Assignment task:
Instructions: Respond to a colleague's post. Suggest additional or different assessments your colleagues should consider for candidate selection based on the KSAs that were provided. Need Assignment Help?
Monique Lascelles
Recruitment and Retention Strategies in Practice: A Reflection from the Financial Services Sector
I am unfamiliar with the recruitment process at my current financial services organization; however, based on my observations and experience, entry-level client service positions typically follow a multi-step approach. This includes online job advertisements, a standardized pre-employment assessment, and structured behavioral interviews. Job postings are generally placed on job sites like LinkedIn, the company's careers page, and industry-specific job boards. I have seen that a job knowledge test and a short problem-solving exercise are used to screen applicants, followed by interviews that assess core competencies such as attention to detail, communication skills, and adaptability.
Aamodt (2016) states that making hiring decisions with the help of job tests and formal interviews increases accuracy. Based on my experience, doing so ensures the selected employees possess the minimum knowledge, skills, and abilities to perform well after training. Retaining employees, however, is hard, particularly in the first 12 to 18 months on the job.
Ensuring Capability and Likelihood to Stay
The company provides simple onboarding and job preview programs that inform individuals about what to anticipate. Little effort is made to retain employees during the hiring process. Allen and Vardaman (2017) add that belonging to the company's culture, opportunities for long-term development, and matching individual objectives are significant in preventing employees from diverse backgrounds from leaving the company. These aspects are usually overlooked for education and skill.
The company has a general training process that might not be suited to new hires' various learning requirements and work objectives. Evidence indicates that improved onboarding experiences and mentorship programs can engage new employees earlier and retain them longer (Al-Emadi, Schwabenland & Qi Wei, 2015).
Factors Influencing Retention and Recommendations
There are numerous reasons for high turnover among entry-level positions in my organization:
- Its employees typically believe there is no definite path to advance from an entry-level position.
- Emotional labour and fatigue: It is hard work working with customers sometimes, particularly with difficult ones or where the rules are complicated.
- Inadequate feedback: New hires may not feel heard or supported if feedback is insufficient or comes from the bosses.
To improve retention, I would recommend implementing the following changes:
1. Career Development Plans should include specific goals and timeframes for promotions in your profession to decrease ambiguity and support self-motivation.
2. Cultural Fit Assessments: Values alignment and motivational drivers are assessed during recruitment to predict better long-term engagement (Li & Song, 2018).
3. Retention Interviews: Get together frequently during the first year to catch and solve problems early before losing interest.
4. Personal Onboarding and Mentoring: Pair new employees with existing workers to assist them in settling in and becoming comfortable faster.
In summary, my organization has a proper method of selecting talented candidates, but requires improved hiring processes to retain employees. Meyers and Paauwe (2018) write that good talent management requires bridging the hiring and training activities to the organization's future objectives and the employees' goals.
References:
Aamodt, M. G. (2016). Industrial/organizational psychology: An applied approach (8th ed.). Cengage Learning.
Allen, D. G., & Vardaman, J. M. (2017). Recruitment and retention across cultures. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 4, 153-181.
Al-Emadi, A. A. Q., Schwabenland, C., & Qi Wei. (2015). The vital role of employee retention in human resource management: A literature review. IUP Journal of Organizational Behavior, 14(3), 7-32.
Li, X., & Song, Z. (2018). Recruitment, job search, and job choice: An integrated literature review. In D. S. Ones, N. Anderson, C. Viswesvaran, & H. K. Sinangil (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of industrial, work, and organizational psychology (2nd ed., Vol. 1, pp. 489-507). Sage Publications, Ltd.
Meyers, M., & Paauwe, J. (2018). Talent management. In D. S. Ones, N. Anderson, C. Viswesvaran, & H. K. Sinangil (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of industrial, work, and organizational psychology (2nd ed., Vol. 3, pp. 517-544). Sage Publications