Selection is a long process, commencing from the preliminary interview of the applicants and ending with the contract of employment. In practice, the process differs among organizations and between two different jobs within the same company. Selection procedure for senior managers will be long-term and rigorous, but it is simple and short while hire shop-floor workers.
Environmental factors affecting selection:
Selection is influenced by several factors. More prominent among them are supply and demand of specific skills in the labour market, unemployment rate, labour-market conditions, legal and political considerations, company’s image, company’s policy, human resource planning, and cost of hiring. The last three constitute the internal environment and remaining form the external environment of the selection process.
Preliminary interview:
The applications received from the job seekers would be subject to scrutiny so as to eliminate unqualified applicants. This is usually followed by a preliminary interview the purpose of which is more or less the same as scrutiny of applications, that is, elimination of unqualified applications.
Selection Tests:
Job seekers who pass the screening and the preliminary interview are called for tests. Different types of tests may administer, depending on the job and the company. Generally, tests are used to determine the applicant’s ability, aptitude and personality. Ability Tests ( also called achievement tests) assist in determining how well an individual can perform tasks related to the job. An excellent illustration of this is the data entry test given to a prospective employee for a secretarial job. An aptitude test helps determine a person’s potential to learn in a given area. An example of such a test is the General Management Aptitude Test (GMAT) which many business students take prior to gaining admission to a graduate business school program.
Personality Tests are given to measure a prospective employee’s motivation to function in a particular working environment.
There are various tests designed to asses a candidate’s personality. The Bernsenter personality Inventory, for example, measures one’s self sufficiency, neurotic tendency, sociability, introversion and extroversion, locus of control, and self-confidence. The Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) assesses an individual’s achievement and motivational levels. Other personality test, such as California Psychological inventory (CPI), The Thurstone Temperament Survey(TTS), Minnesota Multiphasic Personality(MMPi) etc.
