Chapter 6

Selection
and Hiring
Learning Objective
1. Describe the three types of fit between an employee and an organization.
2. Explain the differences between screening, evaluative, and contingent
assessment methods.
3. Describe the differences between structured, behavioral, and case interviews.
4. Describe the two ways of combining assessment scores.
5. Explain the factors that can influence the content of a job offer.
6. Explain the three types of fairness.
7. Describe the difference between implicit and explicit employment contracts.

2
Assessment Goals

• Identify the people who best meet the organization’s staffing goals, which
usually include, at a minimum, high job performance and enhanced business
strategy execution.
o Accuracy: The wider the range of talent in an applicant pool, the more important it
is that the assessment system accurately weed out the bad fits and identify the
good ones.
o Fit: People need to fit the organization, workgroup, and job to be most successful.

Selection and Hiring 3

 Fit
Table 6-1

Selection and Hiring 4

Assessment Goals

• Ethics: The entire selection process should be managed ethically, including

explaining how assessment results will be used and how applicants’ privacy will
be protected.
• Legal compliance: Legally defensible hiring practices compare all applicants
using the same fair, consistent, and objective information predictive of job
success.
• Positive stakeholder reactions: Meeting stakeholder needs, including those of
recruits, recruiters, and hiring managers, is another goal of the assessment
process.

Selection and Hiring 5

Selection
Figure 6-1

Selection and Hiring 6

Assessment Methods

• Screening assessment methods is used to reduce the pool of job applicants to

job candidates.
• Job candidates are then evaluated in more depth using evaluative assessment
methods to identify successful hires.
• Job offers may be made contingent on the results of contingent assessment
methods. If the contingent assessment (typically a background check, drug
screen, medical exam, etc.) is passed, then a formal job offer is extended.

Selection and Hiring 7

Evaluative Assessment Methods

• Personality and values assessment: predict performance only for specific

occupations or criteria
• Cognitive ability tests: typically use computerized or paper-and-pencil tests to
assess general mental abilities, including reasoning, logic, and perceptual
abilities
• Noncognitive ability tests: measure sensory and psychomotor abilities
o Sensory tests assess visual, auditory, and speech perception.
o Speaking clearly, discriminating sounds, and seeing in low light are examples of
sensory abilities.
o Psychomotor tests assess strength, physical dexterity, and coordination.

Selection and Hiring 8

Evaluative Assessment Methods

• Integrity tests: assess candidates’ attitudes and experiences related to their

reliability, trustworthiness, honesty, and moral character
• Job knowledge: measure job-related knowledge (often technical) required for
success
• Interviews: assess a variety of characteristics, including interpersonal skills,
decision-making style, and leadership style
o Unstructured interviews ask varying questions across interviews and usually lack
standards for evaluating candidates’ answers.
o Structured interviews use consistent, job-related questions with predetermined
scoring keys.

Selection and Hiring 9

Evaluative Assessment Methods

• Assessment centers: put candidates through a variety of evaluation techniques

to evaluate their potential fit with and ability to do the job
• Work samples: evaluate the performance of actual or simulated work tasks
o A work sample can be as simple as a situational judgment question asking, “What
would you do in this situation?” or as comprehensive as an actual portfolio of the
applicant’s previous work.

Selection and Hiring 10

Cognitive Ability Test Items
Table 6-3

Selection and Hiring 11

Behavioral Interview Question
Table 6-4

Selection and Hiring 12

Situational Interview Question
Table 6-5

Selection and Hiring 13

 Case Study: Hiring at MITRE Corporation

MITRE Corporation is a not-for-profit organization work in the public interest in

the areas of systems engineering and information technology, and has its own
research and development program that explores new technologies.
MITRE has won awards for health and wellness and work-life balance, and has
been named to "best places to work" lists.
MITRE employs over 7,000 scientists, engineers, and support specialists, most of
whom have Masters or Ph.D. degrees.
The hiring process can take up to three months, and is described in detail on the
company's website.

Selection and Hiring 14

 Case Study: Hiring at MITRE Corporation

The first step of the hiring process is the review of résumés submitted for the
position.
All submitted résumés are acknowledged by email, postcard, or onscreen if
submitted at MITRE's career site.
Because MITRE recruiters regularly search submitted résumés for other openings,
applicants have the option of being considered for other jobs in the future.
Phone screens are sometimes done to acquire additional information about the
candidate's knowledge, interview availability, salary expectations, etc.

Selection and Hiring 15

 Case Study: Hiring at MITRE Corporation

Hiring managers review the prescreened résumés forwarded to them by a

recruiter and select the candidates to be interviewed.
Two to four individual interviews with department representatives are then done
to evaluate the candidate and communicate information about MITRE and its
work. Some candidates are asked in advance to prepare and deliver a brief
presentation.
Background checks covering employment history, references, education, etc. are
then done for candidates being considered fora job offer.
An HR representative contacts selected candidates to present a job offer.
Candidates are given a week to make a decision.

Selection and Hiring 16

 Exercise
Case Study: Hiring at MITRE Corporation

1. What elements of MITRE’s hiring process do you find attractive? Which, if any,
would not appeal to you as a potential candidate? Explain your answers.
2. Do you think that MITRE’s hiring process reinforces its image as a desirable
employer? Why or why not?
3. How else do you think MITRE should assess candidates? Explain your answer.

Selection and Hiring 17

Choosing Whom to Hire

• Combining Scores: multiple predictors improves the prediction of job success. A

candidate’s scores on the different assessments must be meaningfully
combined to derive an overall score that can be compared across candidates or
to a minimum hiring standard.
o Multiple hurdles: candidates must receive a passing score on an assessment before
being allowed to continue in the selection process.
o Compensatory approach: high scores on some assessments can compensate for
low scores on other assessments.
o Combining multiple hurdles & compensatory approaches.

Selection and Hiring 18

Making a Final Choice

• Cut score: a minimum assessment score that must be met or exceeded to

advance to the next assessment phase or to be eligible to receive a job offer
• Rank order candidates from highest to lowest score

Selection and Hiring 19

Making a Final Choice

• Cut score: a minimum assessment score that must be met or exceeded to

advance to the next assessment phase or to be eligible to receive a job offer
• Rank order candidates from highest to lowest score

Selection and Hiring 20

Making the Job Offer

• What to Offer
• Assessing the likely reaction of the job offer recipient is important, and the offer
should be created in a way that he or she will find maximally appealing. Content of
the job offer influence by:
o Job Type: full/part time, level of position.
o Organizational Factors: formal policies, how fast company needs to hire.
o Finalist Factors: finalist’s compensation requirements, needs, has other job offer.
o External Factors: labor market, cost of living.
o Legal Factors: equal employment opportunity.

Selection and Hiring 21

Making the Job Offer

• Fairness Perceptions
• Fairness perceptions influence candidates’ willingness to accept job offers.
o Distributive fairness: perceived fairness of the outcomes
o Procedural fairness: perceived fairness of the policies and procedures used to
determine the outcome
o Interactional fairness: perceptions of the degree of respect and the quality of the
interpersonal treatment received during the decision-making process

Selection and Hiring 22

Making the Job Offer

• Negotiating Employment Contracts

• Salaries and employment contracts are often negotiable, particularly for higher
level jobs. The degree to which a job offer is negotiable depends on the job, the
hiring manager, the organization, and the candidate’s perceived value to the
organization.

Selection and Hiring 23

Negotiable Job Offer Elements
Table 6-6

Selection and Hiring 24

The Employment Contract

• Explicit employment contract: a written or oral employment contract

• Implicit employment contract: an understanding that is not part of a written or
oral contract

Selection and Hiring 25

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