THE ADMINISTRATIVE STAFF RECRUITMENT AND SELECTION IN ROMANIAN PUBLIC HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTIONS

Administrative staff, it will be argued, is essential to the activity of higher education. Adminis-trative staff make up about 44% of the Romanian public higher education workforce, working directly with students and providing services that allow schools to function. There is a major shortfall in the effort and attention now being devoted to the administrative staff of all kinds, despite the workload and importance of this staff. The paper looks at some of the challenges facing higher educational institutions and then suggests the competencies which will be needed by administrative staff. The paper suggests that there is significant scope for collaborating in meeting these challenges, through the recruitment and selection of the right staff. Staff recruitment and selection was considered as a way of coping with change, with the increasing range of demands now placed on staff working in higher education institutions. The paper identified a selection a five key area to be considered, and institutions are encouraged to make clear their policies on staff recruitment and then to implement them.