Staffing

• Staffing
– Process of recruiting & selecting
prospective employees
– Has significant impact on organization’s
bottom line
• Requires staffing process to become strategically focused
– Recruitment & selection activities offer
organization numerous choices to find &
select new employees
– Staffing decisions need to ensure
employees fit organization’s culture
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 Recruiting

• Temporary versus permanent employees

– Increase headcount temporarily or
permanently should be strategically-
driven
– Basis for decisions is HR forecast
– Temporary employees less costly
– Temporary headcount increases can
be obtained from specialized
agencies
– Headcount increases can be avoided
by subcontracting work
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Advantages & Disadvantages of Internal &
External Recruiting

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 Recruiting

• When & how extensively to recruit

– When do recruiting efforts need to begin?
– How large an applicant pool needed?
– Data from past recruiting efforts utilized
• To answer questions where feasible
• Adjust for changed conditions
• Yield ratios
– Offer information on how many applicants
eliminated/remain at each step in
recruitment process
– Can determine proper or necessary size of
applicant pool 1–4
Recruiting Pyramid

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Recruiting Timeline

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 Methods of Recruiting

• Informally or formally
• Internally or externally
• Targeted advertising in selected media
• Recruiting on Internet
• Outsourcing to staffing agencies
• Private Industry Councils (PICs)
• Executive search firms
• On-campus recruiting
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 Recruiting on Internet

• One of fastest-growing recruitment methods

• More cost-effective than newspaper advertising
• Low cost, speed, & ability to target applicants
with technical skills
• Allows applicants to assess interests & needs with
employer’s offerings
• Global exposure to potential applicants
• Can cut search process time by as much as 75%

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 Recruiting on Internet

• Some potential challenges

– Ensuring security
– Viruses
– Access to unauthorized areas

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 Recruiting on Internet

• Some potential challenges

– Disparate impact against certain
protected classes
– Can complicate reporting of data
related to compliance with
federal & state laws

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 Selection Process Issues

• Reliability
– Consistency of measurement
– Screening criteria should elicit
same results in repeated trials
across time & evaluators

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 Selection Process Issues

• Reliability
– Reliability influenced by criterion
deficiency & contamination errors
– Reliability is prerequisite for
validity

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 Selection Process Issues

• Validity
– Degree to which what is assessed is related
to actual performance
– Ability to establish job-related validity is
crucial to employers in defending
themselves in discrimination allegations

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 Selection Process Issues

• Validity
– Content validity illustrates that measure or
criterion is representative of actual job
content or knowledge
– Criterion (empirical) validity demonstrated
by relationship between screening criteria
& job performance

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 Interviewing Process Issues

• Who should be involved?

– Prospective supervisors, peers,
subordinates
• Which interview format?
– Individual or group interviews
• Common interviewer errors
– Similarity errors
– Contrast errors
– First impression
– Halo errors
– Personal biases
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 Behavioral Interviewing

• Used with experienced & inexperienced

applicants
• Asks about situations candidate is likely to
face on job
• Candidates can present real-life situations
they were involved in & how they handled
them

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 Testing
• Work sample tests
– Ask applicant to complete
representative sample of actual work
• Trainability tests
– Measure
• Aptitude in certain areas
• Ability to understand critical job components that
firm will teach new hires

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 Testing
• Realistic job previews
– Make applicants aware of both
positive & negative aspects of job
– Decrease likelihood new employee
will become dissatisfied
– Increase likelihood of candidate’s
self-selecting out of position
• Personality testing is useful in anticipating
how applicants are likely to behave

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The Big Five Personality Dimensions

Characteristics of Person Scoring

Personality Dimension Positively on Dimension

1) Extraversion Outgoing, talkative, social, assertive

2) Agreeableness Trusting, good-natured, cooperative,

soft-hearted
3) Conscientiousness Dependable, responsible,
achievement-oriented, persistent
4) Emotional stability Relaxed, secure, unworried

