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RECRUITMENT, SELECTION AND TRAINING – II

It involves a number of activities which may be performed either by the owner-manager himself or with the assistance of specialists. Following is the process of selection.

• Application Blank
  It contains a written record of candidates qualifications, name, experience, references etc. from a perusal of the record, a broad idea can be formed about the applicant’ potential.
• Personal Interview
  The purpose of this interview is to ascertain technical competence of the candidate and his capacity to meet the requirements of the position. The fundamental mistakes committed in interviewing are;
  1. Not spending enough time analyzing the requirements of the job to be filled.
  2. Failing to ask right questions to test strengths and weaknesses of the candidate,
  3. Relying too much on gut reaction instead of making an objective analysis.
• Checking References
  References listed by the applicant should be cross – checked through telephone and preferably through a written letter.
• Employment Tests
  Though not a sole criterion of selection, these tests are making the employee selection more efficient. These are;-
  1. Aptitude test to measure mechanical, electrical, manual dexterity and other potential talent.
  2. Achievement test to measure performance (skill proficiency)
  3. Intelligence test to measure general mental abilities e.g. verbal ability, reasoning, comprehension etc.
  4. Personality test to select managers.
• Final Interview
  It is designed to final impression based on earlier assessments and particularly to ascertain interpersonal competence (capability to go along well with others), whether he has autocratic/democratic disposition, cooperativeness, rigidity flexibility. The interviewer should do well to adopt a balanced approach. He should guard against “Halo effect” i.e. forming rational judgment on the basis of first impression. What happens is that the interviewer forms a favorable or unfavorable impression of the applicant very early and searches for confirmation. To guard against it, the interviewer should withhold judgement until after the interview.



Read more: MGT601 - SME Management - Lecture Handout 27

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SHORT AND MEDIUM TERM ISSUES FOR SME POLICY FORMULATION – III

This lecture is continuation of defining the issues for making a SME policy; this lecture deals with the short and medium term issues. The vital issues of gender development and environmental protection are also discussed in detail

Market and Industry Information

Access to market and industry information is one of the keys to develop successful business strategies. Frequently, business and trade associations are able to provide their members with such services. By associating with like institutions in foreign countries, they are also able to establish links and obtain information on foreign markets.

Over half of our SME belong to business and industry association. Their perceived role is limited to lobbing and negotiation with the government. Yet very few SME (12%) perceive their associations to be a source of information on new developments in their fields of business operation. How to increase the service provisions by all types of stakeholders will become a fundamental issue when SME support programs will be looking for deliver channels.

Monitoring Developments
Harmonizing Enterprise size Categories

Pakistan has no across the board legal definition of SME. This makes is extremely difficult to monitor the development of our SME economy and to establish benchmarks against other countries in order to devise areas of intervention and support.

Various government departments and public-sector agencies have adopted their own definitions. There are, of course, various reasons for them to define SME, and there may even be discussion on just how a strict and reasonable size standard could be defined. A number of current definitions are based on capital standards since this influences the pattern of fund raising in the formal and informal market by SME. Many stakeholders consider enterprises with 100 or more employees as large, and enterprises with less than 5 employees as micro. Yet our statistical system classifies enterprises with more than 10 employees as large, and the State Bank of Pakistan considers those with more than 250 employees as large.

Read more: MGT601 - SME Management - Lecture Handout 13