Management Function: Staffing

Management Function: Staffing

Staffing is a managerial function which involves obtaining, utilising and retaining, qualified and competent personnel to fill all positions of an organisation, from top to operative echelon. In finer terms, staffing is placing the right person at the right job.

Importance of Staffing

• It helps in the finding out efficient and effective workforce, to fill different posts in the organisation.
• It improves organisation’s performance and productivity by appointing the right person at the right job.
• It facilitates in identifying the staffing requirements of the organisation in future.
• It ensures continuous survival and growth of the organisation, by way of succession planning for executives.

Process of Staffing

1. Manpower Planning: Popularly known as human resource planning, it is the process of forecasting the firm’s demand for and supply of competent workforce, in the adequate number in future.
2. Recruitment: It entails seeking, stimulating and obtaining, as many applications as possible from the eligible and competent candidates.
3. Selection: It is the decisive step of the staffing process, which involves differentiating between applicants, so as to identify and choose the candidate who best fulfils the qualifications and requirements of the vacant position.
4. Placement: The allocation of rank and responsibility to selected candidate, is known as Placement.
5. Orientation and Induction: After the placement, the next step is to provide the new employee with the information they require for functioning comfortably and efficiently in an organisation. Induction is the process of introducing the new joinees to the job and the organisation as well.
6. Training and Development: In this step, the new joinees undergo training to acquire specific skills. Development implies learning opportunities, designed by the organisation, to ensure the growth of employees.
7. Performance Appraisal: A rational assessment and evaluation of employee’s performance against clear-cut benchmarks.

Staffing process recognises the significance of each person employed by the organisation, as the work of every individual, keeps the organisation going. So, acquiring a good staff is a tough task, because the success of the organisation depends on it and so, the process should be performed attentively.