Supporting Employee Retention within a Complex International Labour Market - Essay Example

THE ROLE OF RECRUITMENT AND SELECTION STRATEGY IN SUPPORTING EMPLOYEE RETENTION WITHIN A COMPLEX INTERNATIONAL LABOUR MARKET [Type Here] [Subject Name Here] [Instructor Name Here] [Date Here] Table of Contents References 13 An Evaluation of Recruitment Strategy and Issues of Attracting Talent in an International Dimension Recruitment strategy is essential for every organization; the human resource department takes it as a very important task (Stay, 2008). If an organization develops a recruitment strategy that is effective and aligned with its goals, over all organizational performance is positively effected. Recruitment strategies help an organization hire useful talent and use this talent in the best way possible. A good strategy has to be well planned and practically applicable to ensure that the organization gets access to good talent. "Recruitment is the process of searching the candidates for employment and stimulating them to apply for jobs in the organization" (Flippo). It starts with the hunt for new employees and it continues till a pool of application is generated out of which new employees are selected. To develop a good strategy an organization an organization should always keep itself updated on the opening that are present in it , openings that may be required and positions that are potentially going to be vacant in the future. An organization should target the positions needed immediate fillings first, but it is best to predict the vacancies and plan for recruitment as this ensures that the quality of recruitment activities stays good. Requirements for a certain type of position should be fully understood for better recruitment. The performance level required, the experience needed by the potential employee should ne properly be established. The organization should identify that the vacant post can be best filled by external recruitment or internal recruitment. Some organizations feel that employee referrals are very effective forms of recruitment source (Lisa Guerin, 2007). Vacancies are mostly properly advertised. Human resources personnel involved in recruitment should have proper training and experience so that they can judge the skills and parameters required for the job and determine if they are present in the candidate or not. Evaluation methods of candidates should be described (Linda L. Neider, 2003). The most popular evaluation methods are written tests, interviews, psychometric tests (Carter, 2004) or a combination of these. Things that affect the recruitment process are the organizations objectives and policies, the government policies and labor laws, the source of recruitment traditionally used by an organization, the current needs of the organization and the costs affiliated with the recruitment (Rouse, 2007) The recruitment challenges faced by organizations are that the labor in some countries has aged and the pension costs are becoming high. In the modern day the organizations invite employees from all around the world (Hook, 2008), to generate a larger candidate pool the organizations use modern sources like outsourcing. Organizations outsource their recruitment activities to another organization which screens candidates initially according to organizational requirements given to it so that its employer organization can select employees from its screened candidate pool (Ian Beardwell, 2007). The advantage of this is that even if the company is not planned for a vacancy it can forward its need to the outsourcing organization and get a desired employee in lesser amount of time. It also creates competitive advantage by speeding up the process of recruitment; it helps the management to stay focused on other things rather then the generation of a candidate pool. These organizations usually negotiate salaries on the behalf of their employers to save time and resources of its employers. Poaching and raiding is also another way of acquiring talent, in this the organizations attract and employee a person who is already an employee of another good company by offering greater package or conditions (Nonaka, 2005). It is assumed as unethical but is commonly uses in many organizations. People are looking for challenging work that rewards them and provides growth to them. Whatever the world scenario be Starbucks is a company that is hiring about 200 employees per day as it is growing day by day. It has done some innovations in its recruiting process as it has interviews which involve coffee tasting, and encourages people to apply by hand written applications. All applications are answered in a due time and gift cards are sent to people who applied. It treats its candidate pool like customers. E- Recruitment is a good way of attracting international talent; internet is used for the purpose of recruitment. Jobs are advertised on the internet and interested people post their CV's to a provided email address or site (Hook, Introducing Human Resource Management, 2008). People also post their CV's on sites from where organizations can skim CV's that they are interested in and generate a candidate pool. This kind of recruitment is low cost and more direct; it minimizes the time needed for appropriate recruitment and increases the efficiency of recruitment process. Recruitment management systems help organizations to conduct their recruitment process and it immensely improves the recruitment process (Krishnamurthy, 2006). To attract better talent an organization should make sure the interviewers and advertisements communicate the business plan of the organization well (Michael Dickmann, 2008). There should be a realistic