SUMMER TRAINING & PROJECT REPORT ON

RECRUITMENT & SELECTION PATTERN FOR

EMPLOYEES AT AMERICAN EXPRESS INDIA
PVT. LIMITED
Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the award of
Degree of Master of Business Administration (MBA)

1
 PREFACE

It gives me immense pleasure to present this concise Project Report to BV-IMR in

partial fulfillment for the award of Post Graduate Degree in Business
Management (PGDBM). I carried out a summer project work and wrote on the
topic of “Recruitment and Selection pattern for employees at American Express
India Private Limited” give clear picture of operation of AMERICAN EXPRESS
INDIA PRIVATE LIMITED as a successful global financiers and financial
services in India as well as many developed and developing countries across the
globe having its headquarters at New York City. Founded in 1850, it is one of the
30 components of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The company is best known
for its credit card, charge card, and traveler's cheque businesses. Amex cards
account for approximately 24% of the total dollar volume of credit card
transactions in the US, the highest of any card issuer and above all it is popular
and familiar for its customer friendly attitude.
The purpose of this study is to apprise readers’ fraternity of business management
stream to know how corporate conglomerates in the sector of financial services in
general and AMERICAN EXPRESS in particular actually carry out their unique
HR related functions in more fascinated and transparent while giving weightage
for merits of budding professionals and how they chalk out their marketing
strategies to retain talented skills and remain customer friendly for achieving
success by accomplishing their goals despite utter competition among their
competitors.
Before presenting this project, at the outset I must say I have learned many
broader concepts relating to Human Resource Management – methods to retain
talented heads and Sales and Marketing skills followed by corporates financial
services theoretically. These concepts are only in the books, but I was delighted
when I entered AMERICAN EXPRESS offices New Delhi to have the first hand
experience on actual practice followed in HRD department, and Sales – Finance

2
service Credit card division Travelers’ Cheque business - Marketing department
and its constant struggle to forge ahead as successful global – regional and
country financial service despite its competitors who are also leading in the Indian
corporate financial service barons. Through this in-depth report I am sharing my
experience with all has to how the AMERICAN EXPRESS employees’ are fully
satisfied with their job profiles and how their sales and marketing strategies have
made them to be pioneers in their sphere of business with sole motto to be remain
customer-friendly.
Globalization and Liberalization and its aftermath, many economies all over the
world have witnessed rapid changes in business horizons, and the financial
services sector is not exception to this notion where business emerged not only as
commercial entity but it has become economical and customer friendly.
Simplified procedure for extending financial assistance to needy people in more
systematic and transparent manner and extending card facilities to its valued
reputed clients in their business have become buzzword and need of the present
society.
The two major aspects of present management education are theoretical approach
and practical approach. Of these two, practical approach serves as the key of
management course and is of vital importance in present scenario. It serves as a
tool in shaping a future manager from amongst student fraternity of management
to get an exposure on how the actual practice of HR related issues along with
sales and marketing strategy that will steer the business entity and in this Report
on AMERICAN EXPRESS how its service has been viewed by society and how
it is reaching to new heights.

3
 CONTENTS

Topic Page no.

1.0 Introduction 11

1.1 Overview of American Express 12-13

1.2 Formation of the Company 13

1.3 Historical Background 14

1.4 Mission & Vision of the Company 15-16

1.5 Products offered by the Company 17-18

1.6 Functions of the Company 18-19

1.7 Amex Guiding Principles 20-21

1.8 Company Values 22-23

1.9 Competition Information 23-24

1.10 SWOT Analysis of the Company 25-28

1.11 Porters Five Forces Model of Competition 28-32

2.0 Objective 34

3.0 Research Methodology 35

3.1 Data Collection 36

3.2 Objective and Scope of the Project 37-38

3.3 Managerial Usefulness of the Study 38-39

3.4 Type of Research and Research Design Used 39-41

3.5 Overview of Data Collection Techniques 42-50

3.6 Limitations to the Study 51-55

3.7 Conclusion 56

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4.0 Literature Survey 57

4.1 Meaning of Human Resource Management 58

4.2 Functions of Human Resource Management 59-61
4.3 Importance of Human Resource Management 62
4.4 Scope of HRM at Organizational Level 63
4.5 Human Resource Development 65
4.6 Staffing 68-79
4.7 Current Issues 79-83
4.8 Company History and Development 83-85

5.0 Data Analysis 86

5.1 Data Collection 87-97

5.2 Data Interpretation 98-103

Findings 104

Conclusion 105

Suggestions 106

Bibliography 107

Annexure 108-112

5
 INTRODUCTIO
N

INTRODUCTION

Human Resource is a basic need of any work to be done. HR according to

ARTHUR LEWIS is that “there are great differences in development between

6
 countries which seem to have roughly equal resources, so it is necessary to
enquire into the difference in human behaviors”

The project report is all about recruitment and selection process that is an
important part of any organization.

Recruitment highlights each applicant’s skills, talents and experience. Their

selection involves developing a list of qualified candidates, defining a selection
strategy, identifying qualified candidates, thoroughly evaluating qualified
candidates and selecting the most qualified candidate.

It is said if right person is appointed at right place the half work has been done. In
this project I have tried to cover all the important point that should be kept in
mind while recruitment and selection process and have conducted a research
study through a questionnaire that I got it filled with all the sales managers of
AMERICAN EXPRESS INDIA PVT. LTD. and tried to find out which methods
and various other information related to recruitment and selection and tries to
come to a conclusion at what time mostly the manpower planning is don’t , what
the various method used for recruiting the candidates and on what basic the
selections is done.

American Express India has a well-articulated equal opportunity policy, which

lays strong emphasis on hiring of individuals irrespective of age, race, caste or
gender. As a best practice in recruitment.

CHAPTER I

About the Company

1.1 Overview of American Express

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The company is one of the world's largest travel agencies, but it is better known
for its charge cards and revolving credit cards. And yes, the company still issues
traveler's checks and publishes such magazines as Food & Wine and Travel +
Leisure through its American Express Publishing unit. Its travel agency
operations have thousands of locations worldwide, and its Travelers Cheque
Group is the world's largest issuer of traveler's checks. But the company's charge
and credit cards are its bread and butter; American Express has some 88 million
cards in circulation worldwide.

American Express Company is a global travel, financial, and network services

provider. It is renowned for its service excellence, strong brand equity and long-
term customer loyalty. American Express is a leader in delivering high quality
services to its customers through integrated call centers. This document describes
how American Express achieves top performance in its three major service
centers.

American Express Company, sometimes known as "AmEx" or "Amex", is a

diversified global financial services company headquartered in New York City.
Founded in 1850, it is one of the 30 components of the Dow Jones Industrial
Average. The company is best known for its credit card, charge card, and
traveler's cheque businesses. Amex cards account for approximately 24% of the
total dollar volume of credit card transactions in the US, the highest of any card
issuer.
8
BusinessWeek and Interbrand ranked American Express as the 22nd most valuable
brand in the world, estimating the brand to be worth US$14.97 billion. Fortune
listed Amex as one of the top 30 Most Admired Companies in the World.

The company's mascot, adopted in 1958, is a Roman gladiator whose image

appears on the company's travelers' cheques and credit cards.

Company Profile

1.2 Formation of the Company

Origins

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Soon after gold was discovered in early 1848 at Sutter's Mill near Coloma,
California, financiers and entrepreneurs from all over North America and the
world flocked to California, drawn by the promise of huge profits. Vermont native
Henry Wells and New Yorker William G. Fargo watched the California boom
economy with keen interest. Before either Wells or Fargo could pursue
opportunities offered in the West, however, they had business to attend to in the
East.

American Express Co. receipt, New York, NY Aug. 6, 1853

Wells, founder of Wells and Company, and Fargo, a partner in Livingston, Fargo
and Company, were major figures in the young and fiercely competitive express
industry. In 1849 a new rival, John Butterfield, founder of Butterfield, Wasson &
Company, entered the express business. Butterfield, Wells, and Fargo soon
realized that their competition was destructive and wasteful, and in 1850 they
decided to join forces to form the American Express Company.

Soon after the new company was formed, Wells, the first president of American
Express, and Fargo, its vice-president, proposed expanding their business to
California. Fearing that American Express's most powerful rival, Adams and
Company (later renamed Adams Express Company), would acquire a monopoly
in the West, the majority of the American Express Company's directors balked.
Undaunted, Wells and Fargo decided to start their own business while continuing
to fulfill their responsibilities as officers and directors of American Express.

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 1.3 Historical Background

More than a century and a half after its founding, American Express has become a
global financial services powerhouse and one of this nation's most recognizable
brands around the world.

American Express started out in 1850 as a freight and valuables deliver service for the
rapidly expanding nation. The fledgling U.S. Postal Service was unreliable at the time
and only allowed shipment of letter-sized envelopes. This provided a business opening
for the company to ship larger parcels and valuable items such as jewelry, cash, stock
certificates and other merchandise.

The company took a turn when it began to realize more profit from a sector of its
customer base that included banks and other financial institutions. Banks placed a high
value on American Express' secure and reliable delivery service for interbank transfers
and drafts made between eastern cities and the growing western territories. American
Express then began focusing its efforts on this sector and used its connections to
eventually enter the financial services arena.

In the late 1890s, American Express decided to compete with the banks they
serviced, by issuing money orders. This line of business took off rapidly and
allowed the company to expand into Europe, where the American Express brand
name became associated with security, capital and dependability. Soon thereafter,
the company had major offices in London, Paris, Antwerp, Zurich and Berlin.

The beginning of World War I forced American Express into the travel services
businesses. More than 150,000 Americans were stranded in Europe in 1914 at the
outbreak of the Great War. These citizens flocked to the offices of American
Express seeking funds after other European banks refused to honor their
American letters of credit. American Express honored these letters of credit in
full, which allowed American citizens to fund their passages back home.

11
In 1922, American Express jumped into the travel services business by providing
luxury steamship travel around the world, along with most other related services
for passengers. Its traveler's check business meshed well with this well-heeled
crowd of luxury globe-hoppers. The traveler's check business fueled the growth of
the company over the next several decades, based on the upfront fees and in how
firm invested the float income.

In the 1950s, American Express issued its first credit card, which caught on
quickly in the booming postwar economy. In 1966, the company issued its first
gold card, in an effort to cater to the upper echelon of business travel. Its platinum
card debuted in the 1990s

American Express continues to be a powerful global brand through the present

day with an array of consumer products ranging from the Blue Card to the ultra
exclusive Black Card, which isn't publicly advertised, but issued by invitation
only to the wealthy and famous). 

1.4 Mission of the Company

To be the most respected brand in the world.

Vision of the Company

To win the hearts, minds, and wallets of our customers by providing extraordinary
customer service.

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Each day, American Express makes it easier, safer and more
rewarding for consumers and businesses to purchase the things
they need

and for merchants to sell their goods and services. An engine of

commerce, American Express provides innovative payment, travel and expense
management solutions for individuals and businesses of all sizes. Most of all, we
help our customers realize their dreams and aspirations through industry-leading
benefits, access to unique experiences, business-building insights, and global
customer care. We enable our customers to do more and achieve more.

At American Express, We:

 are the world's largest card issuer by purchase volume

 process millions of transactions daily as the premium network for high-
spending card members

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  help small business owners succeed by delivering purchasing power,
flexibility and financial control
 provide commercial payment tools and expertise that help companies
control their spending and save billions of dollars
 offer marketing and information management insights that help merchants
build their businesses
 are customer loyalty experts with industry-leading rewards programs and
platforms
 operate the world’s largest travel network serving consumers and
businesses
 are recognized as the most innovative company in our industries
 are dedicated to serving our customers, 24/7, around the world

A Unique Service Company

American Express is the only company with a strong, global presence across the
entire payments chain.

We are the world’s largest card issuer, the premium network for high-spending
card members, a processor of millions of transactions daily, and a partner that
provides business-building services to a worldwide merchant base.

Having this horizontal scale across payments gives us diverse opportunities to

grow our business and drive innovation in the marketplace. It’s also a gateway to
a broader array of services that further differentiate American Express.

Our direct relationships with many millions of consumers, businesses and

merchants worldwide -- combined with our leading-edge marketing, information
management and rewards capabilities -- enable us to offer an array of valuable
services that enrich lives, build business success, encourage financial
responsibility, and create communities of people with common interests.
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This is what makes American Express a unique, and uniquely powerful, services

company.

15
1.5 Products offered by the Company:

16
More Products & Services:

Gift Cards:

1.6 Functions of American Express:

As one of the world's leading service brands, American Express offers a broad
array of products and services to individual and business clients around the world.
We are, among other things, one of the world's largest travel agencies and a global
payments company that processes millions of transactions daily.

