ANALYSING AND ASSESSING THE MUNICIPAL PERSONNEL SELECTION METHODS: SOCIOLOGICAL RESEARCH EXPERIENCE

Abstract

The aim of the research is to identify main limitations of the tools used for the organization of competitions to fill vacancies and personnel reserve of municipal service. As the main method, questionnaire survey in the Administration of the “city of Ekaterinburg” municipal entity was applied. It was observed, that despite the importance of local government in the field of public administration, insufficient attention is drawn to methods to select staff for municipal service due to various factors. Moreover, it is the municipal employees, who provide the efficiency of the local problems solving, the implementation of the general principles of local government and public policy organization in this field at local level, and, finally, are key to the success of the ongoing local government reform in the Sverdlovsk region. The scientific novelty lies in the fact that based on the obtained theoretical and empirical data the authors identify the problem areas of the applied methods and outline the direction to transform the existing procedure. The authors argue, that certain problems in the municipal service staff selection can be cancelled out through the municipal employees selection reform, applying the methods of the given research. Candidates’ personal, psychological and professional qualities assessment to fill municipal service positions is used as part of the unified competitive selection procedure, with quite a limited number of methods applied. As evidenced in practice, the competitive selection implemented in the most successful organizations (of both private and public sector), combination of assessment of qualities, so different in nature, using one or two assessment methods, leads to reducing of the competitive procedures efficiency. Practical significance. The results and conclusions of the research can be used to reform the municipal employees selection system not only in the Administration of the city of Ekaterinburg, but also in other local bodies.