Human Resources

Chapter 8 Questions: Human Resources

1. Diagram the sequence of a typical selection process.

-Selection is the process of choosing individuals with qualifications needed to fill jobs in an organization. Without qualified employees, an organization is less likely to succeed. (Hire hard; manage easy. Good training will not make up for bad selection.).

-Employment Functions in any organizations:

Receiving Applications

Interviewing Applicants

Administering tests to applicants

Conducting background investigations

Arranging for physical examinations

Placing and assigning new employees

Coordinating follow up of these employees

Conducting exit interviews with departing employee

Maintaining appropriate records and reports.

-The ultimate purpose of selection is placement (fitting a person to the job).

-Person-job fit: matching the knowledge, skills and abilities (KSAs) of people to the characteristics of jobs (tasks, duties, responsibilities-TDRs).

Benefits: Higher employee performance,

Low turnover and absenteeism

This matching affects training and operating costs

- Person-organization fit: congruence between individuals and organizational factors.

- KSA’s=TDRs=Job Success?

IDENTIFY 3 TYPES OF SELECTION TESTS AND LEGAL CONCERNS ABOUT THEIR USES.

-Examples of test: Literacy, skills, psychological measurement, honesty tests are the major category.

Selection Tests:

Ability: Cognitive ability test: measures an individual’s thinking, memory, reasoning, verbal and mathematical skills. When testing this ensure that the abilities are job related. General mental ability has been found to be a good job predictor of performance. These tests cost less than personality tests and are highly reliable, however, certain racial minorities score one full standard deviation below non-minorities- which can lead to an adverse impact.

Physical ability test: measures an individual’s ability such as strength, endurance and muscular movement. Care should be taken to limit physical ability testing until after a conditional job offer is made in order to avoid violating the provisions of the American Disability Act (ADA).

Personality test: (Myers Briggs, Big 5, MMPI) Personality tests can be useful in identifying interpersonal traits needed in jobs and can reveal information about abilities and interests, however, intrusive questions lack validity and need to be used with other selection methods. Faking is a major concern with employers. The test must be job related and valid, do not discriminate against protected class members. Several court cases have ruled that the personality tests are illegally discriminatory and violate the ADA

Honesty /Integrity tests: Standardized honesty/integrity tests or polygraphs. These may be valid as a broad screening device for an organization. These tests can be faked and can have negative impacts for the applicant. Some questions can be constituted as an invasion of individual privacy. For the polygraph test, Congress passed the Employee Polygraph Protection Act, which prohibits employer to use the polygraph as a pre-employment screening mechanism. Federal, state, local government, and certain private sector employers such as security and pharmaceuticals are exempt from the law. The polygraph cannot be used for internal investigations of thefts and losses and the employee should be allowed to end the test at anytime.

Slide

-Compliance with EEO and ADA laws and regulations

-Job related

Proper use of tests in Selection:

Use for additional information, not disqualification;

Negative reactions by test takers to certain tests;

Cost of testing versus “bad hires”

DISCUSS SEVERAL TYPES OF SELECTION INTERVIEWS AND SOME KEY CONSIDERATIONS IN CONDUCTING THESE INTERVIEWS

1) Behavioral: interview in which applicants give specific examples of how they have performed a certain task or handled a problem in the past. It is believed that past behaviors are good predictors of future actions provides the logic behind these type of interviews.

2) Competency: similar to behavior, except that the questions are designed specifically to provide the interviewer with something to measure the applicant’s response againstвЂ"competency profile for the position to do a particular job. Developing behavioral and competency questions are time consuming and may only identify a candidate that is articulated and creates positive impressions.

3) Situational: structured interview composed of questions about how applicants might handle specific job situations. Interview questions are based on job analysis and checked by experts so they will be content valid. Job experts can rate the responses to the question inorder to facilitate ranking of candidates. This type of interview can be predict performance equally well as behavioral interviews.

4) Non-directive: (nonstructured) Interview that uses questions developed from the answers to previous questions. Difficulties include keeping the conversation job related and obtaining comparable data set on various applicants; combination of general and specific questions are asked in no set order and different questions for different applicants. Comparing candidates and ranking are more subjective and open to legal challenges in this format.

5) Stress: designed to create anxiety and put pressure on applicants to see how they respond. Used for jobs that have high degree of stress; (air traffic controllers,

customer complaint areas). High risk for employers because it can generate a poor image of the