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Example research essay topic: Recruitment And Selection Counter Argument - 1,849 words

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On dealing with the premiss that the practice of recruitment and selection is a long way from the recommendations of personnel textbooks, distinction must be taken into account between explicit recommendations and guidelines, on one hand, and, on the other, implicit suggestions stemming from the authors own stance. The implications of distancing from, or identification with, such explicit recommendations and implicit suggestions will be viewed in this paper as well as forms of overt and covert resistance, or adhesion, assumed in actual practice. Also central to the argument is what the whole issue means in terms of both existing problems and potential future problems for the employer and the candidate, for organizational management, the labour market and macro-economic welfare and progress in general. Employment decisions have traditionally been regarded as a privilege exclusive to management.

Many of the US personnel textbooks emphasize this aspect and describe the process in terms of hurdles over which prospective employees have to try to leap to avoid rejection (Torrington and Hall, 1991: 283). In the UK recruitment and selection is an issue which has in the past kept a low profile in personnel textbooks, though the trend has changed (e. g. , Torrington and Hall, 1991, Keith Sisson, 1994), which appears to point out to an evolution from the paternalistic perspective according to which recruitment tends to be dominantly viewed from the angle of providing candidates for the selector to judge. Recommendations are being made with respect to the various stages of the process of recruitment and selection, from approaching and seeking to interest potential candidates to determining whether to appoint any of them. Codes of practice and guidelines for their implementation have been produced with emphasis on different aspects, e. g. , on recruitment starting with a job description and person specification, by IPM; on fair and efficient selection, by EOC (1986); on avoidance of sex bias in selection testing, by EOC (1992); on avoidance of improper discrimination, by ACAS (1981) and negative bias against age, by IPM (1993); on non-discriminatory advertising, by CRE and EOC (1977, 1985); and on the use of cognitive and psychometric tests, by IPM and BPS (1993).

Moreover, legislation promoting equality of opportunity has underlined the importance of using well-validated selection procedures (Torrington and Hall, 1991), and directives such as those issued by CRE (1983) and EOC (1985) emphasize the need to comply with anti-discrimination legislation and this way enhance opportunities to disadvantaged groups. Greater formality will both make the concealment of racial and sexual discrimination more difficult and will permit more effective retrospective surveillance by senior management and bodies such as the CRE (Jenkins, 1982), thus to some extent remedying the weakness of much of the EO literature in not frontally addressing the different types of discriminatory decision, be it determinism, particularism, patronage or rational-legality (Jason & Mason, 1986). As a counter-argument, however, the definition of the employers role as that of implementing and monitoring formal procedures can be seen to absolve senior staff of the responsibility for further investigation of the causes of continuing inequality (Webb & Life, 1988). In fact, case studies have shown that such directives can be misused and their intention subverted as often happens with respect to Ipm's recommendations on job description and person specification (Collinson et al. , 1990: 96 - 108), and, furthermore, the legal definition of justifiability is sufficiently vague for the legislation to be ineffective; and the workforce can be manipulated into becoming managements accomplice in discrimination (ibid. : 70 - 71). Some recommendations are, in themselves, not socially and politically neutral enough to avoid ambiguity and, as such, encourage covert discrimination. Highlighting the causes behind the problem, EOC points out that gender discrimination is embedded in myths (EOC, 1986: 2), while we are also reminded that motherhood still remains a stigma (Curran, 1988) as the general ideology of gender still associates feminist with nurturing, and hence with servicing, which is translated directly into specific occupational terms (Murgatroyd, 1982).

Accordingly - inspite of what has been achieved - women still face bottleneck on the way to top jobs in personnel, a situation which has been aggravated by a recent regression in the previous upward trend for women, the latest figures standing at 44 % of all personnel managers but only 9. 5 % of personnel directors (PM Plus, 1994). Getting into the boardroom is not the same as getting into the club, a glass ceiling made difficult to shatter (BM, 1994) by the club members themselves who may also try to psychologically manipulate women into consenting and thus becoming accomplices of their own fate. At least on their face value, for the past two decades personnel textbooks have been recommending equal opportunities in recruitment and selection. Rodgers Seven Point Plan (Rodger, 1970) and Fraser's Five-Fold Framework (Fraser, 1971: 64 - 80) are checklists which emphasize the need for a logical link between job description and person specification.

Yet, Rodgers headings circumstances and acceptability have strong potential to be used as a cloak for improper discrimination (Sisson, 1994: 189). In instances like this one the author of the personnel textbook is - consciously or unconsciously, intentionally or unintentionally - an accomplice of reluctant management. Recommendations become a vehicle of subversion of the proclaimed spirit. Even when guidelines appear to be socially and politically sound, the identification of requirements remains subjective when it comes to draft a job description as judgement greatly depends on conclusions which are based on ones conceptualizations. The effect of prejudice and bias is, therefore, difficult to control, and unfairness in shortlisting is difficult to restrain. Other main initial steps in the recruitment and selection process offer no guarantee of fairness.

