4 Sequential Steps for Staffing of an Organization for Managerial or Non-Managerial Positions (2024)

The Staffing of an organization for managerial or non-managerial positions consists of four sequential steps: (1) recruitment, (2) selection, (3) training and development and (4) performance appraisal.

These steps are described in more detail as follows:

(1) Recruitment:

Recruitment is a process designed to attract a qualified pool of job applicants to the organization. It is important to ensure that there is compatibility between the job and the applicant.

Before the recruitment efforts can began, the requirements for the jobs to be filled must be clearly specified. These requirements can be established by job analysis, job descriptions and job specifications.

Job analysis is an orderly study of job requirements and involves systematic investigation relating to the operations and responsibilities including knowledge, skills and abilities required for the successful performance of a job.

The information collected includes work activity as to what is being done, nature of the physical environment, type of equipment and tools used, performance standards and personal attributes of the worker such as skills, training, and experience and so on. Job analysis forms the basis for job description and job specification.

Job descriptions are written statements that outline the duties and responsibilities involved in performing jobs. It is a tangible outcome of job analysis as to “who does what, when, where, how and why.” A job description generally contains information which includes job identification, brief summary of the type of job, duties performed, type of machinery handled, and working conditions and so on. Job descriptions clearly communicate to workers as to what they are required to do and this reduces confusion and misunderstanding.

Job specifications specify the characteristics of the individuals who should be hired for the job. These specifications relate to:

Physical characteristics:

These include general health, height and weight, vision, endurance level, hearing, colour discrimination, reflexes, motor coordination and so on.

Psychological characteristics:

These include mental dexterity, emotional stability, maturity, patience, aggressiveness, outgoing nature, poise, initiative, drive, leadership qualities, cooperative spirit, conversational ability and so on.

Responsibility:

This involves supervision of others, responsibility for safety of others and so on.

Other characteristics:

These may be, for the record, age, sex, education, experience, training required, fluency in languages and other sensory demands such as sense of sight, smell or hearing.

Once a complete job analysis has been completed and manpower needs have been determined, then management can begin the recruitment process. The recruitment may be internal to the organization or the prospective candidates can be drawn from outside sources. To what extent the internal sources or external sources for recruitment would be used would depend upon the specific environment of the organization as well as its philosophy of operations.

Some companies prefer to promote from within for key positions because these persons know the company well. Others prefer to hire from outside because the outside personnel do not know the company so that they can bring some new and fresh ideas into the company.

Internal Sources:

Internal sources of recruitment are the most obvious sources within the organization itself. Most organizations have procedures for announcing vacancies through bulletin boards, newsletters or word of mouth. Some promotions may be built in the hierarchical structure and take place automatically on the basis of seniority or when a position at the upper level becomes available.

Whenever a higher level vacancy occurs, someone from within the organization is upgraded, promoted or transferred to another department or location. Occasionally, a person may be demoted to fill a position.

The internal recruitment process can be very encouraging and motivating for employees since they are assured that they will be preferred over outsiders when the opportunities occur. This reinforces a sense of loyalty among employees for it provides them with an opportunity for advancement.

This also helps the management to be assured of the quality of performance of employees since the organization generally keeps a record of the employee performance and progress. Furthermore, internal recruitment is economical in terms of time and money, since all the energies expended in the process of hiring new candidates from outside are saved. Additionally, new employees from outside always have to go through a period of indoctrination during which the contribution of the employee to the organization is limited.

Internal staffing has some drawbacks. First, the promotions may be biased in nature and may be based on nepotism or seniority rather than merit resulting sometimes in unqualified persons in more responsible positions. Secondly, it discourages new blood which may be more innovative and creative, in entering the organization, thus inhibiting change and growth.

External Sources:

The external sources are varied and many. Most organizations cannot fill their manpower needs from within and hence they must look for outside sources. The outside pool of potential candidates includes:

New entrants to work force:

These may be college students who have just finished studies and are entering the job market.

The unemployed:

These are the people who may be temporarily out of a job or may be currently at jobs that are unsuitable to them and who may be looking for better opportunities.

Retired experienced persons:

These may be accountants, mechanics, security guards and so on, who have the necessary experience and may be hired as consultants or supervisors.

Some of the sources of external recruitment include:

1. Active files of potential candidates kept at the organization:

These are the resumes of candidates who had earlier applied but were not selected. Similarly, unsolicited applications may constitute a much used source of personnel. Such records can prove to be a good source if they are kept up to date.

