Report: Recruitment and Selection Process for OZStyle4U Store Manager

This report details the recruitment and selection process for a Store Manager at OZStyle4U, a fashion retail chain expanding into Tasmania. The report begins with pre-recruitment considerations, including business strategies, staffing strategies, and talent philosophy. It addresses the company's proactive staffing emphasis, the need for a core workforce, and the critical position focus of the role. The report also covers the use of an external labor market and the importance of selecting a skilled candidate. The recruitment section discusses the employment value proposition, sourcing through referrals, and the use of press advertising and social networks. The selection process includes key accountabilities, person specifications, and an assessment plan involving cognitive ability tests, personality tests, and interviews. The report emphasizes the need for leadership skills, customer service abilities, and financial management knowledge. The assessment plan includes a structured interview question to evaluate leadership skills, followed by an analysis of the assessment methods and their weighting to determine the most effective approach for selecting the best candidate. The report concludes by providing an overview of the process and its importance.

Running Head: RECRUITMENT AND SELECTION PROCESS
Store Manager Selection and Recruitment Process
Name
Institutional Affiliation
Word count: 2352

Introduction
This chain of fashion stores decided that it is time for growth into other places, the first being
Tasmania in Hobart. The company is looking to employ its first Store Manager for this new store
to allow for its opening in 12 weeks. As a company, we a policy of internal succession but since
no internal candidate is available, we are sourcing externally without the use of external
recruitment organizations. This is, therefore, a report on the process that the Human Resource
manager will formulate to be able to recruit the best fit for the position.
To able to recruit a suitable candidate, the organizational goals will be considered in the sense
that store managers should be committed to excellence and innovation as the company is(Marie
Ryan &Derous, 2016). A store manager should also be highly valued by customers and be
dedicated to enhancing the well-being of his direct reports.
Pre-recruitment
OzStyle4U has a comprehensive, effective business strategy that has contributed largely to its
growth. The strategy entails expansion into new markets and in the process, the company aims at
offering quality customer service. The store manager will be expected to be innovative to be able
to keep up with OZStyle4U's standards and strategy. The manager selected should have good
social skills to be able to properly handle diverse customers (Marie Ryan, &Derous, 2016). This
is important since the fashion company has a strategy of exceptional customer service. The
manager should be able to handle new tasks to the best of his ability and in accordance with the
organization's goals. This is quite necessary since the manager will be managing a new store and
will deal with new issues (Bryson, James, & Keep, 2013).

In relation to the recruitment and selection strategy, OZStyle4U first realizes if they want to treat
staffing like an investment or treat it as a cost. Since the position of the store manager is an
ongoing position, staffing will be treated as an investment. It will be an investment because the
store in Hobart is new and will need consistency from management for its growth and therefore it
is better for us to spend more to hire the best fit for this position and therefore enable growth and
a resultant profit-making outlet.
The staffing emphasis for any organization is either proactive or reactive. Proactive staffing is
carried out before an issue arises and the staff employed is there for when the issue occurs.
Reactive staffing is carried out in response to issues that have already occurred. The staff hired in
this situation deal with the issue as it occurs. For our fashion company, the post of store manager
has a proactive staffing emphasis (Shackleton, 2015). This is because the post is looking to be
filled before the store opens. This is preparing for the opening before it happens. The store
manager once hired is expected to commence within nine weeks if possible even though the store
opens three weeks later. This justifies why the staffing emphasis is proactive.
The type of workforce during staffing is categorized into either core or flexible. The store
requires a core workforce for the manager’s post. The job will be of full-time nature. This is
indeed the best choice because a new store will require a manager who understands its needs
since its inception and ensure they are met throughout its progress and growth. A core workforce
will be the best choice to fulfill this requirement.
During staffing, a position focus can be critical or general. A critical position focus occurs
whereby a post is considered crucial to the organization in achieving its goals. For a general
position focus, the reverse is true. A post is needed but is not quite crucial in aiding the

