Given the concerns of the Auditor General, provide a suite of recommendations to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the first stage of the WAP selection process for new police members
It is possible to provide several recommendations that the administrators of the West Australian Police (WAP) should consider to improve the efficiency of their recruitment strategies. First, they need to re-evaluate the importance of different selection criteria that they use. Some of them can prevent WAP from finding suitable candidates. In many cases, it is impossible to evaluate a person’s in terms of job knowledge, tolerance of stress, or interpersonal sensitivity before he/she encounters real-life difficulties associated with police work.
Additionally, in many cases, people can give the answers that the recruiters expect, even though these responses do not reflect their values. Finally, some of the selection criteria are not fully consistent with one another, for example, one can mention the respect of authority and initiative. Therefore, recruiters need to remove some of the selection criteria. This recommendation is particularly relevant if one speaks about psychometric testing that each applicant has to undergo at the very beginning of the recruitment process. This is one of the suggestions that can be singled out.
Additionally, the recruiters should focus on the interview process which is aimed at identifying the applicants who can meet the demands of WAP. One of the options is to ask the applicants to provide written responses to the questions. The main advantage of this approach is that recruitment officers can evaluate the responses more objectively (Mctaggart 2014, p. 121). Moreover, in this way, one can eliminate the risk of interviewer’s prejudice against a candidate. In this way, one can significantly increase the efficiency of selection, especially at the early stages.
Apart from that, it is possible to design a set of questions or dilemmas that throw light on the complexities of police work. The applicant should be asked to provide their solutions to these problems. This approach will enable recruiters to gain a better idea about the values of a person, and his/her understanding of the police work as well as the challenges that law-enforcement officers can face daily. These are some of the main issues that can be identified.
Overall, these procedures are helpful because they enable HR professionals to gain a better idea about the behavior of a person and the choices that he/she can take under various circumstances. Moreover, these strategies will assist recruiters in finding applicants who are more suitable for police work. These are the main benefits that WAP can achieve with the help of the proposed strategies.
What recruitment strategies would recommend increasing the number of female and indigenous recruits for entry to the Academy?
Much attention should be paid to the recruitment of females and the indigenous population. At present, these groups are underrepresented in the police departments. One of the strategies is to ask employees to offer written responses. As it has been said before, this approach will ensure that recruiters will focus on the responses of an applicant, rather than his/her gender, race, or ethnic origins. This is one of the advantages that this strategy can bring to the recruiters.
Additionally, more attention should be paid to the accountability of recruiters. In particular, these professionals should explain why they have decided to reject one of the candidates. This requirement should be particularly relevant at the time if they deal with a female or a representative of the indigenous population. This approach can make it more difficult for HR professionals to act in a biased or prejudiced way when they choose a certain candidate. This is why this precaution should be taken.
Moreover, it is necessary to implement outreach programs that will attract people who may be willing to work in the police (Dale 2002, p. 51). The main problem is that many people, who are suitable for police work, do not know that they can be employed by WAP. Overall, this strategy can help WAP increase the pool of candidates coming from social groups underrepresented in governmental organizations. This is one of the details that can be distinguished.
Moreover, it is possible to set some minimum quotas that the recruiters of WAP should meet. To some degree, this approach can be described as positive discrimination. However, these quotas should be very low because positive discrimination can lead to conflicts between the employees of police departments. In particular, some of them may say that a certain applicant was accepted only because of his/her race or gender (Greene 2007). This is one of the pitfalls that should be avoided by HR professionals. Finally, the administrators should investigate possible cases of discrimination against applicants or trainees. This policy can significantly decrease the prejudiced treatment of people in this governmental organization,
Overall, the strategies of WAP should be aimed at supporting the needs of individuals who were previously discriminated against by governmental institutions. Nevertheless, they should not pursue diversity at any cost; in other words, they should not employ a candidate, only due to his/her gender or ethnicity since this policy can undermine the efficiency of many police departments. This is one of the arguments that can be advanced.
References
Dale, C 2002, Affirmative Action Revisited, Nova Publishers, New York.
Greene, J 2007, The Encyclopedia of Police Science, Taylor & Francis, New York.
Mctaggart, J 2014, Definitive Guide To Passing The Police Recruitment Process: A handbook for prospective police officers, special constables and police community support officers, Constable & Robinson, New York.