University of Dhaka

Department of Management
MBA (Evening) Program

Case Assignment
Case Title: Recruiting With Bells and Whistles
Course: EM-547
Human Resource Planning & Staffing
Summer- 2015

Submitted To
Dr. Md. Abbas Ali Khan
Professor
Department of Management
University of Dhaka

Submitted by
S.K. Siddiq Ahamed (3-14-27-033)
Md. Habibur Rahman (3-14-27-054)
Md. Kamrul Hasan (3-14-28-013)
Mridul Chakraborty (3-14-28-057)
Rafidin Kayesh Bhuyan (3-14-28-059)

Date of submission: 8th August, 2015

Letter of Transmittal
8th August 2015
Dr. Md. Abbas Ali Khan
Professor, University of Dhaka
Department of Management

Subject: Submission of Term Paper on Recruiting With Bells and Whistles.

Dear Sir,
This is to inform you that we have much pleasure to present the term paper on Recruiting with
Bells and Whistles. In this report we have tried to give an overview of different aspects of the
techniques used to forecast the demand of HR in an organization.
We have tried o ur best to get an orientation to the Books & Internet and to gather all the related
information as per your instruction and have placed our heartily effort to prepare the term paper.
We hope that our report will meet your expectation and serve its purpose.

Sincerely yours,
S.K. Siddiq Ahamed

ID: 3-14-27-033

Md. Habibur Rahman

ID: 3-14-27-054

Md. Kamrul Hasan

ID: 3-14-28-013

Mridul Chakraborty

ID: 3-14-28-057

Rafidin Kayesh Bhuyan

ID: 3-14-28-059

Table of Contents
Letter of Transmittal ............................................................................................................3
Table of Contents ........................................................................................................................4
List of Figures .....................................................................................................................4
Acknowledgement ......................................................................................................................5
Executive Summary ....................................................................................................................6
Introduction ................................................................................................................................7
Strategic Human Resource Management .....................................................................................7
Demand of HR ............................................................................................................................7
Techniques for forecasting HR demand .......................................................................................8
Index or Trend Analysis .......................................................................................................... 8-8
Expert Forecast ....................................................................................................................... 9-9
Delphi Technique ................................................................................................................ 10-10
Steps associated with using the Delphi Technique (6 steps): ............................................ 11-11
Nominal Group Technique (NGT)............................................................................................. 12
HR Budgets: Staffing or manning Table .................................................................................... 14
Envelope/Scenario Forecasts ..................................................................................................... 14
Regression Analysis .................................................................................................................. 15
Identify the Barriers .............................................................................................................. 17
Case question answers ............................................................................................................... 18
Reference .................................................................................................................................. 20

List of Figures
Figure 1: processes of Delphi technique .................................................................................... 11
Figure 2: Nominal Group Technique ......................................................................................... 13
Figure 3: Regression analysis method........................................................................................ 16

Acknowledgement
First of all we would like to thank the almighty for giving us the strength and agility to complete
this report within due time. We are grateful to our beloved course teacher Dr. Md. Abbas Ali
Khan for assigning us such an interesting topic about Recruiting With Bells and Whistles.
We also express the depth of our appreciation to our honorable course teacher for his suggestions
and guidelines, which helped us in completing this report.

Executive Summary
With the progression of business and multiplicity of organizations operation in different activities,
set a new dimension and challenge for the HRM to find out the skilled and competent personal,
who can meet the present and future requirements that comply with the organizational goal. For
this, the demand of HR is also increased in organizations. Now a days the HR professional need
have certain quality to strategically manage the people and resources that supports long-term
business goals and outcomes with a strategic framework. The Strategic HRM approach focuses on
longer-term people issues, matching resources to future needs and macro-concerns about structure,
quality, culture, values and commitment.
For this purpose it becomes necessary to forecast the demand of HR in organization. There are
different techniques which can be used to forecast the demand of HR. Those techniques helps HR
professionals in decision and policy making activities, labor demand forecasting, resource
management, linkage between HR plan with organizations.

