The success of any company is based on the input of its workforce. To attain high performance, a company’s management needs to adopt an effective recruitment process. The recruitment phase is essential to a company because it is through recruitment that companies get suitable candidates to steer the company’s agenda forward. The recruitment process is not a simple task hence the reason why companies hire consultants to help them with recruitment. A recruitment process is a model specified by companies to get the best candidates to identify and hire new employees (Lievens, 2009) . Typically, the duty of recruiting lies within the Human Resource, although companies may outsource depending on the needs and structure of the company doing the recruitment. Recruitment begins with the identification of a company’s needs with respect to the position and ends with the introduction of a successful candidate to the organization. The main aim of the recruitment process is to find a suitable individual who is qualified for a specific position within an organization. Thus, the reason why a recruitment process is crucial in an organization.
The recruitment process is not always the same. Every company and organization has its way of hiring employees. This is because a process that works well for one company may not be effective in another company. It is why companies choose to adopt recruitment strategies that might work with their objectives. However, various processes are similar in most organizations during the recruitment process. These processes include evaluating the physical and mental condition of candidates. The candidate’s aptitude for work is also checked through interviews, psychometric tests, and medical examinations. After going through this steps, an organization will be sure of recruiting the best candidates. This is because a suitable candidate is one with experience, excellent professional training and attitude and who has good ethics and integrity results. This paper will focus on recruitment process in organizations. Consequently, the paper will analyze the best recruitment selection procedures used by companies in their quest to hire the best candidates for a particular position.
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It is prudent to understand the recruitment process before going into many details. The recruitment process is a crucial aspect of human resource management. It, therefore, has to be done with proper strategic planning. Companies have to implement adequate staffing plans and do a clear forecasting to determine how many people they need before embarking on a recruitment process (Newell, 2005) . Forecasting entails analyzing the annual budget of the company and the short and long-term plans of the company. In addition, the life cycle of the company will be a major factor in forecasting. Forecasting depends on both internal and external factors. Internal factors that determine the recruitment process include production levels, expansion plans, budget and the performance of a company. External factors that should be considered in the recruitment process include the rate of unemployment, competition, shift in population and technology and operational laws changes. The human resource management of a company will then find the gaps, once forecasting is done, and embark on the recruitment of people with qualifications that will seek to address a deficiency in the company.
The recruitment process cannot be underestimated because of the benefits it has to a company. Recruitment ensures skills of company’s staff are aligned with the goals its goals. If the top management notices that the staff does not match with the company’s goal, it is only wise for it to change or restructure the workforce. The recruitment process also ensures effective and efficient recruitment. By implementing an effective recruitment process, a company will be assured of having a qualified workforce and save on cost and time. Through the recruitment process, companies are able to comply with laws and policies which dictate human resource management. These laws include equal opportunity and non-discrimination to all. By following the recruitment process, a company will not violate any policies and will be sure of benefiting from the recruitment process through the acquisition of the best talent.
For effective operation, companies always seek to recruit individuals with proper medical conditions. It is why organizations use various strategies to conduct an assessment of personnel to have a clear record of their physical and mental condition. These tests include ability tests which are valid tools that play a vital role in job recruitment and training in different organizations. Ability tests are usually applied in entry-level jobs and candidates without much professional training (Wood, 1998) . Physical conditions include abilities such as flexibility endurance and strength. The physical condition of a candidate is important especially if the job entails physical endurance such as firefighting and mechanics. However, use of physical tests can be unfair especially to women and old people as they cannot match the ability of strong and fit men competing for the same position.
There are also mental ability tests in the recruitment process. Mental ability tests are used to analyze the ability of an applicant to learn and perform specific role and responsibilities. Examples of mental ability tests include verbal, spatial and quantitative abilities. These skills are important to the success of many jobs especially those which require cognitive activities such as communicating, reading and analyzing. Mental ability tests are useful for most jobs as they successfully predict the performance of an individual. These tests are easy and less expensive to administer. However, mental ability tests also have shortcomings. They can lead to high adverse impact, besides being costly to develop and administer the tests. Despite mental ability tests being crucial in determining performance in various jobs, the use of such tests in the recruitment process may cause adverse consequences. Studies have shown that mental ability tests have an adverse impact on minority racial groups as they may not communicate effectively with the natives. Speed can also be a challenge, especially to older applicants as their cognition cannot match that of a younger person hence making them feel discriminated (Persson, 2004.) . Therefore, effective models need to be adopted when doing physical and mental tests to get the best candidates in a recruitment process.
