Recruitment Policies: Everything You Need To Know

Recruitment policies are rules and regulations governing how an organization recruits its employees. Recruitment policies help organizations achieve their objectives by ensuring that they recruit the best people for the job. They also protect the organization against legal risks and ensure that the selection process is fair and equitable.

Your recruitment policy is the backbone of your strategy and is often the first thing applicants will see when applying for a job with your company. It's a document that sets out your commitment to treating applicants fairly and ensuring a transparent process. For additional support, particularly for smaller companies, HR consulting for small businesses can provide tailored advice and strategies to refine your recruitment process.

The recruiting policies of your firm give the parameters that will be followed during the recruitment process in your company. When it comes to human resource management (HRM), recruitment policies are the processes and practices that are employed in the process of recruiting new talent that possesses the required experience, skill set, and credentials that are needed to enhance the productivity of a business. A framework that specifies all of your company's recruitment techniques and practices in a clear and concise manner is called a recruitment policy. A recruiting policy should have as its overarching objectives the promotion of uniformity, transparency, compliance, and adherence to relevant labor regulations and legislation. In order to be successful, a recruiting process has to be supported by appropriate tools, methods, and approaches.

What are the benefits of having a clearly defined recruitment policy?

It enables your business to employ the right personnel;
It protects your organization from legal responsibility based on unfair discrimination or failure to comply with statutory obligations.
It offers your recruiting process credibility;
It guarantees transparency in the recruitment process;
It guarantees that the hiring and promotion decisions are based only on an individual's merit; Recruitment policies allow your organization to be consistent and fair in hiring and encourage practices that ensure consistency and equal participation.

What are the key cornerstones of recruitment policies?

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1. Policy Statement

The policy statement gives a general overview of the recruitment policy. For example, the recruitment policy states that a fair and transparent recruitment process will be followed for all open vacancies so that the right candidate is placed in the right role without discrimination.

2. Policy Purpose

The recruitment policy provides you with strategic direction on attracting and choosing competent human capital to meet your organization's goals while also ensuring that recruiting and selection operations are in accordance with applicable laws and regulations.

3. Policy Principles

What are the principles guiding recruitment policies?

4. Policy Procedure

It refers to the steps to be taken when conducting a recruitment process.

Below are some of the steps that should be followed for an effective recruitment and selection process:

Vacancy Authorization
Develop or revise the job description
Design the Selection Criteria
Advertise the vacancy
Shortlist the candidates
Identify and select the interview panel
Assessment Tests
Conduct the actual interview
Conduct Reference Checks and Vetting
Select the most suitable candidate

4.1. Vacancy Authorization

Before advertising a vacancy, the line manager should fill out the requisition form. The requisition form should outline the following: job title, experience, qualifications, justification for the opening, duties, and responsibilities.

4.2. Development of the Job Description

After the authorization of the position, a job description needs to be developed. The job description gives the potential candidates the job requirements and is used to stimulate demand from the applicants. Before recruiting can begin, each role must have a job description. The job description should outline, among other things:

overall job purpose
duties and responsibilities
Person specification for the role: experience, qualifications, knowledge, and skills need to execute the duties competently.

4.3. Design the Selection Criteria

The selection criteria outline the experience, qualifications, and competencies required to execute the job. You can choose 5- 8 competencies against which assessments will be done depending on the priorities of your business and policy requirements. The selection criteria should include the education, training, certification, experience, and aspects of core functional competencies.

4.4. Advertise the vacancy

Any organization needs to design advertisements that attract a high caliber of candidates. All posts must be advertised to ensure transparency and equal opportunity. In any job advert, they should clarify about:

qualifications, skills, and experience required
the remuneration;
the terms of the appointment
core functions of the job.

Internal Advert

It is advisable first to advertise the job internally once it arises within your organization. This will convey a strong message to your internal personnel that you prioritize them above external prospects. In a scenario whereby an adequate pool of qualified, experienced, and merited candidates are available internally, you may proceed to the next recruitment phase with internal candidates only.

External advert

An external job advert can be done using various channels. The external advertising channels include, among other things: recruitment agencies, newspapers, online job boards, careers portals, and LinkedIn pages.

4.5. Shortlisting

This stage entails screening candidates against the shortlisting criteria. They are certain activities that need to be undertaken during the shortlisting stage, and these include, among others :

prepare a long list of all the applications received
screen candidates against the qualifications, experience, and competencies stated in the job description
Scoring of candidates in order of merit
prepare a report of candidates who meet the shortlisting criteria
prepare a report of candidates who do not meet the shortlisting criteria

4.6. Assessment Tests

After the shortlisting procedure is done, candidates who satisfy the selection criteria should take psychometric tests. A mix of selection tools should be used based on the nature and level of position: psychometric tests, personality tests, and assessment centres.

4.7. Conduct the actual Interviews

During this process, they are specific activities that will be undertaken, and these include, among other things:

prepare the interview schedule
invite the shortlisted candidates for the interviews
constitute the interview panel
train the interview panel
design structured interview questions
conduct the interviews
score the candidates against certain competencies in order of merit
prepare the interview report

4.8. Appointment of a Successful Candidate

The HR Manager is responsible for issuing the offer of employment to the successful candidate, confirming their entitlements and benefits. The successful candidate has to sign the contract before the commencement of work. The contract of employment should state, among other things:

job title
salary range
job grade
associated benefits
probation period

4.8. Police Clearance

Some roles may require successful candidates to complete a criminal record check depending on your recruitment policy. In a situation whereby the pre-employment checks are deemed to be unsatisfactory, the offer of employment may be withdrawn.

4.9. Reference Checking

As an organization, you must conduct employment background checks before taking any employee on board. The references furnish information about a candidate's performance in their previous roles. Such information will be obtained from the candidate's previous employers. Regardless of the candidate's skills, experience, and talents, reference checks might disclose information about a candidate's behavior with previous employers that could be significant to your selection.

4.10. Responsibilities

Line Managers: make recruitment requisitions and take part in interviews
HR Manager: oversee the entire recruitment process
Candidate's Responsibilities: External and internal applicants who apply for a position are expected to follow the policy's standards.

In light of the debate that has taken place so far, having a recruiting policy that has been effectively created assures that your firm will acquire exceptional employees who have the necessary credentials, expertise, and skills to derive your strategy.

Newturn Wikirefu is the Talent Acquisition Manager at Industrial Psychology Consultants (Pvt) Ltd a management and human resources consulting firm.

Phone +263 4 481946-48/481950/2900276/2900966 or cell number +0784 597343 or email: newturn@ipcconsultants.com or visit our website at www.ipcconsultants.com