Introduction
Human Resource (HR) deals with a set people who provides the workforce of the organization. It
is considered as capital for an organization as it is the driving force to the organizational goal. HR
management is the process which focuses on the designing functions that maximize the employees
performance of an employer's strategic objectives.

Strategic Human Resource Management

Strategic Human Resource is a concepts and practices that guide and align Human Resource
Management philosophy, tactical planning and practice with the strategic and long term goals of
the organization, with a particular focus on human capital. It deals with the macro-concerns of the
organization regarding structure, quality, culture, values, commitment, matching resources to
future needs and other issues of the organization and the people.
Strategic HRM gives direction on how to build the foundation for strategic advantage by creating
an effective organizational structure and design, culture, employee value proposition, systems
thinking, an appropriate communication strategy and preparing an organization for a changing
landscape, which includes downturns and mergers & acquisitions. Sustainability and corporate
social responsibility come within the ambit of this discipline, especially with reference to
organizational values and their expression in business decision making.
Strategic HRM emphasizes organizational codes of ethics, managing the societal impact of
business decisions, philanthropy and the role of the human resource professional in improving the
quality of life of employees, their families and the community at large

Demand of HR
Forecasting human resource demand is the process of estimating the future human resource
requirement of right quality and right number. The potential human resource requirement is to be
estimated keeping in view the organizations plans over a given period of time. Analysis of
employment trends; replacement needs of employees due to death, resignations, retirement
termination; productivity of employees; growth and expansion of organization, absenteeism and
labor turnover are the relevant factors for human resourced forecasting.
According to an interview of Pete Macauley, Regional Director of Michael Page in New Zealand
said that Businesses looking to grow aggressively are investing in employing HR specialists that
can deliver in-house training programs, career and workforce planning and performance
management programmers. He also said that-Were seeing demand for HR professionals with
social media skills not just around employment branding but recruitment. Businesses have
continued to focus on their costs and employers are seeking professionals that can provide insight
into the effective use of management and to attract candidates.

Techniques for forecasting HR demand

There are various techniques are used by organizations for presenting and examining to forecast
the HR demand. The techniques are varied according to their forecasting time horizon and tend to
be either qualitative or quantitative. Successful organization combine statistically driven
quantitative forecasts with more qualitative expert processes to achieve the most comprehensive
demand forecast possible. Organization must consider the demand for personnel not only for the
current operation but also for the future to ensure that right number of employees are available to
work with required skills and competencies.
The techniques used to forecast the demand of HR is

Index/Tend analysis
Expert forecasts
Delphi technique
The nominal group technique
HR budgets
Envelop/Scenario forecasting
Regression analysis

This techniques are used to forecast HR demand for the organization. The various use and the
aspects of those techniques are discussed later on.

Index or Trend Analysis

Index analysis is the historical relationship between an operational business index and the demand
for labor. It is also known as Trend analysis which is the historical relationship between
operational index and the number of employees required by organization. The indexes used by
organization are

Sales level
Number of unit produced
Number of clients serviced
The production hours etc.

There are five steps to conducting index/trend analysis

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Select the appropriate business/operational index

Track the business index over time
Track the workforce size over time
Calculate the average ratio of the business index to the workforce size
Calculate the forecasted demand for labor

Trend analysis not only calculate the relationship between the operational index and workforce
size of an entire organization but also the department or operational sub-units through the 1) direct
labor and 2) indirect labor. Trend analysis also gives the information about the smooth operation
of business variable on different times, which show the growth or decline of the business operation
of an organization.
ADVANTAGES
Trend analysis can:

Reveal potentially fruitful areas of audit investigation

Detect significant variations over time
Be easily understood and communicated
Be readily accepted due to its widespread use

DISADVANTAGES
Trend analysis can:

Provide little insight into the root causes of variations

Fail to indicate what the entitys normal or benchmark position is
Be undermined by frequent changes in financial reporting formats
Be heavily influenced by the choice of the base fiscal period.
Index/trend analysis is only used to find the relationship between a single business
variable and demand for the labor.
Comprehensive analysis this method is not viable
For such comprehensive analysis multivariate regression or other techniques may be used

