The recruitment and selection process, internal versus external recruitment, the main types of training (induction, on-the-job and off-the-job), and the link between training, development and performance.

What this dot point is asking

AQA wants you to describe the recruitment and selection process, compare internal and external recruitment, explain the main types of training, and link training and development to performance. Higher-mark questions ask you to weigh the costs and benefits of a choice for a named firm.

Recruitment and selection

The two terms are not interchangeable: recruitment widens the pool, selection narrows it. A good job description and person specification make selection more accurate because they define exactly what a successful candidate must offer.

Internal versus external recruitment

Types of training

Induction training introduces new employees to the business, their role, colleagues and procedures, settling them in quickly and safely. On-the-job training has staff learn while doing the work, guided by an experienced colleague, which is cheap, directly relevant and keeps people productive, though the trainer's bad habits can pass on. Off-the-job training takes place away from the workplace (courses, college, external providers), which can teach broader and specialist skills but costs more and takes staff off task.

Training, development and performance

Training raises productivity, quality and flexibility, supports motivation (meeting Maslow's and Herzberg's higher needs) and improves retention. Development goes further than training for the current job: it prepares staff for future, more senior roles, building a pipeline of talent. The drawbacks are the cost, the time staff spend away from productive work, and the risk that newly trained staff leave for rivals, so firms often pair development with retention measures.

Weighing the investment

Recruitment, training and development are best seen as an investment with a payback rather than a pure cost. The cost is real and immediate (advertising and selection, trainers and courses, the output lost while staff learn), while the benefits build over time (higher productivity and quality, lower turnover, a stronger talent pipeline). The risk that a trained employee leaves and takes the investment with them is genuine, but the response is not to skimp on training; it is to pair it with the retention measures and motivation that make staff want to stay, since untrained, unmotivated staff are more likely to leave anyway.

The right amount and type of investment depend on the firm's situation. A fast-changing, skills-intensive business (technology, professional services) gains most from heavy training and development and a careful external search for scarce skills. A business with high-volume, lower-skill work may rely more on efficient induction and on-the-job training and on internal recruitment to fill routine roles. As with the other HR decisions, the approach should flow from the corporate objectives and the kind of workforce the firm needs, not from treating training simply as an overhead to cut.