3.4 Recruitment and selection

Why do businesses recruit?

Recruitment is the process where a business finds the most skilled applicant for a job vacancy. A business may need to recruit for many reasons:

Replace employees who have left: business needs to fill job vacancy

• Found new job elsewhere
• Fired or retired
• Injury or health issue
• Maternity or paternity leave
• Promoted Business growth: business needs more workers, supervisors and managers as it expands

Skills gap: business needs more skilled employees to reach their goals

Different recruitment methods to meet different business needs

• Internal recruitment: is where a business recruits someone who is already a part of the business, such as a promotion.
• External recruitment: is where a business recruits someone new who was not previously part of the business, such as when they need more skilled workers.

Advantages of internal recruitment	Advantages of external recruitment
Motivates workers who want to be promoted	Bring new skills, ideas and enthusiasm to the business/team
Quicker selection process as the employee's details are already known	May have valuable knowledge if worked for competitors before
Candidates already know company culture well	May already experienced, meaning less training

Person specification: document business must create outlining required personal qualities, work experience, qualifications and skills.

Job description: document business must make that describes the duties and responsibilities of the role, and what would happen on a daily basis.

Where can a business advertise jobs?

• Social media and LinkedIn
• Website/recruitment website
• Poster/newspapers/notice boards

Methods of selection

Businesses can use multiple different methods of selection to find out about candidates who apply for a role.

Method	Description	Advantages
CV	Document outlining applicant's details, qualifications, employment history and references	Shows the applicant's skills and ability to organise information. You can easily see information at a glance.
Application form	Form applicants complete to provide certain information to the business	Business chooses what information they need so they can easily compare candidates
Letter of application	Letter written by applicant explaining why they would like to apply	Demonstrate communication skills such as punctuation and grammar and usually includes their personal qualities
Interviews	Applicant is asked certain questions by someone at the business, possibly as a group	Easier to judge how the candidate presents themselves and their communication skills
Tests	A test is provided to the applicant to test their knowledge, skills and thought process	Tests the applicant's knowledge for the job and shows how suitable they are. It is easy to compare candidates in this way.
Group activities	Group of applicants are asked to work together on a particular task or particular activity	Assess their teamwork and communication skills and see how they interact with others
References	Someone who knows the applicant gives information about their work ethic and qualities	Very honest and more reliable source on how the applicant will fit into the business' team