Number of Number Percent 4/5ths
Gender Applicants Hired Hired Threshold
Men 100 60 60%
Women 80 20 25% 48%
There is adverse impact against women because 25% is below the 48% threshold.
Note: In the first case, 60% of male applicants and 50% of female applicants were hired. Because 50% is more than 4/5ths of 60%, there is no adverse impact against women. In the second case, 60% of male applicants but only 25% of female applicants were hired. Because 25% is less than 4/5ths of 60%, there is adverse impact against women.
every possible group is unlikely. Of importance here is the percentage of applicants who are hired, not the actual numbers.
Adverse impact is a threshold for possible discrimination in selection. It is not necessarily illegal to use a selection device that has adverse impact on a protected class.
If a selection device or procedure has adverse impact, there are further tests to decide its legality. To be legal, a selection device must be job relevant. This means that it assesses a KSAO that is necessary for job success. One way to establish job relevance is by showing that a selection device is a valid predictor of job performance.
If selection practices produce adverse impact, an organization must be ready to defend itself from legal challenges. Tests of cognitive ability and physical strength are both likely to have adverse impact on some groups. Their use can be justified only if a job analysis shows that these attributes are necessary KSAOs for the job and if the tests are shown to be valid. An organization that fails to do both a job analysis and to use valid selection methods risks using procedures that are unfair to the adversely affected groups. Although it is legal to require that those who are hired have the required KSAOs to do a job, it is illegal to require KSAOs that are not necessary for success on the job.
Essential Functions and Reasonable Accommodation
The 1990 Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) extended legal protection from dis-crimination to people with disabilities. Two concepts came from this legislation. Essential functions, as we discussed in Chapter 3, refer to KSAOs that are an important part of the job. For example, typing is an essential function for a secretary, but lifting heavy objects is not. It can be illegal to deny a job to a person with a disability based on a KSAO that relates only to nonessential functions. The idea is that rarely done tasks, such as lifting a heavy object, that require a KSAO that an otherwise competent employee does not have can be done by someone else.
The second concept is reasonable accommodation for an employee with a disabil-ity. An organization must make allowances that are feasible to enable a person with a disability to perform the job. For example, an organization should not fail to hire someone in a wheelchair just because he or she has to climb two steps to get into the building for work. A minor and reasonable accommodation would be to provide a ramp so the person can access the building without much difficulty and having to climb the stairs. Providing help in doing nonessential functions for a job can be another reasonable accommodation.
It is not yet clear what other actions are reasonable and what actions to help a worker with a disability are too difficult or expensive for an organization. Undoubtedly, future court cases will determine how far organizations must go to make reasonable accommodations for employees with disabilities.
Affirmative Action
Affirmative action consists of a variety of practices that organizations use to increase the number of protected class members in targeted jobs. Its purpose is to address the lingering effects of past discrimination in hiring by allowing certain groups to catch up in acquiring jobs that were at one time unavailable to them. Kravitz (2008) distinguished between programs designed to increase the number of minority applicants and those that give preferential treatment to minorities in job offers. The former type of opportunity
Legal Issues " 163 enhancement program increases the number of minority applicants by engaging in extra recruitment efforts (e.g., advertising in media that target minorities) or by offering training so more minorities have the KSAOs required for a job. Affirmative action is not a quota system and does not require the hiring of anyone without the necessary KSAOs. The U.S. Supreme Court has consistently ruled against entities using such practices except in extraordinary circumstances (Kravitz, Harrison, Turner, Levine, Chaves, Brannick, Denning, Russell, & Conard, 1997), for example, an organization refused to comply with legal selection practices and blatantly discriminates in their hiring. Nevertheless, the Court also let stand the California law that prohibited most forms of preferential treatment. This does not mean, however, that other forms of affirmative action have been eliminated.
Organizations that have more than 50 employees and government contracts exceed-ing $50,000 are required by executive order to have an affirmative action program.
This requirement affects most colleges and universities whose faculties have government research grants. For most other organizations, this activity is voluntary, although some employers that have been caught using discriminatory practices have been ordered or strongly encouraged by a court to adopt an affirmative action program to end their illegal practices. Most large organizations in the United States practice some form of affirmative action, although some do so more rigorously than others. The widespread practice can be seen in the prominently displayed notice that an employer is an “Affirmative Action”
employer, common on the stationery of many organizations and most universities.
The intent of an affirmative action program is to remedy the widespread problem of discrimination. Such programs should be introduced carefully because they can have unintended detrimental effects on the groups they are designed to help. Heilman and her colleagues have found that women who are given preferential treatment in hiring can have a negative view of themselves and other women (Heilman, Kaplow, Amato, & Stathatos, 1993), and such negative views can affect self-confidence (Heilman & Alcott, 2001). This effect has been found with minority candidates as well (Evans, 2003). Furthermore, a person who is hired under affirmative action is likely to be seen as incompetent, and that stigma of affirmative action is difficult to overcome in the minds of coworkers (Heilman, Battle, Keller, & Lee, 1998). Research has also shown adverse effects on nonbeneficiaries when preferential treatment has been perceived as unfair (e.g., as reverse discrimination) (Heilman, McCullough, & Gilbert, 1996).
