Hiring is not at the top of everyone’s mind in 2020.  When you do hire, you want to make sure you are hiring the right person that will be able to hit the ground running and add value right away.  Before you engage in any hiring activity, consider this.

Not every candidate you see will be the right hire for you, and you are likely to have to go through many more CV’s before you find the right person.  Everyone is going to put their best foot forward, and it’s going to be a bigger job to find the Jewell in among the crowds.

No doubt in the current climate, the right person is more likely to be there, but there are some things you want to know so you can spot them faster.

Your Gut Feeling was never enough.

A poor hire is going to have a huge impact on your bottom line and never before has there been a bigger reason to get it right.  People can show their best side in an interview and its not until you bring them into your business that they have the impact you don’t want to see.  You can not afford to give it a go right now.

The problem with winging it

Many Recruitment Agencies will continue to send you people that don’t work out, regardless of how nice they are.  They spend maybe an hour with your candidate and then pass them off based sometimes, on keyword research.  

But failing to really analyse your needs results too often in a poor hire who doesn’t fit the team, isn’t quite as shiny as they appeared to be at the interview and needs massive time and energy from you to get up to speed.

Clients tell me this results in massive losses in wasted salary, productivity and added stress to them and their team.  Having said that, many Agencies will take the time to ensure the right people are in front of you.  But how will you know if you don’t do your own due diligence?

You don’t always get to see what lurks beneath.  Human nature can be held out for around 3 months, and then true colours can’t help but come out.  With respect, this can be a good thing, because you can actually hire someone great and suddenly see their potential unfolding, but you and I know this doesn’t always happen.

Prepare for the Outcome you want

Knowing what behaviours you need for success and more importantly, what behaviours you don’t want to see is key to hiring the best candidate.  People are so often hired on the skill and leave because of poor behaviour fit, lack of clarity around the job expectations or a  clash of values.

Knowing what you want is key to being able to assess fit accurately.  Interviews are for one hour, and we can all be on our best behaviour in one hour.

I’m not saying you had rose coloured glasses on during the interview, but some people are very good at showing you what they want you to see.  And humans being human, we do have a natural tendency towards bias, and often we don’t consider if someone fits our values till way after they prove they don’t.

Hiring the wrong person doesn’t just have an impact on you and your business.  I can also be soul-crushing for the person that gets hired.  There is no disappointment more than not being able to do a good job because you don’t fit or are not skilled enough.

The bad news is, you are stuck with this guy till you can (expensively) manage him out.  The good news is, there are straightforward ways you can make sure that never happens again.

Steps to Hiring Well

  1. Develop an unambiguous Job Description that will inform the kind of advertising you do.
  2. Make sure you are crystal clear on the accountabilities and relationships the role is responsible for.
  3. Take an analysis of the behaviours that work best with your team and your customers.  Analyse the candidate against those behaviours and rank in order of importance.
  4. Ask the right behaviour based as well as competency questions at the interview and be prepared to challenge and dig deeper regardless of what you see in front of you.
  5. Ask searching questions during the interview and at the reference checking stage.  Casual conversations serve no one.

Even if you have been hiring for a long time, you can always nail the process for more focused outcomes.  Never hire at a coffee meeting.  It is a recipe for disaster and a cost to your business.