Expert Forecast
Expert forecast is the managerial input which is most commonly used method for determining the
workforce requirements by a numerical estimation. It is a qualitative process for determining future
labor demand considering a detailed process of starting assumption, considering potential
organizational and environmental changes and deriving a rationale to support the numerical
estimation. A large group of individuals may be considered experts for their knowledge of
organizational operations, competitive HR practices, and international trends in the labor markets
etc.
The very first and foremost, organizations own line managers, who have every detailed
knowledge of workload, responsibilities, and overall task responsibilities for his or her department,
are in possession of important information about the required demand for the labor. Secondly,
organizations HR and business planning staffs certainly hold critical information that can enable
them to provide guidance in forecasting the future labor demand.
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Thirdly the business consultants, financial analysts, university researchers, union staff members
and other persons who possesses the detailed knowledge of specific industries or types of
organizational activity and are able to give rich, detailed, and largely impartial judgments on future
labor demand because of their external perspective relative to the organization. Finally, but not
exclusively, federal, provincial, and local governmental staff and officials are important
individuals to consult as they possess knowledge of future environmental changes in labor and
business legislation that can dramatically change labor demand.
Disadvantages of Expert Forecast:
Experts can be the managers, line managers, HR and business planning staffs, business
consultants, federal and provincial government staffs etc.
Irrespective of which experts we select a number of options are available for obtaining
labor demand estimation.
This method can be useful but sometimes the estimation might incorrect

Delphi Technique
A systematic forecasting method that involves structured interaction among a group of experts on
a subject. The Delphi Technique typically includes at least two rounds of experts answering
questions and giving justification for their answers, providing the opportunity between rounds for
changes and revisions. The multiple rounds, which are stopped after a pre-defined criterion is
reached, enable the group of experts to arrive at a consensus forecast on the subject being
discussed.
In other words Delphi technique is a carefully designed program of sequential, individual
interrogations (usually conducted through questionnaires) interspersed with information feedback
on the opinions expressed by the other participants in previous round.

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Figure 1: processes of Delphi technique

Steps associated with using the Delphi Technique (6 steps):

1. Define and refine the issue or question-project coordinator is assigned, works with the
HR staff to determine the specific personnel category or activity that will be the focus of
the Delphi Technique, the group targeted for forecasting must be well defined so relevant,
focused and detail feedback can be derived.
2. Identify the experts, terms, and time horizon - a team is selected that are deemed experts
with respect to personnel grouping that requires forecast, both parties must meet an
agreement on terms and conditions for participation and setting contact and explicitly
defining nature of the work.
3. Orient the experts - identifying relevant time horizons & clarifying which personnel
groups are of interest, overview of the demand forecasting decision process. Experts told
either predetermined number of questionnaire or sequence will continue until majority
opinion exists.
4. Issue the first round questionnaire - questionnaire sent by courier, fax, email, mail,
includes time frame for completion and return. First questionnaire focuses on defining
explicit assumptions made by each expert and background rationale supporting particular
demand estimate.
5. Issue the first round questionnaire summary and the second round of questionnaires
- second subsequent rounds of questionnaire with written summary of findings, aim of
second questionnaire focus experts initial assumptions by providing feedback from all
members.
6. Continue issuing questionnaire - continue issue questionnaire until either all
predetermined questionnaire stages been complete and summarized or group reaches a
clear majority decision.
Advantages of Delphi Technique:

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Delphi Technique:

Is conducted in writing and does not require face-to-face meetings:

- responses can be made at the convenience of the participant;
- individuals from diverse backgrounds or from remote locations to work together on the
same problems;
- is relatively free of social pressure, personality influence, and individual dominance and
is, therefore, conducive to independent thinking and gradual formulation of reliable
judgments or forecasting of results;
- helps generate consensus or identify divergence of opinions among groups hostile to each
other;

Helps keep attention directly on the issue:

