Recruitment and Selection Practices in SMEs: Empirical Evidence from a Developing Country Perspective

Abstract

This paper purports to investigate the recruitment and selection practices of SMEs and suggests appropriate strategies on how to improve human resource management practices to enhance organisational performance. Recruitment and selection practices are the key factors to the entry point of human resources to any organisation which also tends determine the success and sustainability of SMEs. These practices are said to encourage innovation, survival and growth of SME if taken serious by owner/ managers. Many studies which have been conducted on recruitment and selection practices by SMEs have only concentrated on large and multinational firms on the west and little has been done on recruitment and selection of SMEs in developing economies and yet SME tend to contribute a lot in employment creation and economic growth. This research therefore tries to develop unique recruitment and selection practices which are applicable to the needs of SMEs in developing countries. The random samplings of eighty managers/owners of SMEs were selected for the study, in which data were analyzed by using descriptive statistics. The paper contributes to the body of knowledge especially in provoking a debate amongst managers/owners to come up with appropriate strategies to encourage SMEs to develop formal ways of recruitment and selection practices in organisations. The finding from the study shows that most SMEs tends to practice both informal and formal approach in hiring their employees. The limitation of the study is that the sample size selected was not large enough to generalise the results.