people from various ethnic groups and diverse backgrounds. According to their Changeworknow (n.d) campaign, candidates that fail to pass through the applications and questionnaires receive immediate feedback and are also directed to other employers thereby creating a positive employment and interaction experience. 4.2 Selection methods: Final selection of candidates at Sainsbury’s is done only after detailed tests and face-to-face interviews are conducted by the store managers or other managers. These interviews help in assessing the abilities and competencies of the candidates; these interactions also help in assessing the candidates’ willingness and enthusiasm towards the job they are meant to do. The interviewers usually probe into candidates’ knowledge and experience, if any; they ensure the candidates understand the job requirements and expectations by reiterating all roles and responsibilities as well as specific clauses, if any. Only when the candidate and the interviewer completely agree with the requirements, the candidate is announced as selected and offer letter is released. 5. Discussion: Martin et al., (2011) assert that a positive employment experience adds great value to employer branding and a distinctive organisational identity which itself is advantageous in creating employee value, engagement and confidence. This, Sainsbury’s strives to achieve from the very beginning of potential-employee interaction. Recruitment and selection procedures at Sainsbury’s are closely related to its higher order business strategy, such as, creating positive experience to the community. From R&S perspective, Sainsbury’s strategy of avoiding large numbers of CVs from candidates directly saves much time and costs to their hiring team as this method straight away avoids applications from candidates that do not suit their vacancies. Most part of their selection process is already included in recruitment application forms. Their detailed tests and interviews for final selection further strengthen the process of selecting the right candidate for the job. This job-environment fit strategy ensures that the candidates selected can perform as per Sainsbury’s expectations (Changeworknow, n.d). An extensive research by Purcell et al., (2002) has proven that conscious efforts towards recruitment and selection of people from diverse backgrounds facilitate effective diversity management as well as help attracting diverse consumers. Sainsbury’s adoption of national equality standards is a significant step towards diversity and inclusion, which will help increase its consumers too (J Sainsbury plc, n.d). Sainsbury’s R&S methods are more effective compared to its competitors’, such as Tesco’s, methods as they save administrative costs and time for the hiring team; secondly, their extensive questioning helps in better screening of the applicants; thirdly, recruitment process also educates the potential employees about company’s expectations. Their selection processes of test and interviews provide much more meaningful information to the managers about the candidates’ fitment with the vacant role. These processes not only validate the recruitment decisions, but provide an opportunity for clarifications for the candidate. However, interviews and tests fail to validate and assess abilities of different candidates applying for a particular post if the interviewer lacks interviewing skills; moreover, interviewers’ balanced attitude and emotions play an important role in taking unbiased and objective decisions. Nevertheless, the disadvantages of interview-based selection processes are greatly minimized at Sainsbury’s due to their comprehensive recruitment process. Recruitment and selection are critical factors that affect performance and productivity in long term as these processes are responsible not only to pick the suitable candidate but also to avoid stress. For instance, CIPD studies emphasize the need for strategic fit between recruitment, selection and assessment procedures with the nature of the job (Stress management, n.d). Their rationale relates to the impact of stress felt by staff members on their performance. Staff members that are well suited for the jobs they are meant to perform tend to feel less stressed and are therefore more productive. Nevertheless, Sainsbury’s recruitment and selection procedures do not provide any fool-proof method to check candidates’ ability to perform under stressful conditions. In such mismatch, staff members’ commitment towards their job lowers with time thereby leading to lower productivity, which will not only affect the employee’s area of work but also the organisation’s performance and its customers. Such mismatch also results in high employee turnover, which again is a substantial loss for the business. 6. Conclusions and Recommendations: Finally, the conclusive fact of this study is that the unique R&S procedures have significantly helped Sainsbury’s performance and sustenance. Moreover, streamlined R&S procedures are highly advantageous to Sainsbury’s in terms of saving costs and time; their tailor-made approach to recruitment is further strengthening the quality of candidates being hired. However, there still exists scope for improvement. Firstly, some of the other high-stress customer-oriented businesses, such as McDonald’s, use on-job-evaluation programmes (OJE) to check candidates’ ability to perform under stress (Recruitment & Training at McDonald’s, 2008), which also provides an idea to the potential candidate about work pressures; such programmes that provide real-time experience help in better decision making both for the candidate and the employer. Secondly, candidates hired for customer-oriented high-pressure jobs can be provided the advantage of working in flexible hours while meeting other staffing requirements; this will not only create positive employment experience but also help employees create a work-life balance. Thirdly, all store managers have to be trained to interview as a part of their managerial training programme. References Changeworknow. N.d. sainsbury’s. Available from http://www.changeworknow.co.uk/case_studies/sainsburys_graduate_case_study.pdf (Accessed 5 November 2013). Delery, J and Doty, H. 1996. Modes of theorising in strategic human resource management tests of universalistic, contingency and configurational performance predictions, Academy of Management Journal, 39 (4), 802-835. Hill, C.W.L and Jones, G.R. 2010. Strategic management an integrated approach. 10th ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co. J Sainsbury plc. N.d Available from http://www.j-sainsbury.co.uk/about-us/ (accessed 5 November 2013). Marchington, M., and Wilkinson, A. 2008. Human resource management at work, CIPD, London. Martin, G, Gollan, P and Grigg, K. 2011, Is there a bigger and better future for employer branding? Facing up to innovation, corporate reputations and wicked problems in SHRM, International Journal of Human Resource Management, 22 (17), 3618-3637 Purcell, K, Morley, M and Rowley, G. 2002. Employers in the new graduate labour market: recruiting from a wider spectrum of graduates. Employment Studies Research Unit. Available from http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/assets/hca/classics/unsure/locationunsure/0205RecruitingWiderSpectrum.pdf (Accessed 05 November 2013). ‘Recruitment and Training at McDonald’s.’ ca. 2008. McDonald’s. Available from http://www.mcdonalds.co.uk/content/dam/McDonaldsUK/People/Schools-and-students/mcd_recruitment_training.pdf. (Accessed 5 November 2013). Sainsbury’s.Jobs. n.d. Sainsbury’s.com. Available from http://sainsburys.jobs/ (Accessed 5 November 2013). Stress management, 2008. Building the business case for managing stress in the workplace. CIPD Publishing. Available from http://www.cipd.co.uk/NR/rdonlyres/F5B27EA2-1A75-4C26-9140-1C9242F7A9C6/0/4654StressmanagementWEB.pdf (Accessed 5 November 2013). Read More