All of our operations worldwide are categorized under these four umbrella
organizations:

17
•    Cards
•    Travel
•    Business Services
•    Corporate/Enterprise Functions

Cards:
Exceeding the customer's expectations is a top priority for American Express, and
we have millions of business clients and card members worldwide. Our card
businesses include:
 Consumer Card Services Group
 Customer Service International
 Global Commercial Card
 International Consumer Card
 Global Prepaid Services
 Service Delivery Network

Travel:
Exceeding the customer's expectations is a top priority for American Express, and
we have millions of business clients and card members worldwide. Our travel
businesses include:
 Consumer Travel Network
 Global Travel Services

Business Services:
Exceeding the customer's expectations is a top priority for American Express, and
we have millions of business clients and card members worldwide. Our business
services groups include:
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  Global Merchant Services
 Global Network Services
  International Small Business Services
  OPEN from American Express

Corporate Functions:
The Corporate Functions at American Express work across multiple lines of
business to make sure the right strategies, personnel and technologies are in place
to ensure the Company's continued growth and success. Our Corporate Functions
include:
 American Express Interactive
 Corporation Affairs and Communications
 Finance
 Global Advertising and Brand Management Human Resources
 Legal
 Publishing
 Risk, Information, and Banking
 Strategic Planning Group
 Technologies

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1.7 AMERICAN EXPRESS GUIDING PRINCIPLES

At American Express, service has been a hallmark of our company throughout its
160-year history. This service ethos comes to life every time we help a customer –
whether with a simple, everyday request or in an emergency situation. We show
the same care and commitment to service in our communities.  

Today's leaders navigate a world that is undergoing continuous change. As the

landscape changes, so do the tools leaders need to harness that change and
improve organizational and individual performance. We appreciate the impact

20
that talented leaders can have on business and society as a whole and we dedicate
significant resources to attract, develop and retain talented employees

Cultural heritage forms our individual, local and national identities. It shapes
relationships with our neighbors and with other communities around the world. At
American Express, we believe that respect for and celebration of our diverse
cultural heritage promotes human understanding and economic development in an
increasingly interdependent world.

At American Express, we believe that serving our communities is not only

integral to running a business successfully, it is part of our individual
responsibilities as citizens of the world. The mission of our Corporate Social
Responsibility program is to bring to life the American Express value of good
corporate citizenship by supporting diverse communities in ways that enhance the
company's reputation with employees, customers, business partners and other
stakeholders. We do this by supporting visionary nonprofit organizations that are:

21
   Preserving and enriching our diverse cultural heritage
 Developing new leaders for tomorrow
 Encouraging community service where our employees and customers live
and work

COMPANY CEO – Mr. Ken Chenault

A heritage built on service and sustained by innovation. American Express is a

global services company, providing access to products, insights and experiences
that enrich lives and build business success.

Distinct, from our brand to our business model. It's hard to put a label on the Blue
Box because American Express is unique. No other company is built like us.

1.8 Company Values 

Our Blue Box Values reflect who we are and what we stand for and clearly state our
commitment to customers, quality, people, integrity, teamwork and good citizenship.

Customer Commitment

We develop relationships that make a positive difference in our customers' lives.

22
Quality
We provide outstanding products and unsurpassed service that, together, deliver premium
value to our customers.

Integrity
We uphold the highest standards of integrity in all of our actions.

Teamwork
We work together, across boundaries, to meet the needs of our customers and to help the
company win

Respect for People

We value our people, encourage their development and reward their performance.

Good Citizenship

We are good citizens in the communities in which we live and work.

A Will to Win

We exhibit a strong will to win in the marketplace and in every aspect of our business.

Personal Accountability

We are personally accountable for delivering on our commitments.

1.9 Competition Information:

Demand for banking services is closely tied to economic activity and the level of
interest rates. The profitability of individual banks depends on marketing skills,
efficient operations, and good risk management. Large economies of scale exist
in some segments of the industry, which has encouraged industry consolidation.
23
Smaller banks can compete successfully in segments where customer service or
knowledge of the local market is more important. Many banks and thrifts
aggressively offered adjustable rate and subprime mortgages during the housing
boom of the early 2000s only to find themselves saddled with loan defaults and
extensive losses when the housing bubble burst. Deep exposure to subprime
mortgages and mortgage-backed securities caused bank failures, government
takeovers, and involuntary mergers. Although the financial climate has improved,
slow demand for loans and increased government regulation may result in a long
recovery period for the banking industry.

The lucrative fees AmEx charges merchants are under attack, and it has been slow
to sign up U.S. banks to issue its cards. What's more, rivals Visa International and
MasterCard International are fast encroaching on its high-end turf. In a July 12
report, UBS card analyst Eric E. Wasserstrom said he expects the aggressive
marketing of Visa's Signature card, aimed at upmarket customers, to slow AmEx's
earnings growth. Adds Duncan MacDonald, former general counsel for Citibank
cards: "AmEx has to be scared for a bunch of reasons."

Top American Express Company Competitors

Companies Location
Discover Financial
Riverwoods, IL
Services
MasterCard Incorporated Purchase, NY
Visa Inc. Foster City, CA

Who are American Express Company's

24
Competitors?
From refining your strategy to uncovering new
opportunities, solid information about a company’s
competitors can be critical. Hoover’s subscribers have
access to a complete analysis of American Express
Company's main competitors with details in key
categories.
Competitor on file Charlotte, NC
Competitor on file McLean, VA
Competitor on file New York, NY
Competitor on file Bellevue, WA
Competitor on file London, United Kingdom
Competitor on file New York, NY
Competitor on file New York, NY
Competitor on file San Jose, CA

1.10 Swot Analysis of American Express

The American Express Company-SWOT Analysis company profile is the
essential source for top-level company data and information. American Express
Company-SWOT Analysis examines the company’s key business structure and
operations, history and products, and provides summary analysis of its key
revenue lines and strategy.

American Express (Amex or ’the company) is a leading global provider of travel

related global provider of travel related service, payment services, financial
advisory, payment services, financial advisory services and banking service.
Amex operates primarily in North America and Europe and in the Asia Pacific
region; its products are offered in about 200 countries. It is headquartered in New
York City, New Your and employs 58,300 people. The company recorded total
net revenues of $24,523 million in the financial year (FY) ended December 2009,
a decrease of 13.5% over FY2008. The operating profit was $2,841 million in
25
FY2009, a decrease of20.7% over FY2008. The net profit was$2,130 million in
FY2009, a decrease of 21.1% over FY2008.

Strengths
American Express Company - SWOT Analysis company profile is the essential
source for top-level company data and information. American Express Company -
SWOT Analysis examines the company%u2019s key business structure and
operations, history and products, and provides summary analysis of its key
revenue lines and strategy.

American Express (Amex or 'the company') is a leading global provider of travel

related services, payment services, financial advisory services and banking
services. Amex operates primarily in North America and Europe and in the Asia
Pacific region; its products are offered in about 200 countries. It is headquartered
in New York City, New York and employs 66,000 people. The company recorded
total net revenues of $28,365 million in the financial year ended December 2008,
an increase of 2.9% over 2007. The operating profit was $3,581 million in 2008, a
decrease of 37.1% over 2007. The net profit was $2,699 million in 2008, a
decrease of 32.7% over 2007.

Opportunities
Expand into point-of-sale debit card services

 Global expansion, particularly in China

 Financial services product expansion
 Divestment of AEB and AEIDC

Weaknesses
26
  Lack of point-of-sale debit card services.
 Declining Traveler's check business 
 High interest coverage ratio increasing the company's risk profile
 Lack of merchant acceptance
 Higher merchant fees passed on to consumer

Threats

 Interchange fees associated with legislative rulings in Europe

 Heavy competition from other financial institutions
 Financial turmoil in capital markets

The history of American Express is a vivid example of the invisible hand of the
market steering the direction of a company. Starting as a freight forwarder, the
founders learned quickly that it was much more profitable to transport small
parcels for banks rather then larger freight. The innovation that they showed when
they introduced money orders and travelers cheques is the very embodiment of
the definition of business purpose. They created customers.

SWOT Analysis
Strengths
1. Diversity. The company has added different products and services over
the years. This diversity has made it able to spread financial risk over
different channels.
2. Innovation. The company history is a study in innovation. It has
pioneered many of the financial products we take for granted today, and
consistently found ways to improve delivery of its services.

27
Weaknesses
1. Credit and financial businesses are at the mercy of the credit market as well as
consumer confidence. If consumer spending is off, as it is right now, and credit is tight
profits will be down.
2. Size. The credit crunch has caused American Express to take measures to limit their
default rate and minimize losses. As one of the largest credit card companies, they
receive a great deal of attention in the press. This could end up hurting their corporate
image many years after the economic crisis has passed.

Opportunities
1. American Express remains a relatively stable financial service company in comparison
to some of its counterparts. This could be a tremendous plus for them when the economy
begins to recover and customers have fewer choices in the industry.
2. Taking steps to limit risk, and becoming a leaner company could help the company to
become even stronger.

Threats
1. Tighter regulations and government intervention could make the financial services
industry much less profitable in the future.

2. As the US economy begins to affect the global economy, American Express may find
itself a victim of anger and backlash around the world.

1.11 Porter's Five Forces Model of Competition

Assessing the Balance of Power in a Business Situation

The Porter's 5 Forces tool is a simple but powerful tool for understanding where
power lies in a business situation. This is useful, because it helps you understand

28
both the strength of your current competitive position, and the strength of a
position you're considering moving into.

With a clear understanding of where power lies, you can take fair advantage of a
situation of strength, improve a situation of weakness, and avoid taking wrong
steps. This makes it an important part of your planning toolkit.

Conventionally, the tool is used to identify whether new products, services or

businesses have the potential to be profitable. However it can be very illuminating
when used to understand the balance of power in other situations too.

Understanding the Tool:

Five Forces Analysis assumes that there are five important forces that determine
competitive power in a business situation. These are:

1. Supplier Power: Here you assess how easy it is for suppliers to drive up
prices. This is driven by the number of suppliers of each key input, the
uniqueness of their product or service, their strength and control over you,
the cost of switching from one to another, and so on. The fewer the
supplier choices you have, and the more you need suppliers' help, the
more powerful your suppliers are.
2. Buyer Power: Here you ask yourself how easy it is for buyers to drive
prices down. Again, this is driven by the number of buyers, the importance
of each individual buyer to your business, the cost to them of switching
from your products and services to those of someone else, and so on. If
you deal with few, powerful buyers, then they are often able to dictate
terms to you.
3. Competitive Rivalry: What is important here is the number and
capability of your competitors. If you have many competitors, and they
offer equally attractive products and services, then you'll most likely have

29
 little power in the situation, because suppliers and buyers will go
elsewhere if they don't get a good deal from you. On the other hand, if no-
one else can do what you do, then you can often have tremendous
strength.
4. Threat of Substitution: This is affected by the ability of your customers
to find a different way of doing what you do – for example, if you supply
a unique software product that automates an important process, people
may substitute by doing the process manually or by outsourcing it. If
substitution is easy and substitution is viable, then this weakens your
power.
5. Threat of New Entry: Power is also affected by the ability of people to
enter your market. If it costs little in time or money to enter your market
and compete effectively, if there are few economies of scale in place, or if
you have little protection for your key technologies, then new competitors
can quickly enter your market and weaken your position. If you have
strong and durable barriers to entry, then you can preserve a favorable
position and take fair advantage of it.

These forces can be neatly brought together in a diagram like the one below:

30
Using the Tool:

Brainstorm the relevant factors for your market or situation, and then check
against the factors listed for the force in the diagram above.

Then, mark the key factors on the diagram, and summarize the size and scale of
the force on the diagram. An easy way of doing this is to use, for example, a
single "+" sign for a force moderately in your favor, or "--" for a force strongly
against you (you can see this in the example below).

31
Then look at the situation you find using this analysis and think through how it
affects you. Bear in mind that few situations are perfect; however looking at
things in this way helps you think through what you could change to increase your
power with respect to each force. What’s more, if you find yourself in a
structurally weak position, this tool helps you think about what you can do to
move into a stronger one.

This tool was created by Harvard Business School professor,

Michael Porter, to analyze the attractiveness and likely-profitability
of an industry. Since publication, it has become one of the most
important business strategy tools. The classic article which
introduces it is "How Competitive Forces Shape Strategy" in
Harvard Business Review 57, March - April 1979, pages 86-93.

Example:

Martin Johnson is deciding whether to switch career and become a farmer - he's
always loved the countryside, and wants to switch to a career where he's his own
boss. He creates the following Five Forces Analysis as he thinks the situation
through:

32
This worries him:

 The threat of new entry is quite high: if anyone looks as if they’re

making a sustained profit, new competitors can come into the industry
easily, reducing profits.
 Competitive rivalry is extremely high: if someone raises prices, they’ll
be quickly undercut. Intense competition puts strong downward pressure
on prices.
 Buyer Power is strong, again implying strong downward pressure on
prices.
 There is some threat of substitution.

33
Unless he is able to find some way of changing this situation, this looks like a
very tough industry to survive in. Maybe he'll need to specialize in a sector of the
market that's protected from some of these forces, or find a related business that's
in a stronger position.

Key points:

Porter's Five Forces Analysis is an important tool for assessing the potential for
profitability in an industry. With a little adaptation, it is also useful as a way of
assessing the balance of power in more general situations.

It works by looking at the strength of five important forces that affect

competition:

 Supplier Power: The power of suppliers to drive up the prices of your

inputs.
 Buyer Power: The power of your customers to drive down your prices.
 Competitive Rivalry: The strength of competition in the industry.
 The Threat of Substitution: The extent to which different products and
services can be used in place of your own.
 The Threat of New Entry: The ease with which new competitors can
enter the market if they see that you are making good profits (and then
drive your prices down).

By thinking about how each force affects you, and by identifying the strength and
direction of each force, you can quickly assess the strength of your position and
your ability to make a sustained profit in the industry.

You can then look at how you can affect each of the forces to move the balance of
power more in your favor.

