Job analysis forms the foundation of human resources management and helps in attaining effective selection, recruitment, performance management as well as career development. In this regard, a successful job analysis identifies a clear connection between the tasks performed and the knowledge, skills, abilities (KSA), behaviors and competencies needed in performing the job (Ivancevich, 2010). On the other hand, inaccurate and incomplete job analysis leads to poor hiring decisions, which in turn affect both the manager and the new recruit.
Human resources recruitment methods depend on the company size, staffing needs, advertising budget, recruiting staff expertise, cost per hire, among other employment expenses. A job analysis is a systematic way of collecting and analyzing information pertaining to the content, context, as well as the human requirements of jobs (Ivancevich, 2010). A tasked-based job analysis will be used to analyze an entry-level human resource manager job currently available at MacDonald Pizza & Burger Center, which is a fast-food joint in Downtown. A task-based analysis would focus on the specific tasks, duties and responsibilities associated with job position in question.
In view of the increasingly competitive nature of the restaurant industry, every player in the marketplace has been forced to wage a competitive war for talent, particularly for the entry level human resource position. It is on these grounds that MacDonald Pizza & Burger Centre has opted to invest significant amounts of money, time and other resources to attract the best candidate for this job. Through effective talent management, MacDonald Pizza & Burger Center hopes to increase its competitive advantage in the marketplace.
The Job Position
MacDonald Pizza & Burger Center currently has an entrance level managerial job for a human resource manager currently. Considering the human resource job position from a task-based approach, the following are the main tasks that stand out:
1) Placing job offerings onto the company’s website as well as other websites; advertising job vacancies in newspapers; getting in touch with recruiting agencies to inform them of any opportunities and positions available at the company;
2) Conducting interviews by phone on all potential candidates for all vacancies prior to inviting them for formal interviews, and
3) Managing employee complaints.
Although the managerial post entails a number of tasks, these above responsibilities are the main tasks that define the essence of the human resource managerial position.
Task 1
Task 1 involves placing job offerings onto MacDonald Pizza & Burger Center’s website & other websites, placing advertisements onto newspapers regarding job openings, and getting in touch with recruiters to assist in filling the vacant positions. A human resource manager is a professional with great understanding of how best to craft job descriptions and advertisements which will draw the desired type of talent the organization needs to bring on board. The human resource manager of MacDonald Pizza & Burger Centre is tasked with creating job postings that carry explicit descriptions of the position for hiring, the benefits and incentives that the restaurant offers, the organizational culture together with precise details on the ideal candidate for the position. Through thorough job description and job advertisements, the company will be able to sieve out applicants who are unqualified for a position. The Human resource would have to identify the most suitable places to place the job vacancy advertisements so as to attract the best talent there is for the respective positions being offered by MacDonald Pizza & Burger Center at any given time. Several platforms are available to the human resource manager for advertising job vacancies at the company, namely: the Media through newspapers, radio, TV; the online medium through general job boards; specialty job boards and face-to-face networking events (Ivancevich, 2010). In this respect, the HRM can organize host recruiting events to attract talent for the positions offered by the company. Such events would be advertised in places where the restaurant’s ideal job candidates visit to search for employment. During the career events, the HRM would bring the candidates up to speed with company profile, introduce them to available positions at the restaurant and collect resumes (Mathis & Jackson, 2011). The events would further serve as networking events that would offer potential employees an opportunity to interact with the company’s management and staff in an environment that is less formal than an interview.
When the company reaches a decision on whom to hire and reject, the human resource manager would be expected to draft both offer and rejection letters and send to all candidates who had applied (Ivancevich, 2010). Thereafter, the HRM would assist newly recruited employees with the next steps of employment, such as filling out tax information, getting enrolled into the company’s technology-related systems, and signing up for benefits and insurance.
Analysis of Task 1
Considering that MacDonald Pizza & Burger Center is a small size company in the fast food industry along with the low frequency of needing to advertise a new job opportunity at the company, the human resource manager would be expected to spend a relatively small amount of time to undertake task 1 (Prien et al, 2009). In view of the much ease of learning of this task, and the fact that it is very repetitive in nature once learned, task 1 is rightfully rated as easier than most.
However a mistake in this task would be fairly difficult and costly to fix considering that the mistake would be potentially in print translating that it is a rather serious and hard to correct task. While Task 1 is part of the job description of a human resource manager, it is not one of the primary reasons for the existence of this position. At the moment, there is no employee performing this task at MacDonald Pizza & Burger Center, and the task cannot be awarded on a long term basis.
Task 2
The second major task of the human resource manager is to interview, by means of phone, all potential candidates for any open positions before extending them an invitation for formal interviews. This is after the human resource manager has received and reviewed all the cover letters, curriculum vitae or resumes, references and portfolios from all interested applicants (Mathis & Jackson, 2011). The HR would prepare a set of questions that would be posed to every applicant, which shall help in comparing one candidate against the others. The preliminary interviews would assist the HRM to pre-qualify candidates for positions and narrow the pool of applicants which the company will invite for in-person interviews. The HRM would call or email the referees provided by applicants in their application materials to seek clarification of the candidates’ former experience, work ethic, character, and attitude (Ivancevich, 2010). In conducting the telephone interview, the HRM would be expected to observe telephone interview etiquette. From there, the HRM would be able to recommend the most suitable applicants that the company should invite for further interviewing and testing.
