Recruitment

Acquiring and retaining high-quality talent is critical to an organisation’s success. As the job market becomes increasingly competitive and the available skills grow more diverse, recruiters need to be more selective in their choices, since poor recruiting decisions can produce long-term negative effects, among them high training and development costs to minimise the incidence of poor performance and high turnover which, in turn, impact staff morale, the production of high quality goods and services and the retention of organisational memory. At worst, the organisation can fail to achieve its objectives thereby losing its competitive edge and its share of the market (Richardson, 2011).

Recruitment is described as the set of activities and processes used to legally obtain a sufficient number of qualified people at the right place and time so that the people and the organisation can select each other in their own best short and long term interests (Schuler, 1987).

In other words, it is the process of identifying and attracting a group of potential candidates from within and outside the organisation to evaluate for employment (Bernthal, 2010)

The recruitment process therefore provides the organisation with a pool of potentially qualified job candidates from which judicious selection can be made to fill vacancies.

The recruitment industry has five main types of agencies: employment agencies, recruitment websites and job search engines, "headhunters" for executive and professional recruitment, niche agencies which specialize in a particular area of staffing and in-house recruitment (Daswani, 2011).

Successful recruitment begins with proper employment planning and forecasting. In this phase of the staffing process, an organisation formulates plans to fill or eliminate future job openings based on an analysis of future needs, the talent available within and outside of the organisation, and the current and anticipated resources that can be expended to attract and retain such talent.

Also related to the success of a recruitment process are the strategies an organisation is prepared to employ in order to identify and select the best candidates for its developing pool of human resources(Bunting,2007).

Of the many strategies used in the recruitment process, one that is on the rise is the use of on-line recruitment sites (Williams, 2009). This blog explores various aspects of this type of recruitment strategy.

On-line recruitment is a formal method of external recruiting which entails searching the labour market more widely for candidates with no previous connection to the organisation (Bernthal and Wellins, 2001).

Using the Internet is faster and cheaper than many traditional methods of recruiting. Jobs can be posted on Internet sites for a modest amount (less than in the print media), remain there for periods of thirty or sixty days or more - at no additional cost - and are available twenty-four hours a day. Candidates can view detailed information about the job and the organisation and then respond electronically (Richardson, 2011).

On-line recruiting also provides access to passive job seekers, that is, individuals who already have a job but would apply for what appears a better one that is advertised on the Internet. These job seekers may be of a better quality since they are not desperate for a job change as are the active job seekers who may be frustrated, disgruntled workers looking for a new position (Byham, 1992).

REVIEW OF MONSTER.CO.UK ON-LINE RECRUITMENT SITE

Monster.co.uk is one of the largest employment websites in the world, owned and operated by  Monster Worldwide Incorporated. It was created in 1999 by the merger of The Monster Board (TMB) and Online Career Center (OCC), which were two of the first and most popular career web sites on the Internet. Monster is primarily used to help those seeking work to find job openings that match their skills and location.

Below is a review of the website based on its layout, accessibility, navigation and usefulness.

Website

A visit to the website address of www.monster.co.uk opens a colourful page characterised by a blend of many colours with purple being the dominant. The entire web page is set on a background of pictures denoting individuals engaged in various employment sectors. The pictures are however not visible owing to the fact that they are black and white in colour.

Layout

In terms of layout of the website, it is worth mentioning that, all features are attractively and least daunting. All major sections of the website are well structured with the main features indicated boldly. The only aspect in relation to the layout of the site which did not go down well with me has got to do with the position of two search engines which form the top and bottom border of the website. In my opinion, one search engine would have been enough. However, the position of the main buttons namely: Home, CV, Jobs, Career Tools and Advice are excellent.

Text is laid out using style sheets which users can change in their browsers to make viewing easier for their individual requirements. The visual design also accommodates resizing text and, as relative units have been used, text can even be re-sized in Internet Explorer for Windows. In situations where a browser or browsing device does not support style sheets at all, the content of each page is still readable. HTML used is XHTML 1.0 transitional (Monster, 2012).

Accessibility

The accessibility of information required from the site is quite commendable. Various features have got short notes explaining what they imply or can be used for. An example is the Batch Apply feature which is captioned with the information “makes it easier than ever to apply to multiple jobs in one go. Try it today and save time on your job search”.

Although www.monster.co.uk is accessible to as many users as possible, it is worth noting that, just like with many other websites, people with disabilities might find using the site difficult. However, there are many things that the site does to make it easier for users. For instance, it has created a “let us know” feature which allows users to contact Administrators of the site in times of difficulty. It also has a feedback section titled “Give us your take” through which users can provide information as to what changes could be implemented to make the site even more accessible.

