HRM Project: Sainsbury's Recruitment and Selection Process Analysis

This report provides a detailed analysis of the recruitment and selection processes employed by Sainsbury's as part of their Human Resource Management (HRM) strategy. The report begins with an introduction to HRM and its importance in gaining a competitive advantage. It then delves into Sainsbury's recruitment process, outlining each stage from workforce planning and job analysis to job advertisements, shortlisting, and the selection and hiring of employees. The main body also explores different recruitment and selection methodologies, including internal and external approaches, highlighting their advantages and disadvantages. The report discusses the importance of the context, best-fit approaches, and concludes with a PESTEL analysis to provide a comprehensive understanding of the external factors influencing Sainsbury's HRM practices.

HRM PROJECT

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................3
Recruitment Process in Sainsbury’s............................................................................................3
Different Methodologies for recruitment and selection...............................................................6
Importance of the context............................................................................................................8
Best fit approach..........................................................................................................................9
PESTEL analysis-........................................................................................................................9
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Human resource management refers to the strategic approach to the effective management
of human resource in the company such as which helps the company in gaining competitive
advantage and winning over the company. It accounts with the foundation of the company as a
result helps in fostering the growth of the company and business to earn high revenues and high
profit margin. It simply refers as the activity of managing the people of the company to achieve
for the better performances. Sainsbury is the second largest chain of supermarket which provides
wide variety of products and services in the range of clothing, footwear, beauty and various
others. Present report will lead to the understanding of different recruitment process and
selection process and the core strategies which are being involved in the same and will highlight
the importance of the context with the analysis of best fit model and by doing the PESTEL
analysis.
MAIN BODY
Recruitment Process in Sainsbury’s
Recruitment is conducted from the initial phase which assess the requirement of workers
in the various stores of Sainsbury’s. It can be referred to determination of employees, calling out
advertisements and attracting various number of applicants, interviewing and examination,
selection, hiring employees and onboarding of employees. The recruitment process at
Sainsbury's includes all the elements and strategies involved in the entire hiring process from its
inception to the point when the individual recruit integrates into the organisation. It is one of the
most imp process in human resource management as effective recruitment leads to productive
employees, which in turn leads to better organisational performance and meeting the desired
corporate, business and functional goals and objectives (Gilani and Jamshed, 2016). The various
factors that affect the recruitment process is the size of the organisation, employment conditions,
working conditions and wages, affect of previous efforts in recruitment, growth rate, cultural,
legal and economic factors.
Sainsbury's is the leading retailer in UK and conducts its recruitment process very
comprehensively and efficiently to gain the best talent for the organisation.
Workforce planning
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Identification of future staffing requirements and making detailed plans for supply of
proper workers is conducted through workforce planning by the human resource management
department. The vacancies in the company can happen due to various reasons such as staff
leaving the organisation due to retirement, or employee turnover due to change of jobs and other
factors. Also, certain staff could have been dismissed for various reason, or certain workers may
have been promoted to higher level of job posts and the old post get vacant. Also, Sainsbury's is
expanding continuously across UK as it is opening various stores and indulging in product and
market development, thereby requiring the amount of workforce accordingly. Changing job roles
is also a major cause of vacancies and overall, the finance department of the company needs to
ensure that the company can afford hiring the new recruits (al Habibi, 2019).
Job analysis
It is the first stage of recruiting the employees. The managers at Sainsbury's gather data
and information regarding the job by interviewing the job holder and observe at work. The
information gets recorded and analysis is done. Also, information is obtained by communicating
with the supervisors and the job analyst compiles a description of the primary responsibilities on
the job. The main tasks of the job, how often completion is needed, specific technical skills
required for the job, the mental processes needed for doing the job. Also, if the job holder needs
to make important decisions and use initiative, the limits of the authority of the job holder. The
output of the job needs to assessed if it is a part or whole, the amount of teamwork needed in the
job and the required performance standards and the measurement process are all evaluated to
form job description (al Habibi, 2019).
Job Description
After the job analyst in Sainsbury's gathers all the data by conducting a job analysis, a
summary is reported regarding what the job entails, which is also known as job description. It
generally explains the tasks and activities involved in the job, the skills and behaviour necessary
to conduct the job at satisfactory levels. The job description involves general information, job
tile, designation and position, task and duties involved, purpose of the task, responsibilities,
working conditions, etc.
