John Michael Vincent E.

 Clarito                                            Prof. Perry David Solosa  

BSBA FM 2-6                                                                        Human Resources Management  

Assessment 3
1. Explain briefly the advantages and disadvantages of various ways of eliminating a labor
surplus and avoiding a labor shortage.
 Downsizing – The advantages of an effective downsizing is it avoids indiscrimination
across-the board-reductions and perform strategies that reduces costs of the company and
improve its competitive position in the market. The disadvantage, however, is it causes
impactful human suffering such as bankruptcies, illnesses, and depression.

 Early Retirement and Buyouts – Offering of early retirement and buyout program have
a wide range of positive influence. First is that it improves old employees’ health and
wellbeing because of decreased physical labor. Second is it attracts many workers who
fear Social Security will be cut. Third is that it relieves the problems concerning the
legislation and outlawing of mandatory retirement ages. An early retirement and buyouts
also help employers from their concerns about losing their old and experienced workers.
The disadvantages for the firm however are that old workers have higher seniority, higher
medical cost, and higher pension contributions, making them cost more than younger
employees.

 Employing Temporary Workers – Hiring workers to fill up the slots temporarily is an

effective way of eliminating labor shortage. It gives firm the flexibility to operate
efficiently in the times when there’s a surge in demand for goods and services.
Temporary workers also help the firm from administrative tasks and financial burdens,
bring fresh ideas and objective evaluations, and so on. The problem of employing
temporary workers however include their possible low level of commitment and their
possible negative impact on customers’ level of loyalty.

 Outsourcing – It's the use of an outside organization for a broad set of service. It's a
logical choice for firms when they do not have expertise or available time and energy into
developing such services. Companies increasingly outsource many of their human
resource management tasks to outsiders who specialize in performing many
administrative tasks associated.

 Offshoring – It's a special case of outsourcing where the jobs that move actually leave
one country and go to another. When making the decision to offshore products or
services, organizations must consider several factors including quality control problems,
security violations, poor customer service experiences, and so on. As such, employers
need to secure work visas if they plan to hire foreign workers.
  Altering Pay and Hours – firms may have the option of getting more hours out of the
existing labor force by altering payment and hours. For a short period, many workers will
enjoy the added compensation. However, over extended periods, employees will
experience stress and frustration from being overworked. In the challenges of labor
surplus, organizations can sometimes avoid layoffs if they can get their employees to take
pay cuts.
2. Discuss the various recruitment policies that organizations adopt to make job vacancies more
attractive.
 Employment-at-Will Policies – These are policies in which termination of employment
relationship can be done by either employee or employer at any time, regardless of cause.

 Due Process Policies – These are policies by which a company specifies the steps an
employee can take to appeal for a termination decision.

 Lead-the-Market Approach – It’s a policy of paying higher-than-current-market wages

which have advantage in recruiting it meets the interest of applicants.

 Lead Policies – These are policies that given vacancy more attractive to applicants.
3. Identify the various sources of recruits, their advantages and disadvantages, and the methods
for evaluating them.
 Direct Applicants and Referrals – The advantage of recruiting direct applicants and
referrals is that most of them have done their researches and have prepared themselves
for the job. It saves the firm the time for recruiting qualified employees. The problem it
poses however is that direct applicants and referrals are not always competent for the job.
They may have been recommended and hired solely based on connections and cronyism.

 Advertisement in Newspapers – The disadvantage of recruiting workers through

newspaper is that it recruits subpar workers compared to a direct applications or referrals.
However, it still helps the firm from filling up vacancies in the workplace.

 Electronic Recruiting – The advantage of using electronics to recruit workers is that it’s
simple, convenient, and effective to use. The disadvantage of using electronics however
is that blogs and social networking can be unpredictable that employers may find it
impossible to control. Another disadvantage is it can be prone to identity theft that
endangers the sensitive personal information of interested applicants.

 Public and Private Employment Agencies – Firms can register their job vacancies with
the local state employment office. The agency then make referrals to the firms at no
charge and can be interviewed or tested, saving employers the time and effort in
recruiting suitable candidates.
  Colleges and Universities – To recruit candidates that meet the necessary skills and
knowledge for a job, firms may have the option to sign prospective graduates up for
interview slots. The ways of establishing a strong presence in the campus is using college
internship program, or participating in university job fairs.
4. Explain the recruiter’s role in the recruitment process, the limits the recruiter faces, and the
opportunities available.
The role of the recruiters in the firm, mainly involves finding candidates and hiring the
best among them. However, there are limits and opportunities presented to the recruiters in doing
so. Such includes the following:
 Recruiter’s Functional Area. Firms must choose whether their recruiters are specialists
in human resources or experts at particular jobs because studies suggest that applicants
find a job less attractive and the recruiter less credible when he is a personnel specialist.
This indicate that recruiters who are assigned as specialists need to take extra steps to
ensure that applicants perceive them as knowledgeable and credible.

