PART II

Fundamentals of Human Resource Management

[12:34 14/4/2009 5298-Wilkinson-Ch09.tex]

Job No: 5298

Wilkinson: The SAGE Handbook of Human Resource Management

Page: 133 133–154

[12:34 14/4/2009 5298-Wilkinson-Ch09.tex]

Job No: 5298

Wilkinson: The SAGE Handbook of Human Resource Management

Page: 134 133–154

9
Recruitment and Selection
Filip Lievens and Derek Chapman

RECRUITMENT AND SELECTION
Few people question that recruitment and selection are key strategic domains in HRM. At the same time, recruitment and selection also have an image problem. First, recruitment and selection are often viewed as ‘old’ ingrained HRM domains. It seems like the traditional recruitment and selection procedures have been around for decades, which is at odds with the ever changing internal and external environment of organizations. Hence, practitioners often wonder whether there are any new research-based ways for recruiting and selecting personnel. Another image problem for recruitment and selection is that a false dichotomy is often created between so-called macro HR (examining HR systems more broadly) and micro HR (examining individual differences). It is further sometimes argued that organizations should value macro approaches and write off micro approaches as not being relevant to the business world. We posit that these image problems and debates only serve to distract and fracture the field and hide the fact that excellent HR research and practice needs to take both macro and micro issues

into consideration. For example, creating an effective recruiting strategy (some would describe this as a macro process) requires considerable understanding of the decision making processes of potential applicants (viewed as micro processes). The same can be said with respect to designing effective selection systems, etc. The challenge for many