Does anyone oversee the process after pilots loose(sic) involvement? At what point does HR get a final decision?
The problem for many airlines is that HR is wedged into every conversation, everything that generates 'performance management' is a work input for them. Generating 'work' is self fulfilling: Control the process and your department survives.
At a particular airline of our experience so entrenched was HR, that flight operations was given a recommended list.The assessment in a simulator a binary outcome. Effectively what was a technical job was reduced and controlled by administration. That was literally all, the process had been captured.
The airline in this example realised a substantial problem with new pilots; issues of training and conversion came to light. It took time but eventually some hardy souls dared to challenge the recruitment templates. What was found was really insightful. HR had looked for mirrors of themselves; those well versed in corporate process, an eye for administrative detail and importantly a willingness to acquiesce. Such traits were not what the airline concerned thought was in the best interests of flight safety.
Removing HR from the process was costly and designing the replacement model found them back where they started before the dark art got control.