Session: 07 POM Organizing & Staffing

Staffing as a Management Function

After an organization's structural design is in place, it needs people with the right skills, knowledge, and abilities to
fill in that structure. People are an organization's most important resource, because people either create or
undermine an organization's reputation for quality in both products and service.

In addition, an organization must respond to change effectively in order to remain competitive. The right staff can
carry an organization through a period of change and ensure its future success. Because of the importance of
hiring and maintaining a committed and competent staff, effective human resource management is crucial to the
success of all organizations.

Human resource management (HRM), or staffing, is the management function devoted to acquiring, training,
appraising, and compensating employees. In effect, all managers are human resource managers, although human
resource specialists may perform some of these activities in large organizations. Solid HRM practices can mold a
company's workforce into a motivated and committed team capable of managing change effectively and achieving
the organizational objectives.

Understanding the fundamentals of HRM can help any manager lead more effectively. Every manager should
understand the following three principles:

 All managers are human resource managers.

 Employees are much more important assets than buildings or equipment; good employees give a
company the competitive edge.

 Human resource management is a matching process; it must match the needs of the organization with the
needs of the employee.

Q1: Define staffing? What are the external sources of recruitment?

A: Staffing function is defined as filling and keeping filled positions in the organizational structure. This is done by
identifying number of employees required, analyzing the number of employees presently working, recruiting,
selecting, placing, promoting, appraising, planning the careers of, compensating and training of both candidates
and existing employees so that they can accomplish their tasks effectively and efficiently.

Recruitment is a process of searching for prospective employees and stimulating them to apply for jobs
Companies can adopt different methods of recruitment for selecting people in the company.

External methods/sources of recruitment:-

External sources of recruitment refer to methods of recruitment to obtain people from outside the company.
These methods are
1. Management consultant :-
Management consultant helps the company by providing them with
managerial personnel, when the company is on the look out for entry level
management trainees and middle level managers. They generally approach
management consultants.
2. Employment agencies :-
Companies may give a contract to employment agencies that search,
interview and obtain the required number of people. The method can be
used to obtain lower level and middle level staff.
3. Campus recruitment :-
When companies are in search of fresh graduates or new talent they opt for campus recruitment. Companies
approach colleges, management, technical institutes, make a presentation about the company and the job and
invite applications. Interested candidates who have applied are made to go through a series of selection test and
interview before final selection.
4. News paper advertisement :-
This is one of the oldest and most popular methods of recruitment. Advertisements for the job are given in leading
news papers; the details of the job and salary are also mentioned. Candidates are given a contact address where
their applications must be sent and are asked to send their applications within a specified time limit. The method
has maximum reach and most preferred among all other methods of recruitment.
5. Internet advertisement :-
With increasing importance to internet, companies and candidates have started using the internet as medium of
advertisement and search for jobs. There are various job sites like naukri.com and monster.com etc. candidates
can also post their profiles on these sites. This method is growing in popularity.
6. Walk in interview :-
Another method of recruitment which is gaining importance is the walk in interview method. An advertisement
about the location and time of walk in interview is given in the news paper. Candidates require to directly
appearing for the interview and have to bring a copy of their C.V. with them.