Aguinis, Herman

Anderson, Neil

Bamberger, Peter

Bayazit, Mahmut

Bertolino, Marilena

Chernyshenko, Oleksandr

Chuang, Aichia

Cook, Mark

Cronshaw, Steven F.

Englert, Paul

Evers, Arne

Fraccaroli, Franco

Frintrup, Andreas

Joubert, Tina

Kriek, Hennie J.

König, Cornelius J.

Lievens, Filip

Mariani, Marco

Mladinic, Antonio

Myors, Brett

Nikolaou, Ioannis

Onyura, Betty

Raj, Shabu B.

Rodríguez, Viviana

Rolland, Florence

Sackett, Paul R.

Salgado, Jesús f.

Schollaert, Eveline

Schuler, Heinz

Sekiguchi, Tomoki

Shen, Winny

Sinangil, Handan Kepir

Steiner, Dirk D.

Subramony, S.

Thommen, Larissa A.

Tomprou, Maria

Tzafrir, Shay

Van Hoye, Greet

Yang, Hyuckseung

RERO DOC Digital Library

RESPONSEBroadening International Perspectiveson the Legal Environment forPersonnel SelectionBRETT MYORSGriffith UniversityFILIP LIEVENS, EVELINESCHOLLAERT, ANDGREET VAN HOYEGhent UniversitySTEVEN F. CRONSHAWUniversity of Northern British ColumbiaANTONIO MLADINIC ANDVIVIANA RODRI´GUEZPontificia Universidad Cato´lica de ChileHERMAN AGUINISUniversity of Colorado at DenverDIRK D. STEINER ANDFLORENCE ROLLANDUniversite´ de Nice-Sophia AntipolisHEINZ SCHULERUniversity of HohenheimANDREAS FRINTRUPHR DiagnosticsIOANNIS NIKOLAOU ANDMARIA TOMPROUAthens University of Economics andBusinessS. SUBRAMONY AND SHABU B. RAJDefence Institute of PsychologicalResearchSHAY TZAFRIRUniversity of HaifaPETER BAMBERGERTechnion—Israel Institute of TechnologyMARILENA BERTOLINOUniversity of TrentoMARCO MARIANIUniversity of BolognaFRANCO FRACCAROLIUniversity of TrentoTOMOKI SEKIGUCHIOsaka UniversityBETTY ONYURAUniversity of GuelphHYUCKSEUNG YANGYonsei UniversityNEIL ANDERSON ANDARNE EVERSUniversity of AmsterdamOLEKSANDR CHERNYSHENKOUniversity of CanterburyPAUL ENGLERTOPRA Consulting GroupHENNIE J. KRIEKSHL and University of South AfricaTINA JOUBERTSHLJESU´S F. SALGADOUniversity of Santiago de CompostelaCORNELIUS J. KO¨NIG ANDLARISSA A. THOMMENUniversita¨t Zu¨richAICHIA CHUANGNational Taiwan UniversityHANDAN KEPIR SINANGILMarmara UniversityMAHMUT BAYAZITSabanci UniversityIndustrial and Organizational Psychology, 1 (2008), 266–270.Copyright ª 2008 Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology. 1754-9426/08266MARK COOKUniversity of WalesWINNY SHEN AND PAUL R. SACKETTUniversity of MinnesotaWe are pleased that our article (Myors et al.,2008) prompted this most useful set of com-mentaries. The goal of our article was tohighlight similarities and differences in thelegal environment for personnel selectionacross a broad range of countries. Whereassome articles in this journal present a pointof view that prompts considerable dis-agreement and challenge from commenta-tors, our article is largely descriptive, andthus, the role of commentators is to expandupon the perspectives offered in our articlerather than to take issue with them. Webelieve that the commentators have accom-plished just that and they offer a most usefulsupplement to our article.Dunleavy, Aamodt, Cohen, and Schaeffer(2008) offer an explanatory model for thedifferences across countries in personnelselection practices. Their commentary canbe seen as a complement to our article, asit posits some interesting explanations basedon the moral, intellectual, and cultural cli-mate of each country (which they refer to asthe ‘‘zeitgeist’’). We find this a useful per-spective and suggest that there is value inexploring national culture differences (e.g.,in terms of Hofstede’s [2001] model) aspotential explanatory factors for differencesin both laws and their enforcement. In addi-tion, we note that the term zeitgeist impliessomething rather unstable. However, cul-tural differences may often be quite stable.For example, our contributing author fromSwitzerland (Ko¨nig) suggests that the prefer-ence for solving conflicts by reaching a con-sensus, not by going to court, has beena culturally shared attitude in Switzerlandfor a long time. This attitude may be onereason why legal cases regarding personnelselection in Switzerland are so rare. Anotherexample is the negative attitude towardbureaucracy (or, more precisely, the fear oftoo much bureaucracy). This fear has longbeen raised, at least in some European coun-tries, and it may reduce the likelihood thatlaws are developed that force companiesto extensively document issues related toadverse impact. Also, as a potential additionto Dunleavy et al.’s model, we suggest thateconomic conditions in each country can beBrett