Chapter 3: Personnel Planning and

Recruitment
Learning objectives:
 Stepsin the recruitment and selection process
 Main techniques used in employment planning and forecasting
 The need for effective recruiting
 Main internal sources of candidates
 Main outside sources of candidates
 Developing a job advertisement that draws attention
 How to recruit a more diverse workforce
FIGURE 5-1 Steps in
Recruitment and Selection
Process

The recruitment and selection process is a series of hurdles aimed

at selecting the best candidate for the job.
© 2005 Prentice Hall Inc. All rights reserved.
 Steps in the recruitment and selection process
https://www.youtube.com/watch? v=6PnFt-Pbo xA&list=WL&index=5&t=0s

1. Decide what positions to fill, through workforce/personnel

planning and forecasting
2. Build a pool of candidates for these jobs, by recruiting internal or
external candidates
3. Have candidates complete application forms and perhaps undergo
initial screening interviews
4. Use selection tools like tests, background investigations, and
physical exams to identify viable candidates
5. Decide who to make an offer to, by having the supervisor and
perhaps others interview the candidates
 Workforce planning and forecasting

 Workforce (or employment or personnel) planning:

process of deciding what positions the firm will have to
fill, and how to fill them
 Factors to Consider:
◦ Overall personnel needs (how many employees required)
◦ The supply of inside candidates
◦ The supply of outside candidates
 Methods of Forecasting Personnel Needs

 Trend analysis: studying variations in the firm’s

employment levels over the last few years
can provide an initial estimate of future staffing needs
However, employment levels rarely depend just on the
passage of time; changes in sales volume and productivity
also affect staffing needs
 Methods of Forecasting Personnel Needs
 Ratio analysis: A forecasting technique for determining future staff needs
by using ratios between, for example, sales volume and number of
employees needed.
 assumes that productivity remains about the same
 The scatter plot: A graphical method used to help identify the relationship
between two variables
Drawbacks:
 They generally focus on historical sales/personnel relationships and assume
that the firms existing activities will continue as it is.
 They tend to institutionalize existing ways of doing things, even in the face
of change
 Methods of Forecasting
Personnel Needs
Managerial judgment play a big role in such forecast as they
should consider subjective factors such as decisions to
upgrade quality, enter new markets, technological,
administrative and financial changes
 Forecasting the Supply of Inside
Candidates
After determining demand, the next step is to assess which current
employees might be qualified for the projected openings
So it is important to know current employees’ skills sets and their
current qualifications
Qualifications (or skills) inventories: Manual or computerized
records listing employees’ education, career and development
interests, languages, special skills, and so on, to be used in selecting
inside candidates for promotion
Personnel replacement charts: particularly used for the firm’s top
positions which show the present performance and promotability for
each position’s potential replacement
Management Replacement Chart
Showing Development Needs of
Future Divisional Vice President

© 2005 Prentice Hall Inc. All rights reserved.

 Methods of Forecasting Personnel supply

Markov analysis: a mathematical process to forecast

availability of internal job candidates

Position replacement card: A card prepared for each

position in a company to show possible replacement
candidates and their qualifications
 Internal Sources of Candidates: Hiring
from Within
Advantages Disadvantages
 Foreknowledge of candidates’  Failed applicants become
strengths and weaknesses discontented
 More accurate view of  Time wasted interviewing
candidate’s skills inside candidates who will
 Candidates have a stronger not be considered
commitment to the company
 Increases employee morale
 Less training and orientation
required

© 2005 Prentice Hall Inc. All rights reserved.

 Recruitment
Employee recruitment: attracting and building a pool
of candidates for the company’s open positions

The Recruiting Yield Pyramid: The historical

arithmetic relationships between recruitment leads and
invitees, invitees and interviewees, interviewees and
offers made, and offers made and offers accepted
Recruiting Yield Pyramid

© 2005 Prentice Hall Inc. All rights reserved.

 Why Recruiting is a Challenge?
some recruiting methods are superior to others, depending on the
type of job for which you are recruiting
the success you have recruiting depends on non-recruitment issues
and policies such as compensation plans and benefits package
employment law prescribes what can be done and cannot be done
when recruiting
Fake applications takes up a lot of time!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYwUfCCMHvk
 Finding Internal Candidates

Job posting: Publicizing an open job to employees (often

by literally posting it on bulletin boards) and listing its
attributes, like qualifications, supervisor, working schedule,
and pay rate
Rehiring: hiring former employees; former employees are
of known quantities (more or less) and are already familiar
with how you do things. On the other hand, employees who
you let go may return with negative attitudes
 Outside sources of candidates
Recruiting via the Internet:
recruitingthrough company’s Web sites, or using job boards
such as bdjobs.com, chakri.com, jobsA1.com
Facebook, LinkedIn are more popular now

Virtual job fairs: online visitors can listen to presentations, visit

booths, leave résumés and business cards, participate in live chats,
and get contact information from recruiters
 Pros and cons of online recruitment
Pros:
• Internet can generate more responses at a lesser time
• It is less expensive than other mediums

Cons:
fewer older people and some minorities use the Internet, so it
may exclude disproportionate numbers of older applicants (and
certain minorities)
Internet overload: Employers end up with lots of résumés and
screening becomes time consuming
 Outside Sources of Candidates
Advertising
 The Media: selection of the best medium depends on the
positions for which the firm is recruiting.
 Newspapers (local and specific labor markets)
 Trade and professional journals
 Constructing an effective ad: Wording related to job interest
factors should evoke the applicant’s attention, interest, desire, and
action (AIDA model) and create a positive impression of the firm.

