An assessment of practices used in the recruitment and selection processes of academic staff at the University KwaZulu-Natal.

Abstract

Recruitment and selection processes are human resource management functions that have critical influence on the performance of organisations in terms of realising set ultimate goals. The purpose of the study was to investigate recruitment and selection practices used at the University of KwaZulu-Natal focusing on the existing recruitment and selection methods, challenges faced, and strategies to address the challenges. A case study research design and quantitative research methodology were used. The target population for this study were all human resource staff in the College of Law and Management Studies. Probability sampling in particular census sampling was used to select all respondents. The sample size for this study was 92. Data was collected using questionnaires and analysed using SPSS version 21.1. The findings show that the university has a recruitment and selection policy. The regularly used recruitment and selection methods are; newspaper advert, internal recruitment, human resource office/labour office, employee referrals, radio advertisement and internet recruitment in this order. The findings show that the recruitment and selection practices have influence on the majority of the academics’ performance. Challenges to effective recruitment and selection practices include: poor human resource planning, ineffective job analysis, low competency levels on the part of academic staff, cost of recruitment and selection of academics, and poor working conditions of academics. It is therefore recommended that before the university commence recruitment and selection processes, all job profiles should reflect the actual requirements of all jobs.