34
OBJECTIVE

35
2.1 OBJECTIVE

1. To study the recruitment and selection procedure followed in American

Express.

2. To study the various sources of recruitment followed in American

Express.

3. To learn what is the process of recruitment and selection that should be

followed.

4. To search or headhunt people whose skill fits into the company’s values.

36
 RESEARCH
METHODOLOGY

37
CHAPTER II
Research Methodology

In everyday life human being has to face many problems viz. social, economical,
financial problems. These problems in life call for acceptable and effective
solutions and for this purpose, research is required and a methodology applied for
the solutions can be found out.
Research was carried out at American Express India Pvt .Ltd to find out the
“Recruitment and selection process”

3.1 DATA COLLECTION:

Primary Data:
Primary data was collected through survey method by distributing questionnaires
to branch manager and other sales manager. The questionnaires were carefully
designed by taking into account the parameters of my study.

Secondary Data:
Data was collected from books, magazines, web sites, going through the records
of the organisation, etc. It is the data which has been collected by individual or
someone else for the purpose of other than those of our particular research study.
Or in other words we can say that secondary data is the data used previously for
the analysis and the results are undertaken for the next process.

3.2 OBJECTIVE AND SCOPE OF THE PROJEC T:

The primary objective of the project is the Recruitment , Selection and Placement
of Personnel. It includes Recruitment Procedure to be adopted while selecting
suitable candidates for different profiles in the company. Different methods to test
the aptitude of the candidates for the desired position and placing them in
different processes based on their skills.
38
The project is based on testing tools to be be used while hiring candidates in the
company. For e.g. Brief Introduction, written aptitude tests, questionnaire's to
analyze the employee behavior, computer awareness and personal interview by
the HR Department.

Objective of the study:

The importance of well-defined objectives cannot be over emphasized. A

questionnaire that is written without a clear goal and purpose is inevitably going
to overlook important issues and waste participants' time by asking useless
questions. The questionnaire may lack a logical flow and thereby cause the
participant to lose interest.

Consequential, what useful data you may have collected could be further
compromised. The problems of a poorly defined questionnaire do not end here,
but continue on to the analysis stage. It is difficult to imagine identifying a
problem and its cause, let alone its solution, from responses to broad and
generalizing questions. In other words, how would it be possible to reach
insightful conclusions if one didn't actually know what they had been looking for
or planning to observe.

An objective such as "to identify points of user dissatisfaction with the interface
and how these negatively affect the software's performance" may sound clear and
to the point, but it is not. The questionnaire designer must clarify what is meant
by user dissatisfaction. Is this dissatisfaction with the learning of the software, the
power of the software, of the ease of learning the software? Is it important for the
users to learn the software quickly if they learn it well? What is meant by the
software's performance?

How accurate must the measurements be? All of these issues must be narrowed
and focused before a single question is formulated. A good rule of thumb is that if
39
you are finding it difficult to write the questions, then you haven't spent enough
time defining the objectives of the questionnaire. Go back and do this step again.
The questions should follow quite naturally from the objectives.

Scope of the Study:

Questionnaires are an inexpensive way to gather data from a potentially large

number of respondents. Often they are the only feasible way to reach a number of
reviewers large enough to allow statistically analysis of the results. A well-
designed questionnaire that is used effectively can gather information on both the
overall performance of the test system as well as information on specific
components of the system. If the questionnaire includes demographic questions
on the participants, they can be used to correlate performance and satisfaction
with the test system among different groups of users.

It is important to remember that a questionnaire should be viewed as a multi-stage

process beginning with definition of the aspects to be examined and ending with
interpretation of the results. Every step needs to be designed carefully because the
final results are only as good as the weakest link in the questionnaire process.
Although questionnaires may be cheap to administer compared to other data
collection methods, they are every bit as expensive in terms of design time and
interpretation.

3.3 MANAGERIAL USEFULLNESS OF STUDY

Questionnaires are quite flexible in what they can measure, however they are not
equally suited to measuring all types of data. We can classify data in two ways,
Subjective vs. Objective and Quantitative vs. Qualitative.

When a questionnaire is administered, the researchers control over the

environment will be somewhat limited. This is why questionnaires are
40
inexpensive to administer. This loss of control means the validity of the results are
more reliant on the honesty of the respondent. Consequently, it is more difficult to
claim complete objectivity with questionnaire data then with results of a tightly
controlled lab test.

For example, if a group of participants are asked on a questionnaire how long it

took them to learn a particular function on a piece of software, it is likely that they
will be biased towards themselves and answer, on average, with a lower than
actual time. A more objective usability test of the same function with a similar
group of participants may return a significantly higher learning time. More
elaborate questionnaire design or administration may provide slightly better
objective data, but the cost of such a questionnaire can be much higher and offset
their economic advantage. In general, questionnaires are better suited to gathering
reliable subjective measures, such as user satisfaction, of the system or interface
in question.

Questions may be designed to gather either qualitative or quantitative data. By

their very nature, quantitative questions are more exact then qualitative. For
example, the word "easy" and "difficult" can mean radically different things to
different people. Any question must be carefully crafted, but in particular
questions that assess a qualitative measure must be phrased to avoid ambiguity.
Qualitative questions may also require more thought on the part of the participant
and may cause them to become bored with the questionnaire sooner. In general,
we can say that questionnaires can measure both qualitative and quantitative data
well, but that qualitative questions require more care in design, administration,
and interpretation.

3.4 Type of Research and Research Design Used:

The Steps used in the Survey Project were :

41
1. Establishing Goals
The first step in any survey is deciding what you want to learn. The goals of the
project determine whom you will survey and what you will ask them. If your
goals are unclear, the results will probably be unclear. Some typical goals include
learning more about:

 The potential market for a new product or service

 Ratings of current products or services
 Employee attitudes
 Customer/patient satisfaction levels
 Reader/viewer/listener opinions
 Association member opinions
 Opinions about political candidates or issues
 Corporate images

These sample goals represent general areas. The more specific you can make your
goals, the easier it will be to get usable answers.
1. Selecting Your Sample
There are two main components in determining whom you will interview. The
first is deciding what kind of people to interview. Researchers often call this
group the target population. If you conduct an employee attitude survey or an
association membership survey, the population is obvious. If you are trying to
determine the likely success of a product, the target population may be less
obvious. Correctly determining the target population is critical. If you do not
interview the right kinds of people, you will not successfully meet your goals.

The next thing to decide is how many people you need to interview. Statisticians
know that a small, representative sample will reflect the group from which it is
drawn. The larger the sample, the more precisely it reflects the target group.
42
However, the rate of improvement in the precision decreases as your sample size
increases. For example, to increase a sample from 250 to 1,000 only doubles the
precision. You must make a decision about your sample size based on factors
such as: time available, budget and necessary degree of precision.

The Survey System (and this Web site) includes a sample size calculator that can
help you decide on the sample size (jump to the calculator page for a general
discussion of sample size considerations).

1. Avoiding a Biased Sample

A biased sample will produce biased results. Totally excluding all bias is almost
impossible; however, if you recognize bias exists you can intuitively discount
some of the answers. The following list shows some examples of biased samples.

The consequences of a source of bias depend on the nature of the survey. For
example, a survey for a product aimed at retirees will not be as biased by daytime

43
interviews as will a general public opinion survey. A survey about Internet
products can safely ignore people who do not use the Internet.

1 Quotas
A Quota is a sample size for a sub-group. It is sometimes useful to establish
quotas to ensure that your sample accurately reflects relevant sub-groups in your
target population. For example, men and women have somewhat different
opinions in many areas. If you want your survey to accurately reflect the general
population's opinions, you will want to ensure that the percentage of men and
women in your sample reflect their percentages of the general population.

If you are interviewing users of a particular type of product, you probably want to
ensure that users of the different current brands are represented in proportions that
approximate the current market share. Alternatively, you may want to ensure that
you have enough users of each brand to be able to analyze the users of each brand
as a separate group. If you are doing telephone or Web page interviewing, The
Survey System's optional Sample Management or Internet Module can help you
enforce quotas. They let you create automatically enforced quotas and/or monitor
your sample during interviewing sessions.

1. Interviewing Methods

Once you have decided on your sample you must decide on your method of data
collection. Each method has advantages and disadvantages.

Personal Interviews

An interview is called personal when the Interviewer asks the questions face-to-
face with the Interviewee. Personal interviews can take place in the home, at a
shopping mall, on the street, outside a movie theater or polling place, and so on.

44
Advantages

 The ability to let the Interviewee see, feel and/or taste a product.
 The ability to find the target population. For example, you can find people
who have seen a film much more easily outside a theater in which it is
playing than by calling phone numbers at random.
 Longer interviews are sometimes tolerated. Particularly with in-home
interviews that have been arranged in advance. People may be willing to
talk longer face-to-face than to someone on the phone.

Disadvantages

 Personal interviews usually cost more per interview than other methods.
This is particularly true of in-home interviews, where travel time is a
major factor.
 Each mall has its own characteristics. It draws its clientele from a specific
geographic area surrounding it, and its shop profile also influences the
type of client. These characteristics may differ from the target population
and create a non-representative sample.

3.5 OVERVIEW OF DATA COLLECTION TECHNIQUES

Data-collection techniques allow us to systematically collect information about

our objects of study (people, objects, phenomena) and about the settings in which
they occur.

In the collection of data we have to be systematic. If data are collected

haphazardly, it will be difficult to answer our research questions in a conclusive
way.

45
Example:

During a nutrition survey three different weighing scales were used in three
villages. The researchers did not record which scales were used in which village.
After completion of the survey it was discovered that the scales were not
standardized and indicated different weights when weighing the same child. It
was therefore impossible to conclude in which village malnutrition was most
prevalent.

Various data collection techniques can be used such as:

 Using available information

 Observing
 Interviewing (face-to-face)
 Administering written questionnaires
 Focus group discussions
 Projective techniques, mapping, scaling

3.5.1 Using available information

Usually there is a large amount of data that has already been collected by others,
although it may not necessarily have been analyzed or published. Locating these
sources and retrieving the information is a good starting point in any data
collection effort.

For example, analysis of the information routinely collected by health facilities

can be very useful for identifying problems in certain interventions or in flows of
drug supply, or for identifying increases in the incidence of certain diseases.

Analysis of health information system data, census data, unpublished reports and
publications in archives and libraries or in offices at the various levels of health

46
and health-related services, may be a study in itself. Usually, however, it forms
part of a study in which other data collection techniques are also used.

The use of key informants is another important technique to gain access to

available information. Key informants could be knowledgeable community
leaders or health staff at various levels and one or two informative members of the
target group (e.g., adolescents on their sexual behaviour). They can be involved in
various stages of the research, from the statement of the problem to analysis of the
data and development of recommendations. Other sources of available data are
newspapers and published case histories, e.g., patients suffering from serious
diseases, or their relatives, telling their experiences and how they cope.*

In order to retrieve the data from available sources, the researcher will have to
design an instrument such as a checklist or compilation sheet. In designing such
instruments, it is important to inspect the layout of the source documents from
which the data is to be extracted. For health information system (HIS) data, for
example, the data compilation sheet should be designed in such a way that the
items of data can be transferred in the order in which the items appear in the
source document. This will save time and reduce error.

The advantage of using existing data is that collection is inexpensive. However, it

is sometimes difficult to gain access to the records or reports required, and the
data may not always be complete and precise enough, or too disorganized.

3.5.2 Observing

OBSERVATION is a technique that involves systematically selecting, watching

and recording behavior and characteristics of living beings, objects or phenomena.

47
Observation of human behavior is a much-used data collection technique. It can
be undertaken in different ways:

 Participant observation: The observer takes part in the situation he or

she observes.

(For example, a doctor hospitalized with a broken hip, who now observes
hospital procedures ‘from within’.)

 Non-participant observation: The observer watches the situation, openly

or concealed, but does not participate.

Observations can be open (e.g., ‘shadowing’ a health worker with his/her

permission during routine activities) or concealed (e.g., ‘mystery clients’ trying to
obtain antibiotics without medical prescription). They may serve different
purposes. Observations can give additional, more accurate information on
behavior of people than interviews or questionnaires.

They can also check on the information collected through interviews especially on
sensitive topics such as alcohol or drug use, or stigmatizing diseases. For
example, whether community members share drinks or food with patients
suffering from feared diseases (leprosy, TB, AIDS) are essential observations in a
study on stigma.

Observations of human behavior can form part of any type of study, but as they
are time consuming they are most often used in small-scale studies.

Observations can also be made on objects. For example, the presence or absence
of a latrine and its state of cleanliness may be observed. Here observation would
be the major research technique.

48
If observations are made using a defined scale they may be called measurements.
Measurements usually require additional tools. For example, in nutritional
surveillance we measure weight and height by using weighing scales and a
measuring board. We use thermometers for measuring body temperature.

3.5.3 Interviewing

An INTERVIEW is a data-collection technique that involves oral questioning of

respondents, either individually or as a group.

Answers to the questions posed during an interview can be recorded by writing

them down (either during the interview itself or immediately after the interview)
or by tape-recording the responses, or by a combination of both.

Interviews can be conducted with varying degrees of flexibility. The two

extremes, high and low degree of flexibility, are described below:

• High degree of flexibility:

For example:

When studying sensitive issues such as teenage pregnancy and abortions, the
investigator may use a list of topics rather than fixed questions. These may, e.g.,
include how teenagers started sexual intercourse, the responsibility girls and their
partners take to prevent pregnancy (if at all), and the actions they take in the event
of unwanted pregnancies.