Person specification
The personnel profile is created to determine all the major attributes and skills that are
needed for doing the job as per the required standards. For instance, if Sainsbury's needs a sales
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assistant, the HRM department would need to specify person specification regarding the
qualifications (ICT), the core skills of communication and problem solving, the technical skills
etc. A six-point plan is devised by the company for listing the person specification, which
includes: physical make up, achievements (Educational qualifications and work experience),
specific skills and talents, interests, personality and individual circumstances (Sheeba and Latha,
2020).
Job advertisements
It is one of the major parts of the recruitment process as at this point Sainsbury's needs to
communicate the workforce requitements or job vacancies to the targeted audience through the
means of job advertisements. The job adverts are written by the human resource department and
its needs to reach the people who pertain to same qualities for filling out the vacancies. In this
case various strategies and platforms are used depending upon the methodology which can be
either external or internal. The various strategies for best recruitment involve internal hiring
being prioritised whereby notice boards or the official site advertises job for existing employees.
IN case of external recruitment, the various platforms that Sainsbury's uses are the official
website careers page, external job portals, campus recruitments etc. Sainsbury's focusses on
extensive employer branding and recruitment marketing to attract high performing employees as
it focuses on talent acquisition. The advertisements usually contain job title, dob description,
company activities and marketplace, the location of work, address and contact, person
specifications, experience, fringe benefits, company identity. While drafting the advertisement,
Sainsbury's needs to comply with the recruitment and employment laws such as Equal pay Act
1970, Race relations act 1976, disabled person act 1944, Sex discrimination act 1986 etc (al
Habibi, 2019).
Shortlisting
After candidates apply for the job, a shortlisting procedure happens where the
applications from either internal or external advertisements are selected and reviewed if the
candidates meet the basic requirements, as interviewing all would be a waste of time. The
shortlisting happens by benchmarking the persons specifications and also the written
applications.
Selection and hiring
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The shortlisted candidates are then called for examinations and interviews where
depending upon the job role, required teats are conducted such as skill test, aptitude and integrity
test, personality test etc. When a person clears the written tests rounds, they are called for the
face-to-face interview with the human resources managers and the supervisors or managers in
the specific job role whereby the most appropriate candidate is selected. The further processes
are followed by hiring and onboarding the employee into the company (Pandey and Patel, 2020).
Different Methodologies for recruitment and selection
The HR department of company currently uses different methodologies in its workplace
for properly recruiting and selecting various talented and skilled employees in the workplace
(Korauš, Kaščáková and Felcan, 2020). Currently each venture wants to hire an effective as well
as skilled employee in its workplace, but to lack of poor recruiting and selection, many of
companies are not able to do same. In this situation, HR department of Sainsbury have to be
some active and aggressive in its workplace for using appropriate methodologies in its workplace
to recruit and selected the actual talent for the workplace. There are some key methodologies of
recruitment and selection has been discussed below which the HR department of company can
adopt and use in its workplace for gaining better outcomes in market place.
Internal Method
This is the first method which is currently used by the company’s HRM for recruiting and
selecting employees in the workplace. This method is basically making able to organisation for
fulfilling its vacant posts by using existing employees of the workplace. This is very common
and useful method, and this is why it is currently considered by many companies and businesses
(Pratibha and Katyayani, 2017). Basically, while hiring employee through this method, there is
HR department of a company has not required to publish any advertisement, and also has not
required to providing primary training and development sessions. This method gives opportunity
to the business for saving its precious time and money in the workplace. The HR manager and
top-level management of company can promote an existing employee for the upper posts in order
to fulfil that vacant upper post. There are companies can face some positive impact as well as
some negative impact after using this method recruitment. For example; after recruiting and
selecting employees from the internal business environment, then will be able to save its time
and money (Mustafa and et.al., 2017). On the other side, when a company recruits and selects
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employees through internal method, then it cannot be able to work in the welfare of society by
providing great employment opportunities to different people in the market place. However,
sometimes company’s HR department uses this internal method to fulfil its various vacant posts.
External Method
This is another major method that has used by almost all companies and organisations.
This is the most ordinary as well as productive method for recruiting and selecting different
talented and skilled employees in the workplace. Existing retail venture Sainsbury has also
highly used this method in own workplace, because it is very productive in gaining an
appropriate workforce. Basically, this method enables to a business for hiring new employees
from its external business environment. For recruiting and selecting employees through this
method, the HR department company has always required to conduct many practices of HRM.