5) Openness to experience Intellectual, imaginative, curious,

broad-minded

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 Other Testing Methods

• Personality testing
– Useful to anticipate how applicants
likely to behave
– Few, if any, jobs require specific
personality type
– Have been successfully challenged in
court

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 Other Testing Methods

• Physical testing
– Restricted under ADA to testing only
for specific critical job-related
physical performance requirements

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 Other Testing Methods

• Honesty testing
– Declined since passage of Polygraph
Protection Act in 1988
• Drug testing
– Challenged in courts as invasion of
privacy
• References
– Little information available due to
former employer fears of liability for
libel, slander & defamation
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 Selection for International
Assignments
• Reasons for failure on international
assignments
– Interpersonal & acculturation abilities
– Rarely technical skills
• Test employees’ adaptability, open-
mindedness, ability to tolerate uncertainty
& ambiguity & independence
• Interview & screen family members who
would accompany employee
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Strategic Issues in Staffing

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 Hiring for Organization, Not Job

• New model of selection geared toward hiring

“whole” person who fits into organization’s
culture
• “Strong situation”
– Intensity of situation suppresses variation
in behavior attributable to person

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 Hiring for Organization, Not Job

• “Weak situation”
– Allows range of employee responses to
work requirements
• In organizations that are “weak situations”
– More important to do good job of hiring
right people

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 Hiring Process for Person-
Organization Fit
• Assess overall work environment
– Job analysis
– Organizational analysis
• Infer type of person required
– Technical knowledge, skills & abilities
– Social skills
– Personal needs, values & interests
– Personality traits

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 Hiring Process for Person-
Organization Fit
• Design “rites of passage” for organization entry that allow
both organization and applicant to assess their fit
– Tests of cognitive, motor & interpersonal abilities
– Interviews by potential coworkers & others
– Personality tests
– Realistic job previews, including work samples

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 Hiring Process for Person-
Organization Fit

• Reinforce person-organization fit at work

– Reinforce skills & knowledge through task design
& training
– Reinforce personal orientation through
organization design

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 Potential Benefits & Problems with
Hiring for Person-Organization Fit
• Potential benefits
– More favorable employee attitudes
– More desirable individual behaviors
– Reinforcement of organizational design

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 Potential Benefits & Problems with
Hiring for Person-Organization Fit

• Potential problems
– Greater investment of resources in hiring
process
– Relatively undeveloped & unproven
supporting selection technology
– May be difficult to use full model where
payoffs are greatest
– Lack of organizational adaptation

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 Reasons for Expatriate Early
Departure
• Not performing job effectively 48.4%
• Received other, more rewarding offer (other co.) 43.7%
• Expatriate or family not adjusting 36.6%
• Expatriate or family missing home 31.0%
• Received more rewarding offer (current co.) 17.2%
• Unable to adjust to deprived living standards 10.3%
• Concerned with problems of safety & health 10.3%
• Believed children’s education was suffering 7.1%
• Feared assignment would slow career advance 7.1%
• Spouse wanted career 6.1%
• Compensation package inadequate 0.0%
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Frequently Mentioned Obstacles to Global
Staffing System
• Legal requirements across
countries/regions
• Education system across
countries/regions
• Economic conditions across
countries/regions
• Ability to acquire & use
technology
• Labor market variations
• Value differences across
cultures
• Availability of off-the-shelf
translated tools
• Level of HR experience varies
across regions
• Role of HR in hiring varies
across regions
• Familiarity with a tool or
practice varies
• Misperceptions that something
is a cultural difference
• Limited local resources for
implementation
• Beliefs about whether a global
system is US-centric or
imposed
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 Frequently Mentioned Benefits to Global
Staffing System
• Global database of qualified
talent
• Quick identification of
candidates to meet needs of
specific location
• Provision of consistent
message about company to
candidates worldwide
• Quality of all hires is ensured
• Better understanding of
country/regional needs by all
HR
• Global succession planning is
enabled
• Global HR personnel have
access to the latest versions of
products/tools
• Shared vision of HR globally
• Comparisons of staffing results
across locations
• Global database as internal
benchmark of achievement in
different parts of world
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