Managing Recruitment and Selection Being able to successfully manage the recruitment and staffing of an entire Human Resources (HR) department is the foundation of a successful enterprise. For example, Reese and French cite the work of Bratton and Gold in saying, "Recruitment is the process of generating a pool of capable people to apply for employment to an organisation. Selection is the process by which managers and others use specific instruments to choose from a pool of applicants a person or persons more likely to succeed in the job(s), given management goals and legal requirements" (2010). This quote aptly highlights the extreme importance of being able to successfully woo and establish a team of competent people who are equally invested in doing an exemplary job with a given company. Thus, the HR department needs to understand the nuances and strategies that go into the process of successfully winning over the right people and keeping them at a particular company.

Background

This paper scrutinizes the importance of HR managers attaining a more detailed understanding and managing the recruitment and staffing process and how they can better achieve those goals. This is a crucial as HR managers are the ones who play a vital role in the shaping and molding of a given company. This paper is going to cover the history of recruitment and staffing, the potential value that good recruitment and staffing can bestow on a particular company, and common mistakes that HR managers generally make when it comes to thoughtful recruitment and staffing. Thus, the title of this paper is "Managing Recruitment and Selection" because this is such a delicate process, that the verb "managing" really does encapsulate all that this process entails.

Findings

3.1

What the assignment is asking me to do.

This assignment is asking me to examine the nuances and importance of the staffing and recruitment process so that I can demonstrate my knowledge and the accumulated knowledge that I've acquired via research. In demonstrating and discussing this acquired knowledge and information I'll be able to deconstruct the management and recruitment process, demonstrating a deeper comprehension of it.

3.2

What I know about the subject already.

Recruitment is a word most often used to describe the general process of finding appropriate people to fill available jobs. "Recruitment consists of strategies intended to identify sources of talent to meet organizational needs, and then to attract the right numbers and types of people for the right jobs at the right time and in the right places" (Rothwell & Kazanas, 2003). Thus, as Rothwell and Kazanas demonstrate, recruitment is an extremely active process that involves concerted efforts to truly draw in people with relevant skills sets and healthy attitudes in order to make a given company or business the best it can be. "Selection is the process of searching for and then identifying the appropriate match between the individual, the job, the work group, and organization" (Rothwell & Kazanas, 2003, p.333). Thus, Rothwell and Kazanas aptly demonstrate how recruitment and selection, while not identical processes are closely related (2003, p.333). An HR manager truly needs to have a strong and nuanced awareness of this fact.

This process is quite so crucial because it directly impacts the type of individuals who end up hired; the ones who eventually get the job. These are the people whose attitudes, work ethics, values and visions can help to shape a given institution: "their attitudes and interpersonal skills will influences what organizational development efforts need to be made in order to improve work-group relations… Their individual desires and expectations can influence appropriate compensation needed to reward, retain and motivate them" (Rothwell & Kazanas, 2003, p.334). These remarks clearly highlight how wise recruitment and staffing can truly shape the look and strength of a particular company or business.

3.3

What I think my focus might be?

The focus of this paper is to truly examine which strategies...

Long-winded and undeniably bureaucratic processes are generally ineffective and tedious when it comes to this process, and thus ineffective, lacking innovation (Burton, 1998). Part of the task of successfully finding the right person for the right job is being able to articulate to oneself what that job entails and having a really nuanced and detailed understanding of it: "When you have clarified these basics (which must be clear not only for recruitment purposes but for running a Home at all), you will then be in a position to specify the details of the person who will be suitable for this job" (Burton, 1998, p. 107). What Burton is illuminating is the importance of how an HR person needs to really know how to best describe the duties and responsibilities of a given position and how the right individual can help this position evolve into something loftier and more complex. Thus, in order to best shape an organization's effectiveness and performance, HR managers need to be able to "…acquire workers who already possess relevant knowledge, skills and aptitudes and are also able to make an accurate prediction regarding their future abilities" (Rees & French, 2010). What's even more vital, is that HR managers need to be aware that the most effective forms of recruitment and selection can help them in avoiding undesirable costs, such as those connected with a high level of employee turnover, subpar performances and unhappy customers and engender a mutually advantageous employment relationship, marked by strong commitment on both sides of the table (Rees & French, 2010).
3.4

What arguments I think I might want to make and where am I going to find the evidence to support these arguments?

Aside from the arguments that I've already made about the importance of strong recruitment and selection as a means of helping to shape the fate of a company and saving the company money from high staff turnover, there's also the importance of acknowledging what poor recruitment and selection will do to an organization. "Inappropriate selection decisions reduce organisational effectiveness, invalidate reward and development strategies, are frequently unfair on the individual recruit and can be distressing for managers who have to deal with unsuitable employees" (Rees & French, 2010, p.107). Recruitment is essentially about finding sources of talent; just as musicians need to find sources of talent to obtain membership in their band to create harmonious music, HR managers need to find potential staff members who will create harmonious additions to their team of employees. HR managers do have the tough case of having to decide whether to look within an organization to fulfill those needs or outside of an organization. If a manager decides to look outside of the organization for potential talent, he will have to be responsible for coming up with some sort of advertisement which effectively draw in this potential talent (Burton, 1998).

Furthermore, HR managers need to be aware of the fact that they're not just examining the educational training and professional experience of each given candidate. They need to also be able to test for the aptitude of each person, yet be able to accurately assess their personality to see if they'd be a good fit for a particular position (Burton, 1998). Meeting and talking well with each candidate, as well as seeing a large group of candidates from a widely diverse area of backgrounds is definitely a way forward and a means of allowing HR managers to have a wide selection of truly distinct individuals who might be right for the job.

3.5

The structure of the final individual paper.

The structure of the final individual paper has thus consisted of an abstract, intentions, arguments and focus.

3.6

Draft the introduction of your final individual paper.

While most HR managers will be able to explain in some fashion, what recruitment and selection means to them, few HR managers have a truly in-depth knowledge of these two phenomena. This is unfortunate as these are two inter-connected processes…