picture painted of the vacancy. Over qualified people may not be discouraged from applying (Edenborough, 2007)and even if more money is required to hire greater talent it should be utilized. People who are unemployed may not be underestimated; their reason of unemployment may not be connected to their capabilities. Company referrals should always be encouraged. In the International labor market today it is very easy to generate a candidate pool for any kind of job because of the global recession a lot of people who are good at their jobs and know how to do things well are unemployed and a lot of people graduating from different colleges and universities are facing a tough time in the market. So an organization can get the best people to post their CV's to them and in this time period they can more people from worldwide to want to apply for their posted jobs. There is talent the world and it is waiting to be utilized. Design of Selection Tools and Selection criteria to Support International Selection It is a process through which a candidate is screened through different steps to determine whether he is the right candidate or not (Peter W. Winfield, 2004). In this candidates not found suitable are rejected after seeing the results of their interviews and tests. It ends when the organization selects an employee and does a contract of service with him. Tools used for selection are Hogan Report (OECD, 2008) which makes the competency profile of the candidates; it is a report about the business, interpersonal and intrapersonal skills of them. It helps interviewers to hire top management with leadership skills. Suitability report is a graphical report that displays scale performance (Tyson, 2006), cut score performance and recommends who to hire. If a lot of people are hired at once this report proves to be very effecting. can be used for filling of many types of positions. Another report identifies the capability of the candidate (Storey, 2007) and accesses how well an employee may fit in the organization. Another report is the Candidate potential report accessing the best candidate for an organization. The focus in this report is that the employee hired should increase organizational performance and minimize the cost that is incurred by hiring the wrong person and employee turnout (Paul Banfield, 2008). It suggests employees that may be low high or moderate fit to an organization wants to resign soon increasing the turn over. Strengths of the candidates are highlighted. Individual performance assessment report evaluates the employees by assessing all tests taken of each candidate (Price, 2007). Personality profiles assess the personality types of the candidates and helps choosing personality type that may be best for the job (Edmund Heery, 2001). Aptitude tests access the academic excellence of a candidate (Margaret Foot, 2005). In the time of recession today, all people searching for jobs make sure that they can give their selection tests online. Companies like Unilever and Procter and Gamble have online tests which the required candidates are asked to complete in a given time and the evaluation of these tests help in the selection of candidates world wide. Unilever encourages candidates to go on its site and fill out a form, according to the assessment the candidate is interviewed on phone, if the candidate passes that he is supposed to take a psychometric test online. It is only after this stage is the candidate presented in front of a board in which his physical presence is absolutely necessary; if the candidate passes this stage he is offered a job on the acceptance of which he becomes an employee. Role of Recruitment and Selection in Supporting Employee Retention and the Goals of the Organization Employee retention is very important, and critical for the success of any organization (Derek Torrington, 2008). Employee who works hard should be encouraged to stay with the organization. An organization when employees a person it spends a lot in and money on the acquiring of talent and its training (Cynthia D. Fisher, 2008). If an employee leaves an organization all investments on him goes to waste. If we are looking in the international arena an employee may become interested in a job overseas which gives him more money and benefits (Paul Banfield, Introduction to Human Resource Management, 2008), it is the job of the organization to make the employee so comfortable that he feels that going away from it will not be beneficial for him. It is the job of the organization to match his skills with proper compensation so he does no feel that he is not getting the enough for all the hard work he is putting in. If an organizations starts to lose its key employees it means that the level of dissatisfaction (Corpuz, 2006) is increasing over all in the organization and more employees may start wanting to quit. Exit interviews of employees are very important as this may help to retain other existing employees (Shawn A. Smith, 2004). To enhance employee retention it is essential to build employee satisfaction. To improve employee satisfaction an employee should clearly understand the organizations expectations from him (Bach, 2005). If there in an ambiguity in this the employee gets unreasonably stressed and insecure. If an employee is not comfortable with his manager or leader he may leave an organization just because of this. If the leader is not strong an employee is never successful. If the employee thinks he has a voice in an organization and he is heard and his ideas are valued, then the employee's feels more satisfied. A useful employee wants his skilled to be fully utilized, and if these are not fully utilized he feels his capabilities