Firstly, the HRM have to make an advertisement to publish it on different platforms in order to
attract many talented and skilled employees towards own brand (Easa and El Orra, 2020). After
advertising, the HR manager of company have to accept applications from different candidates,
and after accepting application human resource department needs to invite eligible candidates for
the interview or written examination purposes. This is really necessary to check capabilities of
various existing candidates to ensure they can play great role for job role of vacant post or not.
After organising interview and written exam processes, the department has required to select the
most appropriate and capable candidate for its vacant post. After completing these all HRM
practice or processes, the HR manager of company need to send joining letter to the selected
candidate. This department is responsible for providing appropriate training and development
sessions also to new candidates.
These both are two key methods of recruiting and selecting people within the workplace,
and these are currently used by almost all organisations in market place. There is external
method is more time-consuming and costly for the company as compare to internal method.
However, the external method gives opportunity to the organisation for working in well-being of
society by generating great growth opportunities. On the other side, internal method also has its
own benefits and drawbacks. For example; this method not promote employment generation, but
it saves lots of precious time and resources of the company (Singh and Nath, 2020). In this
dynamic world, currently many people are looking for the employment opportunities, in which
use of external recruitment and selection process is the best deal for the management of
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company, because it enables to a business for hiring new talent in the workplace. The HR
manager of company has required to conduct many practices of HRM while hiring an employee
through external method, but this method is very useful for the company to build an effective as
well as talented workforce in the workplace. In some cases, the department can use internal
method as well, but it should give higher priority to the external method, because it is very
appropriate to gain positive outcomes in market place.
Importance of the context
It is being very important for securing high quality workforce as it helps the company
with taking upon various challenging task which leads to fostering the growth of the company as
a result helps the company with the ability to survive in uncertain business dynamics. It is being
important to have effective leadership in the company where the problems are being
communicated more effectively and efficiently and helps in providing up with the direction and
guidance which accounts to solving up of the problems more productively, it helps with the
enhancement of effective decision making in the company which helps in taking and counting up
for risk taking that is being highly supportive in nature and on the other hand helps the company
to undertake activities are being highly beneficial in terms of increasing the sales and revenues of
the company (Abu-Nahel, 2020).
It accounts with getting valuable insight about the customers what are there needs and
wants and delivering the products and services accordingly which helps the company to spread
positive word of mouth and helps the company to build effective relationship with the customers
which is being long term in nature and accounts to boost up the sales of the company not in
present but future also.
By having and securing high quality workforce it accounts with the company having
creative and innovative ideas which helps the company with coming up with products and
services which can cater the needs and wants of the company and accounting to research for new
things which if implemented can result in company gaining the competitive advantage and
winning in the marketplace. It also accounts with the fun loving culture which helps the company
in deriving the high satisfaction at the workplace as result leads with the retention of employees
and as a result leads to less turnover of the same which helps to build positive brand image of the
company (Ramadevi, 2016).
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Best fit approach
`It outlines that for securing quality workforce the approach emphasis the importance of
ensuring that HR practices at the company are appropriate to the circumstances and condition of
the company which includes taking into consideration operational process, culture and external
environment where this suggest that practices of Human resource have to take into consideration
the needs of both its people and company as well. This is being stated by most of the experts that
best fit is more important and useful concept as compared to best practice where it discourages
that there is being universal prescriptions for Human resource management practices and policies
, which all depends on the situation and adopting to the strategy which best fist the company at
that time and which is being highly useful.
This is being also known as model of contingency as it accounts to situation and adopting
and implementing HR policies which best fits the same. It accounts with the emphasis that HR
practices and strategies of the company must be aligned with each other as it helps in securing
high quality workforce who can utilise their skills and talents in prevailing condition and
accounting to face the same in manner which is being suitable for the condition and helps in
testing the same in highly competitive business environment and supporting the business
dynamics (Mendy, Rahman, Bal, 2020). It accounts with making sure that strategies are being
suitable for different circumstances of the company which accounts with the flexibility of
organisation and getting relevant solutions that are being designed by balancing goals of human
resource and the company.
PESTEL analysis-
this are the external factors which affect the functioning of the human resource as well as
various business process
Where political factors relates with various changes in political environment of the
regions where business accounts to operate where by changes in the same needs to be considered
by the human resource of the company and change its policies, structure and process accordingly
to have compliance with the environment in which it operates (Song, Sun, Jin, 2017 ).