The HRM has a crucial task of conducting in-person interviews for each candidate invited after screening through the phone interviews. The Human Resource Manager during face-to-face job interviews is to maintain alignment of the applicants with the corporate culture and the overall recruitment strategy of the company (Mathis & Jackson, 2011). Therefore, the HRM would have to determine whether a candidate would fit into the company’s environment by assessing their soft skills. These include ethics, communication skills, honesty, ability to work with others and under pressure. This implies that the HRM as the interviewer needs to have sufficient training and skills to instantly recognize the drivers and values of each candidate so as to form an opinion regarding the fit of the applicant and the corporate culture (Mathis & Jackson, 2011). Similarly, it is the responsibility of the HRM to determine the qualification or suitability of the candidate for the specific job offering.
Analysis of Task 2
Typically, this task requires a large amount of time as compared to Task 1. This is especially the case because phone interviews often consume most of the human resource manager’s time as a great number of potential candidates are interviewed prior to reaching a final decision on whom to invite for formal interviews. The phone interview task is more difficult than most to learn and not one of the hardest. Once a human resource manager has mastered the key interviewing skills and is comfortable with the whole interview process, it is often simple to cross over between interviewees.
Nonetheless, a mistake during the phone interview stage would prove serious and costly to correct. Task 2 would be potentially costly to the company in an instance where the human resource manager makes the mistake of bringing in a candidate for formal interview when the person falls way below the consideration level. Similarly, the mistake at this stage would prove serious where the human resource manager posed inappropriate question(s) that that attracted a lawsuit. The task of phone interviews is a primary part of the human resource managerial job and thus one of the major reasons for the existence of the position. Currently, there is no personnel handling this task at MacDonald Pizza & Burger Center and cannot be offered on a long term basis.
Task 3
Task 3 entails handling employee complaints. The Human Resource Manager responds to employee complaints following stipulated procedures of the organization. Resolving complaints would entail examination of all facts and identification of alternatives to reach a solution that would meet the needs of all parties involved (Mathis & Jackson, 2011). To a reach a desirable decision, the HRM would have to gather the input from employees and other personnel who would offer relevant contributions. The HRM, as a complaint handler, would be required to explain the resolution process to employees, identify legal issues and volatile situations, in addition to managing the conflict in an effective manner (Ivancevich, 2010).
In addition, the HRM would have to possess excellent skills of responding to stressful situations that result from dealing with angry employees. To this effect, the HRM has a myriad of interventions that can be applied to resolve workplace conflicts among the restaurant’s employees. These include: mediation, mentoring, personal coaching or formal classroom. It is the duty of the HRM to devise a strategy of how best to react to the complaint from the employee(s) (Mathis & Jackson, 2011). As such, the HRM would need to create a checklist which would include steps of the response. At MacDonald Pizza & Burger Center, the process of handling employee complaints is defined: interview the complainant; identify any initial precautions; make the compalianant feel important; review personnel files for both the person complained about and the complainant; identify other individuals whose input is needed; determine the persons(s) best suited to conduct the interviews; schedule the interviews; determine the steps needed to be taken to avert any misplaced interaction; meet with the supervisors to assure no chance for retaliation; ensure that no evidence (electronic or otherwise) is compromised or lost; schedule a debriefing after conclusion of the investigation; and determine appropriate steps needed to be taken with the complainant (Ivancevich, 2010). However, the procedure is flexible – meaning that additional steps may be necessary to suit different nature of complaints.
Furthermore, the HRM would be required to determine if the involvement of an attorney is necessary in resolving a given case of employee conflicts or complaints. The HRM would thus assist MacDonald Pizza & Burger Center to continuously improve the working environment for workers, which would in turn enable the restaurant to meet its strategic goals whilst maintaining adherence to local, state and federal regulations. This may call for conducting focus groups, running surveys and implementing changes to policies and procedures where necessary (Mathis & Jackson, 2011).
Analysis of Task 3
The human resource manager is expected to spend less than average amount of time to performing this task. However, it is one of the hardest tasks to learn. Similarly, a mistake during this task would prove very serious or very hard to correct with the probability of losing one or more employees. The task of handling employee complaints is a central part of the human resource managerial job and it is one of the main reasons the job exists. The task is currently not performed by any other employee and it cannot be reassigned on a long term basis.
A good job analysis needs to provide the following in order to be viewed favorably: It should result in a thorough, clear job description; it should have an assessment of the frequency and significance of task behaviors, it must enable accurate assessment of knowledge, skills, abilities, and other such characteristics (KSAOs) needed by the position, it must provide information relating to the relationship between job duties and the KSAOs identified (Ivancevich, 2010).
Considering the tasks associated with the human resource management position at MacDonald Pizza & Burger Center, the tasks largely make sense but the individual in the position needs to be better assessed as to how s/he would perform the three main tasks. In this respect, the fast food company could do better by conducting an accurate assessment of the knowledge, skills and abilities (KSA) of the human resource manager help ease the issues linked with the position (DuBrin, 2008). Although some tasks can be achieved with accuracy, it would be prudent for MacDonald Pizza & Burger Center to further train their human resource manager so as to achieve the desired efficiency in the other problematic tasks and reach self satisfaction (Deb, 2006).PLACE THIS ORDER OR A SIMILAR ORDER WITH US TODAY AND GET AN AMAZING DISCOUNT!
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