MGT 2010 Chapter 9

Qualified applicants for jobs may be

recruited from inside or outside the organization. The task of choosing the best person is enhanced by such tools as reviewing candidates' application forms, resumes, and refer- ences; doing interviews, either structured or unstructured; and screening with ability, personality, perfor- mance, and other kinds of employment tests.

Bullying

repeated mistreatment of one or more persons by one or more perpetrators -Abusive physical, psychological, verbal, or nonverbal behavior that is threatening, humiliating, or intimidating

Human resource inventory

report listing your organization's employees by name, education, training, languages, and other important information

Disparate treatment

results when employees from protected groups are intentionally treated differently

The reason for this exceptional treatment?

"Happy people are more productive," says former CEO Eric Schmidt.14 That productivity has made Google an earnings powerhouse; in 2013, for example, it reported a 22% growth in revenue and 28% prof- its.15 Google has discovered, in other words, that its biggest competitive advantage lies in its human resources—its people.

Human Capital: Potential of Employee Knowledge & Actions

"We are liv- ing in a time," says one team of human resource management authors, "when a new economic paradigm—characterized by speed, innovation, short cycle times, quality, and customer satisfaction—is highlighting the importance of intangible assets, such as brand recognition, knowledge, innovation, and particularly human capital."20 Human capital is the economic or productive potential of employee knowledge, experience, and actions.21 Thinking about people as human capital has an obvious basis: "Attracting, retain- ing, and developing great people is sometimes the only way our organizations can keep up with the competition across the street or around the globe," says Susan Meisinger, president and CEO of the Society for Human Resource Management. "Research has shown that highly educated, knowledgeable workers—the most in demand—are the hardest to find and easiest to lose."22

Benefits

-AKA fringe benefits -Additional nonmonetary forms of compensation

Three types of selection tools

-Background information -Interviewing -Employment tests

Sexual harassment

-Consists of unwanted sexual attention that creates an adverse work environment -Quid pro quo harassment, hostile environment

Three concepts important to HR management

-Human capital -Knowledge workers -Social capital

Four areas of legal requirements of HR

-Labor relations -Compensation and benefits -Health and safety -Equal employment opportunity

Employment tests

-Legally considered to consist of any procedures used in the employment selection decision process, even applications forms, interviews, and educational requirements -Ability, performance, personality, integrity

Workplace discrimination

-Occurs when people are hired or promoted/denied hiring or promotion for reasons not relevant to the job -Adverse impact, disparate treatment

Recruiting

-Process of locating and attracting qualified applicants for jobs open in the organization -Internal and external

Three concepts covered by EEO laws

-Workplace discrimination -Affirmative action -Sexual harassment

Workplace Discrimination

A large gap exists in perceptions between the sexes as to whether men or women have more opportunities for advancement. In a survey of 1,834 business professionals worldwide, 66% of men said opportunities to move to top management were gender neutral, compared with 30% of women who stated that.151(In actuality, only 4.9% of CEOs are women at the 1,000 biggest U.S. companies, and of the 200 highest-paid chief executives in the United States, only 11—just 5.5%—are women.152) Workplace discrimination occurs when people are hired or promoted—or denied hir- ing or promotion—for reasons not relevant to the job, such as skin color or eye shape, gender, religion, national origin, and the like. Two fine points to be made here are that (1) although the law prohibits discrimination in all aspects of employment, it does not require an employer to extend preferential treatment because of race, color, religion, and so on; and (2) employment decisions must be made on the basis of job-related criteria. In other words, the gap widens in higher-paying occupations such as business, medicine, and law.154)

Realistic Job Previews

A realistic job preview (RJP) gives a candidate a picture of both positive and negative features of the job and the organization before he or she is hired. This recruiting technique is very effective at reducing turnover within 30-90 days of employment. Many organizations, such as AT&T, Hilton, the Idaho State Police, and Assess Systems, reduced turnover and enhanced employee satisfaction by using RJPs.