The investigator should have an additional list of topics ready when the
respondent falls silent, (e.g., when asked about abortion methods used, who made
the decision and who paid). The sequence of topics should be determined by the

49
flow of discussion. It is often possible to come back to a topic discussed earlier in
a later stage of the interview.

The unstructured or loosely structured method of asking questions can be used for
interviewing individuals as well as groups of key informants.

A flexible method of interviewing is useful if a researcher has as yet little

understanding of the problem or situation he is investigating, or if the topic is
sensitive. It is frequently applied in exploratory studies. The instrument used may
be called an interview guide or interview schedule.

• Low degree of flexibility:

Less flexible methods of interviewing are useful when the researcher is relatively
knowledgeable about expected answers or when the number of respondents being
interviewed is relatively large. Then questionnaires may be used with a fixed list
of questions in a standard sequence, which have mainly fixed or pre-categorized
answers.

For example:

After a number of observations on the (hygienic) behavior of women drawing

water at a well and some key informant interviews on the use and maintenance of
the wells, one may conduct a larger survey on water use and satisfaction with the
quantity and quality of the water.

Though in principle one may speak of loosely structured questionnaires, in

practice the term questionnaire appears to be so hooked to tools with pre-
categorised answers that we have decided to use the term interview guide for
loosely structured tools. However, in reality there is often a mixture of open and
pre-categorized answers. In that case we will still use the term questionnaire.

50
3.5.4 Administering written questionnaires

A WRITTEN QUESTIONNAIRE (also referred to as self-administered

questionnaire) is a data collection tool in which written questions are presented
that are to be answered by the respondents in written form.

A written questionnaire can be administered in different ways, such as by:

 Sending questionnaires by mail with clear instructions on how to answer

the questions and asking for mailed responses;
 Gathering all or part of the respondents in one place at one time, giving
oral or written instructions, and letting the respondents fill out the
questionnaires; or
 Hand-delivering questionnaires to respondents and collecting them later.

The questions can be either open-ended or closed (with pre-categorized answers).

3.5.5 Focus group discussions (FGD)

A focus group discussion allows a group of 8 - 12 informants to freely discuss a

certain subject with the guidance of a facilitator or reporter.

3.5.6 Projective techniques

When a researcher uses projective techniques, she asks an informant to react to

some kind of visual or verbal stimulus.

51
For example: An informant may be provided with a rough outline of the body
and be asked to draw her or his perception of the conception or onset of an illness.

Another example of a projective technique is the presentation of a hypothetical

question or an incomplete sentence or case/study to an informant (‘story with a
gap’). A researcher may ask the informant to complete in writing sentences such
as:

— If I were to discover that my neighbor had TB, I would. . .;

— If my wife were to propose that I use condoms, I would. . .

Or she may ask the informant: Suppose your child suffered from diarrhoea, what
would you do?

Such techniques can easily be combined with semi-structured interviews or

written questionnaires. They are also very useful in FGDs to get people’s opinion
on sensitive issues.

3.5.7 Mapping and scaling

Mapping is a valuable technique for visually displaying relationships and

resources.

In a water supply project, for example, mapping is invaluable. It can be used to

present the placement of wells, distance of the homes from the wells, other water
systems, etc. It gives researchers a good overview of the physical situation and
may help to highlight relationships hitherto unrecognized.

Mapping a community is also very useful and often indispensable as a pre-stage

to sampling.

52
Scaling is a technique that allows researchers through their respondents to
categories certain variables that they would not be able to rank themselves.

For example, they may ask their informant(s) to bring certain types of herbal
medicine and ask them to arrange these into piles according to their usefulness.
The informants would then be asked to explain the logic of their ranking.

Mapping and scaling may be used as participatory techniques in rapid appraisals

or situation analyses. In a separate volume on participatory action research, more
such techniques will be presented. (Also see the literature list at end of this
module.)

Rapid appraisal techniques and participatory research are approaches often used
in health systems research.

Differentiation between data collection techniques and data

collection tools

To avoid confusion in the use of terms, the following table points out the
distinction between techniques and tools applied in data collection.

53
Data collection techniques and tools

54
Advantages and disadvantages of various data collection
techniques

55
II. IMPORTANCE OF COMBINING DIFFERENT DATA COLLECTION
TECHNIQUES

When discussing different data collection techniques and their advantages and
disadvantages, it becomes clear that they can complement each other. A skilful
use of a combination of different techniques can reduce the chance of bias (see
below) and will give a more comprehensive understanding of the topic under
study.

Researchers often use a combination of flexible and less flexible research

techniques.

Flexible techniques, such as

 loosely structured interviews using open-ended questions,

 focus group discussions, and
 participant observation

are also called QUALITATIVE research techniques. They produce qualitative

data that is often recorded in narrative form.

QUALITATIVE RESEARCH TECHNIQUES involve the identification and

exploration of a number of often mutually related variables that give INSIGHT in
human behavior (motivations, opinions, attitudes), in the nature and causes of
certain problems and in the consequences of the problems for those affected.
‘Why’, ‘What’ and ‘How’ are important questions.

Structured questionnaires that enable the researcher to quantify pre- or post-

categorized answers to questions are an example of QUANTITATIVE research
techniques. The answers to questions can be counted and expressed numerically.

56
QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH TECHNIQUES are used to QUANTIFY the size,
distribution, and association of certain variables in a study population. ‘How
many?’ ‘How often?’ and ‘How significant?’ are important questions.

Both qualitative and quantitative research techniques are often used within a
single study.

For example:

It has been observed in country X that children between 1 and 2-1/2 years, who
have already started to eat independently, have unsatisfactory food intake once
they fall ill. A study could be designed to address this problem, containing the
following stages:

 Focus group discussions (FGDs) with 2 to 5 groups of mothers or in-depth

interviews with 10 - 20 mothers, to find out whether they change the
feeding practices for children in this age group when they suffer from
(various) illnesses and how mothers deal with children who have no
appetite when they are sick (exploratory study);
 A cross-sectional survey, testing the relevant findings of the exploratory
study on a larger scale; and
 FGDs with women in the study area to discuss findings and possible
questions arising from the survey and to develop possible solutions for
problems detected.

In this example, the first, qualitative part of the study would be used to focus the
survey on the most relevant issues (mothers’ feeding behaviors and reasons for
these behaviors) and to help phrase the questions in an optimal way in order to
obtain the information that is needed.

The second, quantitative part of the study would be used to find out what
proportion of the mothers follow various practices and the reasons for their
57
behaviors and whether certain categories of children (e.g., the younger ones or
children from specific socio-economic categories) are more at risk than others.

The third, qualitative part of the study would provide feedback on the major
findings of the survey. Do the conclusions make sense to women in the study
area? Have certain aspects been overlooked when interpreting the data? What
remedial action is feasible to improve practices related to feeding sick children?

It is also common to collect qualitative and quantitative data in a single

questionnaire. Researchers collecting both types of data have to take care that
they:

 do not include too many open-ended questions in large-scale surveys,

making data analysis more complicated; and
 do not use inappropriate statistical tests on quantitative data generated by
small-scale studies.

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3.6 Limitations to the Study

BIAS IN INFORMATION COLLECTION

BIAS in information collection is a distortion in the collected data so that it does

not represent reality.

Possible sources of bias during data collection:

3.6.1 Defective instruments, such as:

 Questionnaires with:

— fixed or closed questions on topics about which little is known (often

asking the ‘wrong things’);

— open-ended questions without guidelines on how to ask (or to answer)

them;

— vaguely phrased questions;

— ‘leading questions’ that cause the respondent to believe one answer

would be preferred over another; or

— questions placed in an illogical order.

 Weighing scales or other measuring equipment that are not standardized

(see section 1).

These sources of bias can be prevented by carefully planning the data collection
process and by pre-testing the data collection tools.

59
3.6.2 Observer bias:

Observer bias can easily occur when conducting observations or utilizing loosely
structured group- or individual interviews. There is a risk that the data collector
will only see or hear things in which (s)he is interested or will miss information
that is critical to the research.

Observation protocols and guidelines for conducting loosely structured

interviews should be prepared, and training and practice should be provided to
data collectors in using both these tools. Moreover it is highly recommended that
data collectors work in pairs when using flexible research techniques and discuss
and interpret the data immediately after collecting it. Another possibility -
commonly used by anthropologists - is using a tape recorder and transcribing the
tape word by word.

3.6.3 Effect of the interview on the informant:

This is a possible factor in all interview situations. The informant may mistrust
the intention of the interview and dodge certain questions or give misleading
answers. For example: in a survey on alcoholism you ask school children: ‘Does
your father sometimes get drunk?’ Many will probably deny that he does, even if
it is true. Such bias can be reduced by adequately introducing the purpose of the
study to informants, by phrasing questions on sensitive issues in a positive way,
by taking sufficient time for the interview, and by assuring informants that the
data collected will be confidential (see Module 10B).

It is also important to be careful in the selection of interviewers. In a study

soliciting the reasons for the low utilisation of local health services, for example,
one should not ask health workers from the health centres concerned to interview
the population. Their use as interviewers would certainly influence the results of
the study.

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3.6.4 Information bias:

Sometimes the information itself has weaknesses. Medical records may have
many blanks or be unreadable. This tells something about the quality of the data
and has to be recorded. For example, in a TB defaulter study the percentage of
defaulters with an incomplete or missing address should be calculated.

Another common information bias is due to gaps in people’s memory; this is

called memory or recall bias. A mother may not remember all details of her
child’s last diarrhoea episode and of the treatment she gave two or three months
afterwards. For such common diseases it is advisable to limit the period of recall,
asking, for example, ‘Has your child had diarrhoea over the past two weeks?’

Note:

All these potential biases will threaten the validity and reliability of your study.
By being aware of them it is possible, to a certain extent, to prevent them. If the
researcher does not fully succeed, it is important to report honestly in what ways
the data may be biased.

3.6.6 ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS

As we develop our data collection techniques, we need to consider whether our

research procedures are likely to cause any physical or emotional harm. Harm
may be caused, for example, by:

 violating informants’ right to privacy by posing sensitive questions or by

gaining access to records which may contain personal data;
 observing the behaviour of informants without their being aware
(concealed observation should therefore always be crosschecked or
discussed with other researchers with respect to ethical admissibility);

61
  allowing personal information to be made public which informants would
want to be kept private, and
 failing to observe/respect certain cultural values, traditions or taboos
valued by your informants.

Several methods for dealing with these issues may be recommended:

 obtaining informed consent before the study or the interview begins;

 not exploring sensitive issues before a good relationship has been
established with the informant;
 ensuring the confidentiality of the data obtained; and
 learning enough about the culture of informants to ensure it is respected
during the data collection process.

If sensitive questions are asked, for example, about family planning or sexual
practices, or about opinions of patients on the health services provided, it may be
advisable to omit names and addresses from the questionnaires.
Other General Tips:

In personal interviews it is vital for the Interviewer to have empathy with the
Interviewee. In general, Interviewers should try to "blend" with respondents in
terms of race, language, sex, age, etc. Choose your Interviewers according to the
likely respondents.

Leave your demographic questions (age, gender, income, education, etc.) until the
end of the questionnaire. By then the interviewer should have built a rapport with
the interviewee that will allow honest responses to such personal questions. Mail
and Internet questionnaires should do the same, although the rapport must be built
by good question design, rather than personality. Exceptions to this rule are any
demographic questions that qualify someone to be included in the survey. For

62
example, many researchers limit some surveys to people in certain age groups.
These questions must come near the beginning.

Do not have an interviewer ask a respondent's gender, unless they really have no
idea. Have the interviewer fill in the answer themselves.

Paper questionnaires requiring text answers, should always leave sufficient space
for handwritten answers. Lines should be about half-an-inch (one cm.) apart. The
number of lines you should have depends on the question. Three to five lines are
average.

Leave a space at the end of a questionnaire entitled "Other Comments."

Sometimes respondents offer casual remarks that are worth their weight in gold
and cover some area you did not think of, but which respondents consider critical.
Many products have a wide range of secondary uses that the manufacturer knows
nothing about but which could provide a valuable source of extra sales if
approached properly. In one third world market, a major factor in the sale of
candles was the ability to use the spent wax as floor polish - but the manufacturer
only discovered this by a chance remark.

Always consider the layout of your questionnaire. This is especially important on

paper, computer direct and Internet surveys. You want to make it attractive, easy
to understand and easy to complete. If you are creating a paper survey, you also
want to make it easy for your data entry personnel.

Try to keep your answer spaces in a straight line, either horizontally or vertically.
A single answer choice on each line is best. Eye tracking studies show the best
place to use for answer spaces is the right hand edge of the page. It is much easier
for a field worker or respondent to follow a logical flow across or down a page.
Using the right edge is also easiest for data entry.

63
The Survey System lets you create a Questionnaire Form with the answer choices
in two columns. Creating the form that way can save a lot of paper or screen
space, but you should recognize doing so makes the questionnaire a little harder to
complete. It also slows the data entry process when working with paper
questionnaires.

Questions and answer choice grids, as in the second of the following examples,
are popular with many researchers. They can look attractive and save paper, or
computer screen space. They also can avoid a long series of very repetitive
question and answer choice lists. Unfortunately, they also are a bit harder than the
repeated lists for some people to understand. As always, consider whom you are
studying when you create your questionnaire.