2. Walk-ins and gate hiring:

These are potential candidates, generally for lower level jobs who simply walk into the personnel office and ask for a job. This type of recruitment is especially useful for mass hiring of unskilled and semi-skilled workers.

3. Employment agencies:

These employment agencies may be public or private. The public employment agencies are subsidized by local governments and may provide a variety of services. Private agencies have a pool of applicants, specializing in different areas and supply them to the organizations for a fee charged either to the applicant or to the organization.

Some agencies specialize in temporary help, others in executive recruitment. They generally interview and screen the candidates and match their skills with job requirements on file, before sending them to the organization.

4. Advertising:

Advertising is a powerful technique reaching a wide audience and generally a potential target market. It is the most frequently used method and consists of a brief statement of the nature of the job and its requirements and the compensation paid. Highly specialized recruiting jobs are advertised in technical and professional journals which reach a targeted market.

5. Colleges, universities and other educational institutions:

These include the technical and trade schools as well as alumni placement offices at colleges and universities. These sources are specially useful for recruiting into middle management positions, technical personnel, scientists, engineers, and professional business positions such as accountants, financial analysts,, systems analysts and so on.

College recruiting is one of the least expensive techniques of attracting professionals because a lot of potential candidates can be interviewed in a short period of time.

6. Professional associations:

Professional associations keep their members informed about job opportunities through their technical newsletters and professional journals. Some of them have their own placement services.

7. Labour unions:

Labour and trade unions are useful sources, especially for manual workers. These workers may be plumbers or electricians. In the construction industry, many contractors get their labour force from the local labour unions.

8. Military processing units:

This is an excellent source for highly disciplined veterans who have been trained as mechanics, welders, and airline pilots and so on. These veterans may be retired officers or personnel who want to leave the army for civilian jobs.

9. Employee referrals:

These are friends and relatives of present employees of the company. It is a useful source of recruitment, since the employees for the sake of their own reputation, would only recommend people whom they believe to be adequately qualified. One drawback of the referral technique is that it encourages nepotism which may be at the cost of quality.

10. Billboards at community centers:

These are primarily for non­professional lower level jobs, sometimes of temporary nature. These may be for baby sitters, typists, and waitresses and so on.

11. Scouting:

Some company representatives are continuously out in search for talent. Some recruiting firms have head-hunters who specialize in pirating executives from one organization to another.

12. Foreign consulates:

Many multi-national companies, which are starting to operate in another country, advertise in that country’s consulate in the home country to recruit native personnel who can be trained and sent to their own country, as employees of the multi-national organization.

For example, a company in India which is looking for an American trained Indian executive may advertise through the Indian Embassy, here in America, either through a bulletin board at the Embassy or through Embassy newsletter.

13. Open house:

In this type of recruitment, a company holds an open house and invites the members of the community to see the company facilities in an informal and social manner. This helps create a positive image for the company for any future personnel needs.

(2) Selection:

Selection is a process of choosing the right candidate from a pool of applicants. This process is established to achieve a good match between the job requirements and the candidate’s skills and motives. A good match results in increased productivity and quality performance. A bad match is extremely costly to the company due to cost of training the candidates, the cost of mistakes made by the candidate and the cost of replacement.

McMurray has listed some comprehensive steps that can be taken in the selection process.

The first step for the management is to be thoroughly familiar with the requirements of the job as well as the qualifications and expectations of the candidate. This would include any leadership qualities or decision making authority inherent in the job.

After looking at the resumes of the candidates, those candidates whose qualifications do not adequately match the requirements of the job are rejected outright. This leaves a smaller pool of more suitable candidates.

The second step is to conduct a preliminary screening interview to have an initial assessment of the candidate’s abilities and aspirations. This interview would generally establish a candidate’s goals and interests and general attitude towards the organization and what the candidate can contribute to the company.

The third step is the completion of a formal application form which summarily lists a person’s background, education, experience and special skills. The information asked for in the application form should be relevant to the selection, factual, legal and not unduly sensitive or too personal.

The fourth step is to check the candidate’s references and seek opinions from his previous employers or instructors if the candidate is fresh out of college. This should be done prior to the comprehensive interview so as to get a better idea about the candidate, especially in the area of those characteristics that do not show up on application forms. These characteristic include leadership qualities, ability to act assertively, ability to communicate well and attitudes towards subordinates as well as superiors.