 Recruiter’s Traits. Two traits stand out when the applicants' reactions to recruiters are
examined, which presents problem for the recruiters. One is called ―warmth. It reflects
the degree to which the recruiters seem to care about the applicant and are enthusiastic
about their potential in the company. The other one is called informativeness. In general,
applicants respond more positively to recruiters who are perceived as warm and
informative. These characteristics seem more important than such demographic
characteristics as age, sex, or race, which have complex and inconsistent effects on
applicant responses. As such, recruiters must develop the two traits to effectively hire
qualified candidates.

 Recruiter’s Realism. Some limits the recruiters face in attracting candidates is the
providing information about the job and company. Applicants are highly sensitive to
negative information in which will repel them. On the other hand, a positive information
may mislead candidates and lured them into taking the job under false pretenses which
can lead to unmet expectations of employees and a high turnover rate in the company.
5. Identify the 17 most relevant recruitment metrics, their usage and importance to effective and
efficient recruitment activities.
1. Time to Fill – It’s the time it takes to recruit a new candidate and is measured by
identifying the number of days between publishing job openings and recruiting the
candidate. It provides firms an accurate view to assess the time it will attract a
replacement for a retiring employee.

2. Time to Hire – It refers to the time it takes for someone to move through a hiring process
once they have applied and is measured by the number of days between the moment a
 candidate is approached by the firm and the moment the candidate accepts the job offer.
Time to hire provides an insight into the performance of recruitment team and influences
the candidates’ experience by how long or short the recruitment process.

3. Source of Hire – It refers to tracking the sources which attract new recruits to the firm.
The metric is used to efficiently track the effectiveness of different recruiting including
job boards, social media, sourcing agencies, and as such.

4. Quality of Hire – It indicates the first-year performance of new recruits and is measured
by their performance rating. The quality of hire is the input of Success Ratio which is the
number of hired candidates considered satisfactory divided by the total number of
candidates hired. The ratio is used for the Recruitment Utility Analysis which allows the
firm to calculate the ROI for different selection instruments.

5. Hiring Manager Satisfaction – It’s a metric that is indicative of successful recruiting

metrics. When the hiring manager is satisfied with the new candidate, the candidate is
likely to perform and blend well in the team and thus increasing the chance the candidate
will be hired.

6. Candidate Job Satisfaction – It’s a metric used to track whether the expectations set
during the recruiting process are aligned with reality. If there’s a low candidate job
satisfaction, it spells a mismanagement of expectations or an incomplete description of
the job. To create a more realistic view, it’s optimal to provide a realistic job preview
which helps in presenting the positive and negative aspects of the job.

7. Applicants per Opening – This metric gauge the popularity of a job. A large number of
applicants may indicate a high demand for jobs in that particular area or a job description.
Firms may narrow the job description and include hard qualifications to reduce the
number of applicants without reducing the number of suitable candidates.

8. Selection Ratio – It’s a metric ratio that determines the number of candidates hired
compared to the total number of candidates. This ratio is also called the Submittals to
Hire Ratio. Similar to the applicants per opening, when there’s a high number of
candidates, it may indicate a high demand for jobs. Which is reflected as the ratio
approaches zero. The ratio provides information including the value of different
assessment and recruitment tools which can be used to estimate the utility of a given
selection and recruitment system.

9. Cost per Hire – It’s the total cost invested in hiring divided by the number of hires. The
ratio consists of multiple cost structures which can be divided by internal and external
cost. It’s used by firms to calculate the total recruitment cost, providing them insights to
make necessary changes.
10. Candidate Experience – It’s recruiting metric that reflects the way that job seekers
perceive an employer's recruitment and on boarding process. It's typically measured by
using a candidate experience survey.

11. Offer Acceptance Rate – It’s a metric ratio that compares the number of candidates who
successfully accepted a job offer with the number of candidates who received an offer. A
low rate indicates compensation problems. When such problems occur, the firms
minimize the impact of a refused job offer by discussing the payment in the recruiting
process. An example is listing the payment in the job opening or by asking the candidates
about their salary expectations.

12. Percentage of Open Positions - the metric is the total number of open positions divided
by the total number of positions in the organization. It can be applied to specific
departments or to the entire organization. A high percentage can indicate high demand or
low labor market supply and enables the firm to fix the problem.

13. Application Completion Rate – It’s a metric effectively used by organizations with
elaborate online recruiting systems. Many large corporate firms require candidates to
manually input their entire CV in their systems before they can apply for a job. A drop-
out indicates problems in this procedure such as web browser that's incompatible with the
application system or interface that's non-user friendly.

14. Recruitment Funnel Effectiveness – It measures the effectiveness of all the different
steps in the funnel to specify a yield ratio per step. The metric has changed a lot over the
last few years due to advances in Human Resource technology. The first few steps are
often divided and sorted. Software helps to automatically screen CVs and select the best
fits and companies opt to go for video interviews to change submittals and even first
interviews.

