Forms R Us

From an proactive HR audit perspective what should a hire justification form look like and what is the best way to broach this subject with senior management and hiring managers that may interpret the new process as unnecessary work?

Ahh, forms. Once, I was doing some sort of report and I noticed that the company I worked for had a person whose title was "Director of Forms." Awesome. I have no idea what that person did.

And if you're asking me to figure out a justification for your form, do you have any idea what your form is for?

I'm not trying to be snarky. (Well, perhaps a little bit...)

If the form is truly necessary than the reason for its necessity should be sufficient, should it not? If you say it's for "audit" purposes, what kind of audit are you looking at? Internal? Some governmental body? What?

If the purpose of the form is for managers to complete a job description so that the recruiter can start working on finding someone, then that doesn't need an explanation.

If the purpose is so that you can verify that there is available headcount, that's a different ball of wax.

If the purpose is so that your own, internal, director of forms can keep her job--well, not so much.

For hiring authorizations, I'd like to see a job description, title, grade, salary range, name of previous incumbent (if applicable), notations for if it is within budget or not, notations for if it is within authorized headcount or if you are asking for an addition, and an explanation as to why anything has changed to the position. (For instance, if you had a Grade 10 analyst who quit and you'd like to hire someone a bit more experienced and want to upgrade to a Grade 12 analyst, I'd like an explanation of why additional experience/skill is necessary.) I'd like to see a signature (or, preferably an electronic approval) from the requesting manager, her manager and the HR person responsible for that group. The HR person is to verify that the headcount is available and the job description is properly graded. HR's job is not to nitpick and find fault.

What you don't want is a requirement that everybody and their brother signs off. For filling a vacant position, you really shouldn't need the VP, CFO, and head of HR to sign off. Sure, if you're adding to headcount or upgrading in a super fashion (we'd like to replace this admin at $30k to a Sr. Director at $145k) you might want different signers.

The point is, make the form to serve whatever purpose you have. If you can't clearly and succinctly explain the purpose to the hiring manager, then evaluate why on earth you are doing it.