and potential are not recognized by his organization. If the employee thinks he is not given equal and fair treatment ne would not be satisfies with his job and would want to switch. Employees should always be treated fairly. Employees must be well trained to face organizational issues so that he doesn't get scared with the work load. Employees should be given a chance to grow in the organization and acquire more skills and knowledge To retain an employee it has to be made sure that he is appreciated, his work is recognized and he is rewarded according to his work. If the recruitment and selection process is good the employee that is hired for the organization knows the terms and conditions of the organization before hand. He has a personality which is evaluated to be compatible with the work environment of the organization and he has the skills and abilities to take the work load of the organization. He does not feel that he has come to an alien environment; he feels a part of the organization and feels comfortable in his work. All this effects the employee in this way that he does not get stressed out, he does not do a lot of mistakes and he does not feel alienated form his environment. This makes him feel motivated and devoted to his organization. He does not get scared of his job and does not quit, thus decreasing the organizational turnover. The organization when finds a good employee who is a best fit to all its dimensions, its critical activities associated with the job get back on track soon, the more efficient the recruitment and selection process the less time it is spent to find the best match employee. When this employee feels comfortable he takes less time in orienting himself with his organizational surroundings and starts being productive very soon. This helps in the achievement of the greater organizational goals without hindrance. If the organization does not find good employees in a timely manner who understands the organization well, the over all organizational goals are affected as they are the representative of the smaller individual achievement of all employees aligned with the bigger goals. Retention of an employee is very necessary because in the market many other companies may be wanting to give an employee higher salary and benefits by seeing that he is a reputed employee else where and if this employee goes the whole team id effected (Derek Torrington, Human Resource Management, 2005), the team effects the whole department and in the end the whole organizational goal is effected. In the global labor market today, there is chaos and confusion, companies are lying off employees and people are insecure in their jobs. All that most people want is to hang on to their existing jobs, and all fresh graduates want to get a good job. They are not expecting to be treated very well and their levels of tolerance to variables that may have effected their motivation have increased. From all over the world people are ready to work for low costs and less additional advantages. Hard Approach and the Soft Approach of HRM The hard approach of HRM considers the employee as a resource or commodity. The employees are not treated very well usually they are treated like other non living resources. It is not humanistic in its views. When there is some benefit of the organization imbedded in the retention of employee, only then is the employee treated well. This is implemented through calculative and quantitative approach of logical thinking. It was presented by the Michigan Business School (Michael R. Losey, 2005) believes that like other commodities employees should also be recruited cheaply, and exploited to a great extent. Soft approach of HRM is the Harvard approach of HRM, which wants the employee to be resourceful himself and wants to make it an organizational competitive (Analoui, 2007)advantage. It emphasizes on the use of employee motivation techniques, communication with employees and the availability of proper leaders to make sure all employees are led well. It focuses on giving employees satisfaction so that they become more productive. In the global scenario, developed countries usually use the soft approach and other countries use the hard approach. People from developing and under developed countries are always willing to work at low wages and without proper benefits, if an organization wants to use the hard approach it designs it recruitment and selection strategy in such a way that all people who are good or who can be developed into good employees but are willing to work in a lower salary are attracted and selected. This enables the organization to get more work done by paying less. If an organization is using soft approach it develops recruitment and selection strategies that help it get the people who are best aligned with its organizational goals and who will have less difficulty adjusting in the environment. They want to employ people who have greater chances of being happy with the organization and who can become the strength of the organization by engaging into a long term relationship with the organization. In the time of global recession every company can get away with using the hard approach because of high rate of unemployment, everybody wants to get a job and stick to it. People are willing to work harder for fewer amounts of money and benefits. They are willing to be treated like machines because that is better than being job less. The job market had fewer vacancies and many people are interested in one job, in other words there is lesser supply and more demand. This situation always leads to decrease the price of available commodity. 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