Issues and Challenges in the Recruitment and Selection of ...

More documents

Recommendations

Info

immigrant communities have come to use their own networks in sharinginformation about employment and related issues (a job search strategy thatis widely used among Irish workers too). The use of personal networks wasnoted to have both benefits and disadvantages – on the one hand it opens upopportunities for employment whereas on the other it can reinforce labourmarket segmentation and lead to the creation of immigrant employment ghettos.There was also a general consensus among focus group participants thatimmigrant workers need to be flexible in their approach to looking for work andthat they should anticipate some difficulties. In line with this, most participantsused a variety of methods of looking for work, sometimes simultaneously. Themost frequently used methods were newspaper advertisements, job-related websites (including Publicjobs.ie), personal networks, FÁS, dropping CVs into employersand approaching recruitment agencies. Some LES (Local Employment Service)co-ordinators corroborated this view, noting that immigrant workers rarely reliedon a single strategy to find work, but used as many mechanisms as they couldidentify. There was a view, however that the job search efforts of immigrants arefrustrated by the practice of some employers of advertising vacancies in a limitedrange of media and by the use of their own informal recruitment practices ornetworks which may exclude immigrants.Some focus group participants had sought information on public sectoremployment and noted some criticisms. They felt for example, that websites ofpublic sector agencies can be difficult to use by people unfamiliar with the systemhere. They also commented that they have never seen any public job, other thanan Garda Síochána, advertised in a manner that suggested that migrant workerswould be welcomed. Others said they found it hard to position themselves vis-àvisthe general grade jobs that were on offer – it wasn’t obvious to them what thejob entailed or whether or not they were qualified to apply.2.4 Getting help to look for workIn general, focus group participants recognized the need for support forimmigrants in finding work in Ireland. The types of support people wantedincluded information on jobs, on how to apply for jobs and on preparing forinterviews. Specifically, preparing CVs within a different cultural context andadvice on personal presentation at interview were frequently mentioned asareas requiring support. Some participants expressed the view that the extent ofcultural differences in how people are expected to sell themselves at interview ispoorly understood by employers. These views were also echoed in the consultationwith organisations: all noted that difficulties in preparing CVs and difficulties inpreparing for interview represented barriers to employment in both the publicand private sectors.32Issues and Challenges in the Recruitment and Selection of Immigrant Workers in Ireland
However, the dominant experience appears to be that immigrants find it difficultto secure assistance in looking for work and the following problems werefrequently mentioned:• Lack of awareness among some groups about the existence of agenciesthat offer support. As noted, this was most marked amongst Asianparticipants.• Even where there is an awareness of the existence of agencies,immigrants have found it difficult to get assistance. People who werestudying or working in ‘stop-gap’ jobs had no time to engage with theagencies and noted that there are no telephone line services to providehelp to people seeking work.• African participants in particular recognized that having informationis the first point in the process of looking for work: but they foundinformation particularly difficult to access and the term ‘gate keeper’ wasused to describe those in positions to provide labour market informationand other services. This included personnel in public offices who wereconsidered to be frequently unhelpful, and perceived to consider allAfricans to be asylum seekers and therefore wasting their time. Therewas a more general perception that people working in public sectoragencies need training in intercultural work and need to have moreconnection with migrant networks to sort out issues.• In a similar vein, some participants questioned the capabilities of theLES mediators and / or their desire to work with migrant workers andthere was a general sense that information was not always easy to get.As one focus group participant put it, “you have to know the rightquestion to ask”.• The need to find work immediately also impacts on how immigrants uselabour market agencies. Some LES co-ordinators note that frequentlyimmigrants have no time for career planning or vocational advice - theyjust want to know where the jobs are.• The view was expressed that sometimes migrant workers simplydon’t have the confidence, (or as one Lithuanian participant put it, thecultural programming to be assertive), to use what is actually available tothem or to ask the right questions.• Lack of supports in terms of upgrading or adapting skills was also notedby Africans and their experience of FÁS courses is that they may be sent33
Page 2: 2Issues and Challenges in the Recru
Page 7: Chapter 1Exploring the Recruitment
Page 10 and 11: persecution. Economic migrants enco
Page 12 and 13: • The third group is the so-calle
Page 14 and 15: • Green Cards, which have replace
Page 16 and 17: Employment Services (LES) although
Page 18 and 19: Unemployment is not the only issue
Page 20 and 21: Overall, both official statistics a
Page 22 and 23: issues from the perspective of thes
Page 24 and 25: and facilitate integration and, equ
Page 26 and 27: Chapter 2Looking for work in Irelan
Page 28 and 29: and longer term aspirations with th
Page 30 and 31: In terms of public sector 6 employm
Page 34 and 35: on courses they do not want to do a
Page 36 and 37: 2.6.1 Communication issuesAmong the
Page 38 and 39: • There was also the view that Ir
Page 40 and 41: • Freedom of movement for the cit
Page 42 and 43: • what they see as the reluctance
Page 44 and 45: are employed. By the end of the sec
Page 46 and 47: large organisations are more likely
Page 48 and 49: other occupations such as youth wor
Page 50 and 51: at 24 per cent (and just 22 per cen
Page 52 and 53: Other mechanisms to recruit foreign
Page 54 and 55: In large volume recruitment campaig
Page 56 and 57: Innovation in the use of testsIrish
Page 58 and 59: 3.2.7 VettingThe vetting of candida
Page 60 and 61: that considered foreign workers to
Page 62 and 63: Chapter 4Conclusions and Discussion
Page 64 and 65: of recruitment should be more integ
Page 66 and 67: Table 4.1:Divergent views of Employ
Page 68 and 69: Perceive written andlanguage based
Page 70 and 71: as either a basis for determining e
Page 72 and 73: It is reasonable to assume that in
Page 74 and 75: Of more specific relevance to the c
Page 76 and 77: public sector employers) as well as
Page 78 and 79: BibliographyBarrett, A and Y McCart
Page 80: O’Connell, P and F McGinnity (200
Page 84:
Public Appointments ServiceChapter
show all

Issues and Challenges in the Recruitment and Selection of ...

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?