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E-recruiting and fairness: the applicant’s point of view

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Abstract

More and more companies currently recruit online, partly because of cost savings and competitive pressure, and partly because it is the best way to reach their target group of applicants. In our study, applicants’ perceptions of procedural fairness were examined in e-recruiting contexts. Using an adapted form of the Social Process Questionnaire on Selection, we found that 1,373 participants’ expectations regarding fairness were mediocre and always lower than the perceived importance of five procedural fairness aspects. Based on an experimental manipulation, we showed that feedback was particularly important in online application procedures, whereas participation had smaller effects. Furthermore, participants tend to rate procedural fairness for offline application procedures as fairer than for online procedures although they reported generally positive experiences with online applications in the past. Based on our results, we discuss practical implications and limitations.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Peter Vorholt for helpful comments on previous versions of this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, University of Muenster, Fliednerstr. 21, 48149, Münster, Germany

    Meinald T. Thielsch & Lisa Träumer

  2. Rewe Group HR Development, toom BauMarkt GmbH, Cologne, Germany

    Leoni Pytlik

Authors
  1. Meinald T. Thielsch
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  2. Lisa Träumer
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  3. Leoni Pytlik
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Correspondence to Meinald T. Thielsch.

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Thielsch, M.T., Träumer, L. & Pytlik, L. E-recruiting and fairness: the applicant’s point of view. Inf Technol Manag 13, 59–67 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10799-012-0117-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10799-012-0117-x

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