Analysing Recruitment Strategies Of Brunt Hotels English Language Essay

Brunt Hotels, owns more than 30 hotels throughout the United Kingdom. They recently acquired a small hotel chain headquartered in France. Brunt’s chief executive decided that half of the new hotels in France would be retained and rebranded as part of the Brunt Hotels Group. The other half will be sold. This will support Brunt’s strategic objective of growing the organization slowly to make sure that new ventures are well supported and opened on time and on budget.

The organization has decided to use an ethnocentric approach and send some of their existing UK-based managers to France to lead the changeover of the new hotels and then manage them after they re-open. If this new overseas venture is successful, Brunt may decide to acquire other small hotel groups in other European countries.

The organization has never owned hotels outside the UK before, and has hired a team of independent management consultants to advise them on how to proceed. The hotel management asked you if they should look only internal candidates who are parent country nationals or recruit host country nationals.

Explain the legal and ethical obligations in recruitment procedures.

The point of a recruitment and selection procedure is to make sure that the best and most suitable candidate is recognized and recruited. The aim of the recruitment and selection procedure is to provide a structure for managing recruitment and selection inside the workplace, in a professional, efficient and fair way, ensuring that the best possible candidate will be selected for the job. This structure will further ensure that no unlawful discrimination occurs throughout the recruitment and selection process and that equality of opportunity is an essential part of the procedure. Any recruitment of family, friends or close associates must be confirmed and reviewed through the appropriate procedures. There should be a methodical and reliable search process and the selection process should be valid. Integrity must be given consideration in recruitment and promotion of employees. Ethics is a bottom-line matter in how managers carry out their responsibilities and how they will train, reward and promote the best employees. Those employees will, in turn, assist to ensure that the company has the most effective and efficient work force promising to achieve its business goals.

In our case, the organization has decided to use an ethnocentric approach and send some of their already existing managers from the UK to France to lead the new hotels and manage them after the re-open. However, the hotel management should hire new employees from the host country in order to complete all the positions in the hotel. The organization as for the recruitment of the new workforce will have to think about several factors concerning ethical and legal obligations. An ethical dilemma arises in our situation and this dilemma is: to send employees from the UK or to keep the previous employees of the hotel or to hire new employees and if they keep or hire employees, will be the appropriate ones. To send managers from UK to lead the hotels is not completely wrong, because they already know the philosophy of the organization but is unethical as for the previous employees of the hotels who will probably lose their jobs. Under “The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Act 1986” every employee must have the same opportunity for the job. If the management wishes to keep the ethical procedures, the best solution is to follow the recruitment procedures as for the new staff and interview the previous ones and after the selection of the best qualified persons to send them for a short period to UK to work in the belonging hotels. With this process the new employees will be introduced to the organizations philosophy and policies which will assist after to a better communication with the managers from UK. This approach will also help the managers to maintain confidence and trust among the new employees.

The management has also to consider and to prevent some other ethical and legal issues that might arise. Such issues are:

-Sex discrimination which anyone can face in the workplace should be prevented. Management in recruitment procedures should be free of prejudice and discrimination because all have the same human rights and opportunities.

-Racial harassment is a very common unethical issue in the workplace and has to do with any verbal or physical act which is based on a person’s color, physical characteristics, country of origin and nationality. Management should not influenced from all these and should treat to all the candidates equal.

-The hiring, training or promoting candidates based on favoritism should be prevented because friendships and relatives are the ones who cause managers the most problems.

-Equity and Justice: employees should be treated fairly from the management and not abused or exploited. Justice is concerned with preventing the abuse of power.

-Respect for People: employees should be treated within the workplace as individuals with rights to be pleased and defended. Respect empowers others to assert their rights and to attain their potential.

The Code of Conduct is based on ethics, values and behaviors outlined in the Code of Ethics which consists of policies, rules that identify the specific actions or procedures appropriate to employees for a range of specific ethical issues. The objectives of the Code are to: assist staff in dealing with ethical issues in ways that reflect the values and standards, provide staff with guidance in ethically unclear situations and encourage staff to do the right think.