Allows a number of experts to be called upon to provide a broad range of views, on which to
base
analysistwo heads are better than one:
- allows sharing of information and reasoning among participants;
- iteration enables participants to review, re-evaluate and revise all their previous
statements in light of comments made by their peers;
Is inexpensive.
Disadvantages of Delphi Technique:
Dependency on individual knowledge and commitment of each experts
Become less innovative and creative in course of action
Insufficient attention given to the developing criteria for the identification and selection of
experts

Nominal Group Technique (NGT)

Nominal Group Technique is a long-run forecasting technique utilizing expert assessments. The
nominal group technique is a decision making method for use among groups of many sizes, who
want to make their decision quickly, as by a vote, but want everyones opinions taken into
traditional voting. Such as Introduction and Explanation
Silent Generation of Ideas
Sharing Ideas
Group Discussion
Voting and Ranking
There are 7 Steps associated with implementing the NGT, they are:
1. Define and Refine the Issue or Question and the Relevant Time Horizon
2. Select the Experts
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3.
4.
5.
6.
7.

Issue the HR Demand Statement to the Experts

Apply Expert Knowledge, State Assumptions, and Prepare an Estimate
Meet Face-to-Face
Discuss the Demand Estimates and Assumptions
Vote Secretly to Determine the Expert Demand Assessment

Figure 2: Nominal Group Technique

One major feature of NGT is that it avoids two problems caused by group interaction. First, some
members are reluctant to suggest ideas because they are concerned about being criticized, or are
reticent and shy. Second, some members are reluctant to create conflict in groups. (Many people
want to maintain a pleasant climate.) NGT overcomes these problems. NGT has the clear
advantage in ensuring relatively equal participation. It may also, in many cases be a time-saving
technique. Other advantages include producing a large number of ideas and providing a sense of
closure that is often not found in less-structured group methods.
Internal supply refers to the current members of the organizational workforce who can be retrained,
promoted, transferred etc. to fill anticipated future HR requirements, External supply- potential
employees who are currently undergoing training or working for competitors, or who are members
of unions or professional associations, or currently are in a transitional stage, between jobs or
unemployed.
Advantages of Nominal Group Technique
Generates a greater number of ideas than traditional group discussions.
Balances the influence of individuals by limiting the power of opinion makers
(particularly advantageous for use with teenagers, where peer leaders may have an
exaggerated effect over group decisions, or in meetings of collaborative, where
established leaders tend to dominate the discussion).
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 Diminishes competition and

pressure to conform, based on status within the group.

Encourages participants to confront issues through constructive problem solving.

Allows

the

group

to

prioritize

ideas democratically.

Typically provides a greater sense of closure than can be obtained through group
discussion.
Disadvantages of Nominal Group Technique
Requires preparation.
Is regimented and lends itself only to a single- purpose, single-topic meeting.
Minimizes discussion, and thus does not allow for the full development of ideas, and
therefore can be a less stimulating group process than other techniques

HR Budgets: Staffing or manning Table

HR Budgets: quantitative, operational, or short-run demand estimates that contain the number and
types of personnel (i.e., personnel classes, such as bank clerks, loans officers, and branch
managers) required by the organization as a whole and for each subunit, division, or department.
Staffing Table: total HR demand requirement for operational or short-run time periods
HR budgets prepared by the HR staff with line managers
Take into consideration; historical company staffing trends, competitor staffing practices,
industry, professional associations, Statistics Canada
Staffing table contains information related to set of operational assumptions / levels of
activity (e.g., maintain the current organization structure, increase sales level by a
percentage over previous year levels)
Staffing table presents total HR demand requirement, number of personnel required, by
level and function