The fifth step is to give certain tests to the candidate, if necessary, to make judgements about certain specific aspects of the candidate. These tests may be classified in many ways and the type of test given to the candidate would depend upon the type of job required to be filled. For example, certain “intelligence tests” are given to measure mental capacity and general intelligence of the candidate.

The test usually involves verbal comprehension, memory, inductive reasoning and so on. Most of these tests are formulated by psychologists. Other tests such as aptitude tests are designed to measure an individual’s capacity to learn a given job, if the candidate is given proper training. IQ tests are one kind of aptitude tests. “Performance tests” are given to evaluate the candidate’s ability to do the job properly. For example, a typist may be asked to type a letter.

“Personality tests” are used to measure fundamental aspects of the candidate’s personality such as self confidence, integrity, emotional stability and behaviour under stress. “Ink blot tests” are a kind of personality test.

The sixth step is the in-depth interview which is conducted to evaluate the applicant’s acceptability in terms of his ability to fit into the company’s culture and his “motives” in joining the company.

This interview can be structured in which well designed questions are asked which are pertinent to the job and the answers are analyzed. Such an interview could also be unstructured in nature which is free thought flowing two way communication. In order to make the best of the interview, it is essential that both the candidate and the interviewer be fully prepared.

The candidate must be poised and confident of himself. Good grooming, choice of clothing, a firm handshake, the manner of sitting and general enthusiasm will give good initial impression. It is also important for the candidate to know about the company as much as possible and be prepared to answer questions thoroughly and precisely.

The seventh step is to establish the applicant’s physical health. This can be checked from his medical records as well as a thorough physical examination conducted by the company physician. This will ensure that the candidate is physically fit and capable to exercise his duties and responsibilities.

The final step is the process of hiring itself. For some responsible executive positions, the management may want to get socially acquainted with the candidate before the final decision is made.

(3) Training and Development:

Training and development is the process of developing knowledge, skills and behaviours in people that will enable them to better perform their current and future jobs.

In the past, training and development was primarily oriented towards functional, technical and specific job related skills. In today’s business and managerial environment, the training and development programmes stress a broad range of group interaction skills, cross-functional issues, quality issues and diagnostic and problem solving skills.

Training programmes are primarily directed towards maintaining and improving current job performance while development programmes are primarily intended to develop skills for future jobs. According to Stoner and Freeman, both managers and non-managers receive help from training and development programmes, but the non-managers are more likely to be trained in technical skills required for their current jobs and managers are more likely to develop conceptual and human relations skills that are required in future jobs.

The need for Training:

It is important that the employees be inducted into training programmes to improve their job knowledge, skill and future performance. The need for proper training is increased by the following considerations:

1. Increased productivity:

Adequate training improves job performance skills which improves both the quality as well as quantity of the product due to increase in the level of performance.

2. Improvement in employee morale:

Because of the improvement in needed skills, training programmes build up confidence and satisfaction among employees. This in turn, develops enthusiasm and pride which are indicators of high morale.

3. Availability for future personnel needs of the organization:

Good training programmes develop the employees and prepare them for future managerial and executive positions. Accordingly, when the need arises for personnel change, the internal sources can be utilized more effectively. This will ensure the organization’s ability to sustain its effectiveness despite the possible loss of key personnel.

4. Improvement in health and safety:

Proper training can help prevent industrial accidents and create a safer work environment. Accidents are generally caused either by defects in machines and equipment or due to deficiencies in people who are not properly trained to handle and maintain such equipment. Skilled and knowledgeable workers are less prone to accidents due to training in job skills and safety attitudes.

5. Reduced supervision:

A trained employee supervises himself. He accepts responsibility and expects more freedom and autonomy and less supervision. This creates a spirit of participation and team work. Additionally, it can result in increase in span of supervision, thus reducing the costs associated with supervision.

6. Personal growth:

The training programmes give the participants a wider awareness, a sense of self satisfaction and fulfillment, an enlightened philosophy and a value system that are the apex of personal growth.

7. Organizational stability:

Training and development programmes foster the initiative and creativity of employees which increases a sense of belonging, thus preventing a manpower obsolescence. There is no greater organizational asset than that of trained and motivated personnel.

Training techniques:

There are a variety of training approaches that managers can use. Training can either be on-the-job or off-the-job.