Ability Tests

Ability tests measure physical abilities, strength and stamina, me- chanical ability, mental abilities, and clerical abilities. Telephone operators, for in- stance, need to be tested for hearing, and assembly-line workers for manual dexterity. Intelligence tests are also catching on as ways to predict future executive perfor- mance.79 The military tests for physical qualifications, along with behavioral and edu- cational abilities (71% of 17- to 24-year-olds don't qualify for military service, a surprisingly high figure).80 Corporate-event company Windy City Fieldhouse uses a test that measures attention to detail, asking takers to do such things as "do a count of the letter 'l' in a three-sentence paragraph to measure how carefully a respondent works," according to one account.

There are two types of workplace discrimination:

Adverse impact and Disparate treatment:

Adverse Impact

Adverse impact occurs when an organization uses an em- ployment practice or procedure that results in unfavorable outcomes to a pro- tected class (such as Hispanics) over another group of people (such as non-Hispanic whites). For example, requiring workers to have a college degree can inadvertently create adverse impact against Hispanics because fewer His- panics graduate from college than whites. This example would not be a prob- lem, however, if a college degree was required to perform the job.

Affirmative Action

Affirmative action focuses on achieving equality of opportunity within an organization.It tries to make up for past discrimination in employment by actively finding, hiring, and developing the talents of people from groups traditionally discriminated against. Steps include active recruitment, elimination of prejudi- cial questions in interviews, and establishment of minor- ity hiring goals. It's important to note that EEO laws do not allow use of hiring quotas.155 Affirmative action has created tremendous opportunities for women and minorities, but it has been resisted more by some white males who see it as working against their interests.156 Affirmative action plans are more successful when employees view them as being fair and equitable and when whites are not prejudiced against people of color.157 In addition, research shows that women and minorities hired on the basis of affirmative action felt stigmatized as unqualified and incompetent and experienced lower job satisfaction and more stress than employees supposedly selected on the basis of merit.158

Wages or Salaries

Base pay consists of the basic wage or salary paid employees in exchange for doing their jobs. The basic compensation is determined by all kinds of economic factors: the prevailing pay levels in a particular industry and location, what competitors are pay- ing, whether the jobs are unionized, if the jobs are hazardous, what the individual's level is in the organization, and how much experience he or she has.

1. Background Information: Application Forms, Resumes, & Reference Checks

Application forms and resumes provide basic background information about job applicants, such as citizenship, education, work history, and certifications. Unfortunately, a lot of resume information consists of mild puffery and even outra- geous fairy tales—as many as 35% of resumes, by one estimate.36 InfoLink Screening Services, which does background checks, reported that 14% of the tens of thousands of applicants it had screened had lied about their education.37 Vermont-based ResumeDoctor.com, a resume-writing service, surveyed 1,133 resumes that had been uploaded to its site and found that nearly 42.7% had at least one inaccuracy and 12.6% had two or more factual errors.38 And Background Information Services, a preemploy- ment screening company in Cleveland, found 56% of resumes contained falsehoods of some kind.39 It is risky to lie about your background information because it can be used as a reason for terminating your employment. Many companies are finding conventional resumes not all that useful (because they don't quantify an applicant's accomplishments or are too full of fluff descriptors such as "out- standing" or "energetic") and are increasingly relying on social networks such as LinkedIn, video profiles, or online quizzes to assess candidates.50 Other firms are so inundated with resumes that they now have to use resume-filtering software, causing applicants to learn to game the system by loading their resumes with keywords from the job description.51 Some applicants try "stunt resumes," such as those delivered by a stuffed carrier pigeon.52 References are also a problem. Many employers don't give honest assessments of former employees, for two reasons: (1) They fear that if they say anything negative, they can be sued by the former employee. (2) They fear if they say anything positive, and the job candidate doesn't pan out, they can be sued by the new employer.53 Despite liability worries, HR recruiters know that if they get a former supervisor on the phone, they can find out a lot—such as the way he or she answers the question, "Can you enthusiastically recommend this person?" or "What were this person's strengths and weaknesses?"54 Many employers also like to check applicants' credit references, although there is no evidence that people with weak credit scores are apt to be unqualified or dishonest employees.55 (Note: Prospective employers need to get written consent to run credit checks on job applicants.56)