Appraise the value of the selection interview and the interview techniques.

The purpose of interview provides the opportunity for two-way communication and interaction to determine fit between candidate and employer. By the interview the first impression is made and the impression is based on personal appearance, articulation, eye contact, personality and handshake.

Interviews are a vital element of the recruitment process for almost all the organizations. Their principle is to give the selector an opportunity to assess the candidates and to reveal their abilities and personality. The interview gives the employer the opportunity to assess them and to make sure that the organization and the job are right for the candidate. Interview structure improves the reliability and validity of the selection interview and entails standardization of processes, including question selection and response evaluation.

The selection process for the majority of organizations follows a common subject: Application and CVs are received and candidates are short-listed and invited for interview. The interview format can vary and may contain an assessment centre or tests. Some companies are satisfied after one interview, while others will want to recollect additional shortlist of applicants for more. In case that the interview is successful at the final stage, an official job offer is sent to candidate, the interview format is usually determined by the nature of the company, but there are various standard formats. Employers can avoid hiring mistakes by spending a little more time preparing for the interview in advance. The process of selecting the correct person for the right position through an interview should be followed by several standardized procedures:

-Pre interview preparation is the first step and concerns the preparation of the interviewer as for the job requirements and what are the required skills for the position. The interviewer should also have company information available for the candidates and detailed information about the candidates. Review applications in advance to be familiar with the applicant’s background and to recognize gaps in the information or areas which need special attention. Applications include personal data such as: age, family status etc. and candidate’s qualifications such as: experiences, languages, diplomas etc.

-During the interview, the interviewer has the first contact with the candidate and makes the first impression. He should give details for the organization, and give a general description of the job. At this point, the candidate should have enough information to make a opening determination as to whether he/she is interested in the job. Throughout the interview, the interviewer ask questions that are broad, open-ended, objective, job-related, clear, direct, , meaningful, understood and related to gather as more information from the candidate as possible. He should use questions to force the applicant to tell him what he needs to know to compare the applicant to his ideal applicant profile. Ask for examples whenever appropriate. The interviewer should be open and honest and tell the candidate what to expect in the hiring process. The interviewer should tell to the candidates what the company’s expectations are as for the duties, experience expected, career advancement etc and show them where they would fit into the company.

-The next step for the interviewer is to insure that a common ground have concluded with the candidate. Ask the candidate if he/she has any questions and at the end of the interview be friendly and honest and inform him/her if you are interested and give special attention to not give false encouragement.

After the interview the interviewer should take time to add details to his notes while the information is still fresh and to prepare the information for the next candidate.

-The last step is to discuss the candidates’ reactions and answers and rate them as potential employees. The interviewer should make a decision by comparing applicants to his ideal applicant profile. Communicate your decision to the selected applicant as well as to those who are not selected.

By following this process, the interviewer can decide more easily which of the candidates are the most suitable for the job.

There are several techniques that the interviewer can use which will help him to get as more information as possible:

Closed questions: A closed question can be answered with a single word or a short phrase as well as with a yes or no. closed questions gives you fact, they are easy and quick to answer and help the interviewer to keep the control of the conversation. For example: ‘How old are you?’,’ Do you have previous experience in the hospitality industry?’, ‘Where do you live?’

Open questions: An open question is probable to receive a long answer. These questions require from a person to reflect on upon, a particular point in his own way. For example: ‘What you did in your last position?’, ‘Why I should consider you for this position?’

Probing questions: ask for more detailed and specific explanations of a candidates work experience, knowledge, skills and competencies. Probing questions are, in essence, follow up questions that ask for further information, ask for the person expand on what she has said, or request the person to go deeper. Probing questions can be helpful in increasing understanding, while a great number of people need to be encouraged to go beyond what they have said to help someone understand their deeper feelings and opinions.

Play-back questions: checks if the interviewers have understood of what a candidate has said by playing back.

Hypothetical questions: putting a hypothetical situation to candidates and asking how they would response.