Aptitude tests have long been used as the standard practice to screen job applicants across different sectors. It is because they can measure techniques hence have become crucial to the interview process. Today, most job vacancies will attract many potential applicants. Thus, aptitude and knowledge tests being the only way to reduce the number to a size that is manageable before going to other screening phases. When it comes to recruitment, aptitude tests give the human resource management an opportunity to make wise decisions. Aptitude tests give the management team an opportunity to make comparisons of the applicants. Aptitude tests asses a variety of factors such as cognition, problem-solving, speed and coherence among others in a bid to get the right candidate (Anderson, 2001) . Aptitude tests give a clear picture of a candidate's ability to thrive in the position they are aiming. However, it is prudent to design an aptitude test, in that, it is relevant with the actual vacancy being applied for to get accurate results. It is therefore up to the human resource to efficiently provide aptitude tests to get people with the same qualifications they are looking for in the vacancy.
To have a clear understanding of aptitude tests, it is crucial to examine the types of aptitude tests that are there, and how they can be applied. The four common types of aptitude tests are skills test, ability tests, knowledge tests and personality tests. Skills tests majorly test on speed and in most cases are related to jobs that entail using a keyboard. Ability tests measure cognition, whereby they test on performance levels by presenting applicants with scenarios in the workplace where they will have to explain their actions in a given circumstance. Knowledge tests measure a candidate’s acquaintance about certain aspects related to the vacancy. Besides, knowledge tests should focus on a particular topic to ensure that a candidate meets the required knowledge level (Persson, 2004.) . Personality tests are the last types of tests offered in an aptitude test. However, there are many types of personality tests; openness to experience, agreeableness, emotional stability, extroversion, and conscientiousness which are often given to sales candidates to forecast on performance.
Psychometric testing is being used by recruiters to assess ability and the personality of a candidate (Edenborough, 2005) . Psychometric tests also include use verbal problems, numerical and graphical questions. One of the benefits of psychometric testing includes attracting suitable candidates as it helps guide the selection panel. It improves performance by communicating with employees in a way that they understand and is effective in customer service. Psychometric testing also improves engagement by letting the human resource management understand their new members and adjust their management style to suit the individual effectively. Just like any other recruitment method, psychometric testing has its shortcomings (Edenborough, 2005) . It entails over-interpreting o f test results due to inadequate information about what it is being tested. Psychometric testing is also costly as it should be administered by professionals who can interpret them well. Besides, psychometric tests are effective when used together with other methods. This goes to prove that psychometric tests have advantages as well as shortcomings during the recruitment process.
It is the duty of employers to take care of the well-being of their workforce seriously by understanding the risk existing, and prospective workforce has. A pre-employment medical examination helps mitigate such risks in the workplace, with the aim of taking precautions of the health issues of job applicants and existing staff. Medical examinations are necessary for the recruitment process to ensure that applicants can perform their duty safely. Depending on the type of task, most medical examinations test on physical condition, drug and psychological testing of the applicants. Medical examinations are always kept secret in case of emergency treatment in the course of working. For most fields, medical examinations are not only meant to test the health condition of an employee, but also to determine if the applicant is suitable to perform the job at hand. Pre-employment medical examinations are used to ensure safety for both the public and co-workers.
Some of the aspects examined during a medical examination include a drug test, hearing, and visual tests. Drug tests determine if an applicant has used any illegal in recent weeks. Drug tests can be carried out through urine or blood samples, or by testing a strand of the applicant’s hair. A drug test is mostly applied to commercial driving where the driver has to drive for a long period without the influence of any substance. Hearing and vision tests usually test on the physical health of applicants (Edenborough, 2005) . They are aimed to assess if a recruit will need glasses or hearing aids in the course of working.
There are many ways of what experience entails when it comes to recruitment. What cannot be denied is the fact that experience of an applicant is more crucial than ever when it comes to recruitment as it is to the human resource management. A candidate’s experience level has an impact on the company whether positive or negative. One benefit of recruiting experienced individuals is minimizing risks. It is always the hope of every company or organization to build a culture that nurtures innovations and creativity for better performance and sustainability of its operations. That explains why most companies are in aggressively seeking the services of the youth. However, not many human resource management teams are willing to accommodate young people to their team of staff, especially in complex jobs, because of inexperience. Despite risk takers being essential to a company today, companies need to be established and experienced individuals who are composed and are averse to different working cultures and are well adapted to dynamic business cycles. Furthermore, it will be advantageous to a company recruiting experienced professionals because have ways to circumnavigate through turbulent situations in the course of working hence ensure effective management expertise.
