Terranova Consulting Group

Recruiting is a topic of particular interest today as a result of two converging realities. One is the tight labor market that is the obvious result of the lowest unemployment rate this country has seen in 25 years. The other reality is the set of factors that make up the changing nature of work, which include changes to the economy, organizations, jobs, and the workforce. The tight labor market is simply making recruiting harder—more employers competing for fewer employees, at a time when the economy is strong and many businesses are growing. Changes are making recruiting more complicated—the organizations and jobs into which people are being recruited are moving targets, and the workforce is increasingly underskilled for the jobs available. In this column I discuss the ways in which the changing nature of work is affecting recruiting, review strategies that some organizations are using in response to these realities, and explore the contributions I-O psychologists can make to the practice of recruiting.

The recruiting process is essentially a vehicle for two-way information exchange regarding the future match between an individual and an organization. Both the individual and the organization are presenting their best "faces," and both are trying to learn as much about the other as possible. Many aspects of this information exchange are affected by the rapid changes occurring within organizations: (a) new job requirements are associated with restructured, streamlined organizations that require people to wear more hats, work in teams, learn more quickly, and change direction on a dime, (b) new organizational profiles result from corporate-wide alliances, partnerships, and mergers, and (c) recent technological advances have created a level of complexity and sophistication in work that is beyond the technical training and/or capability of many recruiters.

Changes occurring in the workforce are adding complexity to the recruiting process as well. Employees are moving from company to company more quickly, the so-called "generation X workers" are looking for opportunities to have a better work-life balance than the previous generation, and the widening gap between the skills of new entrants to the workforce and job requirements makes matching people to jobs more difficult.

• Offer a referral bonus to employees who refer successful candidates
• Offer a signing bonus to employees accepting hard-to-fill positions
• Make sure the compensation package offered is competitive

In addition to the strategies listed above, the participants in the BAAP session discussed the importance of selecting employees carefully and avoiding the temptation to just fill the job (the "warm-body syndrome"). There also seems to be a category of current recruiting strategies that I’ll call "desperate measures," that includes more unusual measures such as making large cash payments to candidates.

There are a number of areas in which our training and practice as I-O psychologists can make us significant contributors to the quality and effectiveness of recruiting. Although much of our work is related at least indirectly to recruiting, I will highlight those that are most directly related.

Conducting job or work analysis. At the heart of most recruiting efforts is the match between a person and a job (or set of responsibilities in a jobless organization). I-O psychologists have the knowledge and skills to analyze jobs and determine the appropriate job requirements. Given the rapid pace of change in organizations, understanding what it will take to succeed in a job is a critical piece of building organizational effectiveness.

Conducting organizational analysis. In addition to the person-job match is the match between a potential employee and the organization itself. With job assignments changing rapidly, some organizations consider "fit" with the organization to be as (if not more) important than fit with the job. Organizational analysis can determine the job requirements associated with successful membership in an organization. In addition, organizational analysis can serve the purpose of identifying areas in which a company can improve its working conditions, management practice, and/or work/life balance options.

Measuring job requirements. One of the cornerstones of I-O practice is selection and assessment. To the extent that recruiting involves assessing candidates’ potential for a particular job or organization, we can contribute our expertise in this area. At a minimum, we can help identify and/or develop the tools through which to measure the requisite KSAs, train recruiters in the use of these tools, and guide the interpretation of results.

Developing compensation practices. Compensation issues are central to many recruiting decisions today. Our skills in developing job evaluation systems and conducting job evaluation are critical to informing decisions about how to pay new employees in this time of intense competition for qualified candidates. Our ability to advise on compensation philosophy can help organizations make systemic rather than individual decisions.