The typical manager’s role encompasses a huge range of responsibilities. In today’s economic climate, the pressure to achieve consistent results with the minimum resources is ever increasing. Thanks to the credit crunch, organisations are looking for efficiency savings, which may involve, at worst job losses.

However, such is the cyclical nature of these things, growth will begin again and companies can lick their wounds and set about re-building themselves. It doesn’t take a genius to realise that selecting the right people for the job in an investment which will pay future dividends.

Yet, anecdotal evidence suggests that managers spend little time thinking about their recruitment and selection process. Recruitment and selection is a topic that should be focused on, and managers who can objectively recognise their conscious incompetence ought to invest in a management training course.

Most managers see the selection system being a three part strategy; the application form, reference checking, and the interview. However, this traditional method is outdated, and managers ought to make themselves are that there are many more tools in the bag that will help them pick the absolute best people for the job.

Short lists and candidates put forward by recruitment companies represent only the beginning of what ought to be a well considered selection process.