Experience is crucial during recruitment as achievements and history of the candidates are well document which makes it easy for the human resource management to assess and place individuals in the right department. Experience helps eliminate gambling and guesswork that is manifested during the recruitment process with recruits who have no experience. Experience eliminates uncertainty from the normal job operations and the recruitment process. During recruitment, the experience is an added advantage because in most cases, the young talent that gets recruited to the company is still embarking on a journey that requires them to gain much-needed skills. Staff with limited experience may not, in most cases recognize the reflection of their work every day (Edenborough, 2005) . However, it should be noted that individuals with less experience always have the passion and zeal to learn and develop their career. An inexperienced employee will shift careers if it is difficult for them to adapt to a demanding job. This is not always the case with experienced employees as they have work ethics. Besides, experienced workers have self-awareness which places them in a better position as candid communicators besides exercising patience in time of disruption.
Most organizations today focus on business models that stress on smartness, ideal candidates, and multi-skilled professionals. With this, it is difficult to find inexperienced individuals being picked up for such posts. This is because experienced candidates have gone through different paths across different levels in the course of their careers, which makes them adaptable. Also, an experienced individual has worked in diverse roles in a variety of industries making them gain valuable qualifications. As the experienced professionals keep aging, they master essential skills and become specialists in particular areas that will be advantageous to the recruiter and the company. This will also ensure the company has trust in them hence experienced workers be dedicated to their work towards achieving a company’s goals. Experience is also important to an organization as it minimizes expenses. Instead of allocating funds for staff training, human resource managers in most companies prefer hiring experienced professionals who already know what their work entails. This is advantageous to a company as it helps save on cost. Hiring experienced workers mostly applied to blue-collar jobs which hire workers on contract and need quality work to be delivered.
Just like in business, recruitment methods are the same until an individual tries something new and better. This usually happens when the recruitment team has narrowed down to on candidates and needs to get the right candidates for the job. When it comes to this, companies opt to hire the candidates based on attitude where they examine on outlook and traits. Such traits include being charming, unselfishness, trust, taking criticism and being able to be trained and collaborate for the success of the company (Wise, 1987) . The notion of hiring based on attitude is to avoid picking a candidate who is not the right fit for the company’s goal. Attitude also gives a company easy time to teach a skill on an individual. A company which hires people based on their attitude is more likely to get suitable candidates for the job as good attitude is a clear indicator of hard work. Candidates with a poor attitude of work give hard times to managers as they have low morale, which might result in a company or an organization incur losses. Evidently, hiring individuals based on norms seems to be a common practice in future hiring processes as human resource managers in most companies have realized its benefits.
It is always a practice of companies to give new employees training after the recruitment process. It is a sign of inducting recruits to the operations of the organization or company. Normally, after recruitment, the first days at work involve observation, whereby experienced workers show the newbies the key details of what the job entails (Wise, 1987) . However, this depends on the size of a company as most large firms opt for in-house training schemes. This often applies to public companies such as insurance companies and banks. In addition, the staff is encouraged to attend to get further skills by enrolling in courses which can be beneficial not only to the company but also to their career enhancement. Training happens on and off the job way. On the job means that staff members learn skills through their experience at work. Off the job training means that learning is done through taking courses related to the job. Training is essential in the recruitment process as it gives employees an easy time to learn their trades, which will induce specialization and make a company realize high performance. Through better performance, employees can receive an increase in perks and in certain instances get a promotion within the company. Thus, the human resource management has to ensure it has a training department to make the staff have right skills after absorption to the company or in the course of their work.
Conclusion
The recruitment process is crucial to a company because of the role it plays in talent acquisition. It is thus the reason why recruitment processes in companies have become more subjective and refined. This is driven by the complexities associated with the selection process. In the quest to get qualified individuals, most human resource management teams have raised the bar in terms of qualifications and requirements during the recruitment process. Companies have resorted to doing the test during the hiring process. These tests often examine of physical, mental, speed and cognition abilities. Today, it is not surprising to find small companies using aptitudes in their recruitment processes. The reason for this is for companies to get topnotch individuals who are self-driven and can work under minimal supervision. It is why most companies resort to hiring experienced individuals rather than newbies who have less knowledge about the details of a job. Therefore, companies must strive to have an effective human resource team if it aims to get better performance and attain the laid targets.
References
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