Which steps in the hiring process outlined in this Topic's lecture do you feel are most important for HR professionals to pay attention to? Provide reasons for your answer.

PSY-665 Lecture 2

Topic 2: Personnel Selection, Hiring, and Personality Testing

Introduction

There are two main perspectives on human resources (HR): a functional perspective and a strategic perspective. The functional view of HR is sometimes also referred to as transactional, because HR is viewed within the organization as providing a service to meet particular needs. When an employee needs something HR-related, he or she contacts the HR representative (initiating the transaction) and the representative responds (completing the transaction). This usually involves paperwork of some sort. For that reason, HR's role in this transactional process is often viewed as an administrative role, not really contributing to the business in any substantive way.

HR's main role is to assemble a pool of candidates from which managers and executives who hire can choose, and then HR completes the paperwork once the decision is made. This is a functional rather than a strategic aspect of HR. However, as an organizational or industrial psychologist, you may be brought in to serve in a transactional capacity. For example, you may be asked to speak with an employee, to intervene in a situation, or to give advice after a situation has gone awry.

Strategic HR is more proactive. Bringing HR in to get input on the potential impacts of important decisions in the recruiting or hiring process, discussing the employee pipeline for important positions, or develop succession planning are just a few examples of HR's strategic role (i.e., as a vital voice and contributor to organizational and business goals).

Personnel Selection

Personnel selection can be a complicated and resource-consuming process. Resources could include time, money, effort, and sheer brainpower to ensure you are making the best decision possible. This is one of the most important processes that HR conducts. You must advertise or post the job to attract applicants. This is an important step in the process because it impacts the type of applicants you may get. You can post on general job boards like CareerBuilder or Monster, or on ones that cater to a more specific audience−such as The Ladders, Indeed, or Dice. You can also post jobs on job boards associated with the industry that represents the field for which you are hiring.

The preselection process can be outlined as follows:

Preselection phases	Sequential order of process
Preparation	Develop an accurate job description (if not already done). Determine how you will receive (e-mail, mail, fax, etc.) and track the applications (may need an applicant tracking system)
Posting	Develop a job posting (i.e., the advertisement for the job). Post the job on the multiple sites and/or other media that you have decided on.

This ends the preselection process and begins the selection process.

Selection phases	Sequential order of process
Tracking and screening	Track applications as you receive them. Review the applications and determine who you will screen. Screen the applicants. Determine who will become candidates for phone interviews.
Interview and selection	Conduct phone interviews using behavior-based interview questions. Determine final candidates for in-person interviews. Conduct in-person interviews. Select final candidate for the job.

This ends the selection process and begins the hiring process.

Hiring phases	Sequential order of process
Offer	Make a tentative employment offer. If candidate is agreeable to the tentative offer, make a formal, written offer that is conditionally based on the passing of a background check.
Background verification	Have the candidate complete an application (if the selection process was done through an applicant tracking system, the final candidate will have completed his or her application earlier in the process). Have the candidate submit information for the background check. Request the background check from your vendor.
Employment agreement	If the background check is passed and the candidate has accepted the formal written offer, ho or she now becomes an employee of the organization.

The hiring process is now complete and the onboarding process begins.

The onboarding process typically includes an orientation, but expands beyond that to include touch points with the new employee up to 90 days post hire (time can vary widely, depending on the organization and/or the position the employee holds). Sometime prior to orientation, a new hire may be asked to take a psychological test in the form of a personality or behavioral style assessment.

Psychological testing

The Myers-Briggs Personality Assessment is likely the most familiar of the personality assessments and the one many people have taken, either while in college or through work. Large organizations may have employees who have been certified to administer and interpret the test and results. Smaller organizations may contract out the administration of the assessment to a third party. In the HR field, it is routine for many professionals to know and quickly recite their Myers-Brigg personality type. If you plan to be involved in the HR community, it will be useful for you to have experience with this assessment. The history of the development of the instrument and typology can be found at http://www.myersbriggs.org/.

The DISC assessment is another predominant personality assessment used in organizations. More accurately, DISC is an assessment of behavioral style. The DISC assessment produces results that indicate the assessment-taker's natural behavioral style and an adapted behavioral style. DISC stands for Dominance, Influencing, Steadiness, and Conscientiousness (Resources Unlimited, n.d.). Another description of the acronym is Driver, Innovator, Socializer, and Corrector (Crane, n.d.) and yet another is Drive, Influence, Steadiness, and Compliance (Disc Insights, n.d.). Which variation you get will depend on who administers the test and interprets the assessment for you.

A third common personality assessment is called OCEAN, commonly known as the "Big 5" though technically there are subtle differences between the OCEAN model and the Big 5 model (Popkins, 1998). OCEAN stands for Openness, Conscientiousness, Extroversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism (Popkins, 1998). The grouping of behaviors into these 5 categories can be helpful in analyzing beneficial and sought out traits. For instance, Sackett and Walmsely (2014) found "robust evidence that attributes related to Conscientiousness and Agreeableness are highly important for workforce readiness across a variety of occupations that require a variety of training and experience qualifications."

DISC, and arguably the Big 5, are becoming more popular than Myers-Brigg because they help members of the organization understand how to work better with each other. For example, the results of the DISC could tell your supervisor how you may respond when spoken to in a certain manner or how you may respond when put in a situation in which you feel less comfortable. In other words, it provides a practical use for the results. This could be especially helpful in smaller organization where too much of one behavioral style could tilt the organizational culture too far in one direction. There are numerous personality/behavioral style assessments out there, and it is significant to note that in business, HR, and psychological communities, which assessment is the most appropriate for different purposes is contested. This is on ongoing debate. Other services are available as well. For instance, many organizations use the Forte Communication Style assessment; more information can be found on that at http://www.theforteinstitute.com/.

As a professional practicing in HR, you should verse yourself on many of these psychological tests, as familiarity with them will not only improve your professional credibility, but may also improve your marketability, especially if you become certified in one or more of the assessments.