On-the-job-training:

This method is the most widely used method and it simply means putting the worker on the job under close supervision of a trained instructor. In support, there may be a variety of training aids and techniques such as lecture manuals, procedure charts, sample problems, demonstrations and so on. This training continues until the supervisor is satisfied that the employee can adequately perform the job without supervision.

In order to train employees in a variety of jobs, some trainers will move employees from job to job. This process is known as job rotation and the employee learns a variety of skills. It helps the organization to have a pool of multi-job trained workers in case of absences, vacations or resignations of some workers.

Off-the-job training:

Such training takes place outside the actual work place but attempts to simulate actual working conditions. Also known as “vestibule training”, such a method does not disrupt the normal operations and also, it avoids “on-the-job” pressures that might interfere with the learning process.

Off-the-job training may be conducted in a company class room with lectures, discussions, seminars, case studies, demonstrations and films or it could be undertaken by means of “computer assisted instruction (CAI)”, which can both reduce the time needed for training and provide more help for individual training.

Management Development:

Management training and development is a learning experience and is primarily undertaken to sharpen the managerial skills, knowledge and ability so that the managers can lead and manage organizations successfully in order to further the organizational objectives.

The techniques developed for managerial development are designed to keep the management up-to- date with the dynamic developments in the areas of technology and behavioural sciences. These developmental techniques will aid in assigning additional responsibilities to the managers which would provide satisfaction for higher level needs of achievement, challenge and self-actualization.

The management development programmes can be conducted either on- the-job or off-the-job in a similar working situation.

On-the-job-methods:

On-the-job methods are usually preferred in management development programmes because it saves production hours and the programme can be more conveniently tailored to the individual. This training is achieved in any of the following ways:

i. Coaching:

In this technique the manager (the trainer) and the subordinate (trainee) work together in a student-tutor relationship in which the trainer coaches and guides the trainee and the purpose is to explain the “whys” and “hows” of particular job functions, and provides feedback to the trainee regarding his/her performance and any grounds for improvement.

ii. Job rotation:

This refers to the movement of trainee executives from one job to another within the organization on some planned basis. This would help the trainee to be familiar with different aspects of the organizational operations which results in broadening of outlook and exposure to a variety of management skills. Such free movement of personnel across functional lines reduces barriers to internal communications and ensures a free flow of information and ideas among all divisions.

iii. Junior board meetings and committees:

This method involves participation in junior board meetings and decision making committees where the information is shared and discussed involving real life organizational problems. It helps the trainee in widening his perspective and he is initiated to the managerial process of understanding, comprehension, analysis and decision making.

iv. Planned work activities:

This involves giving trainees important work assignments to develop their experience and ability. Trainees may be asked to head a task force so that they can acquire leadership and managerial skills.

Off-the-job methods:

Off-the-job training programs are used outside the work setting. It could he done within the organization at a separate training facility or at an offsite location such as training programmes sponsored by universities or professional organizations such as American Management Association. Some of the off-the-job training techniques are:

i. Class room lecture:

A lecture simply means a teacher delivering lectures and explaining issues to a group of trainees in a classroom setting. Its major advantage is that large amounts of material can be presented in a short time period.

ii. Case studies:

In this technique, an actual business situation is presented to the trainee in writing and in a comprehensive manner. The trainee is asked to identify the problems in the case, analyze the situation and suggest solutions. These solutions are then compared to the actual solutions that were previously developed in solving such problems.

A variance and an improvement in the case study method is known as the “incident process”, in which the trainer presents an event without furnishing details. The participants have to ask pertinent questions to secure the additional necessary information about the case.

This sharpens the trainee’s faculty of asking logical questions, gathering and analyzing the information, and synthesizing the information into a structure from where logical conclusion can be drawn.

iii. Role playing:

The role playing techniques induce people to assume the role of a specific individual under specific organizational conditions. Each role player is also expected to react to other role playing participants in the group. For example, a trainee may be given the role of a person handling employee complaints about working conditions.

He must gather all the data, ask pertinent questions to other role playing participants relevant to this situation and offer solutions. It is an excellent technique to strengthen inter-personal skills and expand individual understanding of complex interdependent issues.

Role playing helps the participants appreciate other and opposing points of view. For example, when a foreman plays the role of a union representative, he tends to understand the labour problems much better.

iv. Gaming approach:

In this method of training, an actual business situation is presented as a model, in which the teams or individuals compete against one another or against an environment in order to achieve a given objective.

