HR Management: Legal Selection and Recruitment

NB: We do not resell your papers. Upon ordering, we do an original paper exclusively for you.

NB: All your data is kept safe from the public.

Table of Contents

Introduction
Discussion
Conclusion
References

Introduction

The term human resources (HR) in the organizational sphere refers to the manpower or workforce of an organization be it one that is profit oriented or non-profit. The term gained prominence in the 1960s and presently, it is used in almost all organizations worldwide. Human resource education refers to the teaching of human resource management which is actually the profession that handles employees issues and all key areas in the organization that deal with the interaction between people.

The reason why human resource education is important is that human capital is the most basic asset of any organization and its success is dependent on the motivation and zeal of employees to achieve set goals and objectives. Human resource education therefore has various aspects that can be said to relate to the motivation and welfare of workers.

However, this is not the only role of the HR manager. Other important duties include recruitment and ensuring that selection of employees complies with the local and national labor laws; keeping employees records; managing employee behavior; organizational design; industrial relations; running compensation and employee benefit schemes and training employees where necessary.

It is the first role of recruitment and ensuring legal selection methods that is relevant to this research. It is vital that human resource managers learn that the recruitment and selection processes of an organization have provisions in law especially on issues of discrimination. This research paper shall consider what the HR student needs to learn that pertains to legal selection and recruitment methods.

Discussion

Arnold (2004) states that there are several principles that must guide human resource managers when it comes to selection and recruitment of employees according to the law. These principles are; fairness, standardization, appropriateness and objectivity. Fairness is definitely the most important aspect in selection especially due to the provisions that the law has provided against discrimination.

In EEOC v. EchoStar Communications Corp. (2005), a jury verdict harshly punished the defendant company for overlooking the needs of a blind person during the recruitment process. The company had failed to acquire equipment that could be used by blind customer care staff and worse still, they had given him a Braille test that was three times bigger than the test they were giving to other applicants.

Using the case of EEOC v, EchoStar (2005) as an example, there is need for HR students to be taught the value of fairness in recruitment and selection. The principle of standardization enables the HR office to adopt a uniform recruitment policy which has been adopted by the organization for all selection and recruitment needs. Standardization of the process cushions the organization from the risk of allowing recruiting staff and managers to make arbitrary decisions.

Objectivity allows the HR manager to analyze situations rationally such that even where the law has not made a provision, the manager can tell what the right course of action should be. This would save the organization from any lawsuits that may arise from subjective-mindedness of the manager. Finally appropriateness helps the HR manager in deciding the right decision to make where there is an unclear situation during recruitment. The decision must be within the spirit of the law and must shield the company from any liability.

In educating HR students on the legal issues that come up in selection and recruitment processes; two contexts come up. First, there is the legal context that is obviously relevant to the discourse and then there is the issue of perception. While the legal context is quite clear on the issue of discrimination, negligent hiring and other unfair practices, the perception context is much more complex and students need to be sufficiently instructed on this topic.

According to Arnold (2004), HR managers seem to be ignorant of the relevance of learning the law and other legal aspects concerning hiring of employees. This is because of the high number of successful litigants all claiming from organizations for unfair or illegal recruitment practices. In 2003 alone, there were 81, 293 cases brought in the US all dealing with unfair selection practices.

Most of the cases were based on unfair hiring practices, lack of reasonable accommodation (such as the EchoStar case) and privacy issues. Privacy seems to have become a major litigation issue since employers usually require too much personal information from the applicants. It is therefore reasonable that HR students become aware of the areas of risk in recruitment and selection.

In the case of Staples v. Rent-A-Center, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California (1999), Rent-A-Center was sued for having used two clinical instruments for an overall testing program in the recruitment of management candidates. The plaintiff was awarded damages of $2 million and the company forced to discontinue its screening methods. It was determined that a company does not need too much private information for a management candidate.

Conclusion

Human Resource is a major pillar in the success of any organization. It is however critical for a company to operate within certain confines so as not to expose itself to losses arising from court cases and the payment of damages for matters arising from the privacy of recruits. HR managers, therefore, need to be sensitive of the law and the manner in which they are perceived for the success of the company.

References

Arnold, D. (2004). Legal Issues in Employment Selection. London. Pearson Reid London House.

EEOC v. EchoStar Communications Corp. (2005). No. 02-CV-00581 Staples v. Rent-A-Center (1999) C 99- 2987.

Click Here To Order Now!

HR Management: Legal Selection and Recruitment

Do you need this or any other assignment done for you from scratch?

We have qualified writers to help you.

We assure you a quality paper that is 100% free from plagiarism and AI.

You can choose either format of your choice ( Apa, Mla, Havard, Chicago, or any other)