2015 review of HR practices

2015 has seen the usual plethora of focus areas for HR professionals, including an increase focus on employer branding, wellbeing strategies and culture audits. However, possibly the most sweeping changes has been in the use of complex recruitment tools, adopted in the main by larger, professional organisations, in particular the use of Contextualised Recruitment Systems (CRS).

It is suggested that this approach is used with the aim of improving social mobility, by providing a level playing field for all candidates, regardless of their backgrounds.

Social Mobility is a person’s movement over time from one class to another. This can be up or down, and can be occur between generations, such as when a child rises above the class of his or her parents, or within a generation, such as when an individual changes class because of business success.

Social mobility is a considered a “Relative social mobility”, and this refers to how likely children are to move from their parents’ place in the social hierarchy

In an extract from a BBC report (January 2014, Reeta Chakrabarti, Social Affairs correspondent, BBC News, considers the importance of social mobility, and reflected “The search for a better life – for ourselves or for our children – is a fundamental goal for most people, whether it be for more money, more status, or just more stability, and the hope of moving up in one way or another is a common one”.

“The idea that where you’ve come from should affect your life chances is viewed as deeply wrong by most people” and asks the question whether social mobility through education or sheer hard work, comes at a cost, and if there are any downsides to being upwardly mobile?

The data used from the CRSs gives recruiters the access to a range of standardised data on candidates’ economic background and personal circumstances, allowing them to make more informed choices about candidates by considering the context in which their academic achievements have been gained.

David Sproul, senior partner and chief executive of Deloitte UK, who are one of many large firms who have adopted this approach, has been quoted in saying “Improving social mobility is one of the UK’s biggest challenges. For us, there is also a clear business imperative to get this right. In order to provide the best possible service and make an impact with our clients, we need to hire people who think and innovate differently, come from a variety of backgrounds and bring a range of perspectives and experience into the firm. We truly value this difference.

We would recommend that all SMEs start to adopt a similar mind-set when considering recruiting new staff, and to continuously evaluate whether you’re culture, values and training interventions fully support the promotion of equality, diversity and help you stay on the right side of the law?.