Recruitment Guide
- Position: Store Associate
- Reports to: Team Leader/Store Manager
- Qualification: High School with at least 6 months experience as a store associate with sales experience.
- Relevant Labor Market: Western Washington, Eastern Washington, Northern Oregon, Southern Oregon
- Timeline: No timeline as requirements are filled as and when the recruitment department receives requisition.
- Additional activities to source well-qualified candidates:
- Advertise in regional newspapers
- Request for employee Referrals
- Continuous posting on Job sites and using their search engines to find out people and call them for interview
- Contact staffing agencies and ask them to send suitable candidates for interviews.
- Budget: No fixed budget as this is an ongoing process of recruitment.
The recruitment process at Tanglewood was decentralized previously. However, with present changes, the organization was moving towards a more centralized method of the recruitment process. Due to the centralization of the recruitment process, the organization will be able to help reap the benefit of nonduplication of effort. Therefore, if a posting on the I company website is to be given of the position it can be done in a centralized form providing an option for the candidates to choose the region they belong to and want to work in. The main targets for the companies should be young and fresh people who have taken up the job of sales.
These people will be more enthusiastic to do the work and will be easier to mold into the work culture. So campus recruitment might be an option. The other recruiting methods which must be used are using job portals which help in sourcing resumes in bulk at a relatively low cost. Sourcing candidates through agencies. This method provides good candidates though the cost is higher. Then the other method that should be employed is employee referrals. This is a method that will help in sourcing good candidates and at a very low cost. These four methods of sourcing are the suggested method of sourcing candidates.
From Appendix B it is evident that the cost of hiring is maximum when candidates are hired through kiosks. In the case of both the regions, the cost of setting up kiosks is highest. Further, the retention is highest among candidates highest who are sourced through referrals and agencies. From the figures in Appendix B it is clear that people who are hired by Southern Oregon, 35 percent are sourced through referrals and agencies while 31 percent are through kiosks. In all the resumes sourced and candidates interviewed through kiosks, only 40 percent are hired, while the hiring rate is 65 percent and 75 percent for referrals and agency respectively. Further, the retention rate for hired people through referrals and agencies is much higher compared to that of people sourced through kiosks. The retention rate for 6 months and 1 year period is higher.
In terms of costs, the cost of hire per candidate comes to $2663.84 in the case of referrals and $3176 for the agency. However, the cost per hire is highest for kiosks at $4073.
Now consider the case of Northern Oregon we see that the methods of sourcing used here are media, kiosk, and agency. Here too the hiring to sourcing rate is highest in case agency, and then media. The rate is the lowest for kiosks.
The retention rate of hired candidates is higher for agencies and then in the case of kiosks and lowest for candidates sourced through media.
In terms of cost per hire, the cost is highest for kiosk sour candidates. But the retention cost of the media sourced candidates become higher. Therefore in this r best methods region, the best method for hiring is agency sourcing.
Employee referrals are one of the most innovative and used methods of sourcing resumes. This method helps companies reduce their cost of recruitment considerably. From Appendix B it was clear that agency sourced candidates are good to hire however, candidates hired through kiosks did not show a high retention rate nor was their cost per hire lower than the other methods of sourcing. So the proposal put forth by the Northern Oregon region should not be considered in the case of kiosks.
Increasing the external hire for other regions will increase their cost of hiring considerably. Therefore increasing the cost of overall recruitment for the other regions. The internal hiring process provides the facility and ease of sourcing candidates. Screening over the telephone and interviews are the only steps to be followed. However, external hiring will call for providing money to the agencies to source candidates. However, the interviewing part cannot be neglected. So in the case of the agency alone, the setup cost will increase by $40,000.
The other considerations in the case of hiring to ensure a better quality of professionals hired and ensure higher service quality can be done only through looking at the qualification of the candidates hired. So candidates who do not qualify for the given recruitment process are to be rejected in the initial resume screening round. To save time and cost, an initial telephonic interview must be set with the candidate to understand the communication skills of the candidate and his/her attitude to entertain strangers. Then on an interview, a thorough understanding of the personality, job fit, and suitability of the candidate are to be judged by the recruiter.
As has been mentioned in the case study “Many new hires without retail work experience do not recognize the importance of positive customer service for sales, and training often does not solve the problem. Several managers noted that they had discharged new hires for providing inappropriate customer service.” This will invariably increase the cost burden of new hires. What is necessary is a thorough screening process for candidates with experience.
For candidates who do not have any previous sales experience, must undergo on-the-job training under an experienced sales associate to understand the intricacies of the organization. Before that, a centralized induction program must be introduced to help t candidates familiarize themselves with the company and its culture. This will help in boosting the performance of the candidates who are not experienced.
A structured, realistic recruiting message for Tanglewood must comprise the following elements:
- The brand logo and the tagline
- A brief description of the company
- Job Description
- Qualification – academic and professional experience
- Location
- Profile of an ideal candidate
If the recruitment format is made in this manner, the understanding of the candidate regarding the company requirements will become clearer. The recruitment policy should follow the given steps:
- Post the requirements on job portals, company websites, advertisements in newspapers, and contact agencies for the position.
- All candidates must be interviewed over the telephone initially. A telephonic interview saves time and cost.
- Shortlisted candidates must be called for interviews. This process of short-listing resumes and calling interview candidates must not take more than 3 to 4 days.
- Final selected candidates must be reviewed through the employee referring process to understand the opinion of the previous worker before the offer letter is given out.
Bibliography
Heneman, Herbert G. III and Timothy A. Judge. Staffing organizations 4th ed. New York: McGraw Hill, 2007.