Hiring the right people

Selection is the process of choosing individuals with the right qualifications to fill jobs. Without qualified employees, the organization’s success suffers. According to a recent MetLife Employee Benefits Trend Study released in January, 74% of businesses are expecting competition for talent to escalate over the next year. With recruiting emerging as one of the top concerns for employers, no one can afford to make bad hires. A 2004 Gartner report found that organizations are more focused on applicant tracking and automated requisitioning. For effective hiring to be possible it must include well-oiled and executed practices, strategies, and techniques.

Most people would agree that hiring a well-qualified candidate makes a tremendous difference to the organization’s effectiveness and to the bottom line. Imagine for a minute that your company had a regular practice of settling for new hires with average job skills and abilities. Now imagine that you instead had a regular practice of hiring the best-qualified candidates who would perform at 20-40% above average in job skills and abilities. That’s hiring well and adding to the performance of the company.”

Despite the obvious need and importance of hiring the best from available talent the first time, the process still has its challenges. The five most common and costly mistakes we see are:

not having well-defined selection criteria.
not preparing a question strategy mapping out the right questions.
the absence of an interview structure that allows for multiple points of view and well-defined roles and responsibilities during the interview.
lack of a clearly defined evaluation and review process that allows you to compare “apples to apples.”
settling for less than the most qualified candidate for the position.
The fact is that today’s managers and supervisors are asked to lead the interviewing and selection processes when they are not trained and equipped to. They don’t use a structured process, they haven’t been trained in interview and selection skills and strategies, and they may use team members who also have not been trained; or they try to go it alone. The odds are that inconsistent success with hiring will continue.

Ownership of talent management and sound hiring practices begins with top management who builds a culture of “shared accountability” among managers and supervisors. HR plays a role in making sure that managers clearly understand the role they are expected to play. The components of a sound hiring process might look something like this:

A process for defining what you are looking for – typically a position description, job competencies, and questioning strategies.
A plan for the interview process – hiring strategy, sourcing, resume screening, the interview team, and identification of the great reasons to work here.
Attention to the steps in conducting the interview – establishing an appropriate climate, conducting the interview, and responding to challenging interviewee questions.
A process for making the selection – decision- making guidelines, evaluating the candidates, and communicating with candidates.
The goal, through the right kind of training, is to develop a hiring team of managers and leaders that will establish an efficient process that reduces the time it takes to interview and select a qualified candidate. By hiring the right candidates, managers and team leaders will be able to maximize productivity and increase retention by ensuring that those candidates have the talent for the job. Good managers and leaders can ensure cohesion and support for new hires by involving team members in the process.

Small Business Factors has tools for small business that can help you get insights into potential candidates so you can make the right choice the first time.

For a free assessment please contact Joseph Rounds, Director of Member Services at JRounds@smallbusinessfactors.ws