Attitudes among Swedish employers towards different groups of job applicants

Citation

(1999), "Attitudes among Swedish employers towards different groups of job applicants", Journal of European Industrial Training, Vol. 23 No. 7. https://doi.org/10.1108/jeit.1999.00323gab.010

Attitudes among Swedish employers towards different groups of job applicants

Attitudes among Swedish employers towards different groups of job applicants

Keywords: Sweden, Recruitment, Age discrimination

A report published recently by the Swedish Employment Service studied the opinions of employers concerning the possibilities of finding, through the Employment Service, informal contacts or advertisements in the daily press, job applicants with the "right" post-secondary qualifications, the "right" vocational training and the "right" experience who also "fitted in" socially. The relative speed of these different recruitment channels was also considered.

The strength of the Employment Service, in the employers' opinion, lies in quickly finding job applicants with the right vocational training. Informal contacts are also good for finding applicants quickly, as well as applicants who are socially compatible. The biggest advantage of advertising in the daily press is the possibility of finding job applicants with the right post-secondary education. The Employment Service, however, is consistently rated as being inferior to both informal contacts and advertising in the daily press. There may be some reasons for this. It may be that the selection of suitable candidates offered by the Employment Service is considered inferior to the applicants whom employers are able to reach by other search methods. If so, perhaps the Employment Service should also try to attract groups who do not normally get in touch with the service when looking for jobs, for example, those looking for a change of employment. The reason may also be mistaken ideas about the Employment Service, based on rumours and prejudice, in which case the solution may lie in closer contacts between the Employment Service and business.

Another purpose of the report is to study employers' attitudes to hiring job applicants who have been particularly disadvantaged on the labour market during the 1990s: applicants who have been unemployed for a considerable length of time, those from immigrant backgrounds, those aged over 55 and applicants with occupational disabilities. Here it was found that employers are most negative towards applicants aged over 55, followed by those who have been unemployed for a considerable length of time. They are most positive towards applicants with immigrant backgrounds. The study also looked for a connection between employers' attitudes to hiring the different groups and the sector in which a business is involved. Here it was found that representatives of the private sector especially, but also of industry, are more negative towards these groups than is the case in the public service sector. Since labour demand appears to be higher in the private service sector, there is a serious problem if employers in that sector tend more than other sectors to use age, occupational disability, length of employment, etc. as selection criteria. This may be an effect of what is termed statistical discrimination, i.e. employers assess job applicants according to the group to which they belong. Increased communication between employers and the Employment Service can serve to prevent this, with the Employment Service, for example, helping by supplying employers with the information they need about the job applicants, so that job applicants from the disadvantaged groups can be assessed purely on their own merits.

The study also shows the value that employers put on job applicants who have taken part in an employment training programme, compared with job applicants who have been unemployed for the same period. Upwards of 30 per cent would hire the applicant who had taken part in employment training, which suggests that many employers rate employment training participation higher than unemployment. Upwards of 40 per cent were indifferent and took the view that both candidates ranked equally, while very few employers preferred to hire someone who had been unemployed. A similar conclusion also applies as regards other labour market policy programmes.

The report also shows how many months a person has to be unemployed before employers consider him or her less suitable for a job. Generally, the percentage of employers considering applicants less suitable increases with the duration of employment. Where brief periods of unemployment- especially up to three months- are involved, however, there is very little risk that unemployed job applicants will be considered less suitable merely on account of their being unemployed. Periods of up to half a year's unemployment also entail little risk. This, in turn, prompts an interesting and important question which has not been studied more closely in evaluation studies of labour market policy: when should a policy programme or other intervention take place? Judging from employers' assessments of unemployed job applicants, perhaps no one should be referred to a programme until six months have passed.