Managing overqualified employees in HRM

 

(Management, 2014)

Over qualification is a glaring reality in the foreseeable future, at least in terms of educational qualifications. More youth are now pursuing the higher education than ever as higher qualifications are increasingly considered as gateway to accessing high paying employment. However, growth of jobs has not been able to match this pace apparently.

Hiring managers should look for potential hires who can do the job and are excited about doing the job, and if an overqualified candidate has the right attitude, it would be prudent to hire him/her. The question is how the organizations deal with overqualified employees after hiring?

Though it may look like a problem of plenty, going by the conventional wisdom, overqualified employees are more likely to be dissatisfied as they may feel being underpaid, and consequently become less motivated and underperform if they still in the organization. Past research negatively characterized over qualification which leads to low job satisfaction and results in high attrition and more counterproductive work behaviour. 

Nevertheless, some studies note that overqualified employees are more likely to be beneficial rather than a liability to the organization. Overqualified employees are likely to have better mastery of performing tasks beyond their job requirements and may add value in their work by having higher control over their work, suggesting improvements in work process etc. and may be produce higher performance. They are likely easier to train, more energetic, easier to manage, fast and possess more wisdom (Sinha, 2019).

Educationally overqualified employees may strive to perform and exceed expectation in initial period of joining a job. However, over a period, if not kept managed well by proper motivation, they may either leave the job or their performance become passive to their overqualification. They perform at the same level of performance of an employee with just basic qualification, if not less. Worse, they may indulge in counterproductive behavior at work.

Ways to keep the overqualified people motivated and outperform in an organization

• Give them more flexibility
• Make the job more exciting by giving assignments with more complexities
• Placing them in groups or teams consisting of similarly overqualified peers.
• Greater Involvement in Decision Making
• More Appreciation
• Accelerate their career before stagnation sets in

In conclusion, it is much beneficial for the organization to know well how to handle the overqualified employee in order for the organization to try to find jobs and opportunities that may be created or be open for overqualified employees and obtain maximum output of their knowledge and qualification in a positive way.

References

Management, T. I. o. L. &., 2014. How to Handle overqualified staff and candidates, Birmingham: The Institute of Leadership & Management.

Sinha, T., 2019. 6 ways to manage overqualified employees. [Online]
Available at: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/6-ways-manage-overqualified-employees-tripti-sinha