How to Hire… It’s like Gambling in Las Vegas!
Posted on | February 13, 2009 | No Comments
After working with my clients over the last few months during this challenging economic climate I realized that some of the same old issues are beginning to pop up. Here is a discussion of one I thought we should think about…
Do you have a plan when you hire? Do you understand what brings someone to your organization or why you think someone is a “fit”? Do you have an interview process? Do you have evaluation metrics? Do you communicate to reach decisions on candidates?
These may seem like simple questions but I find it is a common problem for companies. I am constantly working with clients’ HR, IT and Business Lines to help them hire and I see these challenges from the inside. It does not matter how large or how small the company is. Additionally, this process gets more disconnected when it is a group of people doing the interview, multiple managers, hiring managers and departments. If there is not a framework for your hiring process you will continue to have limited success in hiring. It will remain a roulette choice… Red or Black, maybe “00″? Candidate A or Candidate B or the internal candidate?
Remember it feels good when you win a couple of spins in a row but it hurts when you have to head back to your room with empty pockets. The companies that are stuck on the hamster wheel and do not meet growth plans, revenue goals and other targets are the one’s that have run out of chips again and are headed back to the room with a good story and a lot of excuses…
Here are a few quick thoughts that I have put together based on my experience in the Human Capital business. This is a “system” if you will, just like Roulette or BlackJack. If you have a system you are more likely to limit risk, have more opportunity for success and not have to guess why you won or lost.
1. Understand your open requirement. Why is it open? Who will it work with? What are the roles & responsibilities? How does it fit into your strategy at a corporate level, business level, group or team level?
2. Understand what hard skills are required to perform the job? i.e. CPA for an Accountant role, .Net Development skills for a .Net Web Developer position, etc… (This is an area that causes inexperienced hiring managers a BIG problem. They get stuck in this area and focus only on hard skills.)
3. FULLY understand the soft skills required and “cultural fit” criteria. Cultural fit is the most important factor for determining success or failure. If you have a great cultural fit with moderate hard skills you have a better chance at success than with top-level hard skills and a moderate or poor cultural fit. Sound Familiar?
4. Have a process… I have used behavioral interviewing techniques as the foundation for my interviewing process. I have also created the ability to capture information and structure it in a way that facilitates evaluation after an interview. This is extremely helpful when you have multiple interviewers, reviewers, hiring managers and HR involved in the process. This will also create the metrics necessary to understand how you hire, how to improve your hiring process and accountability for the process itself.
5. Make sure you communicate your process to your company. Make sure everyone understands why and how you hire. Make sure they understand what a good hire looks like (Employee Referral is your top source of top performers. Save for another post). Hiring Managers and their interview teams must have transparency to the process and work together to be successful and improve the process over time.
I hope this helps to serve as a simple reminder and reason to pause and make sure you are working your system so you can win!
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About Coley
Coley Perry is a 15 year veteran of the sales and marketing grind. Most of his experience is in and around the intersection of sales, marketing, change management, technology and business process helping clients solve business problems through innovative solutions and consulting. He has built sales teams, go-to-market strategies, demand generation engines and sustainable revenue streams. Currently his passion is focused on the convergence of sales, marketing and technology. He wrote a lot of checks to Columbia College and Northwestern University but learned the most from The “Second City” Training Center in Chicago where he studied the Art of Improv.