Look at the following layouts and decide which you would prefer to use:

An alternative layout is:

64
The second example shows the answer choices in neat columns and has more
space between the lines. It is easier to read. The numbers in the second example
will also speed data entry, if you are using a paper questionnaire.

Surveys are a mixture of science and art, and a good researcher will save their
cost many times over by knowing how to ask the correct questions.

65
3.7 Conclusion

Questionnaire design is a long process that demands careful attention. A

questionnaire is a powerful evaluation tool and should not be taken lightly.
Design begins with an understanding of the capabilities of a questionnaire and
how they can help your research. If it is determined that a questionnaire is to be
used, the greatest care goes into the planning of the objectives. Questionnaires are
like any scientific experiment. One does not collect data and then see if they
found something interesting. One forms a hypothesis and an experiment that will
help prove or disprove the hypothesis.

Questionnaires are versatile, allowing the collection of both subjective and

objective data through the use of open or closed format questions. Modern
computers have only made the task of collecting and extracting valuable material
more efficient. However, a questionnaire is only as good as the questions it
contains. There are many guidelines that must be met before you questionnaire
can be considered a sound research tool. The majority deal with making the
questionnaire understandable and free of bias. Mindful review and testing is
necessary to weed out minor mistakes that can cause great changes in meaning
and interpretation. When these guidelines are followed, the questionnaire
becomes a powerful and economic evaluation tool.

66
CHAPTER 3

Conceptual Discussions

on

Literature Survey

67
4.1 Meaning of HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

Human Resource plays a crucial role in the development process of the modern
economics. ARTHUR LEWIS observed

“There are great differences in development between countries which seem to

have roughly equal resources, so it is necessary to enquire into the difference in
human behaviors”

Human resource management is the management of employees skill, knowledge

abilities, talent, aptitude, creativity, ability etc. different terms are used for
denoting Human Resource Management. They are labour management, labour
administration, labour management relationship, employee–employer
relationship, industrial relationship, human capital management, human assent
management etc. Though these terms can be used differently widely, the basic
nature of distinction lies in the scope or coverage and evolutionary stage. In
simple sense, human resource management means employing people, developing
their resources, utilizing, maintaining and compensating their services in tune
with the job and organizational requirements.

68
4.2 Functions of Human Resource Management

(i) Administration:
Strategic planning, organizational evaluation, County Board relations, policy
recommendations, supervision of department staff

(ii) Benefits:
Health insurance, dental insurance, life insurance, disability insurance, retirement
benefits, vacation, sick leave, paid holidays, section 125 plan, donor program,
educational incentive, uniform allowance, and others.

(iii) Compensation:
Salary and benefit surveys, job evaluation, job descriptions evaluation, job
descriptions

(iv) Employee relations:

Disciplinary processes, incident investigations, complaint/grievance procedures,
labor-management relations.

(v) Employee services:

Enrollment in benefits, employee discounts for recreational spots, resolution of
enrollment or claim problems, employee newsletter. Educational assistance,
employee
service awards

69
(vi) Fiscal:

Staffing budgets, departmental budget, accounts payable, insurance receivables,

insurance fund management, total package costing. Insurance receivables,
insurance fund management, total package costing.
(vii) Health and safety:

Employee assistance, workers compensation claims, drug testing, safety

compliance and training.

(viii) Leaves of Absence:

State and/or Federal Family and Medical Leave rights, County approved leaves of
absence, rights upon return to work, light duty assignments for temporary periods

(ix) Payroll Administration:

Computer-based or manual evaluation systems, supervisory training, compliance
with timeliness standards.

(x) Performance appraisal:

Employee files, litigation files, payroll records, safety records and other
administrative files.
(xi) Record-keeping:

Job posting, advertising, testing administration, employment interviews,

background investigations, post-offer employment testing.

70
(xii) Recruitment:

Recruitment is defined as a process to discover the sources of manpower to meet

the requirement of the staffing schedule and to employ effective measures fir meet
the requirement of the staffing schedule and to employ to employ effective
measures for attracting the manpower in adequate numbers to facilitate effective
selection of an effective workforce.

(xiii) Selection:

After identifying the sources of human resources, searching for prospective

employees and stimulation helps too apply for jobs in an organization, the
management has to perform the function of selecting the right man at right job
and at the right time.
(xiv) Separations and terminations:

Rights upon termination of employment, severance benefits, unemployment

compensation, exit interviews.

(xv) Training and development:

County-wide needs assessment, development of supervisory and management

skills, employee training and workshops. Benefits orientation for new and
transferring employees, Supervisory newsletter.

(xvi) Salary and benefits:

Salary/wage plans, employee benefits

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4.3 Importance of Human Resource Management
1: Attract highly qualified and competent people
2: Ensure that the selected candidate stays longer with the company.
3: Make sure that there is match between cost and benefit.
4: Helps the organization to create more culturally diverse workforce

Whereas, the poor quality of selection means extra cost on training and
supervision. Further in more , when recruitment fails to meet organizational needs
for talent, a typically response is to raise entry level pay scales . This can distort
traditional wages and salary relationship in organization, resulting in unavoidable
consequences. Thus the effectiveness of the recruitment process can play a major
role in determining the resources that must be expended on other HR activates
and their ultimate success.

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4.4 Scope of HRM at Organizational Level

73
 Ten Principles of HR
Every employee, at every level of the company, should view HR as adding
specific, tangible value.
Every employee should see HR as the paragon of fairness, and should
believe we exist to make certain the needs of the company and the
needs of the employee are balanced.
HR should seek business partnerships that imply a sense of shared
accountability for the success or failure of the employee experience.
We must develop expertise in HR subjects that exceeds the expertise of
the line leadership; this is a prerequisite to “adding value”.
As a cost (tax) on the business, we must be extremely cost effective,
completely transparent in our economics, and seek to deliver our
products and services on a declining cost basis.
As the owner of many processes with many potential points of failure,
we must develop process expertise and a “six sigma” operating
philosophy in all we do.
We must ensure a steady stream of innovation in HR-related products
and services.
We should endeavor to produce products and services that are strong
enough to become candidates for commercialization, and ultimately, a
source of revenue.
Achievement of these principles will both require and enable robust
career tracks for HR practitioners; the most successful HR executives will
combine specific subject matter expertise with strong business acumen
and superior transactional abilities.
When these principles are fully realized, there should be no doubt that
American Express Human Resources is the place to practice the craft of
HR.

74
4.5 Human Resource Development

This department looks after the needs and Requirement the present employees.
This Department includes number of function which are as follows:

1. Training and Development–it includes technical, soft skills and process

related to training.
2. Process and policies–it contains all the rule and regulations that need to be
followed by the employees.
3. Appraisal and increment- it is in the formal feedback to the employees
about their performance and the conduct of work
4. Induction-involves the information to the new employees about the
company, job, departments etc
5. Motivational activities and entertainment- involves motivating the
employees to improve their productivity.
6. Roles and responsibilities-that every individual employee needs to fulfill.
7. Key Result Area (KRA)–it is the measurement quantifiable of output for
the roles of responsibilities.
8. Employee separation-includes resignation and dismissal.
9. Joining formalities- take place when a new employee joins the company.
10. Computerization
11. Helpdesk
12. Employee verification-take place at the time of joining of the new
employee.
13. Surveys
14. Project trainees
15. Counselling and grievance handling-both are different as counselling is
basically helping out in personal problems whereas, grievances Handling

75
 involves the handling of complains that the employees has towards the
management.

 All the above head are included in the human resource development and
involves the
over all development of individual employees which in turn increases the
overall profit of the company.

About HR

Operating Principles

No matter what job titles we hold or what part of the business were in or where we are in
the world, these principles should guide the work of all American Express employees:

 We must offer a superior value proposition to all of our customer groups. With
every product and service we offer, we must provide the best value of any
competitor in the marketplace for the price we charge—whether were servicing
carmembers, travel or banking clients, merchants and other business, partners, or
any other American Express customer.
 We must have best-in-class economics. In other words, we must be focused on
doing business as efficiently possible so that we continually generate savings to
invest in our future growth.
 We must support the American Express brand. Any business action we take must
be in step with the core tenets of our brand -- world-class service, personal
recognition -- and our inherent company values.

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2010 Priorities

Our 2010 mantra is to:

 Drive Growth
 Drive Efficiency, and
 Deliver Superior Service

These priorities are a fundamental change from last year. They focus more on growth
rather than on responding to crisis conditions around us. They reflect our improved
position from a year ago, but they also recognize that growth will not come easily in an
environment shaped by a still weak economy and increased regulation.

There's another very important point to understand about these priorities. Absolutely
everyone in the organization, no matter their job title or level, has contributions to make
in driving growth, driving efficiency and delivering superior service.

Each of these three priorities is critical and affects the others. For instance, if we don't
manage our expenses carefully and free up funds to invest in our future, we will hurt our
ability to grow. If we don't deliver superior service, we will lose customers and the
revenues they bring. That’s why we have to deliver on all of these priorities
simultaneously.

4.6 STAFFING
Staffing Philosophy:
Creating peak performance by putting the right people in the right jobs is a critical
staffing goal.
 To ensure that we hire the best available talent, we want to:
77
  Involve you, the hiring manager, in each step of the process Enable you to
make key decisions quickly, and
 Have HR professionals available to offer professional advice
Employee Recruitment Process Overview
(I) Manpower Requisition Form
(II) Recruitment Plan
(III) Budget
(IV) Sourcing
(V) Selection Process
(VI) Joining
(VII) Post Recruitment Data Updating

RECRUITMENT
Recruitment is “hiring” of employees from outside. Recruitment has been
regarded as the most important function of the HR department , because unless
the right type of people are hired, even the best plans, organization chart and
control system would not do much good.

Recruitment is the discovering of potential applicant for actual or anticipated

organizational vacancies. Accordingly the purpose of recruitment is to locate
sources of manpower to meet the job requirements and job specification.

It is defined as a process to discover the sources of manpower to meet the

requirements of staffing schedule and to apply effective measures for attracting
the manpower to
adequate number to facilitate effective selection of an effective workforce‟

Yoder points out that recruitment is a process to discover the sources of

manpower to meet the requirement of the staffing schedule and to employee

78
effective measures to attracting that manpower in adequate number to facilitate
effective selection of an effective workforce.

Edwin B Flippo defines recruitment as the process of searching for prospective

employees and stimulating them to apply for the jobs in the organization.

“It is the process of finding and attracting capable applicants for employment. The
process begins when new recruits are sought and ends when their application are
submitted. The result is a pool of applicants from which new employees are
selected.”

Methods of Recruitment

Dunn and Stephens summaries the possible recruiting methods into three
categories, namely :

1: Direct method
2: Indirect method
3: Third party method

DIRECT METHOD

The direct method includes sending of the recruiters to different educational and
professional institutions, employees contact with public, and mannered exhibits.
One of the widely used methods is sending the recruiters to different colleges and
technical schools. This is mainly done with the cooperation of the placement
office of the college. Sometimes, firms directly solicit information form the
concerned professors about student with an outstanding records.

79
Other direct methods include sending recruiters to conventions and seminars,
setting up exhibits at fairs, and using mobile offices to go the desired centers.

INDIRECT METHOD

Indirect method involves mainly advertising in newspapers, on the radios, in trade

and professional journals, technical magazines and brochures.

Advertisements in newspapers and or trade journals and magazines are the most
frequently used methods. Senior post is largely filled with such methods.
Advertising is a very useful for recruiting blue color and hourly worker, as well as
scientific, professional, and technical employees.
Local newspaper can be good sources of blue collar workers, clerical employees,
and lower level administrative employees.

The main point is that the higher the position in the organization the more
dispersed advertisement is likely to be. The search for the top executive might
include advertisement in a national periodical, whereas the advertisement of the
blue color jobs usually confine to the daily newspaper.

According to the Advertisement tactic and strategy in personnel Recruitment,

three main points need to be borne in the mind before an advertisement in
inserted.

First, to visualize the type of applicants one is trying to recruit.

Second, to write out a list of advantages the company offers, or why should the
reader join the company.

80
Third, to decide where to run the advertisement, not only in which area, but also
in which newspaper having a local, state or a nation- wide circulation.

THIRD PARTY

These include the use of commercial or private employment agencies, state

agencies, and placement offices of schools colleges and professional associations
recruiting firms, management consulting firms, indoctrination seminars for
college professors, and friends and relatives.

Private employment agencies are the most widely used sources. They charge a
small fee from the applicant. They specialize in specific occupation; general
office help, salesmen, technical workers, accountant, computer staff, engineers
and executives.

State or public employment agencies are also known as the employment or labour
exchanges, are the main agencies for the public employment. Employers inform
them of their personnel requirement, while job seekers get information for them
about the type of job are referred by the employer.

Schools and colleges offer opportunities for recruiting their student. They operate
placement services where complete biodata and other particular of the student are
available.

Professional organization or recruiting firms maintain complete information

records about employed executive. These firms maintain complete information
records about employed executives. These firms are looked upon as the “head
hunters”, “raiders”, and “pirates” by organization which loose their personnel
through their efforts.

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Evaluation of the recruitment method

The following are the evaluation of the recruitment method

1: Number of initial enquires received which resulted in completed application
forms
2: Number of candidates recruited.
3: Number of candidates retained in the organization after six months.
4: Number of candidates at various stages of the recruitment and selection
process, especially those short listed.