businesses in acquiring a competitive advantage (Coller, Cordero, &Echavarren, 2018). The post
of store manager in Hobart has a critical position focus because the store manager has a role of
managing all activities carried out in the store. For the store to gain profits it will first require
good management to steer it and this is where the post of store manager comes in. This proves
that the position of the store manager is critical.
The labor market considered during staffing could be internal or external. An external labor
market is whereby an organization prefers to hire new employees from outside the business. An
internal labor market is where the organization develops its own employees and promotes them
to fill an available job. For the job opening of the store manager, in OZStyle4U, an external labor
market will be used even though we do have an internal succession management plan in place
(Tholen, 2017). We are sourcing a manager externally because there are no qualified internal
employees to fit this position. Therefore labor market used is both internal and external; external
since for this post an individual who has not worked for the company will be hired and internal
because the initial plan was internal succession.
An organization could hire a skilled person or they could hire one who is not and train them.
This skill acquisition is categorized into select and train respectively (Compton, 2009). This
company requires a skilled store manager. There is no time to train them extensively once hired
because we are running on a tight schedule. The training that will be offered to the one hired will
be basic such as induction. The manager will be required to already have retail management,
communication, financial management, accounting, social skills and knowledge on point of sale
software. An individual with these set of skills will be considered for the job.

The staffing aspect of talent management has two options; replace or retain. The replace option is
valid for firms in first growing industries so they can hire new people with new ideas. The
retention option is considered whereby employee loyalty is crucial for the company. In
OZStyle4U both the replacement and retention options are viable. The fashion industry is a fast-
changing industry that requires the continuous generation of new ideas for the firm's prosperity
hence the replacement option. On another perspective, the position of the store manager is quite
important to this company and loyalty to the company by the manager is revered because if they
are loyal they will take on the job enthusiastically hence bear fruits of profitability and customer
satisfaction.
For this new store in Hobart, we will select a manager with both personal and job fit skills focus.
The store’s opening is on a schedule hence no time for training new personnel hence a person-
job fit. As a manager, the individual is expected to be able to cooperate with other employees
and with customers hence, the need for a person-organization fit.
Staffing decisions in this company are made by both the Human Resource Manager and the
Hiring Manager. The HR Manager is involved in the decision making to ensure the hired
individual aligns with the organizational goals while the hiring manager is involved to ensure the
individual has skills required for the job because the person will be reporting directly to the
hiring manager (Noe, et al 2006). In the hiring of the store manager both the HR Manager and
the Operations Manager who is the hiring manager will be involved in making the staffing
decision
table 1 shows the job available, the tasks associated with the job, the relevance of the job to the
organization, the time to be spent on it, the Knowledge, Skills, Abilities and Other characteristics

required to do the specified job effectively.A job requirements matrix is essential in finding the
best candidate for the position of store manager. The skills required to fit the job should align
with the organizational goals.
Recruitment
An employment value proposition tells a prospective employee of what makes the company a
good place to work. It tells them of the company's culture, values, and benefits of working there.
At OZStyle4U we are an employer of choice (Kehoe, 2009). A lot of employees are retained
within the company for long periods of time due to their loyalty brought about by the provision
of a healthy working environment. We have 150 full-time permanent and part-time casual
employees who we have been able to retain by providing proper working conditions.
Our intrinsic work values include socializing, cohesion and responsibility (Lievens, & Chapman,
2010). Socializing is enabled by our need as a company to provide exceptional customer service
hence constant interaction with fellow employees and customers are required thus the
opportunity to create social links and cohesion is formulated (Rees, & Rumbles, 2010). As a
store manager, the hired person will have a set of responsibilities they are required to perform
that enable them to put their skills into use.
Our extrinsic values are a good pay, the presence of job security and a prestigious job. We are a
fast growing company that has been able to spread their wings into different states. Our
generated revenues are able to satisfy our current employees and will be able to support those we
will hire in the new store (Newell, 2005). Job security is brought about by the need to have loyal
employees who already know how the store works. We are a prestigious company, the largest
Queensland-owned chain of fashion retail stores and therefore working with us makes the