Myors, School of Psychology, Griffith University;Filip Lievens, Eveline Schollaert, and Greet Van Hoye,Department of Personnel Management and Work Orga-nizationalPsychology, Ghent University; Steven F. Cron-shaw, School of Business, University of Northern BritishColumbia; Antonio Mladinic and Viviana Rodrı´guez,Department of Psychology, Pontificia UniversidadCato´lica de Chile; Herman Aguinis, The BusinessSchool, University of Colorado Denver; Dirk D. Steinerand Florence Rolland, Laboratoire de Psychologie Cog-nitive et Sociale, Universite´ de Nice-Sophia Antipolis;Heinz Schuler, University of Hohenheim; AndreasFrintrup, HR Diagnostics; Ioannis Nikolaou and MariaTomprou, Department of Management Science andTechnology, Athens University of Economics and Busi-ness; S. Subramony and Shabu B. Raj, Defence Instituteof Psychological Research; Shay Tzafrir, Department ofHuman Services, University of Haifa; Peter Bamberger,Davidson Faculty of Industrial Engineering and Manage-ment, Technion: Israel Institute of Technology; MarilenaBertolino, Department of Cognitive Science and Educa-tion, Universityof Trento; Marco Mariani, Department ofEducational Science, University of Bologna; FrancoFraccaroli, Department of Cognitive Science and Educa-tion, University of Trento; Tomoki Sekiguchi, GraduateSchool of Economics, Osaka University; Betty Onyura(Kenya), Department of Psychology, University ofGuelph; Hyuckseung Yang, Department of Manage-ment, Yonsei University; Neil Anderson and Arne Evers,University of Amsterdam; Oleksandr Chernyshenko,Universityof Canterbury; Paul Englert, OPRA ConsultingGroup; Hennie J. Kriek, Research and Development,SHL and Department of Industrial and OrganizationalPsychology, University of South Africa; Tina Joubert,SHL; Jesu´s F. Salgado,Departmentode Psicologia Social,Universityof Santiago de Compostela; Cornelius J. Ko¨nigand Larissa A. Thommen, Psychologisches Institut, Uni-versita¨t Zu¨rich; Aichia Chuang, National Taiwan Univer-sity; Handan Kepir Sinangil, Business AdministrationDepartment, Organizational Behavior Division, Mar-mara University; Mahmut Bayazit, Department of Man-agement, Sabanci University; Mark Cook, University ofWales; Winny Shen and Paul R. Sackett, Department ofPsychology, University of Minnesota.Oleksandr Chernyshenko is now at the NanyangBusiness School, Nanyang Technological University,Singapore.This research was conducted while Antonio Mla-dinic was on leave from the Pontificia UniversidadCato´lica de Chile and holding a visiting appointmentat the University of Texas at El Paso, Herman Aguiniswas on sabbatical leave from the University of ColoradoDenver and holding a visiting appointment at the Uni-versity of Salamanca (Spain) and the University ofPuerto Rico, and Hyuckseung Yang was on sabbaticalleave from Yonsei University and holding a visitingappointment at the University of Maryland. Authorsfrom each country contributed equally to this article.Author names are ordered within country, with coun-tries listed in alphabetical order.Broadening international perspectives 267influential. Most sociological theorieswould argue that we cannot ignore eco-nomic relationships as an important deter-minant of the legal principles in eachcountry and how the law is implementedand enforced.A particularly important issue raised byDunleavy et al. is the distinction betweenthe existence of the law and the enforcementof the law. Many countries have similar laws,but some countries enforce them more effec-tively than others. Similar to organizationallevel policies (e.g., performance manage-ment), execution is key (Aguinis, 2009). Auseful follow-up to Myors et al. would bethe study of the extent to which laws areenforced; such a study would provideresearchers and practitioners with a morerealistic picture of the various environmentsin addition to knowledge of the laws in exis-tence in each country.Gutman’s (2008) commentary outlinesa set of features that help explain why thelegal environment for selection is generallybetter developed and better enforced in theUnited States than in other countries. Weagree with most of his points, but do offera differing perspective in a few instances.Gutman’s first point is that the United Stateshas a history of righting wrongs. He docu-ments the gradual addition of one protectedclass after another over an extended period oftime, and contrasts this with several EuropeanUnion (EU) countries where there was littlehistory of concern for