Kravitz (2008) argued that the problems with and debates over affirmative action have all concerned preferential treatment. Programs concerned with other aspects of affir-mative action have shown promise and do not share the same drawbacks. He suggested that affirmative action programs should focus on both increasing the number of minority applicants and retaining minority employees. Attracting applicants can be accomplished by doing a better job marketing the organization to minority applicants and by increas-ing the pool of minorities with the necessary KSAOs through educational programs.
Retention can be accomplished with programs that improve the working environment and experiences for minorities—for example, by offering mentoring and training and by reducing negative experiences, such as ethnic bullying. Kravitz notes that to be effective, these programs should be available to everyone, and not just minorities. For example, a program to decrease incivility should focus on incivility toward everyone, and not just minorities. The advantage of being inclusive with such programs is that they improve working experiences for everyone, and not just minorities.
Legal Selection Outside the United States
Many countries throughout the industrialized world have discrimination laws similar to those in the United States. Some countries are as vigorous as the United States in enforcing antidiscrimination laws (e.g., Canada and South Africa), whereas others are more lax (e.g., Australia and England). Although the United States may have taken the lead, other countries give employees even more protection and extend protection to additional groups not specifically mentioned in U.S. law. How different countries approach their discrimination problems depends on the nature of those problems and their societies. In 1995, the United Kingdom instituted the Disability Discrimination Act, which is much like the ADA in the United States. As in the United States, there is resistance by employers, especially those who have negative attitudes about persons with disabilities and who have little knowledge of what the law actually requires (Jackson, Furnham, & Willen, 2000).
Canada is much like the United States in terms of laws and vigor of enforcement, although Canada also disallows discrimination based on sexual preference, which the United States does not. To avoid legal problems, organizations in Canada need to follow practices to those they would follow in the United States. Ireland is a more homogeneous society than Canada or the United States, having fewer minority groups of sufficient size to push for legal protection. In Ireland, discrimination on the basis of gender or marital status is illegal, but the law is silent about Blacks or other minority groups (Federation of Irish Employers, 1991).
The countries mentioned here, as well as the remainder of at least the industrialized world, have endorsed the idea that employee selection should be based on the job-relevant attributes of people. With this approach, the person hired is the person who can best do the job. This will eliminate unfairness in selection that results from discriminatory practices.
It should also help organizations enhance their effectiveness by hiring the best-qualified people, regardless of age, color, disability, gender, national origin, race, religion, sexual preference, or other personal characteristic that is irrelevant for job success.
! CHAPTER SUMMARY
One of the most important functions of an organization is the recruitment and selection of new employees. To remain effective, an organization must have a supply of skilled people with the necessary attributes or KSAOs to do the job. Acquiring such people involves a four-step procedure:
Planning the need for new employees
Getting appropriate people to apply for positions (recruitment) Deciding who to hire (selection)
Getting the selected people to take the jobs
Planning the need for new employees requires the use of forecasting methods. This involves comparing the need for people with particular KSAOs with the number of such people who might be available in the area. Future planning for organizational changes and expansions must consider the availability of people to fill the necessary positions.
Failure to consider these issues can result in the inability to find the people necessary to carry out an important organizational function.
Chapter Summary " 165 Getting people to apply for jobs can be a difficult task if there is a shortage of qualified people. The problem is more often one of getting the right people to apply, because there can be a surplus of people with certain skills and a shortage of people with others. There are a number of ways that organizations acquire applicants, including advertising, using recruiters, and using web-based services.
Scientific selection involves the use of selection devices that have been shown to predict job performance. To develop a system of effective or valid selection devices involves a five-step procedure: The KSAOs are identified with a job analysis, the criteria are chosen, the potential predictors are chosen, the predictors are validated with a research study, and finally, the predictors are cross-validated with a second sample or study.
Once an organization has decided whom to hire, it must convince the person to take the job. To do so, an organization must be sure that it offers rewards that are equivalent to those offered by other organizations. One procedure that has been used to ensure a better match between a person and a job is the realistic job preview (RJP), which provides accurate information about the job that allows an applicant to make an informed decision about accepting a job offer.
Utility analysis is used to determine the benefits of using a predictor to hire people.
These analyses are based on mathematical formulas that require an estimate of the mon-etary value of good job performance. There have been disagreements among researchers about the best way to conduct utility analysis. Nevertheless, the results of utility analyses have shown that scientific selection can have substantial benefits for organizations.
Employee selection is not only a scientific process; it is also a legal process. Most industrialized countries have laws against discriminatory selection practices. In the United States, it is illegal to discriminate on the basis of age, color, disability, gender, national origin, race, or religion. To avoid legal problems, an organization must base selection decisions on job-relevant factors. Southwestern Bell Inc. Dr. Erickson received her Ph.D.
in I/O psychology in 1995 from Iowa State University.