Envelope/Scenario Forecasts
Projections, or multiple-predictor estimates, of future demand for personnel predicated on a variety
of differing assumptions about how future organizational events will unfold. It entails actually
three forecasts: an "optimistic" forecast, a "most likely" forecast and an "adverse" forecast. Each
of these forecasts has its own staffing table and allows the organization to be flexible when
circumstances change rapidly.
Advantages of Envelope/Scenario forecasting
1. Scenarios help people to move away from day to day business
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2. Considering a wider range of possibilities and taking these into account in organizational
decision making
3. Systematic yet highly flexible approach, and highly participative, forces reflection at
individual and collective levels.
4. Uses known information
5. Provides rigor as well as opportunities to draw upon the creativity of those involved,
resulting in new views and interpretations on important external developments
6. A popular, creative yet structured approach that generates new ideas
7. Stretches decision makers thinking about their organizations business model and its
future environment, overcoming corporate blind-spots, and enhancing strategic flexibility
Disadvantages of Envelope/Scenario forecasting
1. We are not certain about the knowledge of future course of events
2. We need to develop several plausible outcome which is time and cost consuming.

Regression Analysis
Very effective, quantitative forecasting technique for short, medium and long-range time horizons.
Can be easily updated and changed. It is a statistical method of estimating forecast of future
demand of personnels. Regression presupposes that a linear relationship exists between one or
more independent (causal) variables, which are predicted to affect the dependent (target) variable
in our instance, future HR demand for personnel (i.e.: the number of personnel).

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Figure 3: Regression analysis method

Based on logic similar to that used in trend analysis, regression projects into the future based on
the past historical relationship between the independent and dependent variables. Linearity refers
to the observed relationship between the independent and dependent variables. If the analysis
consist of several casual or independent variables then this analysis referred as multivariable
regression analysis.
This forecasting technique enables us to plan and execute recruitment, selection, training, and
development programs in a planned, proactive fashion to ensure the trained marketing staff are on
hand exactly when required by the organization.
Advantages of Regression Analysis
The key benefits of using regression analysis are that it can:
1. Indicate if independent variables have a significant relationship with a dependent variable.
2. Indicate the relative strength of different independent variables effects on a dependent
variable.
Regression analysis can also help to make predictions.
Predicting the Future
One of the primary advantages of regression-based forecasting techniques is that they use research
and analysis to predict what is likely to happen in the next quarter, year or even farther into the
future.
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Supporting Decisions
Businesses large and small are awash in data on finances, operations and customer purchases.
Increasingly, managers that once relied on their experience and intuition look to data and analysis
to inform business decisions.
Correcting Errors
Although forecasting and regression can lend empirical support to management intuition, these
techniques also can correct management thinking when the evidence indicates otherwise.
New Insights
Large data sets have the potential to yield valuable new information about small businesses and
their operations. However, the data do not speak for themselves, making analysis necessary.
Regression and forecasting techniques can yield new insight for managers by uncovering patterns
and relationships that they had not previously noticed or considered.
Linear regression is a simple statistical process and so is easy to carry out.
Disadvantage of Regression Analysis
Forecasting the demand of labor is associated with several independent factor, for such
multivariable regression need to be done.
Multivariable regression analysis need to be done by sophisticated software(SPSS) and
experts which incurred extra cost and time for analysis

Identify the Barriers in Recruitment Assessment

In the face of challenges you cannot control, it becomes critical to remove the barriers that you
can. Consider the following:
Are you really ready to recruit?

Are all stakeholders aligned?

Do you have consensus on practice and candidate parameters?
Is there a sense of urgency?
Are you using all the bells and whistles to attract candidates?
Are your candidates the right fit?
Do the members of the interview team understand their individual roles? Are interviews a
great experience?
Is your compensation package competitive?
Do candidates leave the interview wanting the job?

If your answers to these questions are not sure, maybe, sometimes, or no your competition
has a significant advantage over your organization in hiring and retaining physician talent. You
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can increase your competitive advantage by identifying and removing the stumbling-blocks
specific to your organizations recruitment process.