Application forms, multi-purpose as advised by Edwards (1983: 64), or not, may become a tool of discrimination as they can easily incorporate a discriminatory bias within their highly structured framework. Letters of application and CVs appear to be seen as of little relevance as a measure of performance in manual jobs (Dux field, 1983: 246 - 7) but to be regarded of great importance and possibly decisive on other kinds of placement (Knollys, 1983: 236 - 8) where they are left to the assessors subjective evaluation. It is generally acknowledged that they are open to discriminatory use by the employer (McIntosh and Smith, 1974). Furthermore, the use of graphology, though controversial, is being practised in Britain (PM, 1985). Inappropriate use of screening tests is another point of concern. The use of cognitive and psychometric tests appears to be quite popular in the UK, bearing in mind that the production of a personality questionnaire has been financed by over fifty companies in this country (Saville and Holdsworth Ltd, 1987).

Discerning and cautious use of psychological techniques of selection has been advocated by Rodger (1970; 1971; 1983) while Kline (1993) is particularly concerned with reliability and validity as key requirements for selection methods to be technically sound as a measure of both immediate suitability of a candidate and also of prediction of his / her future performance, though the former function is more highly valued by Scholars et al. (1993). Still with respect to psychological testing, Brotherton has drawn a distinction between measures of organizational performance and job performance and emphasized that successful non-discriminatory selection requires validation based on the latter (Brotherton, 1980). Low validity interviewing is yet another point of concern. Evidence suggests that the single interviewer tends to be the generalized practice with respect to manual workers (Mackay and Torrington, 1986: 38 - 40), while in the case of non-manual employees the general practice is the line manager and a personnel specialist to be involved, though this results, in practice, in one-person interviewing as personnel specialists prefer a purely advisory role (Collinson et al. , 1990). The final decision tends to be made by one individual - usually a white middle-aged male -, which provides open ground for abuse (Wants, 1980; Honey, 1984; and Collinson et al. , 1990) and shortlisted prospective appointees are let down at the final interview.

Not just the outcome but the way interviews are conducted can be arbitrary, and applicants may be subjected to invasion of privacy with questions such as on their personal life and family background or on their political beliefs. Another aspect to consider is that, on the other hand, interviews - particularly on a one-to-one basis - may give the applicant the opportunity to impress beyond fact. In a study of a university milk round candidates admitted to being far from truth full in their statements (Keenan, 1980). The need to promote ethical awareness in the practice of interviewing has been highlighted not only in order to improve selectors fairness but also to control dubious honesty from applicants (Pocock, 1989). Recommendations on the issue of internal or external recruitment cannot be universally suitable.

Court (1985: 15) does not give priority to internal recruitment which in itself presents the double advantage of being economical and encouraging career development. However, as a counter-argument, internal recruitment can also result in a delimitating effect for the company and injustice to the supply side of the labour market. With respect to methods used when aiming to interest potential candidates, deviation from guide-lines and supporting legislation can prove to be fruitful as in the case of the US-style head-hunting and search consultancy, a practice at first hindered by UK legislation - or its interpretation -, but recently expanding to over eight hundred recruitment and search consultants operating in this country (Clark, 1991). High fees result in it being used mainly at rather senior levels, thus offering the possibility of being a means of neutralizing the tendency for females and certain other sectors of population being met with a career ceiling at middle management level. In principle, beneficial to both interested parties in the labour market, brokerage between them can have double-edged consequences such as employers falling victim to consultants who both both exploit their privileged access to knowledge of the companys needs and reuse candidates after they have remained with the firm for an agreed period of time. A defensive stance against the prescriptions of textbooks is taken by line managers who defend that recruitment can not be scientific but that it is a mixture of what they define as gut and objectivity, as contradictory in terms as this may be.

They also stress how they are aiming in the selection process to gauge future job performance. In other words, underlying the practices defended by line managers are certain principles which seem to link to the organizations culture and overall corporate strategy (Wood, 1986). Acceptability criteria thus prevail over suitability criteria. As an excuse for arbitrary selection, the formalization of the process of selection advocated by IPM, CBI, EOC and CRE with a view to rendering recruitment more efficient, meritocratic, consistent and accountable, is demeaned by general line managers as being bureaucratic encumbrance (Collinson, 1987) as an excuse for arbitrary selection. It is significant, though, that conviction usually appears to be lacking in that the key to competitive advantage is to get the best person for the job, who may b...


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Research essay sample on Recruitment And Selection Counter Argument

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