© 2005 Prentice Hall Inc. All rights reserved. 5–19

 Job Advertisement

Source: The Miami Herald, March 24, 2004, p. SF.

© 2005 Prentice Hall Inc. All rights reserved. 5–20

 Outside Sources of Candidates
Outsourcing: having outside vendors supply services (such as
benefits management, market research, or manufacturing) that the
company’s own employees previously did in-house.
Offshoring: a narrower term, means having outside vendors or
employees abroad supply services that the company’s own
employees previously did in-house
Recruitment process outsourcers: special vendors who handle all
or most of the employer’s recruitment needs in exchange of a fixed
fee
Helps the employer to reduce time spent on recruitment activities
and lower down cost related to in house recruitment office
 Employment Agencies
There are two main types of employment agencies:
 public agencies operated by federal, state, or local
governments e.g. Bangladesh Association of International
Recruiting Agencies (BAIRA)
 privately owned agencies: Bashundhara Employment
Services, AJEETS group
 Temporary workforce
Temporary workforce: where employment is limited to a certain
period of time based on the need of the employing organization
Temporary workers: part time/contingent/just in time workers
who are not bound by any employment contracts and their period
of employment is bound by the demand of the employer
 Temporary workers
Benefits of employer for using
Temporary workers:
 They are paid only when
working
 They are more productive
 No recruitment, screening, and
payroll administration costs has
to be spent
Disadvantages of
employers for using
temporary workers:
 High amount of fees need
to be paid to temporary
agencies
 Temporary workers might
not be strongly committed
to the firm
© 2005 Prentice Hall Inc. All rights reserved. 5–24
 Temporary employees’ concerns
 They are often treated by employers in a dehumanizing and discouraging way.
 Temporary workers are insecure about their employment and are pessimistic
about the future.
 They are often worried about their lack of insurance and pension benefits.
 Workers are often misled about their job assignments and in particular about
whether temporary assignments will become permanent.
 They remain underemployed (particularly those trying to return to the full-time
labor market)
 Executive Recruiters
Executive recruiters (also known as headhunters): special
employment agencies employers retain to seek out top-management
talent for their clients e.g. Enroute international Ltd., Talent centric
Ltd.
two types of executive recruiters:
 Contingent-based recruiters collect a fee for their services when a
successful hire is completed.
 Retained executive searchers are paid regardless of the outcome of
the recruitment process
Internet technology and specialization trends are changing how
candidates are attracted and how searches are conducted
 Guidelines for Choosing a Recruiter

Make sure the firm is capable of conducting a thorough search.

Meet the individual who will actually handle your assignment.
Ask how much the search firm charges
Make sure the recruiter and you see eye to eye on what sort of
person you need for the position.
Never rely solely on the executive recruiter to do all the
reference checking

© 2005 Prentice Hall Inc. All rights reserved. 5–27

 Outside Sources of Candidates (cont’d)
Employee referral campaigns: the employer posts announcements
of openings and requests for referrals on its Web site, bulletin, and/or
wallboards
often offers prizes (holidays) or cash awards for referrals

Pros:
generate more applicants, more hires
Current employees will usually provide accurate information about
the job applicants they are referring, since they are putting their own
reputations on the line.
Used by organizations like: Google, Salesforce, Fiverr, Intel, Accenture
 Outside Sources of Candidates (cont’d)
Walk-ins: applicants come directly for at office with their
applications
Particularly for hourly workers, walk-ins generate a large number
of applicants
Issues regarding walk-ins:
 Courteous treatment of any applicant is a good business practice
 requires answering all letters of inquiry from applicants promptly
and courteously
 Outside Sources of Candidates (cont’d)
College Recruiting: sending an employer’s representatives to
college campuses to prescreen applicants and create an applicant
pool from the graduating class
Cons:
on-campus recruiting is expensive and time-consuming.
Schedules must be set well in advance, company brochures printed,
interview records kept, and much time spent on campus
Recruiters themselves are sometimes ineffective. Some recruiters are
unprepared, show little interest in the candidate, and act superior
 Outside Sources of Candidates (cont’d)
Internships: interns taken by companies; intern can learn more
about employers and hone different skills, employers can
consider them as full time workers and make them contribute
for the organization
Telecommuters: workers who work remotely from different
parts through internet
Military Personnel: Returning and discharged military
personnel provide an excellent source of trained and disciplined
recruits
 Recruiting a More Diverse Workforce
Singleparents
Older workers
Minorities
Women
Disabled

© 2005 Prentice Hall Inc. All rights reserved. 5–32

 Application forms
Purpose of Application Forms: usually the first step in recruitment
process that provides information on applicant’s education, prior
work record and skills
Uses of information from applications
 Judgments about the applicant’s educational and experience
qualifications
 Conclusions about the applicant’s previous progress and growth
 Indications of the applicant’s employment stability
 Predictions about which candidate is likely to succeed on the job
Further reading:
 Chapter 5, Dessler, G. (2017), Human Resource Management. Pearsons.
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJNcYZvToGY
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-VcHu-wZxE
 Factsheet on recruitment and selection [given in google classroom]
 Mahmood, M & Absar, M.M.N. (2015), Human Resource Management
Practices in Bangladesh: Current Scenario and Future Challenges, South Asian
Journal of Human Resources Management [online] 2(2): pp.171-188. Available
at: Google classroom [Accessed 5 January 2019].