Additionally, the on-line recruitment site offers users the luxury of using short keys to explore the site quickly and easily.  The ACCESS KEY functionality used on the site is as follows:

    * Alt + 0 - Go to Monster Homepage.

    * Alt + 1 - Go to content.

    * Alt + 2 - Go to main navigation.

    * Alt + 3 - Go to breadcrumb trail navigation.

    * Alt + 5 - Go back to the top of the page.

Navigation

There is one main navigation menu located towards the bottom of the page. A "jump to main navigation" link is provided at the top of each page to enable users jump directly to the main menu for quick access. The main menu is sometimes supplemented with an "In this Section" navigation menu for exploring the current section of the site. When present, this is located directly beneath the main navigation menu.

Usefulness

Characterised with many features and products such as Career Services and Tips, Company profiles, Virtual Job interview sections, Salary Calculator, Training Courses, CV Templates, my personal comment is that monster.co.uk is a good recruitment site and is also very diverse.

General Comments about monster.co.uk

Good Points

Ø  Apart from the advertisement of job positions, the site also provides useful information to aid people seeking employment in general as to how to prepare for interviews and write CVs.

Ø  Easy to use Options to post more than one CV Confidentiality.

Ø  Excellent layout of search results.

Bad Points

Ø  Monster just seems to have jobs from employers that have paid to post vacancies, and since the recession, most employers are defiantly tightening the purse strings.

Ø  The listings display on sections of the site such as the “Upload CV” section lacks clarity.

Ø  Uploading a CV has to be done to the Monster format which is really annoying. The CV has to be very specific to get the right people approaching you.

Ø  Monster has been to blame in several instances of personal information theft. In less than two weeks, in August 2007, Monster had numerous leaks that resulted in the loss of millions of customers' data to identity theft. Although Monster waited several days to announce this leak (drawing heavy criticism), they subsequently announced new security measures to prevent this from happening again.

However, in January 2009, there was another large scale leak at its UK based site monster.co.uk, in which demographic information of up to 4.5 million people was obtained by hackers (Percival, 2009).

“REALLY GOODE” ONLINE RECRUITMENT CAMPAIGN

The “Really Goode” online recruitment campaign was launched by the Murphy-Goode Winery in 2009. This recruitment was initiated after the company thought about the new age of communications and figured it was a pretty good thing. So to get going, they decided to look for someone who really knew how to use Web 2.0 and Facebook and blogs and social media and YouTube and all sorts of good stuff like that — to tell the world about its wines and the place where they live: the Sonoma County Wine Country.

In exchange, the company was offering a Really Goode Job — a six-month job paying $10,000 a month plus accommodations. ……………………………………………………………

The title of the person employed was to be “Murphy-Goode Wine Country Lifestyle Correspondent” who was to report on the cool lifestyle of Sonoma County Wine Country and, of course, tell people what they were learning about winemaking.

 

What really caught my attention was the fact, the employee was already given the tools or mechanisms through which he or she was to advertise the company and interestingly enough, it was basically through social networking sites including Facebook and YouTube. This meant that the employee already had a target market defined by the employer and thus it was up to him or her to maximise the market share of the company. 

In other words, with a compensation of $10,000 per month plus accommodations and flexible working hours, all that one had to do was experience wine and good living, and then tell people about it. In my opinion, the package or benefits was tempting enough to whip my interest in applying for such a fun-filled job. ………………………………………………………

The USA wine company Murphy-Goode Winery thus, adapted "The Best Job in the World" to a "Really Goode Job".  

 

Another interesting aspect of the campaign was that, although Murphy-Goode had the final say, viewers were also asked to rate the best applicants. Finally, the captivating and colourful advert that was associated with the campaign also caught my attention.

It is an excellent example of what can be achieved and continues to challenge the benchmark for online recruitment.  

Please click on link below to see the advert “Really Goode” online recruitment campaign:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPUzbTwtLBQ&feature=player_embedded

SHL APTITUDE TEST COMMENT 

At a time when companies can ill-afford to make the wrong hiring decisions, it is perhaps not surprising that online assessment has become more appealing to employers (Martindale, 2009).

Online assessment systems allow companies to attract applications from all over the world and filter them in a time- and cost-effective way. More importantly, they offer a tangible way of assessing an individual's skills for a particular role and how they would fit within an organisation.

For potential employees, meanwhile, online assessment can be done at a time and location that suits them and can give them a better idea of what the job is likely to involve before deciding whether to proceed with the application.

According to SHL Group Limited (2011), ability or aptitude tests are proven methods for assessing critical qualities for job success such as solving problems, communicating effectively as well as innovation and creativity. It is for these reasons that employers use such tests widely.