Benefits

Benefits, or fringe benefits, are additional nonmonetary forms of compen- sation designed to enrich the lives of all employees in the organization, which are paid all or in part by the organization. We discuss benefits in more detail in Chapter 12, but examples are many: health insurance, dental insurance, life insurance, disability protection, retirement plans, holidays off, accumulated sick days and vacation days, recreation options, country club or health club memberships, family leave, discounts on company mer- chandise, counseling, credit unions, legal advice, and education reimburse- ment. For top executives, there may be "golden parachutes," generous severance pay for those who might be let go in the event the company is taken over by another company. Benefits are no small part of an organization's costs. In March 2014, private industry spent an average of $31.93 per hour worked in employment compensation, of which wages and salaries accounted for 69.9% and benefits for the remaining 30.1%.

Stock Options

Companies like to offer favored employees stock options rather than higher salaries as benefits. Not only do employees place a high value on options, but companies can issue as many as they want without hurting corporate profits because, under present accounting rules, they don't have to count the options' value as an expense. However, some critics believe that making stock options a big part of CEO compensation does not spur better performance. When the stock is up, the CEO benefits. When the stock is down, he or she doesn't really lose money but rather just makes less money.

Strategic human resource planning

Consists of developing a systematic, comprehensive strategy for -Understanding current employee needs -Predicting future employee needs

Soft Skills & Social Graces: Boosting Your Advantage in the Hiring World

Dress for Success Going Forward with Fork & Knife Avoiding Bad Tech Habits Watching What You Do on Social Media—Today

Disparate Treatment

Disparate treatment results when employees from pro- tected groups (such as disabled individuals) are intentionally treated differently.An example would be making a decision to give all international assignments to people with no disabilities because of the assumption that they won't need any special accommodations related to travel.

Selection: How to Choose the Best Person for the Job

Essentially this becomes an exercise in prediction: How well will the can- didate perform the job and how long will he or she stay? Three types of selection tools are background information, interviewing, andemployment tests.

2. External Recruiting: Hiring from the Outside

External recruiting means attracting job applicants from outside the organization. In years past, notices of job vacancies were placed through newspapers, employment agencies, executive recruit- ing firms, union hiring halls, college job-placement offices, and word of mouth. Today more and more companies are using social media to recruit.30 For example, experts estimate that 89% of U.S. organizations use social networks to recruit. LinkedIn, a social network with more than 259 million members in over 200 countries, accounts for 94% of the people hired via social media, followed by Facebook and Twitter.31 In one survey of 3,500 U.S. college students, 80% said they use smartphones for job hunting or see themselves doing so in the future.32 Both methods have advantages and disadvantages.

In different organizations one part may take on more importance than another.

For in- stance, in some nonprofit organizations (education, government), salaries may not be large, but health and retirement benefits may outweigh that fact. In a high-technology start-up, the salary and benefits may actually be somewhat humble, but the promise of a large payoff in incentives, such as stock options or bonuses, may be quite attractive. Let's consider these three parts briefly.

3. Health & Safety

From miners risking tunnel cave-ins to cotton mill workers breathing lint, industry has always had dirty, dangerous jobs. Beginning with the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) of 1970, a body of law has grown that requires organizations to provide employees with nonhazardous working conditions. Later laws extended health cover- age, including 2010 health care reform legislation, which requires companies with more than 50 employees to provide health insurance.148

Structured Interview Type 2: The Behavioral-Description Interview

In the second type of structured interview, the behavioral-description interview, the inter- viewer explores what applicants have actually done in the past. Example: "What was the best idea you ever sold to a supervisor, teacher, peer, or subordinate?" This ques- tion (asked by the U.S. Army of college students applying for its officer training pro- gram) is designed to assess the applicant's ability to influence others.

