Attracting: Recruiting and Selection - Article Example

Talent Management Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Instructor Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Date Talent management Talent management is very important for an organisation. It should be considered in attraction, retention and sourcing strategies. Any company that want to have a competitive advantage should instil a talent mind set throughout the workforce in the organisation. Talent management in an organisation is very important in ensuring that recurring cost are reduced, economic outputs increase and enterprise value are maximised. Recruitment and selection forms a very important part of the central activities in the organisation which include the acquisition, development and reward of workers (Josh 2006). Most organisations experience a shortage of capabilities at different levels. This is mostly caused by several factors for instance rapid growth, changing role requirements, key people being poached by competitors and a difficulty in retaining talented people. For organisations to be able to deal with these challenges, it is important for it to tap into the quality people already in the organisation and develop these talents so as to be able to compete comfortably with other organisations. Given that there is a very high level of competition for talent in the market, companies that find and keep good managers are effective in keeping attractive work environment for selecting the right candidates and getting them to do their work well. As organisations strive to meet their business goals, and through this, they must develop a continuous and integrated process for recruiting, training, managing, supporting and compensating its employees so as to be able to maintain their talents (Andrienne 2007). Recruiting and selection is a very important aspect of talent management. It plays the role of ensuring that there is worker performance and positive organisational outcomes. Selection and recruitment of workers does not only occur to replace departing employees or to add to the workforce, but it also aims to put in place workers that can perform at a higher level and demonstrate commitment. It is also very important because only those people that are selected for employment in an organization that can be led, managed and developed (Rees & Ray 2010). An organisation that instils a talent mind set to its employees is able to advertise itself and attract new talents. Recruiting and selecting the right talent in an organisation ensures that talents that do not exist in the organisation are acquired, and they are acquired at a reasonable premium. When the organisation creates an employment brand or image in the market place that has high levels of fit in the organisation, there is effective selection, then the process is able to deliver tremendous gains for the organisation (Mark 2003). Recruitment and selection is able to shape an organisations effectiveness and performance. This can be done by ensuring that an organization acquires workers who already possess the relevant knowledge, skills and aptitudes. The organization can also try and make an accurate prediction on the future abilities of their workers. It has become increasingly difficult to find workers with all the skills and knowledge that a certain post in an organization requires. To overcome these, it was reported by CIPD (2009), that most organisations are undertaking different initiatives for instance appointing people who have the potential to grow, but they do not have all that the position requires at the time of recruitment. This has impacted positively on both the employers and employees because of the additional training that allow the internal staff to fill the post and also the considerations made on the candidates qualities rather than their qualification when recruiting. Perception is very essential in enhancing effective recruitment and selection. It is important to put in mind that ones perception can have a major impact to the decisions that an organization make. There some of the common mistakes that can be made due to perception of the recruiter for instance, selective perception where the brain is not able to process all the information received, and therefore, one tend to select particular aspects or objects of people for attention and attribute this to positive or negative characteristics to this stimuli. Another mistake that can occur is where a recruiter has self centred biasness in which he evaluates a candidate by giving reference to himself. Early information bias is also a mistake that is made by many recruiters where they make early decisions on a candidate and therefore, the recruiter spends the remaining time during an interview trying to confirm there decision. Stereotyping, which is a short cut to understand a candidates attributes is very common. Stereotyping an individual’s characteristics because of a group they belong to may be biased during recruiting and selection because all individuals are unique in their own ways. These common mistakes that are made due to perception are likely to impact negatively both to the organisation and the candidate. This is because the organisation may make the wrong decision while selecting the candidates (Rees & Ray 2010). Selection in itself is very crucial in recruitment and selection. The employer reduces the short listed group after the recruitment stage and here an employment decision is made. Selection decisions however, should be made based on a range of selection tools as some of them have poor predictive job ability. Unlike the perception, that recruitment is a positive activity where optimum number of job seekers are attracted to apply for a position, selection as a negative perception where it mostly involves rejection of applicants. The tools that are used for selection should not be biased so as to ensure that the best fit candidates to fill a certain position are selected. Recruitment and selection is very essential to an organisation and, it has very great cost implications therefore, a lot of considerations should be done to ensure that things do not go wrong during the process. There are the apparent costs which are mainly incurred as direct costs of recruitment procedures and the opportunity costs which are incurred due to repeated recruitment and selection. An organisation must consider the investments involved in recruitment and selection so as to avoid excessive pre occupation of the managers from their other productive activities that they can be engaged in rather than always being preoccupied in recruitment and selection. Also the investment involved for instance in training of new employees should be considered. Organization should try and retain their employees to ensure they do not leave prematurely. A survey report by CIPD (2009), estimates that the average direct cost of recruitment per individual in the UK