Case related question answers

Question: Discuss the benefit and limitations of using the techniques described to fulfill
organization demand for labor. Consider the impact of environmental factors such as
competitor response to such action?
Answer: As we discussed earlier about the features and benefits of different techniques in
forecasting the HR demand. It has some limitations too. In case of index/trend analysis it is only
used to find the relationship between a single business variable and demand for the labor. But for
the more comprehensive analysis this method is not viable as comprehensive analysis reflects a
variety of factors that affecting the business operation such as interest rate, level of unemployment,
consumer disposable income etc. For such comprehensive analysis multivariate regression or other
techniques may be used.
The expert forecast govern with the experts estimation of labor or workforce for the current and
future operation of the business. There are several number of people which can be considered as
the expert who bears the knowledge and expertise about the current labor condition and the future
demand of labor for any kind of environmental changes. Such experts can be the managers, line
managers, HR and business planning staffs, business consultants, federal and provincial
government staffs etc. Irrespective of which experts we select a number of options are available
for obtaining labor demand estimates and assumptions from those concerned. Though this method
can be useful but sometimes the estimation might incorrect due to some dramatic change in
different environmental factors associated with the workforce demand.
Delphi technique is one of the useful and advantageous technique as it a carefully designed
program of sequential, individual interrogations interspersed with information feedback on the
opinions expressed by the other participants in previous rounds. Despite of the several advantages
of the techniques there are also some disadvantages of this techniques. They are as follows

Time and cost incurred can be higher than other techniques as a series of questionnaires
administrated in forecasting
Dependency on individual knowledge and commitment of each experts, the result
cannot be validated statistically
Become less innovative and creative in course of action because of selecting an expert
who bears the knowledge on one specific field and guided by their common
professional training
Insufficient attention given to the developing criteria for the identification and selection
of experts

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Nominal group technique (NGT) is used to forecast long-run demand of HR qualitatively. It has
some advantages over Delphi technique. The major disadvantage of NGT is that the method lacks
flexibility by being able to deal with only one problem at a time. Also, there must be a certain
amount of conformity on the part of the members involved in NGT. Everyone must feel
comfortable with the amount of structure involved. Another disadvantage is the amount of time
needed to prepare for the activity. There is no spontaneity involved with this method. Facilities
must be arranged and carefully planned. Opinions may not converge in the voting process, crossfertilization of ideas may be constrained, and the process may appear to be too mechanical.
HR budgeting is concern with the short-run forecasting of sub-units of an organization or as whole
of the organization. But it cannot forecast future workforce on the basis of prediction or single
estimate of future. For the comprehensive analysis of the future planning of operation this
technique is not suitable.
Envelop/scenario forecasting are the prediction or multiple predictors estimation of future demand
for personnel predicated on variety of differing assumptions about how future organizational
events will unfold. The disadvantage of this method is- as we are not certain about the knowledge
of future course of events, we need to develop several plausible outcome which is time and cost
consuming.
Regression analysis is an effective statistical tools for the forecast analysis of demand of labor like
trend analysis. Linear or simple regression analysis can be done by hand but in forecasting the
demand of labor is associated with several independent factor, for such multivariable regression
need to be done. Multivariable regression analysis need to be done by sophisticated software and
experts which incurred extra cost and time for analysis.
There are some challenges arise from environmental forces such as Economic developments,
Political, legal, social and technical changes, and the Competition. Competitors may be considered as
one of the important factors which influence on the HR demand of and organization. Companies
operating in the same fields likely to enhance their market shares tends to reduce their workforce.
Competition is beneficial to customers but suicidal for companies operating on thin margins.
Sometimes companies have necessarily gone lean by reducing their workforce e.g. GE, TISCO etc.
On the other hand, companies that are doing well and progressing smoothly will always look for people
with critical skills.

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Reference
1
2
3
4
5

Business dictionary, Delphi Technique.

http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/Delphi-technique.html#ixzz3i1uHpjz8
Kathy Murray, Recruitment Assessment Solutions,
http://www.cejkasearch.com/assessmentsolutions/
Kenneth J. McBey, & Monica Belcourt, Strategic Human Resources Planning, 2nd
Edition, Thomson-Nelson, New Delhi, 2004.
Society of Human Resource Management, Strategic HRM, http://www.shrm.org/india/hrtopics-and-strategy/strategic-hrm/pages/default.aspx
Tammy Buckley; HR professionals in demand- 30 September,2013,
http://www.hrmonline.co.nz/news/hr-professionals-in-demand-179864.aspx

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