Computerized Shortlisting Saves Time and Money
CapacityPlus works with the Uganda Ministry of Health to enhance workforce performance support, including field testing the project’s global rapid discrete choice experiment (DCE) tool to address attraction and retention of health worker cadres in rural and remote areas and a retention costing tool, iHRIS Retain. This is an excerpt from an original post on the IntraHealth International blog.
In Uganda there is only one doctor and 13 nurses to care for every 10,000 Ugandans, far short of the 23 health workers the World Health Organization recommends. Currently, only 56% of approved health worker posts are filled with qualified workers.
Manual to computer-based recruitment
The challenge of filling the large number of empty positions has been compounded by the work involved in the hiring process. Previously, districts used a manual system of reviewing and shortlisting job candidate applications, which required substantial time to review every candidate’s resume and copy candidate details into a hard copy format.
Recognizing the amount of time and energy invested in this system, the Uganda Capacity Program began collaborating with the Uganda Ministry of Public Service and the Public Service Commission to come up with a better, quicker way of using a computer program to aid this process. Last year, 10 Ugandan districts piloted the new tool and trained members of the District Service Commission—district hiring body for all public servants—to use it.
The tool helps human resources staff create prescreening criteria specific to each vacancy. Potential job candidates are then entered into the system and the pool is reviewed to match candidates to specific vacancies. This allows human resources staff to quickly and efficiently generate a final shortlist for each open position.
Assessing the process
Last month, a team from the Public Service Commission and the Uganda Capacity Program visited the pilot districts. All of the districts had recruited to fill positions since the introduction of the computerized system, but only half of the districts had used the electronic shortlisting system in the recruitment process.
Among those districts not using the system, the term of office for some District Service Commissions had expired, so the recruitment process was halted. In other cases, the staff members trained to operate the system were on leave during the recruitment period.
However, districts that were using the computerized system reported significant savings both in time and money during recruitment.
- Human resources staff members were able to enter a job applicant into the system in about 4.6 minutes using the computerized system, two and a half times faster than using the manual system.
- By comparing the cost of a simulated computer exercise to known recruitment costs, the team estimated that in the Isingiro and Sembabule districts, the computerized system could cut recruitment costs by half or more.
- Staff noted that the ability to store information in one central database will make the future retrieval of information easier, and using the automated system helps to standardize applicant requirements and discourage influence peddling.
The team also identified the need for a policy from the central government that would support districts to use the computerized shortlisting program with fewer regulatory bottlenecks.
Dr. Grace Namaganda and Martin Namutso from the Uganda Capacity Program, and Andrew Abunyang, Richard Manano Keuber, and Achal John Baptist from the Public Service Commission contributed to this work.
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Photo by Carol Bales. (Ugandan health worker)
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