A survey of recruitment and selection practices in Egypt

Purpose – The paper's aims are to ascertain whether there is evidence of Egyptian organisations using recruitment and selection practices which are context specific and whether different practices are used for different job types; whether responsibility for recruitment and selection is shared between HRM specialists and line management; and whether there is evidence of increasing devolution of this responsibility to line managers. Design/methodology/approach – Data were collected between May and July 2007 and produced 108 usable questionnaires. The questionnaire was adapted from the Price Waterhouse Cranfield project on HRM in Europe. Findings – There is some evidential support for the influence of the Egyptian national context upon the practices used, with different practices, including the number of techniques being used for the recruitment and selection of different job types. There is evidence of substantial sharing of this responsibility with line management through consultation and of an increased devolution of responsibility to line management. Research limitations/implications – Investigating recruitment and selection practices with the influence of ownership and by organisational size is needed to pursue whether there are significant associations between these variables. Practical implications – Organisations moving into Egypt would not appear to be confronted with substantial resistance to the adoption of new methods and techniques for recruiting and selecting staff or the adoption of different methods for different job types, neither with resistance if they wish to involve line management in the decision‐making process. Originality/value – The influence of the Egyptian national context upon the recruitment and selection practices used is an important issue for organisations to know the best recruitment and selection methods.