Recruitment and Hiring Practices
A Silicon Valley recruiting firm searches for artificial intelligence (AI) and technology personnel for major companies around the world. The recruits’ workplace could be located anywhere the company operates, depending on their skills and expertise, although the tendency is to hire in-country nationals in each respective country. The company uses technology-oriented magazines, the company website, and social media to recruit the candidates they need for their clients. They started up about a year ago and went from 3 to 50 recruiters. Their recruiters are hired for their charm, communication skills, and industry expertise; however, most of the recruiters graduated from Ivy League colleges in the U.S. and most are white males. Lately recruiting numbers have been slowing down drastically, while general demand in the marketplace by employers for AI and technology personnel for the coming year is up 300%.
The current recruiting practice involves hiring people via the firm’s website recruitment area. The potential candidate merely attaches their resume and includes a short note to the recruiter (Step 1). These resumes are then screened (Step 2) using a data mining program, looking for certain criteria and terminology in their resumes. Those candidates getting through the initial screening are then auto-contacted by email (Step 3) to tell them they need to complete a quiz on the website using a particular password. If they pass this second screening, they are given an individual interview (Step 4) via the company’s online conference room. The final candidates are sent to the potential employer for the final interview (Step 5) and selection (Step 6).
Now, however, the president is getting complaints from the EEO Commission and the technology firms that they need to be hiring a more diverse workforce and that there are no disabled candidates, and the number of minorities and women is almost nil. The president is now worried about losing clients and about potential lawsuits as a result of the firm’s recruiting and selection processes. The company needs to address a diverse client base. Their clients’ customers are predominantly Northern European, African American, Indian, and Hispanic.
Checklist: As the HR specialist of the company, you are tasked with overhauling the selection and hiring process to address the following:
Identify problems with the potential candidate characteristics for which they are hiring.
Analyze the company’s recruitment and selection process and problems.
What multicultural and diversity planning concepts would you apply at the company to make a positive change?
Describe what changes you would make to address complaints from the EEO Commission and the technology firms.
Requirements:
Use the Case Study Template to format your paper.
Complete a minimum of a 2-page (i.e., 500 words) case study paper (not including the title and reference pages).
Answer each checklist item thoroughly.
Demonstrate your understanding of the information presented in the weekly reading assignments by defining terms, explaining concepts, and providing detailed examples to illustrate your points.
Include at least two references from your reading assignments, or other academic sources, to reinforce and support your own thoughts, ideas, and statements using APA citation style. You can access help with APA by going to the Course Resources area of the course room and accessing the “Academic Writer” resources in Academic Tools.
Recruitment and Hiring Practices
Introduction
The case study exemplifies the absence of diverse systems and structures when selecting and recruiting workers. The complaints generated by the EEO Commission and technology firms are linked to the lack of a diverse workforce. Even though the company has effective recruitment methods, its inability to develop and implement a diverse culture leads to unequal representation. A diverse organizational culture and training can assist the company in overcoming diversity complaints.
Review of the Case
Problems with the potential candidate characteristics hired
One of the major problems portrayed in the potential candidate characteristics for which the company hires is the lack of idea diversity. The firm achieves a workforce with no diverse organizational ideas considering they are selected from U.S colleges, with most males. This means that the company lacks a workforce from other various backgrounds and gender representation. It translates into limited ideas and business insights that they can acquire from a diverse workforce population. As Cletus et al. (2018) state, a diverse workforce population provides an infusion of ideas and skills. Companies must always ensure that they have a diverse workforce at their disposal for improved growth and productivity. The other fundamental problem is the absence of basic workforce skills due to the standardization of the selection and recruitment process. Artificial intelligence exposes recruiters to advanced workforce skills and overlooks basic ones.
Analysis of the company’s recruitment and selection process and problems
The firm has viable ways of recruiting its workforce. It relies on its official website, technology-oriented magazines, and social media to target and recruit potential workers. These are essential platforms that allow businesses to recruit a pool of talented professionals due to their improved exposure. For example, most candidates can access the firm’s website log in to various social media platforms to learn about potential advertisements made by the company. Notably, its recruitment process is well-established to effectively examine if the candidates are qualified for the post at hand. All the key steps incorporated in the recruitment process are meant to guide the team in selecting the right people. However, the company’s recruitment and selection processes lack diversity. The company majorly targets US citizens and male candidates. This means that their strategies overlook racial and gender diversity.
Multicultural and diversity planning concepts meant for positive change
One of the concepts likely to make positive change is the multicultural organizational culture. This entails the company developing a culture that supports the integration of workers from various backgrounds. It would show that the company values diversity and encourages it (Wijewantha, 2016). Thus, developing a multicultural culture would enable the company to develop a diverse workforce population. Another essential concept is gender privilege which would allow the company to learn about its preference of a male workforce over the females. This would enable the business to turn around and create a policy that accommodates males and females as part of the abled workforce.
Changes likely to address complaints from the EEO Commission and technology firms
The significant strategic changes that the company can make to deal with complaints is developing a diverse organizational culture and training their current personnel about diversity. A diverse workplace culture would ensure that there is equal cultural and gender representation. For example, this form of a culture ensures that the firm selects workers across all background and social status. It also compels recruiting companies to target a diverse pool of candidates as supported by diversity policies and procedures. Also, training its current professionals about the same perspective can help avoid discriminative practices in the workplace.
Conclusion
Addressing the issues linked to the lack of diversity recruitment and selection strategies requires a diverse workplace culture and consequent training. The firm should create and implement a diversity recruitment plan that provides everyone with equal representation. Notably, diversity training can help eliminate potential discrimination likely to emerge with the diverse workplace culture introduced in the company.
References
Cletus, H. E., Mahmood, N. A., Umar, A., & Ibrahim, A. D. (2018). Prospects and challenges of workplace diversity in modern day organizations: A critical review. HOLISTICA–Journal of Business and Public Administration, 9(2), 35-52.
Wijewantha, P. (2016). Creating Multi Cultural Organizations for Diversity Management. Business & Management, 44.