Integrity Tests

Integrity tests assess attitudes and experiences related to a per- son's honesty, dependability, trustworthiness, reliability, and prosocial behavior.94The tests are designed to identify people likely to engage in inappropriate, antiso- cial, or dishonest workplace behavior. Typically, integrity tests ask direct questions about past experiences related to ethics and integrity. You might be asked, for ex- ample, "What is the most you have ever stolen? (a) $0; (b) $1-$200; (c) $201- $500; (d) more than $500." Or interviewers may ask questions about preferences and interests from which inferences may be drawn about future behavior—so-called covert tests, where the answers give a sense of the person's conscientiousness, emo- tional maturity, and so on.95

1. Internal Recruiting: Hiring from the Inside

Internal recruiting means mak- ing people already employed by the organization aware of job openings. Indeed, most vacant positions in organizations are filled through internal recruitment, mainly through job posting, placing information about job vacancies and qualifications on bul- letin boards, in newsletters, and on the organization's intranet. (Companies looking to make strategic changes do better hiring CEOs from within the ranks rather than from outside, according to a recent study.29)

Which External Recruiting Methods Work Best?

In general, the most effec- tive sources are employee referrals, say human resource professionals, because, to protect their own reputations, employees are fairly careful about whom they recom- mend, and they know the qualifications of both the job and the prospective employee.33Other effective ways of finding good job candidates are e-recruitment tools, such as "dot-jobs" websites; membership directories for associations and trade groups; social networking sites; and industry-specific blogs, forums, and newsgroups.34 Netflix makes a point of "hiring, rewarding, and tolerating only fully formed adults"—people who will put the company's interests first.35

3. Employment Tests: Ability, Personality, Performance, Integrity, & Others

It used to be that employment selection tests consisted of paper-and- pencil, performance, and physical-ability tests. Now, however, employment testsare legally considered to consist of any procedure used in the employment selection decision process, even application forms, interviews, and educational require- ments.77 Indeed, today applicants should expect just about anything, such as spending hours on simulated work tasks, performing role-playing exercises, or tackling a business case study.78 Probably the most common employment tests are the ability testes, performance tests, and personality tests, integrity tests

Predicting Future Employee Needs

Job descriptions change, of course: Auto mechanics, for instance, now have to know how computer chips work in cars. (Current 7-Series BMWs and S-class Mercedes have about 100 processors apiece.) And new jobs are created: Who could have visualized the position of "e-commerce accountant" 10 years ago, for example? As you might expect, predicting future employee needs means you have to become knowledgeable about the staffing the organization might need and the likely sources for that staffing: The staffing the organization might need. You could assume your organiza- tion won't change much. In that case, you can fairly easily predict that jobs will periodically become unoccupied (because of retirement, resignations, and so on) and that you'll need to pay the same salaries and meet the same criteria about minority hiring to fill them. Better, however, to assume the organization will change. Thus, you need to understand the organization's vision and strategic plan so that the proper peo- ple can be hired to meet the future strategies and work. We discussed strategic plans in Chapter 6. The likely sources for staffing. You can recruit employees from ei- ther inside or outside the organization. In looking at those inside, you need to consider which employees are motivated, trainable, and pro- motable and what kind of training your organization might have to do. A device for organizing this kind of information is a human resource inventory, a report listing your organization's employees by name, education, training, languages, and other important information. In looking outside, you need to consider the availability of talent in your industry's and geographical area's labor pool, the training of people graduating from various schools, and such factors as what kind of people are moving into your area. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and the U.S. Census Bureau issue reports on such matters. ●

