Ensuring fair play in the recruitment process

Irish employees have never had it so good. There are more jobs in our economy today than at any time in our history. Every day brings new announcements of plant set-ups and expansion plans.

We have reached the point most industrialised nations reached decades ago, as we start to look abroad for people to staff the increasing number of unfilled vacancies.

For the employer it's hard enough to find people to apply. But it's becoming even harder to ensure that applicants are being asked the right questions in the right way. The threat of legal action from getting it wrong is now more real than ever before.

A good selection procedure should result in the appointment of the best qualified and most suitable candidate. Ideally, the selection process will be driven by the key demands of the job as opposed to bias or discrimination on the basis of the candidate's sex, marital status, family status, sexual orientation, religion, age, disability, race or membership of the Travelling community.

Under the recently enacted Employment Equality Act, 1998, such discrimination is prohibited in job ads; by an employment agency on behalf of an employer; in the arrangements which an employer makes to recruit employees and in the opportunities for promotion offered by the employer.

Consequently, they must be careful that discriminatory questions or question that could give rise to an inference of discrimination, are not posed.

Thus questions relating to sex, marital status, age, family responsibilities, reactions of spouse should be avoided, on the application form and at interview.

In the past, many of the State's most reputable employers have found themselves in murky legal waters for the manner in which they have handled their recruitment and selection process. They include Superquinn, the Revenue Commissioners, Pan American Airways, Trinity College and University College Dublin, the Coombe Hospital, Gateaux, Independent Newspapers, the Eastern and Southern Health Boards, Nenagh Urban District Council, the Medical Council, the Central Statistics Office, Donegal County Council and VEC and Laois VEC.

For example, questions posed by employers in the past which have been held to be discriminatory include:

asking a married woman if she understands the effect the job would have on her marriage - "you'll never see your husband" - and placing a restrictive note on her application form as regards the type of work for which she was suitable;

asking how many children a female candidate has and how she will have them minded;

asking the age of a child and what the candidate's husband thinks about the job;

asking the candidate if she is thinking of getting married;

asking the candidate if she intends having children;

asking the candidate who takes care of the children when she is working;

asking the candidate about her husband's availability to share the child minding responsibilities;

asking the candidate how much night duty she has done since her child was born;

asking the candidate how much maternity leave she has taken.

While the new Equality Act will force employers to explain themselves in the event of a legal challenge, it is also interesting that in 1998 the Freedom of Information Act took effect, giving job applicants "the right to be given reasons for decisions taken by public bodies that affect them".

Arising from cases already brought under the Act, the information commissioner has determined that shortlisting boards and interviewers must make the notes on unsuccessful interviewees available to them, provide access to the criteria and marking schemes used by the board and advise interviewees of their order of merit and marks.

This practice will extend to private sector employers shortly, when the EU Directive on Data Protection, which provides for access to manual files, is introduced to our statute books during the year.

To ensure the employer stays on the right side of the law at interviews, whilst getting the best person for the job, it is recommended that:

Consideration be given to the job demands and the "ideal" type of person suitable to same. Accordingly a marking scheme should be devised, with the bulk of the marks available for the key criteria set down in the marking scheme.

Interview questions should refer to the requirements of the job. Care should be taken that questions relating to marriage plans, family planning intentions, children, age, religion should not be asked. Where it is necessary to assess whether personal circumstances will affect performance of the job (for example where the job involves unsocial hours or extensive travel), relevant questions, where they are deemed absolutely necessary, should be asked equally of all candidates, and the answers should be evaluated on the same basis.

Where possible, interview boards should not be made up of persons of one sex only, and all participating in the interview process should be carefully trained in the area.

Records of interviews should be kept, showing clearly why applicants were or were not selected.

As we move into the new millennium, the increasing confidence of the Irish labour force sees them less inclined to tolerate biased, arbitrary or capricious employer decisions. For the image conscious employer, coping with the consequence of legal action may be one cost they cannot afford.

Dr Gerard McMahon is a lecturer in Human Resource Management at the Faculty of Business, Dublin Institute of Technology, and the Institute of Personnel & Development's specialist tutor in selection interviewing