By Dan Simmons
Quick Tip: Consider the candidates resume and experience, but hire for their track record and behaviors.
You have an urgent need on your team. The process starts. Usually, the hiring manager is responsible for submitting their “request” that includes: Responsibilities, Duties, Education, Experience, and a few Technical Skills or Qualifications. Some companies will also include all the ADA requisite skills and abilities. Generally, the job specs stop there!
I recently attended a seminar where one of the topics was the “The Cost of a Mis-hire.” Most of us consider the more tangible costs — the recruiting fees, relocation costs, and time and effort spent interviewing. However, do you also consider productivity losses, business opportunities or bids lost? Not to mention the potential damage to your company’s reputation as a result of the aforementioned losses? These costs are just as real. So what can you do to help prevent that “mis-hire?”
When putting together the profile for the position in question, take a serious look at what the previous person was doing, as well as what they should have been doing for the future. How many times have you said or heard others say, “Get me another person just like the last one”?
Once you have evaluated what the previous person accomplished and how they did it, have your hiring manager determine short-term and long-term expectations for this position and incorporate the necessary skills and behaviors into the profile. Have them take a hard look at the “interpersonal skills” and “personal characteristics” that this new person should possess that will ensure their success once on board.
You should now be in a better position to target the “right” person for the job.
Other tips:
- Sell The Candidate: Your interview team should be prepared to sell the prospective candidate on why they should come to work for you. However, once you are interviewing, how are you going to determine if the person is, in fact, “right”? Of course, we all know that most of the information contained in the job description will be contained somewhere in the candidate’s resume. I say that with slight “tongue in cheek.” If only it was that easy!
- Study Their Behaviors: Once you are satisfied that the candidate has the requisite education, experience, and technical skills, what else are you looking for? Their behaviors. The question you should ask is what do they do with all of those skills and how do they do it? Said another way, what behaviors do they possess that allow them to consistently accomplish and exceed expectations?
- Define Your Achievement Expectations: To hire the right person, you must know exactly what you need for that person to succeed in this position and the capacity they possess for reaching that desired level of achievement. Likewise, you should know exactly what that person wants to accomplish and the capacity they possess for reaching that level of achievement. Your needs and their wants should be in sync.
The resume is a first step in determining crucial criteria, but ultimately it’s not the most important one. Consider the resume, but when decision time comes, hire for the behaviors.
Daniel C. Simmons is a Certified Personnel Consultant who has been recruiting since 1991. Dan has won over twenty awards in the last decade with the Top Echelon Network, America’s leading placement network including Placer of the Year in 2009 & 2010.
Frequently Dan also is a recruiter trainer and has been featured at various Top Echelon Conventions and online as a speaker for various webinars. He has also been published in The Fordyce Letter the recruiting industry’s #1 magazine.
Is Your Company Looking for Great Candidates? Contact Dan Today!