Knowledge Workers: Potential of Brain Workers

Knowledge workers add value to the organization by using their brains rather than their muscle and sweat, and as such they are the most common type of worker in 21st-century organizations. Because of globalization and information technology, the United States no longer has an advantage in knowledge workers. Indeed, because of the advancement of China, India, Russia, and Brazil; the offshoring of sophisticated jobs; the decrease in math and science skills among today's younger Americans; and other factors, the United States may be in danger of slipping behind.23

Unstructured Interview

Like an ordinary conversation, an unstructured interview involves asking probing questions to find out what the applicant is like. There is no fixed set of questions asked of all applicants and no systematic scoring proce- dure. As a result, the unstructured interview has been criticized as being overly subjec- tive and apt to be influenced by the biases of the interviewer. Equally important, it is susceptible to legal attack because some questions may infringe on non-job-related matters such as privacy, diversity, or disability.72 However, compared with the struc- tured interview method, the unstructured interview has been found to provide a more accurate assessment of an applicant's job-related personality traits.7

Performance Tests

Performance tests or skills tests measure performance on actual job tasks—so-called job tryouts—as when computer programmers take a test on a particular programming language such as C++ or middle managers work on a small project.82 Some companies have an assessment center, in which man- agement candidates participate in activities for a few days while being assessed by evaluators.83

Personality Tests

Personality tests measure such personality traits as adjustment, energy, sociability, independence, and need for achievement. Career-assessment tests that help workers identify suitable jobs tend to be of this type.84 One of the most fa- mous personality tests, in existence for 65-plus years, is the 93-question Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, with about 2.5 million tests given each year throughout the world. Myers-Briggs endures, observers say, "because it does a good job of pointing up dif- ferences between people, offers individuals a revealing glimpse of themselves, and is a valuable asset in team-building, improving communication, and resolving personality- conflict."85 However, this and other personality tests need to be interpreted with caution because of the difficulty of measuring personality characteristics and of making a legal defense if the results are challenged.86

How do you feel about the job you are in now, if you have one, or the last job you had? Do you feel like you are a "good fit" for the job? That is, do you like the work and does the work match your skills?

Research shows that we are happier and more productive when our needs and skills fit the job requirements. If you would like to see whether or not you fit with your current (or last) job, complete Self-Assessment 9.2. You may find the results very interesting.

sexual harassment

Sexual harassment consists of unwanted sexual attention that creates an adverse work environment. This means obscene gestures, sex- stereotyped jokes, sexually oriented posters and graffiti, suggestive remarks, unwanted dating pressure, physical nonsexual contact, unwanted touching, sexual propositions, threatening punishment unless sexual favors are given, obscene phone calls, and simi- lar verbal or physical actions of a sexual nature.159 The harassment may be by a mem- ber of the opposite sex or a member of the same sex, by a manager, by a coworker, or by an outsider.160 If the harasser is a manager or an agent of the organization, the orga- nization itself can be sued, even if it had no knowledge of the situation.161

Five keys to a successful incentive-pay plan are the following:1

Simplicity. Does the plan pass the simplicity test? Can you explain it on an elevator ride? Clear goals. Are the goals clear? Are the goals fully supported by management? Realistic goals. Are the goals realistic—that is, neither too difficult nor too easy to achieve? Consistency with present goals. Is the plan in line with the organization's present goals? Company goals change. Few organizations have the same business objective for more than five to seven years. Regular communication. Do managers regularly communicate with employees about the plan? People want a scorecard.

Social Capital: Potential of Strong & Cooperative Relationships

Social capital is the economic or productive potential of strong, trusting, and cooperative relationships. Among aspects of social capital are goodwill, mutual respect, coopera- tion, trust, and teamwork. Relationships within a company are important: In one survey, 77% of the women and 63% of the men rated "good relationship with boss" extremely important, outranking such matters as good equipment, easy commute, and flexible hours.24 That relationships matter is shown by the brothers running family-owned J. M. Smucker, who follow a simple code of conduct set forth by their father: "Listen with your full attention, look for the good in others, have a sense of humor, and say thank you for a job well done."25 (The company's voluntary employee turnover rate is a mere 5.5%.)