The SHL test comprises of eleven differing exercises (http://www.shldirect.com/practice_tests.html). After taking three of the tests namely the verbal reasoning, money handling and Situational Judgement Test, I am of the view that, similar tests should not be used as a recruitment tool before gaining an interview due to the following reasons:

The use of such tests has the potential to exclude certain groups. As noted by Martindale (2009), aptitude tests can discriminate against certain ethnic minority groups, such as Hispanic and African American candidates, who tend not to perform well on these types of tests. Hence, this has huge implications for diversity and inclusion.

Older or less IT-savvy candidates could also be deterred, and the inconsistent internet access in some – mainly rural – parts of the UK could also inadvertently discriminate against some people.

Also, looking at the length of time one has to usually spend on the internet completing aptitude test, it is obvious that, candidates who fail to score good marks in the aptitude test thereby being declined an interview session might feel emotionally stressed out feeling dejected after all the time spent on the test.

CONCLUSION

Recruiting the right employees can be a challenge, with no guarantee of success. But using the right information and procedures will improve an organisation’s chances of finding what it is looking for.

Whatever the strategies selected for recruiting, the objective is to recruit the most qualified, committed individuals into the organisations and that the organisations achieve the objectives for which they have been established (Bratton and Gold, 2007).

Job websites offer unlimited space which can be used, by management, to sell the organisation. The site can then be used, not only to post vacancies, but also to publicise the organisation. That will allow candidates to become more familiar with the company, know what skills the company is looking for and get to know about its culture. Most importantly, the system will provide a proper path to securing quick responses to job openings. On-line recruiting facilitates the decentralisation of the hiring function by making it possible for other groups in the organisation to take responsibility for part of the function (Dale, 2010).

On-line recruiting is not all positive, though; there are drawbacks for unwary users:

·         Some applicants still place great value on face-to-face interactions in the hiring process. Such applicants are likely to ignore jobs posted, impersonally, on-line.

·         Companies are overwhelmed by the volume of résumés posted on the Internet. This can, in fact, lengthen the short-listing process. If the screening process is not well done, the quantity of applications/résumés logged-on may be more of a hindrance to the process than an aid to selection.

·         Job seekers who demand confidentiality in the recruitment process may be reluctant to use the Internet as a job search mechanism (Bernthal and Wellins, 2001).

REFERENCES

Bernthal, P.R. (2010) Recruitment and Selection [online]. Available from:  http://www.ddiworld.com/DDIWorld/media/trend-research/recruitment-and-selection_ere_es_ddi.pdf?ext=.pdf [Accessed 13 February 2012].

Bernthal, P. R, and Wellins, R. S. (2001) Retaining talent: A benchmarking study. Pittsburgh, PA: Development Dimensions International.

Bratton, J. and Gold, J. (2007) Human Resource Management: Theory and Practice. 4^th ed. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Bunting, M. (2007) Skills, Training and Human Resource Development: A Critical Text.   Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Byham, W. C. (1992) The assessment center method and methodology: New applications and technologies. Pittsburgh, PA: Development Dimensions International.

Dale, M. (2010) Recruitment.  London: BHP Information Solutions Ltd.

Daswani, K. (2011) Recruitment [online]. Available from:  http://karishmadaswani.com/karishmadaswani/index.php/category/hrm-2/recruitment/ [Accessed 14 February 2012].

Martindale, N. (2009) Testing and selection: The pros and cons of online assessment [online]. Available from:   http://www.personneltoday.com/articles/2009/10/13/52484/testing-and-selection-the-pros-and-cons-of-online-assessment.html [Accessed 12 February 2012].

Monster (2012) Site and Accessibility Information [online]. Available from:   http://www.access.monster.co.uk/Accessibility.aspx [Accessed 11 February 2012].

Percival, J. (2009) Hackers steal jobseekers' details from Monster recruitment website. The Guardian [online].Jan 27. Available from:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/jan/27/hack-monster-data-recruitment [Accessed 13 February 2012].

Richardson, M. A. (2011) Recruitment Strategies Managing/Effecting the Recruitment Process [online]. Available from:  http://unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/documents/un/unpan021814.pdf [Accessed 13 February 2012].

Schuler, R. S. (1987) Personnel and Human Resource Management.3^rd ed. St. Paul: West Educational Publishing.

SHL Group Limited (2011) Practice Test [online]. Available from:   http://www.shldirect.com/practice_tests.html [Accessed 13 February 2012].

Williams, H. (2009) E-recruitment: Rethinking recruitment [online]. Available from:   http://www.personneltoday.com/articles/2009/06/09/50918/e-recruitment-rethinking-recruitment.html [Accessed 13 February 2012].