Objective of recruitment

1: To attract with multi dimensional skills and experience that suite the present
and future organization strategies.

2: To induct outsider with new perspective to lead the company.

3: To infuse fresh blood at all levels of organization.

4: To develop an organizational culture that attracts competent people to the

company.

5: To search or headhunt people whose skill fit the company‟s values.

6: To seek out non-conventional development grounds of talent

7: To devise methodology for assessing psychological traits.

8: To search for talent globally not just with in the company.

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9: To design entry pay that competes on quality but not on quantum.

10: To anticipate and find people for position that doesn’t exists yet.

Recruitment represents the first contact that a company makes with potential
employees.

It is through recruitment that many individuals come to know about the company
and eventually decide whether they wish to work for it.

The recruitment process should inform qualified individuals about the job so that
applicant can make comparison with their qualification and interest.

Factors affecting Recruitment

There are two types of factors that affect the Recruitment of candidates for the
company.

1: Internal factors: These includes

- Company‟s pay package
- Quality of work life
- Organizational culture
- Company‟s size
- Company‟s product
- Growth rate of the company
- Role of trade unions
- Cost of recruitment

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2: External factors: These include

- Supply and demand factors

- Employment rate
- Labour market condition
- Political, legal and government factors
- Information system

Recruitment Process
The actual steps involved in recruitment follow a well defined path:

Application shortlist: In this step, we shortlist the resume received from various
sources based on the suitability for the requirement.

Preliminary Assessment: The short listed candidates go through a preliminary

round of interviews. This interview lays more emphasis on functional
competencies. To have more data on the functional skills, the candidates may be
given a business case for analysis and presentation
(This is done for certain positions only).

Final interview: Here the candidates who successfully clear the first round of
interview go through another round of interview with one or more of the
functional heads.

Medical Evaluation: Candidates who are selected by Colgate are asked to

undergo a medical test.

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85
86
Evaluation of recruitment process

The following are the evaluation of the recruitment process:

1: Return rate of application sent out.

2: Number of suitable candidates for selection.
3: Retention and performance of the candidate selection.
4: Cost of recruitment
5: Time lapsed data.
6: Comments on image projected.

SELECTION

Selection is a negative process and involves the elimination of candidates who do

not have the required skills and qualification for the job proposed. Also it is a
process of differentiating between applicants in order to identify and hire those
with greater likelihood of success in job.

The objective of selection decision is to choose the individual who can most
successfully perform the job from the pool of qualified candidates. It is the system
of function and devise adopted in a given company to ascertain whether the
candidate’s specifications are matched with the job specifications and recruitment
or not.

Selection process or activities typically follow a standard patter, beginning with

an initial screening interview and concluding with final employment decision.
The traditional selection process includes: preliminary screening interview,
completion of application form, employment test, comprehensive interview,
background investigation, physical examination and final employment decision to
hire.
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Organization for selection

Until recently the basic hiring process was performed in a rather unplanned
manner in many organizations. In some companies, each department screened and
hired its own employees. Many mangers insisted on screening their own
employees as they thought no one else could do that as efficiently as they
themselves.

But now selection is centralized and handled by the Human Resource Department.
This type of arrangement is also preferred due to some of these advantages:

- It is easier for the application because they can send their applications to a single
centralized department.

- It facilitates contact with applicants because issues pertaining to employment

can be cleared through one central location.

- It helps operating managers to concentrate on their operating responsibilities.

This is especially helpful during the chief hiring period.

- It can provide for better selection because hiring is done by specialist trained in
staffing techniques.

- The applicant is better assured of consideration for a greater variety of jobs.

- Hiring cost is cut because duplication of efforts is reduced.

- With increased governmental regulation on selection process, it is important that

people who know about these rules handle a major part of the selection process.
88
Ideally, a selection process involves mutually decision making. The organization
decides whether or not to make a job offer and how attractive the job offer should
be.

BARRIERS TO EFFECTIVE SELECTION

The main objective of selection process is to hire people having competence and
commitment towards the given job profile. But due to some reason the main
purpose of effectively selecting candidates is defeated. These reasons are:

1: Perception or the Halo effect: Many a times the interviewer selects a

candidate according to the perception he has or he made up while talking or
looking at the individual. This way he does not see through the caliber or the
efficiency of the individual and many times it leads to the selection of the wrong
candidates.

2: Fairness: During the selection process the interviewer does not select the
individual on the basis of his knowledge and hence the right type of the
candidates is not selected.

3: Pressure: The people from the HR department and also have a lot of pressure
from the top management and from other top class people for selecting the
candidates they want. This ways the purpose of effective selection process of
effective selection process is defeated as they have to select that individual
whether or not he is capable of the job. that is being offered.

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ESSENTIAL OF SELECTION PROCEDURE

- Someone should have the authority to select.

- There must be sufficient number of applicants from whom the required number
of employees to be selected.
- There must be some standards of personnel with which a prospective employee
may be compared.
FACTORS EFFECTING SELECTION DECISION
Includes:

- Profile matching
- Organization and social environment
- Multi correlations
- Successive hurdles

4.7 Current Issues: News (Press Releases)

Ken Chenault: Justice Department's Lawsuit is a Bad Deal for Consumers

NEW YORK,  October 8, 2010 -- 

In a Washington Post op-ed, American Express Company Chairman and Chief

Executive Officer Kenneth I. Chenault outlines the reasons why the company
believes that the recently announced U.S. Department of Justice's civil antitrust
case "does nothing for consumers" and "will eventually lead to less competition,
not more." Full text of the article appears below.

90
Why Amex is fighting Justice's bad deal for credit card holders
By Kenneth I. Chenault. The Waqshington Post, Friday,October8, 2010.

This week, the Justice Department sued Visa, MasterCard and my company,
American Express, alleging that our rules prevent consumers from getting a lower
price when they shop. Visa and MasterCard quickly settled and agreed to follow a
complex set of remedies developed by government attorneys. We chose to fight.
Let me explain why.

The government remedy does nothing for consumers. And, whatever its intention,
the Justice Department is heading down a path that eventually leads to less
competition, not more.

Merchants accept plastic because they know many customers often want to use
credit, charge or debit cards at the checkout counter. Card acceptance brings
higher sales, prevents fraud or counterfeiting, and protects against losses when a
customer doesn't pay his or her bill. In return, merchants agree to welcome cards
at the point of sale and to pay a fee, which is typically between 2 and 3 percent of
the purchase price.

Perversely, the government's remedy would allow merchants that sign a contract
and post decals to show which credit cards they accept to then ignore the
contract's ban on discrimination by pressuring their customers to use a different
card when they pay.

91
In theory, you might be offered a small discount for putting up with the
inconvenience. But this will not lead to lower prices overall for consumers.
Merchant associations, even those that support the Justice Department, won't
commit to lower prices. Nothing in the government's lawsuit requires them to do
so. As it is, merchants are already allowed to offer a discount or incentive to
customers who pay by cash, checks or debit cards. Very few do.

The net result of this "bait and switch" is an unhappy customer who was pushed
to use a backup card that didn't provide the customer service, buyer protection,
benefits or rewards that he or she prefers. Only in Washington could that be called
a consumer benefit.

Antitrust laws were designed to promote competition. But in this case, the
government lawyers who enforce those laws are doing just the opposite by
offering a solution that favors the two dominant networks. Here's how.

Earlier court rulings found that Visa and MasterCard have market power that
allows them to unfairly dominate the payment industry. Given the sheer size of
their customer base, most merchants do business with them because they have to.
Only a small percentage of their card holders also carry an American Express or
Discover product.

By contrast, American Express is a network of choice and the smallest in terms of

merchant acceptance. Merchants don't have to do business with us, but those that

92
do appreciate our overall service and value, including more business from higher-
spending customers who carry our cards. In return, we require that they not
discriminate against our card. Unlike the dominant networks, virtually all
American Express customers carry another card in their wallet. American Express
customers don't have to use our card, but they choose to do so. Their choice
recognizes the superior value and service we provide.

Compare the two different business models, and you'll see the flaw in the
government's thinking. It is difficult to steer Visa or MasterCard holders to
American Express because those consumers don't carry our card. By contrast, it's
possible to pressure our customers toward one of the backup products they carry
deeper in their wallet.

If the government is allowed to do away with the protections we build into our
merchant contracts, the net result would be more business for the two dominant
networks.

Visa and MasterCard already control 70 percent of the market. When dominant
parties gain even more market share, no one will be able to negotiate freely or
fairly with them. The inevitable result would be higher costs for merchants and
less value for consumers. That's the real cost of government intervention.

The Justice Department is supporting bad policy and disguising it with vague
promises of consumer benefit. We think their case is weak and we intend to fight
it.

It's never easy to take on a long, costly battle with the government, but what's at
stake are some important issues: consumer choice, free market competition and

93
the ability to deliver superior products and services to our customers. This is a
fight worth fighting.

The writer is chairman and chief executive officer of American Express Co.

ARTICLES ABOUT THE AMERICAN EXPRESS COMPANY

IN THE Year 2010

The Mundane Credit Card Gets a Modern Makeover

By TARA SIEGEL BERNARD

Cards will soon have lights and buttons that allow users to choose to pay for items
with reward points or credit.

A version of this article appeared in print on October 22, 2010, on page B1 of the
New York edition.

Profit Climbs 71% at American Express

By ASSOCIATED PRESS

Spending on American Express cards rose 14 percent in the quarter, bolstering

earnings, but remained below levels reached before the recession.
October 22, 2010

U.S. Proposes Settlement With MasterCard and Visa

By ANDREW MARTIN

The Justice Department has a proposed deal with two of three companies it sued
for anticompetitive practices.

94
A version of this article appeared in print on October 5, 2010, on page B1 of the
New York edition.

Some C.E.O.’s Strike Gold in Stock Options

By NELSON D. SCHWARTZ

The market’s climb has had a multiplier effect on the value of stock options that
some C.E.O.’s received early last year.

A version of this article appeared in print on April 4, 2010, on page BU1 of the
New York edition.

Top Pay List For Bankers: Fresh Names

By ERIC DASH

Some of highest-paid financial executives in America work far from Wall Street
at companies that have largely avoided outcry over return of hefty paydays; John
G Stumpf of Wells Fargo, who was paid $18.7 million in cash and stock for 2009,
tops list; Stumpf is making twice as much as Lloyd C Blankfein, his counterpart
at Goldman Sachs, who has become symbol of new period of Wall Street riches;
big names on Wall Street usually take home far more than bankers like Stumpf,
whose bank's biggest bus...
February 11, 2010

Credit Cards and Reluctant Regulators

By GRETCHEN MORGENSON

If credit card issuers try to find ways around new rules on fees, how well would a
federal agency enforce them?
95
A version of this article appeared in print on January 17, 2010, on page BU1 of
the New York edition.

Press Releases for American Express Company from the Last 90

Days:

American Express OPEN Recognizes Business Owners for Government

Contracting Success with Victory in Procurement (VIP) Awards
November 6, 2010 - Business Wire
American Express Appoints Toby Eduardo Redshaw as Executive Vice President
and Chief Information Officer
November 5, 2010 - Business Wire
American Express and SAP Join Forces to Launch Integrated Payment Solution
October 18, 2010 - PR Newswire

4.8 Company History and Development:

From its beginnings as an express company forwarding freight and valuables

across the American frontier, American Express has developed into a company
that creates and sells global payment and financial products around the world.
Today, American Express is a global travel, financial and network services
provider and one of the world’s most widely recognized brands. While the
products and services of American Express are constantly evolving, its
commitment to the highest quality products and superior levels of customer
support remains unchanged.

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• 1850 American Express is established as a freight forwarding
: company.
• 1858 Headquarters building completed at 61 Hudson Street, New
: York, the largest privately-owned building in the city.
• 1891 American Express invents the Travelers Cheque.
:
• 1895 First exclusive American Express overseas office: 6 Rue
: Halevy, Paris.
• 1915 Travel Department started.
:
• 1919 The American Express Company, Inc., now known as
: American Express Bank, incorporated in Connecticut, USA.
• 1958 American Express Personal Card introduced.
:
• 1966 “Executive Credit” Card introduced (became the Gold Card).
:
• 1975 Blue Box logo introduced.
:
• 1984 IDS acquired from Alleghany Corporation for approx.
: US$727 million (Re-branded as American Express Financial
Advisors in 1995).
Platinum Card introduced.
• 1986 Corporate Headquarters moved to World Financial Center,
: New York.
• 1987 Optima Card introduced.
:
• 1995 ExpressNet, American Express’ first interactive on-line
: service is introduced.
• 1996 Banco Credito de Nacional, of Sao Paulo, Brazil becomes first

97
 : bank in the world to issue an American Express-branded
credit card.
• 1999 Euro Travelers Cheque is introduced.
: The Centurion Card is introduced, designed for a select group
of American Express’ best customers in the United Kingdom
and the United States.
American Express launches Blue, a new credit card designed
to expand the company’s revolving credit business and attract
new customers in the U.S. by combining financial, shopping
and security benefits.

American Express is truly a global company, employing over 84,000

people worldwide, and offering products and services in more than 200
countries.