employee be categorized as doing a prestigious job. Organization contribution to the well-being
of its employees is in form of rewards(Langston, 2017). We give adequate salaries and bonuses
when the employee is deserving of it. We have a reward system of annual, spot and monthly
bonuses and also employee recognition days. The employee contribution to the organization is in
form of loyalty, providing skills necessary, ensuring exceptional customer service and working
towards organizational goals in their day to day activities.
Employee Value Proposition
We will source individuals through referrals. As a team, we would like to have sourcing be a part
of building our organization (Thurlow, 2003). Employees will be asked to refer people that are
likely to fit the job description and since they already know the all about the organization, they
are most likely to choose potential candidates. As the HR manager, I will also use press
advertising, social network and online job websites to recruit appropriate candidates for the post
of the store manager. Press advertising will increase people's awareness of our presence, speak
volumes about our financial status and therefore encourage people to apply. It will also give
specific requirements hence we will receive applications from highly skilled store managers. We
plan on using social networks since it will give us quite a large number of available candidates
who will be able to apply for the job.
Selection
The key accountabilities and person specification for the position of store manager are; proper
training and skills, experience in management; it would be an added advantage if it was in the
fashion industry (Lievens, & Chapman, 2010). Other requirements are the ability to provide
exceptional customer service, skills for the creation of effective marketing strategies, effective

communication skills, good leadership skills, financial systems knowledge paired with the point
of sale software knowledge and an understanding of staffing and legislative requirements. Using
these specifications we can create an assessment plan (Chaneta, 2014).
The assessment methods we are going to use are; cognitive ability tests, accounting and
budgeting tests, personality tests, recruiter interview and a panel interview. Each assessment
method will be weighted to be able to tell its effectiveness in selecting candidates.
ASSESSMENT PLAN
The first interview question will test leadership skills in a retail environment (Taylor, 2014). As
an applicant what would you do in the event that there is a misunderstanding between a customer
and an employee in the store considering that the company bases itself on exemplary customer
satisfaction and employee loyalty too? The structured answer for this question is that a manager
should first intervene only when the employee is unable to solve the problem and in such an
event, the manager should first serve the customer themselves and then get the employee’s side
of the story later.
This interview question will test the ability to prepare marketing strategies. The candidate will be
asked if the fashion store has a new brand of dresses, the first of its kind, what marketing
strategies they will apply to ensure the sales of that particular brand are high (Costen, 2012). The
suitable answer is the manager will incorporate the sales department in formulating marketing
ideas that have proven to work. The manager will ensure he knows the progress of the sales team
but avoids micromanaging.

Panel Interview
We will use the multiple hurdles approach in evaluating and choosing candidates. This method
has been picked because it is cost effective in terms of administrative costs (Moss, & Francis,
2007). It also saves a lot of time. We need to save on costs since the expense of opening the new
store is already high enough and the store’s opening is running on a schedule hence the need to
save on time to ensure the manager is hired on time and commences work on time too.
Conclusion
In conclusion, to be able to select and recruit a suitable candidate, there are issues to be
considered before the actual recruitment that we will carry out ("Recruitment strategies," 2009).
These include acknowledging and understanding the business strategy, preparing a workable
staffing strategy and finally creating a job requirements matrix. During the actual recruitment
process, arrays of steps are carried out. These steps are; creating an Employment Value
Proposition that reflects the company's true image, creating an informative job advertisement,
deciding the method that will be used to convey it, and finding the most effective sourcing
method to attract suitable candidates. The selection of a candidate to fill the post of the store
manager is the final step. As the HR manager, I have decided to use the multiple hurdles
approach to select the most suitable individual to fill this post. This selection and recruitment
process when successfully applied will see OZStyle4U hire a very skilled and competent store
manager.

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