such protected classissues prior to a mandate that they beaddressed as a condition of joining the EU.Whereas this statement is descriptively true,contributing authors from various countriesnote that the United States is certainly notalone in having a history of righting wrongs,and in the case of offering legal protection tovarious groups, there are numerous instancesof countries with broader sets of protectedclasses than the United States (our articledocuments the substantial number of coun-tries in which categories such as sexualorientation, marital status, and political affil-iation are included among the protected clas-ses). There are also settings where othercountries acted to right social wrongs earlierthan the United States. For example, slaverywas abolished in the United States in themid-1860s, whereas it was abolished inArgentina in 1813, in Puerto Rico in themid-1830s, and in other Latin Americancountries also earlier than in the UnitedStates. Similarly, applicant and employeerights have been recognized in many Euro-pean countries since the 1920s, and Euro-pean personnel selection models (e.g., theone by De Wolff& vandenBosch,1984)havebeen in advance of the United States inincluding applicant decision making as a partof the process. As an additional commentregarding the EU, note that the rangeof ethnic and other groups across the EU isarguably considerably broader than thegroups of major concern in the United States.Thiswill make attempts at legislation enforce-able in every country very difficult, with thelikely outcome a combination of EU andnational legislation (just as the United Stateshas a combination of national and state laws).Gutman’s conclusion is that laws relatedto personnel selection are strongest in theUnited States. We believe this is a soundconclusion if the focus is on the structuraldetail of the regulatory and evidentiary pro-cess for pursuing claims under the law, andwe believe that this is the interpretationintended by Gutman. But laws in other coun-tries may be viewed as stronger if the refer-ence is to the range of groups protected bylaw or to the set of methods available toincrease employment prospects for mem-bers of protected classes (e.g., the availabil-ity of preferential treatment as a remedy).The remaining three commentaries ad-dress country-specific issues. Two provideinformation about countries not covered inour article: Praslova (2008) regarding Russiaand Cozma and Woehr (2008) regardingRomania. This additional coverage broadensour perspective and is quite welcome. Pre-marajan, Thornton, and Pahdi (2008) offeruseful amplification and further detail aboutthe legal environment in India beyond whatis presented in Myors et al. and point outareas of possible misinterpretation. The ini-tiators and editors of the Myors et al. article(Sackett and Shen) attempted to extract268 B. Myors et al.useful information in a relatively small num-ber of pages based on much lengthier initialwrite-ups provided by the authors from eachcountry. Thus, this editing process is respon-sible for the lack of a full and completepicture. Most points raised by the commen-tators, such as the distinction between initialselection and promotion in the use of set-asides or quotas for protected groups, thecitations to studies of group differences,and the lack of regulation in the private sec-tor, were included in the full write-up, andthus, we agree that it is useful for the com-mentators to raise these points.That said, we would like to provide cer-tain clarifications with regard to some oftheir observations. First, the commentatorsobserve, ‘‘Article 15 of the Indian Constitu-tion prohibits discrimination in society, but itdoes not apply to employment in the publicsector as Table 2 might suggest.’’ Article 15specifically addresses prohibition of dis-crimination on grounds of religion, race,caste, sex, or place of birth. This article alsogives powers to the government for makingspecial provisions for women and children.The Myors et al. article had only mentionedcertain provisions in the constitution of Indiahaving direct or indirect relevance to per-sonnel selection practices. All the articlesmay not have direct relevance, but some ofthem, like Article 15, form the basis onwhich certain provisions such as affirmativeaction for disadvantaged groups have beenmade. Second, to our knowledge, no protec-tion is given on the basis of race or place ofbirth. We addressed the other categories.Third, the