Linear personnel are workers who belong to the lower link

The main part of work in production and trade enterprises is performed by line personnel. These are the people who build houses, make doors and windows, cast metal, transport goods to stores, sit on the counter, make out insurance policies, and also engage in other non-prestigious, but such necessary activities. In any organization, the number of these workers significantly exceeds the number of other staff. This is not surprising, because managers, marketers, merchandisers and other employees are already working with what the line staff produced. These are the so-called workhorses of all companies.

Unskilled workers

Often, this category of personnel is classified as unqualified, because special skills are not needed to carry out their simple labor functions. This applies to those positions for the development of which a short internship or probationary period is sufficient:

• Cashiers.
• Sellers.
• Operators.
• Assemblers.
• The guards.

To fulfill such duties, businesses often invite students, mothers on the decree, pensioners or disabled people.

Qualified representatives of line staff

However, specialists who received a specialized education and occupy the lowest levels of the hierarchical ladder at the enterprise are also linear personnel. These are such workers as:

• Sales managers.
• Bank employees.
• Doctors.
• Teachers.
• Locksmiths, welders, foundry workers and others.

Applicants for such positions are presented with a number of requirements that fit within the framework of their education. Sometimes representatives of line staff may have difficulties in finding a job, which is due to the lack of experience, recommendations or simply insufficient level of possession of their specialty.

Complexities of hiring of line personnel

Linear personnel in production or in other areas are characterized by the highest turnover rates in comparison with other departments of the same enterprises. This is largely due to the extremely low wages that are paid to such employees. Proceeding from the fact that their work is unskilled (and in the presence of specialization, the qualification is still at the lowest level), employers are limited to charging the necessary minimum. Often in large enterprises there is a system of motivating active, smart and diligent employees, as well as their promotion through the career ladder.

The result of the functioning of such a system is also the fact that line personnel are a link where employees do not stay for long.

Moreover, many job seekers from among the line staff initially consider these vacancies as temporary: students work between periods of active study, mothers in decrees are very mobile and can switch to more promising and monetary work at any moment.

Hiring an unskilled worker for the employer does not present any difficulty, because there are always enough who want. However, if we are talking about a person who responsibly relates to his labor duties, then the search becomes much more complicated. With regard to the hiring of workers with special knowledge (for example, line personnel in production), this task is even more complicated. To close such vacancies, a career specialist needs to find a middle ground between candidates of unsatisfactory level who agree to the declared salary, and reliable, responsible job seekers who are forced to agree to the employer's proposal.

Who and how manages line personnel

The organizational structure, designed to manage employees of the lowest level, is called line management. Its essence lies in the fact that each department is assigned a leader who is subordinate to a superior. The peculiarity of the system is that each employee in the hierarchy reports directly to his supervisor: from him he receives tasks or instructions, and he is accountable only to this person.

The advantage of vertical management structure is that subordinates are guided by clear interrelated tasks and there are no misunderstandings with the preparation and submission of reports. In addition, the whole vertical functions as a whole.

True, the linear system of personnel management imposes on the leaders additional responsibility and the ability to control all aspects of the production process.

Thus, it can be concluded that the determining role in the production of goods or services belongs to employees who are called "line staff" (someone who has low qualifications or does not have it at all). This category of employees of the company performs an important part of the economic activity, which becomes the basis for the performance of the labor function of other employees (advertising agents, sales managers, representatives of the transport and accounting departments).