At the time of this project, her role in the company
was to do selection research, although she also has done projects in the areas of job analysis, performance appraisal, planning for future employee needs, and sur-veys of employee opinions. At the present time, she is Director of Marketing Research and is responsible for conducting studies of customer preferences for and reactions to telephone company products and services, such as call waiting and caller ID. This is not an unusual job for an I/O psychologist, for the methods and tech-niques are much the same as those for more traditional I/O work discussed in this book.
One type of employee hired by the telephone com-pany is a yellow page artist who sketches ads for company customers. The company decided to expand the advertising services, which requires a higher level
of artistic talent than is necessary for ad sketches.
Supervisors of the ad artists were asked to recom-mend individuals for the more artistic jobs, but this procedure led to widespread controversy and a union grievance over favoritism. Clearly a new procedure had to be found that would be seen as fair to the employees, while providing a valid means of choosing good artists.
Dr. Erickson was asked to solve this problem, but unfortunately no existing assessments for artists could be found. She would have to invent a new assessment device, while at the same time gaining the support of the employees. To accomplish this objective, she put together a task force of employees and managers. At the same time, she studied the research literature on creativity and discovered that, despite the seemingly subjective nature of art, experts show a high degree of interrater agreement when evaluating it. This gave her the idea of developing an assessment center in which raters would be faculty members from a well-known university art department.
The first step in developing the center was to con-duct a job analysis to identify KSAOs for the job.
Results showed that there were two important com-ponents to assess. First, the artist had to deal with customers, and second, he or she had to do the creative work. The customer service part was assessed with a
structured interview. The creative part was assessed by having experts rate the quality of a portfolio the person submitted and the performance of the person in a simulation. All ratings were done blind, with the rater not knowing whose work was being assessed.
The task force was unanimous in approving this assessment procedure. It accomplished the goal of set-tling the union grievance. Dr. Erickson conducted a validation study of the assessment center and found it predicted very well professor ratings of their art stu-dents’ employability. Those students who were rated most capable and employable did best in the assess-ment center. It is now being used for placeassess-ment and selection in the company. This case illustrates how often employees perceive effective selection as fair selection.
Discussion Questions
1. Why was it important to have employee acceptance of the new assessment center?
2. Do you think supervisor nomination was an unfair way to decide who got the jobs?
3. How else could this assessment center be validated other than with the procedure used?
4. Can you think of other ways to measure artistic creativity?
LEARNING BY DOING
Job Market for an Occupation
Go to the O*NET website, http://online.onetcenter.org, and then go to “Find Occupation.” From the top, enter an occupation and you will get a summary for it. Go to the bottom where it shows “Wages & Employment Trends.” Choose a state and hit the GO button. Write a brief report that compares your state with the United States in terms of wages and growth in the number of people needed.
How Companies Approach Minority Hiring
Choose a large company (e.g., a Fortune 500 company like General Motors or Verizon) and go to its website.
Search for evidence and write a report listing ways in which it encourages minorities to apply and values diversity in its workforce.
!
CHAPTER7
Training
CHAPTER 7 OUTLINE
! NEEDS ASSESSMENT
! OBJECTIVES
! TRAINING DESIGN Trainee Characteristics
Design Factors That Affect Transfer of Training Work Environment
Training Methods Electronic Training Mentoring Executive Coaching
! DELIVERY OF A TRAINING PROGRAM
! EVALUATION OF A TRAINING PROGRAM Set Criteria
Choose Design
Choose Measures of the Criteria Collect Data
Analyze and Interpret Data
! CHAPTER SUMMARY
! I/O PSYCHOLOGY IN PRACTICE
! LEARNING BY DOING
If you accept a job with a large organization, it is almost certain that you will go through some sort of formal training program. Even people with college degrees need additional instruction in order to do most jobs. Even simple jobs require training. For example, every employee at a McDonald’s restaurant gets trained. The person who makes French fries is taught the proper way to do the job. A restaurant manager receives hundreds of hours of training, much of it in a classroom setting. There is much to learn to be able to do most jobs well. Future trends suggest that the need for training will increase in most jobs as they become more and more technically oriented.
167
Training is one of the major human resource activities of both large and small organizations in both the private and the public (government) sectors throughout the world. It is a necessary activity for both new and experienced employees. New employees must learn how to do their jobs, whereas experienced employees must learn to keep up with job changes and how to improve their performance. In many organizations, a person will not be considered for a promotion until certain training has been completed and certain skills mastered. Learning in many jobs is a lifelong process that does not stop with a certain level of education.
Five steps are required for effective organizational training programs, as shown in Figure 7.1. The first step of a training program is to conduct a needs assessment study in order to determine who needs training and what kind of training is needed. The second step is to set objectives so that it will be clear what the training should accomplish. The third step is to design the training program. The fourth step is to deliver the training to those employees designated by the needs assessment. The final step is to evaluate
Five steps are required for effective organizational training programs, as shown in Figure 7.1. The first step of a training program is to conduct a needs assessment study in order to determine who needs training and what kind of training is needed. The second step is to set objectives so that it will be clear what the training should accomplish. The third step is to design the training program. The fourth step is to deliver the training to those employees designated by the needs assessment. The final step is to evaluate