statement in the Myors et al. articlethat psychological assessment as a part ofpersonnel selection is mainly practiced inthe armed forces was not meant to imply thatelsewhere it is not practiced at all. In theIndian Armed Forces, personnel selection isfirmly based on assessment of psychologicalattributes. This has been the practice for thepast 5 decades or more. However, it isa recent development in private organiza-tions. Even though psychometric testinghas been recently introduced in recruit-ment/selection in various private-sectorenterprises, the tests that are used are some-times not properly validated. Even in govern-ment hiring other than in armed forces,measurement of psychological attributes isnot given adequate importance. Fourth, thecommentators observe that organizationscan rather easily rebut charges of discrimi-nation. They need only to provide evidencethat the selection procedures fully complywith organizational procedures. The fullerwrite-up had mentioned that there are nolaws controlling selection/recruitment pro-cesses, especially in the private sector.Finally, in reacting to the commentaries,questions arise as to whether we can turn toparticular countries for ‘‘best practice’’models. We believe that it is most usefulto differentiate between ‘‘best’’ in terms ofrigor and currency in incorporating theresearch methods and findings of the per-sonnel selection field and best in terms ofoptimal policies regarding whom to protectand how to remedy historical wrongs. Thefirst is a scientific question, and one canreasonably compare countries on this stan-dard. The second is a question of values,and there is not a scientific or technicalbasis for determining whether, for example,a model that prohibits preferential treat-ment is ‘‘better’’ than a model that permitsor requires it. Thus, we assert that it is impor-tant to keep this distinction clear and toavoid confounding the two. That a countryis sophisticated in its incorporation of thefield’s technical and scientific knowledgebase does not imply that its policies regard-ing protected classes and remedies are to bepreferred to those of other countries.We close by again thanking the com-mentators for their useful additions to ourunderstanding of the legal environment forselection. We hope that our focal articletogether with the commentaries proves use-ful to selection researchers and practitioners.ReferencesAguinis, H. (2009). Performance management (2nded.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall.Cozma, I., & Woehr, D. (2008). International perspec-tives on the legal environment for selection: Roma-nia case. Industrial and Organizational Psychology:Perspectives on Science and Practice, 1, 260–263.Broadening international perspectives 269De Wolff, C. J., & van den Bosch, G. (1984). Personnelselection. In P. J. D. Drenth, H. Thierry, H. Willems, &C. J. De Wolf (Eds.), Handbook of work and organi-zational psychology (Vol. 1). Chichester, UK: Wiley.Dunleavy, E. M., Aamodt, M. G., Cohen, D. B., &Schaeffer, P. (2008). A consideration of internationaldifferences in the legal context of selection. Indus-trial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectiveson Science and Practice, 1, 247–254.Gutman, A. (2008). Legal environment for selection inthe United States. Industrial andOrganizational Psy-chology: Perspectives on Science and Practice, 1,255–257.Hofstede, G. (2001). Culture’s consequences: Com-paring values, behaviors, institutions, and organiza-tions across nations (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA:Sage.Myors, B., Lievens, F., Schollaert, E., Van Hoye, G.,Cronshaw, S. F., M ladinic, A., et al. (2008). Inter-national perspective on the legal environment forselection. Industrial and Organizational Psychol-ogy: Perspectives on Science and Practice, 1, 206–246.Praslova, L. (2008). The legal environment for selectionin Russia. Industrial andOrganizational Psychology:Perspectives on Science and Practice, 1, 264–265.Premarajan, R. K., Thornton III, G. C., & Padhi, P. K.(2008). Legal environment for selection in India.Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspec-tives on Science and Practice, 1, 258–259.270 B. Myors et al.

Broadening International Perspectives on the Legal Environment for Personnel Selection

Broadening International Perspectives on the Legal Environment for Personnel Selection

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

RERO DOC Digital Library