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June 10, 2010

Recruitment and Selection of Sales personnel (Part 3)

The external sources of recruitment include

• Walk in applications or so-called unsolicited applications
• Employment agencies or placement companies
• Sales people calling on the company
• Employees of customers
• Sales executive clubs
• Sales force of non-competing companies
• Sales forces of competing companies
• Educational institutions or campus placements
• Students doing apprentices and summer projects in the organization.
• Indirect recruitment which includes using media like radio, television and the print media
• Some companies also use reciting brochures which are mailed to reputed educational institutions, recruiting career counselors and agents

Advantages of external recruitment include a large pool of applicants can be attracted, best candidates can be chosen, fresh blood and new initiatives can be brought into the organization. But looking at the disadvantages external recruitment is costly and very time consuming and some times unwanted people may get into the company.

Selection follows recruitment and might consist of simple one step system consisting of nothing more than an informal personal interview to complex multiple mechanisms. A selection system is a set of successful screens. At any of the screens an applicant may be drooped from further considerations. Some of the steps of the selection process include

Application blank is the first step where the candidates have to resubmit their application in a standard format in their own handwriting. This is required for standardization of the applications and also to get a sample of the candidate’s handwriting that can be used for a graphology test. Graphology test is test of handwriting that can reveal traits that the candidate might want to hide desperately. This will be followed by a preliminary interview where very basic communication skills and presentation skills of the candidate will be tested.

Written tests are used as a process of elimination. In written test aptitude, oral, theoretical and comprehension skills will be tested.

• Psychological profiling has become popular lately. In psychological profiling tests will be conducted where the personality and traits of a person will be revealed.

• Group discussions are used when there is a large pool of candidates. Candidates are given a topic, which they are supposed to discuss for a short period of time. Candidates are tested for their communication skills, leadership skills and team management skills.

Formal interview/s further can be further classified into

Interview with the immediate boss/supervisor: The immediate supervisor will test suitability of the candidate to do the job

Product Interview: In Product based interview the candidates technical knowledge will be tested

Patterned interview: In patterned interview all the candidates are asked the same set of questions. Patterned interviews are good for comparisons.

• Stress interview: In stress interview the candidate is deliberately put under a stressful situation and seen how he would react and overcome the stressful situation.

• Group interview: In Group interviews a group of interviewers ask a series of questions. The candidate is tested whether he has the ability to multi-task that is able to think in many directions at the same time.

• References, credit and police check: The next stage is reference check whether the details given in the biodata are checked to find out if they are genuine or not. Reference check will be followed by a credit check and now a day’s companies’ even resort to a police check.

• Physical Examination: In the era of litigations and consumer courts, companies take no chances. They make the candidates undergo a medical check to find about the candidate’s health status. Needless to say only candidates in prime health conditions will be considered

• Offer is the most crucial part of the selection. If the candidate passes all the above stages he would be given an offer letter. The candidate has the liberty to either accept an offer or reject it.

• On acceptance of an offer by the successful candidate an appointment order will be issued by the company specifying the terms of employment and the last date of joining of duty. With this the process of recruitment and selection process ends.

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