Recruitment and selection strategies for Landslide Limousines

¶ … Recruitment and Selection Strategies for Landslide Limousines

Organizational goals

The goal of recruitment and selection strategies is to locate and secure the most appropriate individuals for the positions that are available in as efficient and reliable fashion as possible (Absar, 2012). In this regard, Absar reports that, "Recruitment can be defined as the set of activities that an organization uses to attract job candidates who have the capabilities and attitudes needed to assist the organization accomplish its goals" (2012, p. 436). Recruitment therefore consists of taking the steps that are required to attract the most qualified individuals to make application for employment with the organization while selection involves choosing the best available candidates (Absar, 2012). For this purpose, optimal recruitment and selection strategies include recruiting through a variety of media and recruiting externally and internally (Swiercz & Ezzedeen, 2001).

Workforce plan for proper staffing for the next 5 years congruent with organizational goals and objectives

Currently, the company projects an annual turnover rate of about 10%. Therefore, recruiting and selection strategies should be ongoing rather than static in order to ensure an ongoing pool of potential candidates (Stringer & Cheoha, 2003).

Workforce diversity objectives

One of the goals of the company is to promote diversity in its employee base as a corporate mission as well as to comply with applicable state and federal laws (Sims, 2002).

Organizational branding issues

As a start-up, Landslide Limousine should follow the example of other limousine services in the past by emulating an established brand to the maximum extent within legal limits. There are a number of advantages to this approach. According to Foxman, Muehling and Berger (2009), "Imitation strategies involve any or all of the marketing mix elements, including price, product, distribution, and promotion. Thus, a series of increasingly imitative strategies is envisioned, e.g., legally permissible emulation of an established brand" (p. 171). Although there are a number of ways to emulate a leading market brand that are legally permissible, the competitive environment for limousine services in Austin will demand an innovative approach. In this regard, Foxman and his associates point out that, "The aim of the creators of imitator brands is to position the new product next to a better known (often market leader) brand. One simple means of achieving this objective is to emulate the package design of the well-known market leader" (2009, p. 171). Today, one of the leading limousine services in Austin is BigAsTexas Limousine Service (http://www.bigastexaslimos.com/). This company features conventional all-black limousines as well as a distinctive all-pink version targeted at female customers depicted in Figure 1 below which Landslide Limousine could also offer (perhaps with a tamer shade of pink).

Figure 1. Pink limousine offered by BigAsTexas Limousine Service

Source: http://www.bigastexaslimos.com/s/cc_images/cache_4199542784.jpg?t=1373518559

The pink version of the Landslide limousine should feature the distinctive company logo on the driver and front passenger doors.

Interview and testing procedures

An important part of the selection process is to ensure that the selection team fully understands the selection criteria for the position involved (Redrup-May, 2010). In addition, all members of the selection team should be involved in the formulation of questions to be posed during the interview, as well as the review of the potential candidates and the selection of the candidates that will be interviewed (Redrup-May, 2010). Appropriate testing procedures for administrative positions should include typing, computer usage (a conventional word processor, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.); driver candidates should be tested by a staff member qualified to evaluate driving skills on a predetermined course.

Interview process considerations and methods for selecting candidates

During the interview, candidates should do the majority of the talking (Redrup-May, 2010). For example, Redrup-May emphasizes that, "You should impose the 20/80 rule: the interview panel talks 20% of the time and the candidate talks 80% of the time" (p. 75). In addition, the interview process should be guided by predetermined questions (Redrup-May, 2010). A majority of the selection team should be used to select candidates unless an individual team member can demonstrate exceptional reasons to the contrary (Redrup-May, 2010).