American Express is the world’s largest single card issuer, based on

purchase volume generated by our nearly 55 million cards worldwide.
The Cards are currently issued in 43 currencies (including cards issued
by banks and other qualified institutions). American Express is the
number one global charge card issuer, the number one airline card
issuer based on number of partners and the number one Cards Reward
Program based on enrollees. We also are the number one corporate card
issuer in the U.S. and in 22 of the top 25 markets around the world. The
company has more than 1700 travel service locations in over 130
countries serving customers’ travel needs.

American Express Bank operates primarily outside the United States,

with 77 offices in 40 countries. American Express Financial Advisors
has 179 field offices (located in all 50 states in United States), in
98
addition to other corporate offices in Albany, New York, Green Bay,
Wisconsin, London, Singapore and Tokyo.

One of American Express’ truly unique assets is its local market

knowledge and global presence. In markets around the world, the
company contributes to local economic development through the
introduction of new products and services, marketing skills,
technological know-how and people development. The company’s local
capabilities are backed by the strength of an extensive global network.

Wherever American Express operates, the company is committed to

working closely with local business partners. These partnerships not
only benefit local businesses and American Express in terms of
business development, they also bring consumers a wider choice of
products and services.

In all of the markets in which we operate we take our role as a corporate

citizen seriously and are active participants in community and
philanthropic projects. Grants are made under three program themes
that reflect our company values and complement our business priorities:
community service, cultural heritage and economic independence.

All over the world, American Express maintains its ongoing

commitment to the development of valuable products, the highest
quality service, and deepest levels of customer support.

99
Chapter 4:

100
 DATA
ANALYSIS

5.1 Data Collection

101
The Objectives of the Project was Recruitment, Selection and Placement of
Personnel in American Express.
The data for the desired candidates for a suitable profile was collected through
Questionnaires.

The steps required to design and administer a questionnaire include:

1. Defining the Objectives of the survey

2. Determining the Sampling Group
3. Writing the Questionnaire
4. Administering the Questionnaire
5. Interpretation of the Results

This document will concentrate on how to formulate objectives and write the
questionnaire.

Before these steps are examined in detail, it is good to consider what

questionnaires are good at measuring and when it is appropriate to use
questionnaires.

1. Establish the goals of the project - What you want to learn

2. Determine your sample - Whom you will interview
3. Choose interviewing methodology - How you will interview
4. Create your questionnaire - What you will ask
5. Pre-test the questionnaire, if practical - Test the questions
6. Conduct interviews and enter data - Ask the questions
7. Analyze the data - Produce the reports

Data Collection Methods Used

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(I) Telephone Surveys

Surveying by telephone is the most popular interviewing method in the USA. This
is made possible by nearly universal coverage (96% of homes have a telephone).

Advantages

 People can usually be contacted faster over the telephone than with other
methods. If the Interviewers are using CATI (computer-assisted telephone
interviewing), the results can be available minutes after completing the
last interview.
 You can dial random telephone numbers when you do not have the actual
telephone numbers of potential respondents.
 CATI software, such as The Survey System, makes complex
questionnaires practical by offering many logic options. It can
automatically skip questions, perform calculations and modify questions
based on the answers to earlier questions. It can check the logical
consistency of answers and can present questions or answers choices in a
random order (the last two are sometimes important for reasons described
later).
 Skilled interviewers can often elicit longer or more complete answers than
people will give on their own to mail, email surveys (though some people
will give longer answers to Web page surveys). Interviewers can also ask
for clarification of unclear responses.
 Some software, such as The Survey System, can combine survey answers
with pre-existing information you have about the people being
interviewed.

Disadvantages
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  Many telemarketers have given legitimate research a bad name by
claiming to be doing research when they start a sales call. Consequently,
many people are reluctant to answer phone interviews and use their
answering machines to screen calls. Since over half of the homes in the
USA have answering machines, this problem is getting worse.
 The growing number of working women often means that no one is home
during the day. This limits calling time to a "window" of about 6-9 p.m.
(when you can be sure to interrupt dinner or a favorite TV program).
 You cannot show or sample products by phone.

(II) Mail Surveys

Advantages

 Mail surveys are among the least expensive.

 This is the only kind of survey you can do if you have the names and
addresses of the target population, but not their telephone numbers.
 The questionnaire can include pictures - something that is not possible
over the phone.
 Mail surveys allow the respondent to answer at their leisure, rather than at
the often inconvenient moment they are contacted for a phone or personal
interview. For this reason, they are not considered as intrusive as other
kinds of interviews.

Disadvantages

 Time! Mail surveys take longer than other kinds. You will need to wait
several weeks after mailing out questionnaires before you can be sure that
you have gotten most of the responses.

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  In populations of lower educational and literacy levels, response rates to
mail surveys are often too small to be useful. This, in effect, eliminates
many immigrant populations that form substantial markets in many areas.
Even in well-educated populations, response rates vary from as low as 3%
up to 90%. As a rule of thumb, the best response levels are achieved from
highly-educated people and people with a particular interest in the subject
(which, depending on your target population, could lead to a biased
sample).

One way of improving response rates to mail surveys is to mail a postcard telling
your sample to watch for a questionnaire in the next week or two. Another is to
follow up a questionnaire mailing after a couple of weeks with a card asking
people to return the questionnaire. The downside is that this doubles or triples
your mailing cost. If you have purchased a mailing list from a supplier, you may
also have to pay a second (and third) use fee - you often cannot buy the list once
and re-use it.

Another way to increase responses to mail surveys is to use an incentive. One

possibility is to send a dollar bill (or more) along with the survey (or offer to
donate the dollar to a charity specified by the respondent). If you do so, be sure to
say that the dollar is a way of saying "thanks," rather than payment for their time.
Many people will consider their time worth more than a dollar. Another
possibility is to include the people who return completed surveys in a drawing for
a prize. A third is to offer a copy of the (non-confidential) result highlights to
those who complete the questionnaire. Any of these techniques will increase the
response rates.

Remember that if you want a sample of 1,000 people, and you estimate a 10%
response level, you need to mail 10,000 questionnaires. You may want to check
with your local post office about bulk mail rates - you can save on postage using
this mailing method. However, most researchers do not use bulk mail, because
105
many people associate "bulk" with "junk" and will throw it out without opening
the envelope, lowering your response rate. Also bulk mail moves slowly,
increasing the time needed to complete your project.

(III) Computer Direct Interviews

These are interviews in which the Interviewees enter their own answers directly
into a computer. They can be used at malls, trade shows, offices, and so on. The
Survey System's optional Interviewing Module and Interview Stations can easily
create computer-direct interviews. Some researchers set up a Web page survey for
this purpose.

Advantages

 The virtual elimination of data entry and editing costs.

 You will get more accurate answers to sensitive questions. Recent studies
of potential blood donors have shown respondents were more likely to
reveal HIV-related risk factors to a computer screen than to either human
interviewers or paper questionnaires. The National Institute of Justice has
also found that computer-aided surveys among drug users get better results
than personal interviews. Employees are also more often willing to give
more honest answers to a computer than to a person or paper
questionnaire.
 The elimination of interviewer bias. Different interviewers can ask
questions in different ways, leading to different results. The computer asks
the questions the same way every time.
 Ensuring skip patterns are accurately followed. The Survey System can
ensure people are not asked questions they should skip based on their
earlier answers. These automatic skips are more accurate than relying on
an Interviewer reading a paper questionnaire.

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  Response rates are usually higher. Computer-aided interviewing is still
novel enough that some people will answer a computer interview when
they would not have completed another kind of interview.

Disadvantages

 The Interviewees must have access to a computer or one must be provided

for them.
 As with mail surveys, computer direct interviews may have serious
response rate problems in populations of lower educational and literacy
levels. This method may grow in importance as computer use increases.

(IV) Email Surveys

Email surveys are both very economical and very fast. More people have email
than have full Internet access. This makes email a better choice than a Web page
survey for some populations. On the other hand, email surveys are limited to
simple questionnaires, whereas Web page surveys can include complex logic.

Advantages

 Speed. An email questionnaire can gather several thousand responses

within a day or two.
 There is practically no cost involved once the set up has been completed.
 You can attach pictures and sound files.
 The novelty element of an email survey often stimulates higher response
levels than ordinary “snail” mail surveys.

107
Disadvantages

 You must possess (or purchase) a list of email addresses.

 Some people will respond several times or pass questionnaires along to
friends to answer. Many programs have no check to eliminate people
responding multiple times to bias the results. The Survey System’s Email
Module will only accept one reply from each address sent the
questionnaire. It eliminates duplicate and pass along questionnaires and
checks to ensure that respondents have not ignored instructions (e.g.,
giving 2 answers to a question requesting only one).
 Many people dislike unsolicited email even more than unsolicited regular
mail. You may want to send email questionnaires only to people who
expect to get email from you.
 You cannot use email surveys to generalize findings to the whole
populations. People who have email are different from those who do not,
even when matched on demographic characteristics, such as age and
gender.
 Email surveys cannot automatically skip questions or randomize question
or answer choice order or use other automatic techniques that can enhance
surveys the way Web page surveys can.

Many email programs are limited to plain ASCII text questionnaires and cannot
show pictures. Email questionnaires from The Survey System can attach graphic
or sound files. Although use of email is growing very rapidly, it is not universal -
and is even less so outside the USA (three-quarters of the world's email traffic
takes place within the USA). Many “average” citizens still do not possess email
facilities, especially older people and those in lower income and education
groups. So email surveys do not reflect the population as a whole. At this stage
they are probably best used in a corporate environment where email is common or
when most members of the target population are known to have email.

108
(V) Internet/Intranet (Web Page) Surveys

Web surveys are rapidly gaining popularity. They have major speed, cost, and
flexibility advantages, but also significant sampling limitations. These limitations
make software selection especially important and restrict the groups you can
study using this technique.

Advantages

 Web page surveys are extremely fast. A questionnaire posted on a popular

Web site can gather several thousand responses within a few hours. Many
people who will respond to an email invitation to take a Web survey will
do so the first day, and most will do so within a few days.
 There is practically no cost involved once the set up has been completed.
Large samples do not cost more than smaller ones (except for any cost to
acquire the sample).
 You can show pictures. Some Web survey software can also show video
and play sound.
 Web page questionnaires can use complex question skipping logic,
randomizations and other features not possible with paper questionnaires
or most email surveys. These features can assure better data.
 Web page questionnaires can use colors, fonts and other formatting
options not possible in most email surveys.
 A significant number of people will give more honest answers to questions
about sensitive topics, such as drug use or sex, when giving their answers
to a computer, instead of to a person or on paper.
 On average, people give longer answers to open-ended questions on Web
page questionnaires than they do on other kinds of self-administered
surveys.

109
  Some Web survey software, such as The Survey System, can combine the
survey answers with pre-existing information you have about individuals
taking a survey.

Disadvantages

 Current use of the Internet is far from universal. Internet surveys do not
reflect the population as a whole. This is true even if a sample of Internet
users is selected to match the general population in terms of age, gender
and other demographics.
 People can easily quit in the middle of a questionnaire. They are not as
likely to complete a long questionnaire on the Web as they would be if
talking with a good interviewer.
 If your survey pops up on a web page, you often have no control over who
replies - anyone from Antarctica to Zanzibar, cruising that web page may
answer.
 Depending on your software, there is often no control over people
responding multiple times to bias the results.

At this stage we recommend using the Internet for surveys mainly when your
target population consists entirely or almost entirely of Internet users. Business-
to-business research and employee attitude surveys can often meet this
requirement. Surveys of the general population usually will not. Another reason to
use a Web page survey is when you want to show video or both sound and
graphics. A Web page survey may be the only practical way to have many people
view and react to a video.

In any case, be sure your survey software prevents people from completing more
than one questionnaire. You may also want to restrict access by requiring a
password (good software allows this option) or by putting the survey on a page
that can only be accessed directly (i.e., there are no links to it from other pages).
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(VI) Scanning Questionnaires

Scanning questionnaires is a method of data collection that can be used with paper
questionnaires that have been administered in face-to-face interviews; mail
surveys or surveys completed by an Interviewer over the telephone. The Survey
System can produce paper questionnaires that can be scanned using Remark
Office OMR (available from CRS). Other software can scan questionnaires and
produce ASCII Files that can be read into The Survey System.

Advantages

 Scanning can be the fastest method of data entry for paper questionnaires.
 Scanning is more accurate than a person in reading a properly completed
questionnaire.

Disadvantages

 Scanning is best-suited to "check the box" type surveys and bar codes.
Scanning programs have various methods to deal with text responses, but
all require additional data entry time.
 Scanning is less forgiving (accurate) than a person in reading a poorly
marked questionnaire. Requires investment in additional hardware to do
the actual scanning.

Summary of Survey Methods

Your choice of survey method will depend on several factors. These include:

111
Questionnaire Design

General Considerations

The first rule is to design the questionnaire to fit the medium. Phone interviews
cannot show pictures. People responding to mail or Web surveys cannot easily
ask “What exactly do you mean by that?” if they do not understand a question.
Intimate, personal questions are sometimes best handled by mail or computer,
where anonymity is most assured.

KISS - keep it short and simple. If you present a 20-page questionnaire most
potential respondents will give up in horror before even starting. Ask yourself
what you will do with the information from each question. If you cannot give
yourself a satisfactory answer, leave it out. Avoid the temptation to add a few
more questions just because you are doing a questionnaire anyway. If necessary,
place your questions into three groups: must know, useful to know and nice to
know. Discard the last group, unless the previous two groups are very short.

