1. Forensic Science Staffing: Creating a Working Formula
- Author
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Joyce Thompson Heames and Jon Timothy Heames
- Subjects
business.industry ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Staffing ,Futures studies ,Engineering management ,Resource (project management) ,Human resource management ,Key (cryptography) ,Operations management ,Quality (business) ,Human resources ,business ,Limited resources ,media_common - Abstract
The key issue facing forensic labs is “the classic economic problem—how to allocate limited resources with increasing demand for services, while maintaining high quality standards” (Speaker 2009). Employees are the biggest expense and most valuable resource that forensic labs possess, thus the question arises as to how to maximize human resource functions to best allocate resources through personnel. As the search is on to look for better practices to improve the operations as well as technical expertise of labs, human capital management is crucial to that objective. The purpose of this article is to process map some of the staffing issues facing forensic science labs, whether public or private, and to identify metrics from the FORESIGHT study (Houck et al. 2009) that might help lab directors create a working formula to better manage staffing (e.g., recruiting and selection) issues.
- Published
- 2011
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