The game is made up of some specific rules which govern the operations of a particular organization or industry and the trainees play the game by assigning values to the variables that affect the decision and then evaluating the decision. These variables may be what price to charge, how much to spend an advertising, whom to hire and so on.

v. The in-basket method:

In this method, the trainee is asked to assume a particular managerial position and deal with the incoming mail (in- basket), containing a number of pressing matters requiring resolutions and decisions.

These matters may relate to customer complaints, requests for promotions or transfers and so on. The management trainee is expected to give rational and applicable responses. The results are then evaluated.

vi. Programmed learning:

The programmed learning (PL) is self paced and uses a teaching machine or a computer. The topic to be learned is broken down into a series of steps and the participants acquire knowledge in a step-by-step manner. At each learning step, the participant prepares a response to a given question and receives a feedback as to the correctness of the response.

An extension of the programmed instruction is the computer assisted instruction (CAI). In this type of instruction, the individual interacts with the computer in order to assess the learning progress. All answers are pre­programmed into the computer so that the participants can check their responses for accuracy.

4) Performance Appraisal:

The evaluation of the performance of employees serves as a basis for judging the contributions and weaknesses of employees so that continuous efforts can be made to build a stronger and more effective work force. Performance appraisal constitutes a systematic way of evaluating a worker’s performance and his potential for development.

This continuing monitoring of the performance and periodic evaluation helps in retaining, promotional and retraining policies.

Performances can be evaluated against some set standards. The formal appraisal plans are designed to meet three objectives. First, performance appraisal provides evidence to justify or validate selections, promotions, transfers or salary increments.

Second, the worker learns as to where he stands relative to expectations and whether any changes are required in his behaviour, attitudes, skill or job knowledge. Finally, performance appraisal helps determine what additional training the employee may need.

Performance appraisal methods:

There are a number of performance appraisal methods available and care must be taken to select a method which is most suitable for a given candidate for such appraisal. Some of these methods are more suitable for blue collar workers, others for white collar workers and still other for executives.

In addition, the evaluators must be competent in administering these appraisal techniques because some techniques measure productivity while others measure traits and behavioural qualities.

Any performance appraisal method should meet the criteria of reliability and validity. To be reliable, the method should be consistent in yielding the same results over time as well as be independent of the evaluator. For validity it should be unbiased and relevant to job performance factors only.

Some of the performance appraisal methods are discussed as follows:

a. Narrative technique:

In this method, the rater simply writes a page or so about the strengths and weaknesses of the employees and makes some personal recommendations. It provides actual description of performance.

b. Ranking method:

This method simply ranks the person from the “most valuable” to the “least valuable”. This is the simplest method of separating the most efficient from the least efficient worker.

c. Graphic rating scales:

A commonly used method, it assesses a person on the quality and quantity of his work divided into a number of factors. These factors can be categorized as employee characteristics and employee contributions. The employee characteristics include qualities such as initiative, leadership, dependability, cooperativeness, enthusiasm, loyalty, decisiveness, emotional stability, maturity, analytical ability and so on.

The employee contributions include quantity and quality of work, responsibility undertaken, results achieved, devotion to the organization, attitudes towards superiors as well as subordinates, and so on.

These traits are evaluated on a “continuous” scale from unsatisfactory to outstanding, wherein the rater puts his mark somewhere along this scale based on his judgement of that particular trait.

d. Behaviourally anchored rating scales (BARS):

In this method the rating process in highly job oriented rather than trait oriented. This makes the method more quantifiable. In this technique, the requirements, for effective performance as well as the requirements for ineffective performance are identified on the basis of judgement by a specialist and these requirements are “anchored” at each end of a vertical bar.

The bar consists of a series of vertical scales, each scale identifying each important dimension of job performance. Each bar is scaled, generally from 1 to 9, where 1 is the lowest rating and 9 is the highest rating for most effective performance. The rating is on a continuous basis and identifies specific examples of job behaviours.

The rater then scores the performance of each behaviour on the appraisal from. This method is designed to reduce the risk and impact of errors that are caused by subjective judgements and personal prejudices.

e. Critical incident method:

The critical incident method is based on the principle that, “there are certain acts or incidents as a result of the employee’s behaviour or performance which make the difference between the success and the failure.

