CHALLENGES FOR RECRUITMENT & SELECTION

 

                        (Source: BetterPlace, 2020)

Introduction

Selection and recruitment practice is adopted to attract the potential candidates for job opportunities in any company and extract the best among all of them. There are many ways to choose the employee including interviews and tests by computer or written tests that specialize in skills or measuring the intelligence or aspects of the personality of the employee (Banu, 2019). Every experienced HR professional who is responsible for recruitment and selection will occasionally come across a vacancy that is particularly difficult to fi ll. In this situation any compromise that involves appointing someone who does not meet the specification must be avoided (Armstrong, 2009).

Recruitment and selection theories primarily focus on the process of variables that are often associated with the psychological or environmental mechanisms organization which often is believed to be determined based on the outcomes of human resource practices. There is significant link between the effectiveness of human resource management (HRM) practice and performance of organization (Patterson et al, 2000). Recruitment and selection as process and considered as the central activities of HRM which enables management for acquisition, development and reward the employees (Dessler, 2016).

The quality of employee an organization hire depends on an effective recruitment and selection strategy. However, the process isn’t always smooth sailing. Employers face tangible problems (Chaudhary & Nirala, 2014).

Major challenges for recruitment & selection

• Poor Planning of recruitment program

In some organizations, time planning for recruitment and selection is excessive, resulting in missed opportunities to acquire the right individuals and high costs. The time planning to pick acceptable applicants for the final interview and official employment may take longer than the reasonable time interval when businesses seek to select the best-qualified individuals from a large number of interviewees. Specifically, some excellent applicants may be hired by other organizations after a long waiting period. That is the cost may be wasted because they do not have the talents they need (Nawaz, 2019).

• Misanalysing requirement

The analysis of the employment needs of many organizations may be unreasonable and unrealistic. Work standards should be linked to actual professional abilities and the consistency of personality and value with the business culture. Some organizations tend to set extreme high goals that cannot be achieved. Some companies demand excessive certification for a position with modest technical requirements (Rozario, Venkatraman & Abbas, 2019).

• Inability of Attracting Suitable candidates

Poor employer branding is a significant barrier to attracting talent, resulting in a low response rate from job searchers but a high financial burden. Most job searchers examine the organization's reputation when they are applying for the vacancies (Karimi et al, 2019).

• Misrepresentation of qualifications (fake qualifications)

Misrepresentation can occur during a selection process when a fluent communicator can get the job only to be realized later that he is incapable or does not have the right qualifications or experience. Relevant qualifications for the job are often used during the selection process to screen and short list the candidates. The study has established that sometimes applicants present fake diplomas or certificates (Zinyemba, 2014).

• Nepotism and favouritism

In recruitment and selection nepotism is defined as the practice of unfairly giving the best jobs to members of your family when you are in a position of power. Top management takes advantage of their positions to secure jobs to favour friends and relatives. The organization goes through the process of advertising for a vacant post as a matter of procedure (Zinyemba, 2014).

• Political interference

Government controlled companies face challenges of recruitment. Political polarization has spilled over into companies. It became obvious during the research that sometimes politicians may influence the recruitment and selection process by referring candidates for appointment to vacant positions. The Human resources managers usually comply for fear of losing their jobs (Zinyemba, 2014).

• Outdated job descriptions

Technology changes rapidly. Technological changes may affect how a job is done and the specifications required for that job may also change. This has implications on recruitment and selection as the job description of the vacant position might be outdated or inadequate. A review of the vacant position’s job description must be done in order to ensure relevance of the job requirements and specifications (Zinyemba, 2014).

To deal with the problem constructively it is necessary to take the following actions.

Dealing with recruitment & selection problems

• Ensure that all the possible sources of candidates have been used.
• Consider the advertisement or website entry could be made with more attractive way
• Make sure that requirements are realistic.
• Offer package by checking market rates to ensure that the level of pay and benefits are competitive.
• Examine the possibility of reshaping the role to increase its attractiveness with the discussions with line managers.
• If the worst comes to the worst and again in discussion with the manager and consider alternative ways of carrying out the work involved with existing staff (Armstrong, 2009).

References

• Banu, R. (2019) Recruitment and Selection in Practice: A Qualitative Study. International Journal for Research in Engineering Application & Management (IJREAM).
• Armstrong, M. (2009) Armstrong’s handbook of human resource management practice (11^th ed). United Kingdom, Kogan Page.
• Dessler, G. (2013) Human resource management (13^th ed), United States of America, Pearson Education.
• Patterson, F., Griffin, B., & Hanson, M. (2018) Closing Editorial: New insights and reflections on the science of selection and recruitment. MedEdPublish, 7.
• Chaudhary, N. & Nirala, A. (2014) Recruitment and Selection and Its Current Challenges. IRJMSH, 5(5).
• Nawaz, D. N. (2019). Robotic process automation for recruitment process. International Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Technology, 10.
• Rozario, S. D., Venkatraman, S. & Abbas, A. (2019). Challenges in Recruitment and Selection Process: An Empirical Study. Challenges, 10(2). pp.35 [online].
• Karimi, A., Teimouri, H., Shahin, A. & Barzoki, A.S. (2019). Identification and ranking of competency-based recruitment system criteria: an empirical case study. International Journal of Learning and Intellectual Capital, 16, pp.21-39.
• Zinyemba, A.Z. (2014) The Challenges of Recruitment and Selection of Employees in Zimbabwean Companies. International Journal of Science and Research (IJSR), 3(1).