Recruitment. Recruitment is a set of activities designed to attract a qualified pool of

Recruitment is a set of activities designed to attract a qualified pool of

job applicants to an organization. Emphasis on qualified is important.

Effective recruitment brings employment opportunities to the attention

of persons with abilities and skills appropriate to job specifications. Then

and only then will recruiting facilitate the accomplishment of organiza-

tional objectives and fulfill its function as an essential ingredient in the

total staffing process. In this process, human-resource planning leads to

recruiting, which sets the stage for selection.

The three steps in the recruitment process are: 1) advertisement of

a job vacancy, 2) preliminary contact with potential job candidates, and

3) initial screening to create a pool of qualified applicants. You may know

the process best in your response as an applicant to newspaper ads or

word-of-mouth advertisements of job openings. Most probably you will

become involved with the recruiting process when interviewing represen-

tatives of organizations visiting your campus in search of new employees.

Project yourself into this situation. You are near graduation and want

a full-time job that relates to your major field of study. What will the

three steps in recruiting process look like from your side of things? Pro-

bably the following.

1. Job advertisement. The organization advertises its job vacancies by

posting short job descriptions at the campus placement center and/or in

the campus newspaper.

2. Preliminary contact. You sign up for an interview with a recruiter

on campus; during a short (20–30 minute) interview you present a writ-

ten resume of your background and explain your qualifications.

3. Initial screening. The recruiter discusses interview results and your

resume with appropriate line managers; based on their knowledge of job

specifications, you are among the candidates selected for a formal visit

to the organization.

This is the recruitment process through the applicant’s eyes. What

are these aspects of recruiting from the perspectives of line managers and

of recruiting specialists from a personnel department?

External and internal recruitment. There are two basic categories of

job candidates toward whom recruited efforts can be directed – qualified

employees ready for promotion or transfer from within the organization,

and persons from the outside. Internal recruitment involves making em-

ployees aware of job vacancies through job posting and personal recom-

132

mendations. Internal recruitment demonstrates internal opportunities

to advance in one’s career by working hard and achieving high perfor-

mance at each point of responsibility.

External recruitment involves the attraction of job candidates from

sources external to the organization. Newspapers, employment agencies,

technical training centers, personal contacts, referrals and even persons

in competing organizations are among the sources of external recruits.

Each of these recruitment strategies offers potential advantages and

disadvantages to the organization. Internal recruitment is usually the

least expensive, deals with persons of known performance records, en-

courages hard work among those desiring such opportunities. External

recruiting, on the other hand, brings in outsiders with fresh perspectives.

It also represents a source of specialized expertise or work experience

that is not otherwise available from insiders. Overall, a good strategy is

to maintain a mixture of external and internal recruiting. This allows the

manager and organization to gain the best advantage of each as circum-

stances allow.

1. In the process of recruitment emphasis on the word qualified is

important.

2. In this process human-resource planning doesn’t always lead to

recruiting.

3. There are five steps in the recruiting process through the appli-

cant’s eyes.

4. Internal recruitment involves employees’ awareness of job vacan-

cies inside an organization.

5. External recruitment involves the attraction of job candidates from

sources external to the organization.

6. Internal recruitment is usually the most expensive.

7. External recruitment brings the outsiders with fresh perspectives.

8. A good recruitment strategy is to choose only one of the two

categories.

9. A mixture of external and internal recruiting allows the manager to

gain the best advantage of each.

Scan the text once again and speak in detail on external and internal

recruiting.

Text 6

Read the following text and answer the questions that follow it.