These critical incidents, both good and bad are recorded so that the supervisor has some factual basis for discussion during evaluations. For example, if an employee has missed important deadlines, then this could form a basis for “unreliability”.

These collected incidents are then ranked in order of frequency and importance. One drawback of this method is that unfavourable incidents draw much quicker and closer attention than favourable incidents. Also critical incidents usually have a subjective evaluation and are difficult to quantify, hence they do not lend themselves to comparison or statistical analysis.

Current Issues in Human Resource Management:

Human resource management is facing a number of issues that have evolved as a result of dynamics of the current environment. Some of these issues are discussed as follows:

i. Multinational Corporation:

The world has become a global village and many large organizations have become multinational. Multinational organizations face greater diversity in the work force and hence must address the issue of adjusting and adapting to a variety of cultural situations.

Managers who are posted from a home country to a host country must be carefully selected and trained. Some of the characteristics to be considered in such a selection of a manager are flexibility, cultural empathy, family commitments and so on.

Language and cross-cultural training for the manager as well as his family is essential. Accordingly, such managers must be adequately prepared to assume responsibility of managing operations in another country.

ii. Work Force Diversity:

The nature of the work force is changing and it is creating a challenge for many organizations. More women and people of different ethnic origins are joining the work force and this change has forced organizations to revitalize their human resource management (HRM) programmes to adapt to this new work environment. Many organizations are developing training programmes to make their managers aware of and respect the cultural differences among workers.

In the United States, woman have accounted for 60 percent of the total growth in the work force in the last two decades. Most of these women are mothers with young children and hence organizations have to make provisions for them by offering child day care centers, flexible work schedules and even telecommuting where these mothers can work at home and be connected to the office via computers.

In India also, the work mobility has increased. Delhi and Bombay are both cosmopolitan cities where people from all provinces work together. Workers from the East and South work in the wheat fields of Punjab. Punjabi farmers, technicians and businessmen are located in every corner of India.

Most organizations have a diverse work force of Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and Christians. Both managers as well as workers originally come from various provinces where provincialism and localized cultures had a strong impact on the upbringing of these workers. Accordingly, the managers are generally trained to be sensitive to these differences and be respectful to cultural affiliations of all individuals.

Even though, Indian organizations are still male dominated entities, more and more woman are getting education and according to law, they are to be provided with equal opportunities. Hence more women are expected to join the work force and contribute considerably to the organizational and national growth.

iii. Sexual Harassment:

Sexual harassment refers to actions that are sexually directed such as- sexually suggestive remarks, unwanted touching and sexual advances, request for sexual favours and other verbal and physical conduct of sexual nature.

Sexual harassment occurs when sexual compliance is required from members of opposite sex for job related benefits such as keeping the job or promotion. It can also occur when work environment is such that women feel violated and uncomfortable such as men workers making sexually oriented jokes and comments. Sexual harassment can occur between a boss and a subordinate, among co-workers and even among people from outside who deal with the organization such as a buying client who may be a man and a sales person who may be a woman. The vast majority of situations involve harassment of women by men.

From management’s point of view,” sexual harassment is a concern because it intimidates employees, interferes with job performance and exposes the organization to legal liability.

To avoid such situations, management must establish a clear and strong policy against sexual harassment and enforce it strongly. Management must make it clear to all workers through discussions, seminars, newsletters and so on, that sexual overtures to another employee will not be tolerated.

iv. Health Concerns:

Managers are very concerned about the safe and healthy working environment in the organizations. Even a common cold can make the worker absent from work thus disrupting operations to some degree.

Many organizations are taking a proactive approach to assist employees in dealing with some of their physical and mental problems. These problems may include drug use, alcoholism, stress, emotional illness and even family problems.

These employees assistance programs (EAPs) can benefit the organization financially in the long run. For example, in America, alcoholism costs corporations an estimated 86 billion dollars a year due to employee health problems caused by drinking and poor .work performance. Accordingly, helping an alcoholic to recover costs much less than the otherwise long-term potential cost.

A more serious disease that has become a major concern for management is the spread of AIDS. It can have a profound impact on the work force and on employees. Accordingly, management must be prepared to deal with AIDS related issues in the work place such as using educational forums to inform employees about these issues. Managers should create a work environment where AIDS suffering employees can continue to lead useful and productive lives and where coworkers are empathetic, understanding and helpful.