Explain the advantages and disadvantages of interview.

Advantages of an interview:

Top Management

Middle Management

Office / Administrative

-The interview enables a face-to-face meet to take place which will help the interviewer to make an evaluation of how the candidate might fit in the organization and what they would be like to work with.

-The interviewer can describe the job and the organization by providing the candidate more detailed information.

-Give the interviewer the opportunity to ask probing questions about the candidate’s experience, knowledge, skills and competencies.

-Provide the candidates the opportunity to ask his/her questions about the position and clarify issues.

-More than one interviewer can assess the candidates, if it is necessary.

Disadvantages of an interview:

-The interview process relies on the skills and the abilities of the interviewer to make the interview successful but usually many people do not have the abilities needed for interviewing.

-There is a possibility that the interviewer will not succeed to assess directly competence in carrying out the several tasks that are included for the position.

-After the end of the interview, the interviewer can be lead to subjective judgments.

Assess the different interview types.

There are various different types of interviews. An interviewer should has a familiarity with one or more of the situations described below. When an interviewer schedules an interview, he should try to get as much information about the candidate who will be meeting. It is unusual to have only one interview prior to a job offer. Most employers will evaluate a candidate many times to be sure that the possible employee will fit into the company culture.

Face-to-Face Interview

• The mass of the interviews are face-to-face and the most common is a one-on-one conversation.

• The candidate should pay great attention to the person who asking questions and keep an eye contact, listen and respond once a question has been asked.

• The candidate should aim to establish a link with the interviewer and show him that his/her qualifications will help the company.

Panel/Committee Interview

• In this type of interview is more than one interviewer may perform in this part of the selection process. This is the chance for the candidate to put his/her presentation skills on display.

• In these pre designed standard questions ranging overall aspects of the job are asked. They focus directly on elements of person specification.

• The candidate the time that his is responding to a question should keep eye contact with the panel member who asked the question.

Behavioral Interview

• This type of interview concerns the past behavior of the candidate and is the best predictor of your future actions. These kinds of questions may be asked in any interview: panel, one-on-one, telephone.

• If the interviewer asks behavior-oriented questions, he is no longer asking hypothetical questions but the behavior-oriented questions must be answered based on facts.

• Through a behavioral question, the interviewer is looking for results, not just an activity list. He is listening for names, places, dates, results and especially what the candidate’s role was in achieving that result.

Case Interview

• In several interviews the interviewer may ask from the candidate to demonstrate his problem-solving skills. The interviewer will outline a situation or provide the candidate with a case study and ask him to prepare a plan that deals with the problem.

• The interviewers are looking for how the candidate applies his knowledge and skills to a real-life situation.

• The candidate before answer the case interview question should prepare himself to ask the interviewer many questions for informational purposes

• The more the candidate is able to analyze and divide the case study, the more he will likely impress his interviewer.

Telephone Interview

• Many companies conduct interviews through telephone to narrow a field of candidates. Telephone interviews may also be used as a pre- interview for candidates who live far away from the job site.

• In this kind of interview is important for the candidate to treat as he/she would in a face-to-face connection.

• The candidate should be focused on the conversation and listen to the questions carefully before he answers.

Group Interview

• A group interview is planned to expose the leadership potential of prospective managers and employees who will be dealing with customers.

• The preferred applicants are gathered together in an informal, discussion type interview. A topic is introduced and the interviewer will start off the discussion.

• The aim of the group interview is to see how the candidate interact with others and how he/she use his/her knowledge to influence others.

Lunch/Dinner Interview

• The same rules apply at a meal as those in an office.

• The candidates can use the interview to develop common ground with his/her interviewer.

Stress Interview

• In this interview the interviewer deliberately creates stress to see how an applicant operates in stress situation. The stress interview is usually an on purpose attempt to see how the candidate handles him/herself under pressure.

• The interviewer may be argumentative or sarcastic, or may keep you waiting. The candidate must calmly answer each question.

• The interviewer may also to stay silent during the questioning and this may be an attempt to unnerve the candidate.