Strategic Recruitment and Selection Practices for Enhancing Productivity in School Administration in Nigeria

This opinion paper examines the roles of strategic recruitment and selection practices in enhancing productivity in school administration in Nigeria. It argues that the effectiveness of educational institutions depends substantially on the quality of personnel entrusted with leadership, management, and administrative responsibilities. Drawing on the Resource-Based View (RBV) developed by Banny (1991), the paper maintains that competent human resources constitute valuable, rare, difficult to imitate, and non-substitutable organizational assets capable of creating sustainable institutional performance. The paper identifies significant challenges inhibiting strategic recruitment and selection in Nigerian educational institutions, including political interference, nepotism favouritism, bureaucratic delays, inadequate human resource capacity, corruption, job monetization, and insufficient use of technology. It examines current recruitment and selection practices across public and private educational institutions and proposes strategic measures to improve the quality, transparency, and strategic orientation of these processes. Recommended practices include workforce planning, competency mapping, e-recruitment, structured interviews, assessment centres, background verification, merit-based selection, professionalization of school administration, and continuous human resource development. The paper concludes that strategic recruitment and selection are essential mechanism for strengthening administrative efficiency, staff commitment, institutional accountability, and overall educational productivity in Nigeria. When consistently implemented, these practices can develop more competent leadership, improve resource utilization, strengthen staff morale, reduce administrative inefficiency, and enhance overall educational outcomes.