The economic factors accounts with human resource of the company providing reports of
taxes being paid by individual towards the contribution to the economy and various others
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which outlines the huge responsibility on the end of human resource to make policies and
regards with the compilation of things that accounts with economic contribution.
The next factors accounts social factors that accounts with building relationship with
various business parties such as customer and lasting them with the fruitful association to
account them with long term relationship with the company and which helps in boosting the
sales of the company
Technological factors accounts with how human resource implement various upgraded
technology such as bio metric tool which result in effective generation of attendance and makes
the process of payroll effective in the company and accounts with quality workforce
Legal factors serves as the most important source which accounts to human resource of
the company accounting to various acts such as health and safety act and others which if not
followed results in discontinuation of business and several penalties and restrictions (Kairuz,
2020).
The human resource of the company needs to accounts with serving various environment
factors which accounts to opting out strategies that are in favour of the environment where by
human resource of the company opt out for measures to reduce carbon footprints and others as
result leads to spread of positive word of mouth.
CONCLUSION
It can be concluded that HRM practices are very essential to each type of ventures, because
there is no venture or business can achieve appropriate workforce in the workplace without
conducting different practices of human resources management. The HR department of
Sainsbury have to be very active as well as energetic for using various modern strategies of
HRM, because it is very important in order to gain very positive outcomes in the market place.
There are talent management and performance management are also two key practices of HR
department in the company.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Abu-Nahel, Z.O., and et.al ., 2020. Human Resource Flexibility and Its Relationship to
Improving the Quality of Services.
al Habibi, B., 2019. HR practices of Marks & Spencer, Selfridges, Primark, and
Sainsbury’s (Doctoral dissertation, University of Science & Technology).
Easa, N. F. and El Orra, H., 2020. HRM practices and innovation: an empirical systematic
review. International Journal of Disruptive Innovation in Government.
Gilani, H. and Jamshed, S., 2016. An exploratory study on the impact of recruitment process
outsourcing on employer branding of an organisation. Strategic Outsourcing: An
International Journal.
Kairuz, A.R.P., and et.al., 2020. PESTEL analysis of environment state responsibility in
Ecuador. Neutrosophic Sets and Systems, Book Series, Vol. 34, 2020. An International
Book Series in Information Science and Engineering. Special Issue: Social Neutrosophy
in Latin America, p.70.
Korauš, A., Kaščáková, Z. and Felcan, M., 2020. The Impact Of Ability-Enhancing Hrm
Practices On Perceived Individual Performance In It Industry In Slovakia. Central
European Journal of Labour Law and Personnel Management. 3(1). pp.34-46.
Mendy, J., Rahman, M. and Bal, P.M., 2020. Using the “best‐fit” approach to investigate the
effects of politico‐economic and social barriers on SMEs' internationalization in an
emerging country context: Implications and future directions. Thunderbird International
Business Review.62(2. pp.199-211.
Mustafa, G., and et.al., 2017. MOTIVATION ENHANCING HRM PRACTICES’AND
EMPLOYEE DEMOGRAPHICS ON AFFECTIVE COMMITMENT AMONG
EMPLOYEES IN TEXTILE MANUFACTURING IN PAKISTAN. Pakistan Business
Review. 18(4). pp.865-886.
Pandey, P. and Patel, G., 2020. Retaining front-line service employees: introducing analytic
hierarchy process in the retail industry. International Journal of Management
Practice, 13(3), pp.321-337.
Pratibha, S. and Katyayani, J., 2017. Impact of HRM Practices on the Performance of Small
Scale Industries. International Journal of Management (IJM). 8(5).
Ramadevi, D.,and et.al., 2016. Human resource management in a healthcare environment:
Framework and case study. Industrial and Commercial Training.
Sheeba, M. and Latha, S., 2020. Creative Methods of Recruitment in Attracting Human
Talent. Studies in Indian Place Names, 40(60), pp.1116-1119.
Singh, S. and Nath, D., 2020. An Assessment in the Green HRM Practices With Job Satisfaction
and Its Impact on Organisational Commitment. International Journal of
Management. 11(9).
Song, J., Sun, Y. and Jin, L., 2017. PESTEL analysis of the development of the waste-to-energy
incineration industry in China. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews.80. pp.276-
289.
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