PEOPLE AND ORGANISATIONS: THE SELECTION ISSUE
A In 1991 according to the Department of Trade and Industry a record 48000 British companies went out of business. When businesses fail the post-mortem analysis is traditionally undertaken by accountants and market strategists. Unarguably organizations do fail because of undercapitalisation poor financial management adverse market conditions etc. Yet conversely organizations with sound financial backing good product ideas and market acumen often underperform and fail to meet shareholders’ expectations. The complexity degree and sustainment of organizational performance requires an explanation which goes beyond the balance sheet and the“paper conversion”of financial inputs into profit making outputs. A more complete explanation of “what went wrong”necessarily must consider the essence of what an organization actually is and that one of the financial inputs the most important and often the most expensive is people.
B An organization is only as good as the people it employs. Selecting the right person for the job involves more than identifying the essential or desirable range of skills educational and professional qualifications necessary to perform the job and then recruiting the candidate who is most likely to possess these skills or at least is perceived to have the ability and predisposition to acquire them. This is a purely person/skills match approach to selection.
C Work invariably takes place in the presence and/or under the direction of others in a particular organizational setting. The individual has to “fit”in with the work environment with other employees with the organizational climate style of work organization and culture of the organization. Different organizations have different cultures (Cartwright &Cooper 1991; 1992). Working as an engineer at British Aerospace will not necessarily be a similar experience to working in the same capacity at GEC or Plessey.
D Poor selection decisions are expensive. For example the costs of training a policeman are about ￡20000 (approx. US $30000). The costs of employing an unsuitable technician on an oil rig or in a nuclear plant could in an emergency result in millions of pounds of damage or loss of life. The disharmony of a poor person-environment fit (PE-fit) is likely to result in low job satisfaction lack of organizational commitment and employee stress which affect organizational outcomes i.e. productivity high labour turnover and absenteeism and individual outcomes i.e. physical psychological and mental well-being.
题目我基本上能做出来了，就是觉得翻译不出来的句子，心里很别扭，就像一种强迫症。