15. Sourcing Channel Effectiveness – It helps firms to measure the conversions per
channel. By comparing the percentage of applications with the percentage of impressions
of the positions, they easily assess the effectiveness of various channels. A simple way to
do this is by using Google Analytics to track the people who viewed the job opening on
the firm's website. And by setting goals, the conversion rate can be made more accurate.

16. Sourcing Channel Cost – The cost efficiency of various sourcing channels can be
calculated by including the amount of money spent on advertisement, on such platforms.
By dividing the money spent on advertisement with the number of visitors who
successfully applied through the job opening, firms can measure the cost per hire of their
sourcing channels.
 17. Time to Productivity – It refers to how long it takes to make people motivated and
productive. It is measured by the time between the first day of hiring and the point where
the employee fully contributes to the organization.
John Michael Vincent E. Clarito                                            Prof. Perry David Solosa   
BSBA FM 2-6                                                                        Human Resources Management   

Assessment 3
1. Discuss the scientific properties of personnel selection methods, including reliability, validity,
and generalizability.
 Reliability – It refers to consistency of a performance measure or the degree to which a
performance measure is free from random error. It helps firms determine the right
candidates to hire. For example, they will prioritize candidates who did well in their
physical, cognitive abilities, and personality tests.

 Validity – It refers to the extent to which performance on the measure is related to

performance on the job. A measure must be reliable if it is to have any validity.

 Generalizability – It's the degree to which the validity of a selection method established
in one context extends to other contexts. The two main contexts are different situations
and different samples of people.

 Utility - It refers to degree to which the information provided by selection methods

enhances the effectiveness of selecting personnel in real organizations. Generally
speaking, the more reliable, valid, and generalizable the selection method is, the more it
will have utility.

 Legality – It refers to the conformation or adherence of any selection method used to the
existing laws and legal precedents.
2. Discuss how the particular characteristics of a job, organization, or applicant affect the utility
of any test.
Different kinds of jobs, organizations, and applicants require different kind of tests. And
the utility of any tests depends on the necessity of a firm for such tests. If for example, a
physically demanding work examines the cognitive capacity of their applicants, it will not be
able to assess the performance of the applicants on the workplace, resulting to a decrease in
utility of any cognitive tests. Another example is the use of reference check. If an applicant does
not have a strong connection with others or wasn't very vocal in expressing their themselves, any
result of reference checks will not be reliable to assess the applicant.
3. Identify the common methods used in selecting human resources.
 Interviews – Selection interview is a dialogue initiated by one or more persons to gather
information and evaluate the qualifications of an applicant. Such kind of interview must
be validated by traditional criterion-related or content-validation procedures to avoid
unconscious biases. To improve the effectiveness of selection interview, HR staff should
keep the interview structured, standardized, and focused on accomplishing a small
number of goals. They should also focus on questions about specific situations that are
likely to arise on the job and determine what the candidates are likely to do in those
situations. Furthermore, using trained multiple interviewers are effective in detecting and
stopping subjective errors that can result in the interview.

 References, Application Banks, and Background Checks – Firms gather information

about the applicants from the people who know them through reference checks. The
evidence on the reliability and validity of reference checks implies that these are weak
predictors of future job success. The reason for low validity is primarily because the
evaluations supplied in most reference letters are so positive that firms find it hard to
make distinctions among the applicants.

 Physical Ability Tests – Tests of physical abilities are used in occupational tasks that are
physically demanding. It's employed to testify the performance of candidates and predict
their possible injuries and disabilities as well. The areas covered in such tests are
muscular tension, muscular power, muscular endurance, cardiovascular endurance,
flexibility, balance, and coordination.

 Cognitive Ability Tests – These tests examine and differentiate candidates based on their
mental capacities. The main facets covered in a cognitive test are verbal comprehension,
quantitative ability, and reasoning ability. Verbal comprehension refers to individual's
capacity to understand and use written and spoken language. While quantitative ability is
concerned about individual's speed and accuracy in solving arithmetic problems.
Reasoning ability, on the other hand, refers to individual’s capacity to think of solutions
to various problems. Some jobs require only one or two of these facets of cognitive
ability and it's important to maintain separation among its facets.

 Personal Inventories – Compared to ability tests that categorize candidates to where

they excel, personal inventories are test that categorize the personality of candidates. It
examines their personality based on the Big Five Personality Traits which are
extroversion, neuroticism, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness.

 Work Samples – These are tests that simulate the job in a pre-hiring context to observe
the performance of applicants in a simulated job. Work samples can vary greatly in
which in some cases, applicants respond to a set of standardized hypothetical case studies
and role play how they would react to certain situations. In other cases, the job applicants
are brought to the employers' location and perform the job as a form of job tryout.
 Simulations that involve role-plays engages applicants and display higher levels of their
predictive validity compared to paper-and-pencil tests.

 Honesty and Drug Tests – Such tests are used to evaluate job applicants. Paper-and-
Pencil honesty test, for example, uses questions that emphasize about dealings with past
theft admissions or associations with people who stole from employers.