in 2009 was £4,000 which increases to £6,125 when the costs of associated labour turnover are calculated. Therefore, organisations should try and set up a strategy for recruitment and selection to reduce the costs that are associated with frequent recruitment and selection. In order to ensure that there is talent management of workers in the organization, it is important to develop a strategy for retaining employees who have been selected. This helps to prevent high turn over levels which in turn keep recruiting and selection costs under control. When there are cleverly thought retention objectives and goals, there is an ability of an organisation to attract new talent and strengthen the internal employer’s brand. This in turn enables the organisation to meet its goals and objectives and the relationship between the employer and the employee is strengthened (Mark 2003). During the recruitment cycle, it is essential to ensure that an appropriate number of suitable candidates are attracted to the position. This can be done by ensuring that the recruitment medium being used attracts a sufficient number of qualified candidates so that it does not overwhelm the recruiters during making the selection, with large numbers of unsuitable applicants. Using a recruitment agency has proven to be a very good alternative to ensure that there is a good match of workers to jobs. It is also more cost effective and efficient than a major advertisement done by the organisation. Online recruitment is one of the recruitment criteria that have proven to be most cost effective and has no geographical limits for organisations. It also has speed and reduces the administrative burden for the organization. For the applicants, it is easy, faster and convenient to post their CVs or such for a job site online. Online recruitment is however, positive to only those with skills that are highly in demand because if employers post vacancies on their websites, candidates have to trawl the web in order to find the vacancies. Also, it has a negative impact on candidates because not everybody has access to computers and some may not be comfortable to use the internet. It is very critical for organisations to be fair during recruitment and selection. Most of them want to take on the most appropriate person in terms of their contribution to the organisational performance. Decisions that are made in the process of recruiting should be fair and admissible to all parties in procedural justice and distributive justice. It is very important for employers to choose selection methods wisely so as to maintain credibility among applicants as this help in talent management in the organization(Rees & Ray 2010). There are some contingent factors in an organization that can impact on recruitment and selection. These factors are affected by the underlying principle of the organisations policies and practices. They are usually unique for every organisation. An example of these factors is national culture. For example, different cultures emphasise different attributes when recruiting and selecting employees. Those organisations that emphasise on individual achievements rather than to ascribed status are likely to have legislation that prohibits discrimination against particular groups. This impacts positively to both the employer and the employee because, the organisation is able to get individuals who best fit the position and the employees get work in positions that match their personal values. Culture of particular organisations in most cases influences the selection decisions made by the recruiters. The recruiters most of the times are found to recruit those individuals that they feel will best fit that culture both consciously or unconsciously. Some organisations follow recruitment policies and practice that are found in the overall strategy which shows the values of the recruitment and selection process. This is also reflected in many individuals as most seek work in the organisation that they feel they will best fit depending on their personal values (Rees & Ray 2010). There are several challenges that are affecting organisations negatively during selection and recruitment of employees. These challenges make it very difficult to fill the talent management pipeline. For example, the demographic development which causes shortage of well qualified personnel and in turn creates a war between companies as they such for talents. Education mismatch is another challenge that is facing organisations. There is a mismatch between the education level of graduates that are leaving colleges and market needs. Another challenge is the emergence of the “Y” generation. This generation came into being in the 1980s when there was a connected environment with mobile phones, computers and internet. This generation of people mainly looks for employees who have good employee lines and good reputation. They want a work life balance, freedom and enjoyment which is very essential in their career plans (Mark 2006). In conclusion, recruitment and selection has a very important role to ensure worker performance and positive organisational outcomes. It is not only done to replace workers that depart from the organisation but also, to put in place workers that perform at a high level and show commitment to the work that they do. Organisations should include a social context in the employment offerings they make, as many people have developed a notion of flexible working. It is important that candidates that are best fit for a position are selected without any biases. When the process is done effectively, undesirable costs are avoided. For instance, those organisations that are associated with high staff turn over, they in turn have poor performance and large numbers of dissatisfied customers. When the candidates are selected effectively there is a beneficial employment relationship characterised by high commitment to both the employees and the employers. Perceptual errors are not inevitable and can be overcome making recruitment and selection very effective. Inappropriate selection decisions reduce organisations effectiveness, invalidate reward and development strategies and are mostly unfair on the individual recruit and are distressing to the managers who have to deal with unsuitable employers. Effective talent management, both in recruitment, selection and retaining of employees is very important as it helps to reduce recurring costs for the organisation, improves economic outputs and maximises the enterprise value. References Andrienne, H .2007, Bring out the best: four strategies for successful talent management, Workforce management, London. Arnold, J et al. 2005, Work psychology: understanding human behaviour in the workplace, FT prentice Hall, Harlow. Bernthal, P .& Sheila, M .2005, Recruitment and selection practices, Development Bimensions International, Pittsburgh. 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