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A Simple Guide for Smart Hiring
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HIRING HELP: Effective Tips and Tricks In past issues of The Examiner, you have received advice from various experts on the subject of hiring. Now it is time to hear from your peers! Brainbench clients share their favorite tips and tricks to aid in finding the perfect fit for your job opening. They share methods that have helped them find good candidates, reduce hiring time, interview effectively, and save money during the hiring process. Start incorporating these suggestions into your next search for the perfect candidate. What works for them could work for you! Plan and Prepare
Plan your recruitment effort the way you would any other major project. Before you begin, clarify roles and responsibilities, identify needed resources, articulate desired outcomes and success factors, and determine acceptable timeframes. Be prepared to develop tailored recruitment strategies in order to target your specific audiences. How you reach and attract one segment of the job market may not apply to another. Think about where your ideal candidates are located (academic and professional organizations, industry conferences) and target those sources. Don't be afraid to try new approaches, but continuously evaluate their effectiveness. Anita Pinder What Motivates Your Candidate?
With the number of testing centers, brain dumps, and exam crams available, certifications do not by themselves indicate to me a good employee. Since hiring a poor employee requires as much effort as hiring a good one, I think it is important to know why a potential employee chose the path they are on. I try to place these questions towards the end of an interview, at a point in which much of the candidate's nervousness may have passed. I look for frank and open discourse as to why they chose to pursue a career in the area I am interviewing. For example, if they are applying for an IT position, I ask them how long they have been using computers and what was their first experience with IT. Then I ask them if they read any trade magazines or books. I find those that are the best candidates for IT positions seek out knowledge on their own. An old employer once told me that he found his best employees while spending time in bookstores. Alfred Goldberg Push the Limits
Don't limit your job posting to only one or two sources.Instead, adopt a shotgun approach to sourcing your candidates.Start with your staffing and executive search firms, post your job ad on your internal website, select job boards, local newspaper, employee referrals, internal postings, etc. You never know where that next great employee will see your ad! Michael Bovaird On Your Mark
Do some benchmarking — look at the productivity of the current strong staff and use it as a measure to select future staff. For example in hiring a Programmer/Analyst you could have one of the team's current top performers take a skills test to set a benchmark. Paula Kyte Know Your ABC's
Too often, the hiring manager is not an A level talent. B and C level talent are considered "average" to "below average" performers. B's and C's tend to hire on the level of comfortthey have with a candidate rather than on the candidate's capabilities. This generates another B or C level hire. Having the best talent (in the right roles at the right time) is the key to beating the competition - so executives should spend the time necessary to make sure the right people are involved in the selection process in order to give them the opportunity to hire the best talent. David Cochran Let's Do Lunch
Would you like to have lunch with this person? If you feel like you could have an interesting casual conversation with someone, you are more likely to be able to work well with them on a day to day basis. Laura Livesay Time's a Wasting
Without question, the market has shifted over the last 6-12 months to a candidate-driven market meaning, there are a lot more jobs today than there are qualified candidates to fill them.The candidates I work with today are on the market for a considerably shorter amount of time than they were even 6 months ago.As a recruiter, one of the biggest struggles I face is helping my clients make interviewing a priority, when they are juggling all the responsibilities of their day-to-day role.But now, more than anytime in the last 5 years, time is of the essence.If you see a candidate that you want to interview, schedule it AS SOON AS POSSIBLE, because with even one or two extra days delay, the candidate could very easily be hired away by your competition. Rebecca Guise Assess the Situation
Today the amount of obvious talent is rapidly shrinking. It is getting harder to find good quality candidates by just resumes alone. It is becoming imperative that there be other measuring tools available to match candidates with your open positions. This is why we at Executek Search Corp. employ the use of Behavioral Profiling and Skill Assessment Tests such as those offered by Brainbench. These types of assessments have proven to be extremely valuable in separating the Super Stars from just the Good candidates. The retention rate of employees that are hired after being measured by one or more assessments than simply by reviewing a resume is, according to our research, significantly higher. That in itself saves thousands of dollars by not having to hire someone new for the position you just filled because the person you just filled it with decided they didn't like it after 2 months. If for nothing else, these assessments can be used to create some very important and probing interview questions that could prove to be vary valuable. Ken Schroeder Be Descriptive
It is vital that there be a comprehensive job description that includes duties and responsibilities, soft and hard skills, experience, required education and certifications. Unless this is clear the whole process of hiring will definitely be clouded. Sarita Pusapati Meet and Greet
I've found it to be very advantageous for the company to make sure the candidate meets one of the company's more charismatic employees; one who is sort of the company cheer leader. The person needs to be someone that authentically loves working for the company. This helps the candidate feel sense of excitement in joining the team. Mario De Carolis Recruit "Content" Candidates
We find that the best candidates are generally not in a job search mode. They are typically content and thriving in their current roles, well-respected by both their employers and peers, and in most cases are on a fast track to ever-increasing responsibility within their respective organizations. These are the people we recruit for our clients; and in turn, the perceived value of our service is much higher than that of our competitors who are often simply pulling candidates off the major job boards. By developing a database of only Super Star candidates who were not on the market; we find that our fall out ratios are much lower than average; and that there is practically never a problem with the initial employment, reference or background checking process. Marsha McKim Provide Printed Information
This serves two purposes. If literature is available early in the process, it serves to better educate the candidate, allowing interviews to be more focused. Secondly, it is a sales tool, not only to the candidate, but for the candidate to use to educate their decision influencers (i.e. - spouse, family, etc.). Don Kellner Stay Structured and Impartial
Do not make your "first impression" until 30 minutes into the interview. Studies have shown that interviewing skills are not related to job performance. Sometimes the best performers are the most nervous. This is especially true of sales people & others who normally try to control a meeting. If you make an early first impression, you are likely to then try to support your impression in further conversation. Asking the same question of every candidate, helps you make a more impartial judgment. Gary Kravetz Do you have a hiring tip/trick to share? Submit your ideas to Melanie@brainbench.com. If we use your suggestion, you will receive 250 test credits! |
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