Recruitment: How to Attract Qualified Applicants

The word qualified is important: You want to find people whose skills, abilities, and characteristics are best suited to your organization. Recruit- ing is of two types: internal and external.

Human Resources as Part of Strategic Planning

Some companies—those with flat management structures, for instance—have done away with HR departments entirely, letting the regular line managers handle these tasks. But most workers say they feel the absence of an in-house HR staff, especially when it comes to resolving pay problems and mediating employee disputes.So what should organizations do in regard to investing in human resources? Based on research findings, we come down on the side that people are an organization's most important asset and it's important to invest in human resources. All told, studies show that companies have higher levels of employee satisfaction, financial performance, and service performance when the com- pany has high-quality human resource practices and programs.18 At many companies, human resources has become part of the strategic planning process. Thus, HR depart- ments deal not only with employee paperwork and legal accountability—a very important area, as we describe in Section 9.7—but also with helping to support the organization's overall strategy. Example: Is it important, as Wegmans's owners think, to have loyal, innovative, smart, passionate employees who will give their best to promote customer satisfaction (the grocery chain's mission)? Who, then, should be recruited? How should they be trained? What's the best way to evaluate and reward their performance? The answers to these questions should be consistent with the firm's strategic mission. The purpose of the strategic human resource process, then—shown in the yellow- orange shaded boxes at right—is to get the optimal work performance that will help the company's mission and goals.

2. Compensation & Benefits

The Social Security Act in 1935 established the U.S. retirement system. The passage of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 established minimum living standards for workers engaged in interstate commerce, including provision of a federal minimum wage (currently $7.25 an hour; several states have higher minimums) and a maximum workweek (now 40 hours, after which overtime must be paid), along with banning products from child labor.147 Salaried executive, administrative, and professional em- ployees are exempt from overtime rules.

1. Labor Relations

The earliest laws affecting employee welfare had to do with unions, and they can still have important effects. Legislation passed in 1935 (the Wagner Act) resulted in theNational Labor Relations Board, which enforces procedures whereby employees may vote to have a union and for collective bargaining. Collective bargaining consists of negotiations between management and employees about disputes over compensation, benefits, working conditions, and job security. A 1947 law (the Taft-Hartley Act) allows the president of the United States to pre- vent or end a strike that threatens national security. (We discuss labor-management issues further in Section 9.8.)

4. Equal Employment Opportunity

The effort to reduce discrimination in employment based on racial, ethnic, and reli- gious bigotry and gender stereotypes began with Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This established the Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Commission, whose job it is to enforce antidiscrimination and other employment-related laws. Title VII ap- plies to all organizations or their agents engaged in an industry affecting interstate commerce that employs 15 or more employees. Contractors who wish to do business with the U.S. government (such as most colleges and universities, which receive fed- eral funds) must be in compliance with various executive orders issued by the presi- dent covering antidiscrimination. Later laws prevented discrimination against older workers and people with physical and mental disabilities.149

2. Interviewing: Unstructured, Situational, & Behavioral-Description

The interview, which is the most commonly used employee-selection technique, may take place face to face, by videoconference, or—as is increasingly the case—via the Internet. (In-depth phone interviews of an hour or more may be on the rise, perhaps for cost reasons.69 However, face-to-face interviews have been perceived as being more fair and leading to higher job acceptance intentions than videoconferencing and tele- phone interviews.70) To help eliminate bias, interviews can be designed, conducted, and evaluated by a committee of three or more people. The most commonly used employee-selection technique, interviewing, takes three forms: unstructured interviewsand two types of structured interviews.71

