Hiring Selection

Abstract

Three decades after their inception, many Affirmative Action programs have fallen short of full implementation and lack enthusiastic endorsement by public and private employers (Cherry, 1991; Fiscus, 1992; U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, 1977, 1981a). The reasons for the delayed success of these programs are numerous and confounded, and some, such as racial prejudice, may defy elimination in a single generation (U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, 1981b). However, delayed implementation may also be due to the practices used to generate hiring recommendations. Particularly at federally-funded institutions, personnel officers, in their efforts to achieve racial and sexual balance, are required by law to use methods prescribed in the original Affirmative Action directives (Boisseau and McKay, 1980; Cronback, Yalow, and Schaeffer, 1980; Haertel, 1984). As we describe later, current methods for policy assessment use inefficient population parameters to evaluate minority frequencies during the stages of the hiring process. Moreover, since the recommendations resulting from such evaluations can be vague and subjectively interpreted, it is not surprising that efforts to implement Affirmative Action policies have proceeded slowly and sparked protests of discrimination by minority and majority groups alike (American Society for Personnel Administration, 1982; Blumrosen, 1981; Cherry, 1991; Fullinwider, 1980; Greenwalt, 1979).