Start with an introduction or welcome message. In the case of mail or Web

questionnaires, this message can be in a cover page or on the questionnaire form
itself. If you are sending emails that ask people to take a Web page survey, put
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your main introduction or welcome message in the email. When practical, state
who you are and why you want the information in the survey. A good
introduction or welcome message will encourage people to complete your
questionnaire.

Allow a “Don't Know” or “Not Applicable” response to all questions, except to

those in which you are certain that all respondents will have a clear answer. In
most cases, these are wasted answers as far as the researcher is concerned, but are
necessary alternatives to avoid frustrated respondents. Sometimes “Don't Know”
or “Not Applicable” will really represent some respondents' most honest answers
to some of your questions. Respondents who feel they are being coerced into
giving an answer they do not want to give often do not complete the
questionnaire. For example, many people will abandon a questionnaire that asks
them to specify their income, without offering a "decline to state" choice.

For the same reason, include “Other” or “None” whenever either of these is a
logically possible answer. When the answer choices are a list of possible opinions,
preferences, or behaviors, you should usually allow these answers.

On paper, computer direct and Internet surveys these four choices should appear
as appropriate. You may want to combine two or more of them into one choice, if
you have no interest in distinguishing between them. You will rarely want to
include “Don't Know,” “Not Applicable,” “Other” or “None” in a list of choices
being read over the telephone or in person, but you should allow the interviewer
the ability to accept them when given by respondents.

Question Types

Researchers use three basic types of questions: multiple choice, numeric open end
and text open end (sometimes called "verbatim"). Examples of each kind of
question follow:

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Rating Scales and Agreement Scales are two common types of questions that
some researchers treat as multiple choice questions and others treat as numeric
open end questions. Examples of these kinds of questions are:

114
Question and Answer Choice Order

There are two broad issues to keep in mind when considering question and answer
choice order. One is how the question and answer choice order can encourage
people to complete your survey. The other issue is how the order of questions or
the order of answer choices could affect the results of your survey.

Ideally, the early questions in a survey should be easy and pleasant to answer.
These kinds of questions encourage people to continue the survey. In telephone or
personal interviews they help build rapport with the interviewer. Grouping
together questions on the same topic also makes the questionnaire easier to
answer.

115
Whenever possible leave difficult or sensitive questions until near the end of your
survey. Any rapport that has been built up will make it more likely people will
answer these questions. If people quit at that point anyway, at least they will have
answered most of your questions.

Answer choice order can make individual questions easier or more difficult to
answer. Whenever there is a logical or natural order to answer choices, use it.
Always present agree-disagree choices in that order. Presenting them in disagree-
agree order will seem odd. For the same reason, positive to negative and excellent
to poor scales should be presented in those orders. When using numeric rating
scales higher numbers should mean a more positive or more agreeing answer.

Question order can affect the results in two ways. One is that mentioning
something (an idea, an issue, a brand) in one question can make people think of it
while they answer a later question, when they might not have thought of it if it
had not been previously mentioned. In some cases you may be able to reduce this
problem by randomizing the order of related questions. Separating related
questions with unrelated ones can also reduce this problem, though neither
technique will eliminate it.

The other way question order can affect results is habituation. This problem
applies to a series of questions that all have the same answer choices. It means
that some people will usually start giving the same answer, without really
considering it, after being asked a series of similar questions. People tend to think
more when asked the earlier questions in the series and so give more accurate
answers to them.

If you are using telephone, computer direct or Internet interviewing, good

software can help with this problem. Software should allow you to present a series
of questions in a random order in each interview. This technique will not

116
eliminate habituation, but will ensure that it applies equally to all questions in a
series, not just to particular questions near the end of a series.

Another way to reduce this problem is to ask only a short series of similar
questions at a particular point in the questionnaire. Then ask one or more different
kinds of questions, and then another short series if needed.

A third way to reduce habituation is to change the “positive” answer. This applies
mainly to level-of-agreement questions. You can word some statements so that a
high level of agreement means satisfaction (e.g., “My supervisor gives me
positive feedback”) and others so that a high level of agreement means
dissatisfaction (e.g., “My supervisor usually ignores my suggestions”). This
technique forces the respondent to think more about each question. One negative
aspect of this technique is that you may have to modify some of the data after the
results are entered, because having the higher levels of agreement always mean a
positive (or negative) answer makes the analysis much easier. However, the few
minutes extra work may be a worthwhile price to pay to get more accurate data.

The order in which the answer choices are presented can also affect the answers
given. People tend to pick the choices nearest the start of a list when they read the
list themselves on paper or a computer screen. People tend to pick the most recent
answer when they hear a list of choices read to them.

As mentioned previously, sometimes answer choices have a natural order (e.g.,

Yes, followed by No; or Excellent - Good - Fair - Poor). If so, you should use that
order. At other times, questions have answers that are obvious to the person that is
answering them (e.g., “Which brands of car do you own?”). In these cases, the
order in which the answer choices are presented is not likely to affect the answers
given. However, there are kinds of questions, particularly questions about
preference or recall or questions with relatively long answer choices that express
an idea or opinion, in which the answer choice order is more likely to affect which

117
choice is picked. If you are using telephone, computer direct, or Web page
interviewing, have your software present these kinds of answer choices in a
random order.

Preliminary test of the Questionnaire

The last step is to carry out preliminary testing of the questionnaire design is to
test a questionnaire with a small number of interviews before conducting your
main interviews. Ideally, you should test the survey on the same kinds of people
you will include in the main study. If that is not possible, at least have a few
people, other than the question writer, try the questionnaire. This kind of test run
can reveal unanticipated problems with question wording, instructions to skip
questions, etc. It can help you see if the interviewees understand your questions
and give useful answers.

If you change any questions after a preliminary test, you should not combine the
results from the preliminary test with the results of post-test interviews. The
Survey System will invariably provide you with mathematically correct answers
to your questions, but choosing sensible questions and administering surveys with
sensitivity and common sense will improve the quality of your results
dramatically.

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5.2 DATA NTERPRETATION
QUESTION:

What are the sources for recruitment and selection?

About 73% of the managers say that they prefer both internal as well as external
source for recruitment and selection where as only 9% go for internal source and
18% go for external sources.

119
Question:

Which method do you mostly prefer for recruitment and selection preferred way
of recruitment?

About 65% of the mangers go for direct recruitment and selection and 32% go for
indirect and only 3 % go for third party recruitment way

120
Question:
When do you prefer to go for manpower planning?

Around 50% of the managers go for Quarterly manpower planning and 20 % do

not follow any pattern they dont have any fixed time where as 20% go for yearly.

121
Question:

What are the sources for external recruitment are preferred?

In American Express, 34% of managers go for campus interviews, 33% go for

data bank, 25% from the casual application that are received and only 8% go for
any placement agencies.

122
Question:

What form of interview did you prefer?

Most of the manager Prefer Personal interviews, 30% prefer to take telephonic
interviews where as only 20% go for video conferencing and rest 10% adopt some
other means of interviews

123
Question:
How do you rate the HR practices of the company?

50% of the managers feel that HR department is good where and 30%say that‟s
its very good where as 20% says its average and only 10% manager feel it‟s bad

124
 FINDINGS

In this blue chip corporate conglomerate American Express, most of the

employees have high opinion about the functioning pattern adopted and being
practiced. About 73% of the managers says that they prefer both internal as well
as external source for recruitment and selection.

About 65% of the mangers go for direct recruitment and selection and less
number for mangers prefer indirect or third party. Mostly the manpower planning
is done Quarterly and 20 % do not follow any pattern they don’t have any fixed
time.

American Express prefers to go for campus interviews and even casual

application that are received for recruitment but they hardly prefer placement
agencies.

And most of the middle level and operative level managers prefers personal and
face to face interviews while 30% of them prefer telephonic interviews and 205 of
them opt for video conferencing interviews and remaining 10% of them some
other of interviews.

125
 CONCLUSION

This part of the Report presents the summary of the study and survey was carried
out with total care and observation and microscopic study done in relation to the
Recruitment and Selection in American Express India Pvt. Ltd. The conclusion
drawn from this study and survey of the company reveals that the prevailing
practice being carried out by the company in regard to Recruitment and Selection
process are totally transparent and is not demoralizing the ambitions and level of
aspirations possessed by the new entrants are getting boosted further morale is
high compared to other flag ship companies.

But sad part of the story is that the recruitment and selection process under
practice at American Express to some extent is not done objectively and therefore
bias creep in often which will hampers the future career of the employees. That is
why the search or headhunt of people should be of those whose skill fits into the
company’s values, goals, vision and mission to some extent.

Despite this ugly part still most of the employees were satisfied with the
prevailing practice but feel suitable changes are required in accordance to
according to the needs and conditions of working situation with changing
scenario. However recruitment process has a great impact on the working of the
company as young – smart and budding professionals with new idea in their mind
enters in the company.

Last but not least the company’s selection process is no doubt commendable but
still company should strive for overall excellence and this will be accomplished
only if the company will switch over to new ideas, thoughts and conceptions that
are being practiced by other corporate conglomerates and strategic HR managerial
concepts should be brought in, modified and tailored according to the personnel’s
psyche, and dynamics and job profiles so that main objective of selection of the
candidates could be achieved.
126
 SUGGESTIONS

 Manpower requirement for each department in the company is well identified

and well conceptualized with proper planned strategy well in advance.

 If the manpower requirement is high and the recruitment team of the HR

department alone cannot satisfy it, then attempt should be made for back sourcing
or outsourcing and take help from the placement agencies if the situation so arises
and is need of the hour.

 Time management is very crucial but essential and as such it should not be
ignored at any level of the recruitment and selection process..

 The recruitment and selection process should be carried out from the
company’s side and if the workload will be high and HR department could not
meet the exigencies then they would take the assistance of outsourcing agencies
or through placement agencies as the end of the last resort. This extreme step is
applied or followed only when need arises and situation decries for the same..

 The recruitment and selection procedure should not to lengthy and time
consuming which will hampers for the selection of talented and skilled personnel
who may or may not adhere to these encumbrance.

 The candidates called for interview should be allotted proper and scheduled
timings and it should not overlap with each other.

127
 BIBLOGRAPHY

 C.B Mamoria and S.V. Gankar (2004), Personal Management Text and
Cases. Himalaya Publication.

 K.Aswahthappa (2001),Human Resource and Personnel Management

 Human Resource Management, (2005), Dr.P.C. Pardeshi

 C.B. Gupta (2005)

 www.americanexpress.com

 www.google.com

128
ANNEXURE

129
Questionnaire
Name of the Organization: -American Express India Pvt. Ltd.
Name Of the HR Manager: Richa Pathak
Workforce (No. of Employees): 2200
Nature Of work: Customer Service through different channels

Q1: When are the resources need and forecasted?

 Quarterly
 Monthly
 Annually
 Not fixed

Q2: How is the resource need forecasted?

………………………………………………………………………………………
………………………………………………………………………………………
……………………………………………………………………………………
………………………………………………………. ………………………….

Q3: How do you rate the recruitment procedure?

 Short
 Average
 Long
 Very Long
 Cant say

130
Q4: What is the process you follow for recruitment and selection? People explain
the same in brief?

………………………………………………………………………………………………
………………………………………………………………………………………………
………………………………………………………………………………………………

Q5: Which method do you mostly prefer from the following for recruitment and
selection?

 Direct Method
 Indirect Method
 Third Party

Q6: What sources you prefer for recruitment and selection?

 Internal sources
 External sources
 Both

Q7: What are the sources for internal sourcing among the following -:

 Present permanent employees

 Present temporary employees
 Retrenched / Retired / employees
 Deceased / disabled / employees

Q8: What are the sources for external recruitment among the following

 Campus interviews
 Placement agencies
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 Private employment agencies
 Public employment agencies
 Professional associations
 Data bank
 Casual applicants
 Other, if any please mention

……………………………………………………………………………………

Q9: Which is the most successful method for recruitment?

…………………………………………………………………………………

10: How many rounds of interviews are conducted?

 1-3
 3-5
 More than 5

Q11: Are you satisfied with round of interviews conducted?

 Yes
 No
 To some extent
 Cant say

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Q12: What form of interview did you prefer?

 Personal Interview
 Telephonic Interview
 Video Conferencing
 Any two (then tick those two)
 All three

Q13: Are you satisfied with the interview process?

 Yes
 No
 To some extent

Q14: If no then what is the reason? And suggest the measures to be taken for
improvement?
……………………………………………………………………………………
……………………………………………………………………………………
………………………………………………………………………………………
……………………………………………………… …………………………

Q15: Are you satisfied with the present method being followed by the company
for recruitment and selection?

 Yes
 No

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Q16: If no, what steps would you prefer, to make improvement?
…………………………………………………………………………………
………………………………………………………………………………………
……………………………………. ………………………………………………

Q17: Are the aptitude test conducted

 Yes
 No
 Till some extent
 Cant say

Q18: If yes then it is for

 Fresher
 Executives
 Other (specify)

………………………………………………………………………………………
………………… …………………………………………………………………..

19: Do you conduct any of these test?

 Psychometric test
 Medical test
 Reference test check
 Other (specify)

………………………………………………………………………………………
……………………………………………………………………………………
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Q20: How do you rate the HR practices of the company?

 Very Good
 Good
 Average
 Bad

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THE END

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