Other tests

The list of employment testing techniques has grown to include—in appropriate cases—drug testing, polygraph (lie detectors), genetic screening, and even (a questionable technique) handwriting analysis.96 Human resource professionals need to be aware, incidentally, that there are a variety of products available on the Internet to help employees beat many kinds of drug tests.97 Recently, however, the hair test (of hair follicles) has begun to find favor, since it's said to be able to detect a pattern of repetitive drug use over a period of up to 90 days.98

Structured Interview Type 1: The Situational Interview

The structured interview involves asking each applicant the same questions and comparing their re- sponses to a standardized set of answers. In one type of structured interview, the situational interview, the interviewer fo- cuses on hypothetical situations. Example: "What would you do if you saw two of your people arguing loudly in the work area?" The idea here is to find out if the ap- plicant can handle difficult situations that may arise on the job.

Two Types of Sexual Harassment

There are two types of sexual harassment, both of which violate Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. In the quid pro quo harass- ment type, the person to whom the unwanted sexual attention is directed is put in the posi- tion of jeopardizing being hired for a job or obtaining job benefits or opportunities unless he or she implicitly or explicitly acquiesces. More typical is the hostile environment type, in which the person being sexually harassed doesn't risk economic harm but experiences an offensive or intimidating work environment. According to one survey, 38% of women said they heard sexual innuendo, wisecracks, or taunts at the office.

Compensation

Three parts -Wages or salaries -Incentives -Benefits

Incentives

To induce employees to be more productive or to attract and retain top performers, many organizations offer incentives, such as commissions, bonuses, profit-sharing plans, and stock options.

Understanding Current Employee Needs

To plan for the future, you must understand the present—what today's staffing picture looks like. This requires that you (or a trained specialist) first do a job analysis and from that write a job description and a job specification.26 Job analysis. The purpose of job analysis is to determine, by observation and analysis, the basic elements of a job. Specialists who do this interview job oc- cupants about what they do, observe the flow of work, and learn how results are accomplished. For example, FedEx has specialists who ride with the cou- riers and time how long it takes to deliver a load of packages and note what problems are encountered (traffic jams, vicious dogs, recipients not home, and so on). Job description and job specification. Once the fundamentals of a job are understood, then you can write a job description, which summarizes what the holder of the job does and how and why he or she does it. Next you can write a job specification, which describes the minimum qualifications a person must have to perform the job successfully. This process can produce some surprises. Jobs that might seem to require a college degree, for example, might not after all. Thus, the process of writing job analyses, descriptions, and specifications can help you avoid hiring people who are overqualified (and presumably more expensive) or under- qualified (and thus not as productive) for a particular job. In addition, by entering a job description and specification with their attendant charac- teristics into a database, an organization can do computer searching for candidates by match- ing keywords (nouns) on their resumes with the keywords describing the job. A position in desktop publishing, for instance, might be de- scribed by the kinds of software programs with which applicants should be familiar: Adobe PageMaker, Adobe InDesign, QuarkXPress, Adobe FrameMaker, and Corel Ventura.

Human Resource Management: Managing an Organization's Most Important Resource

Whether it's McKenzie looking for entry-level business consultants, the U.S. Navy trying to fill its ranks, or churches trying to recruit priests and ministers, all organizations must deal with staffing. The fact that the old personnel department is now called the human resources depart- ment is not just a cosmetic change. It is intended to suggest the importance of staffing to a company's success. Although talking about people as "resources" might seem to downgrade them to the same level as financial resources and material resources, in fact, people are an organization's most important resource.

Reliability & Validity: Are the Tests Worth It?

With any kind of test, an important legal consideration is the test's reliability—the degree to which a test measures the same thing consistently—so that an individual's score remains about the same over time, assuming the characteristics being measured also remain the same. Another legal consideration is the test's validity—the test measures what it purports to measure and is free of bias. If a test is supposed to predict performance, then the individual's actual performance should reflect his or her score on the test. Using an invalid test to hire people can lead to poor selection decisions. It can also create legal problems if the test is ever challenged in a court of law.

How do you get hired by one of the companies on Fortune magazine's annual "100 Best Companies to Work For" list—companies such as Google, SAS Institute, Boston Consulting Group, Edward Jones, and Quicken Loans,

You try to get to know someone in the company, you play up volunteer work on your resume, you get ready to interview and interview and interview, and you do extensive research on the company (as by talking to customers)

Managers must manage for

compensation—which includes wages or salaries, incentives, and benefits.

Collective bargaining

consists of negotiations between management and employees about disputes over compensation, benefits, working conditions, and job security

Human resource (HR) management

consists of the activities managers perform to plan for, attract, develop, and retain an effective workforce

Base pay

consists of the basic wage or salary paid to employees in exchange for doing their jobs

Job specification

describes the minimum qualifications a person must have to perform the job successfully

Human capital

economic or productive potential of employee knowledge, experience, and actions

Social capital

economic or productive potential of strong, trusting, and cooperative relationships

National Labor Relations Board

enforces procedures whereby employees may vote to have a union and for collective bargaining

Whatever your organization's human resource strategy, in the United States (and in U.S. divisions overseas) it has to operate within the

environment of American law. Four areas you need to be aware of are as follows.

Fair Labor Standards Act

established minimum living standards for workers engaged in interstate commerce, including provision of a federal minimum wage

Affirmative action

focuses on achieving equality of opportunity within an organization

Realistic job preview (RJP)

gives a candidate a picture of both positive and negative features of the job and the organization before he or she is hired

Three concepts important in this view of human resource management are

human capital, knowledge workers, and social capital.

Behavioral-description interview

interviewer explores what applicants have actually done in the past

Situational interview

interviewer focuses on hypothetical situations

Structured interview

involves asking each applicant the same questions and comparing their responses to a standardized set of answers

Unstructured interview

involves asking probing questions to find out what the applicant is like

Four areas of human resource law any manager needs to be aware of are

labor relations, compensation and benefits, health and safety, and equal employment opportunity.

Internal recruiting

making people already employed by the organization aware of job openings

Assessment center

management candidates participate in activities for a few days while being assessed by evaluators

External recruiting

means attracting job applicants from outside the organization

Performance tests

measure performance on actual job tasks

Ability tests

measure physical abilities, strength and stamina, mechanical ability, mental abilities, and clerical abilities

Adverse impact

occurs when an organization uses an employment practice or procedure that results in unfavorable outcomes to a protected class over another group of people

Three important concepts covered by EEO laws are

orkplace discrimination, affir- mative action, and sexual harassment, which we discuss below. We also consider bul- lying, which is not covered by EEO laws but, as one report says, "could well become the next major battleground in employment law as a growing number of states con- sider legislation that would let workers sue for harassment that causes physical or emotional harm."150

Hostile environment

person being harassed doesn't risk economic harm but experiences an offensive or intimidating work environment

Quid pro quo harassment

person to whom unwanted sexual attention is directed is put in the position of jeopardizing being hired for a job unless he or she gives sexual favors

Job posting

placing information about job vacancies and qualifications on bulletin boards, in newsletters, and on the organization's intranet

Selection process

screening of job applicants to hire the best candidate

Knowledge worker

someone whose occupation is principally concerned with generating or interpreting information, as opposed to manual labor

Job description

summarizes what the holder of the job does and how and why he or she does it

Human resource management consists of

the activities managers perform to plan for, attract, develop, and retain an effective workforce. Planning the human resources needed consists of understanding current em- ployee needs and predicting future employee needs.

Reliability

the degree to which a test measures the same thing consistently

Validity

the test measures what it purports to measure and is free of bias

Job analysis

to determine, by observation and analysis, the basic elements of a job

Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Commission

whose job it is to enforce antidiscrimination and other employment-related laws