Recruiting - Getting it Right

With a tight employment market it is easy to forget the importance of placing the right person into the job. The fallout from poor recruiting can be horrendous both financially and emotionally.

Like most business requirements a good process saves the day.  With recruiting it is first about getting you clear on the type of team member you want and the expectations you have of them going forward. Most managers are rarely clear on these two points at the beginning of the recruiting process.

Recruiting well poses two challenges:-

• Developing the selection criteria
• Working out ways to test them at an interview.

The table below is a simple example of how to record your criteria and how to measure a candidates performance against each factor.

The weighting is critical. In the example below you see that ability to handle pressure is twice as important as supervisory experience.  Once you have recorded the rest of your criteria you can weight each in accordance with its importance relative to each of the other factors. The weighting should add up to 100.

Now you can score the candidate using each weighting as the maximum score achievable for that criteria.

Don’t forget to record comments to assist your memory when comparing notes with the rest of the interview panel.

Keep in mind that if one applicant scores say 80 points and another 78 it doesn't mean one is better than the other. The scoring is a guide to selection not a definitive answer.

Decision Making: What have been some of the biggest business decisions you have made in the last few years? 

Problem Solving: Tell us about a time when you had to solve a difficult problem.

Leadership: What has been the most obstructive group you have had to get cooperation from? 

Tolerating Ambiguity: When has ambiguity been an obstacle in your work? What was ambiguous and how long did it stay so?

Motivation: Describe a situation when you had a positive influence on the attitudes and behaviours of others. 

Interpersonal Skills: Have you ever been challenged to get others to understand and accept your ideas? How did you do this?

Planning And Organising: Have you been in a situation where you knew there were more tasks than you had time to perform and every day was a challenge just in coping with workloads? 

Decision Making: Give me an example of a time when you had to be quick in coming to decisions.

Team Work: When have you worked on a busy team and you were somehow expected to perform tasks that might have been considered below you? 

Presentation Skills: Describe the most creative presentation you have ever given. What did you do?

Goal Setting: What have been the biggest goals you have set and achieved in recent years? How did you do this? 

Difficult People: Tell me about a time when you were able to adapt to, and deal with, an arrogant and dogmatic person. What happened?

Creativity: Give me an example of a time when you were inventive and offered fresh insights about a situation. What was the situation? 

Sample Interview Questions

1. Why did you decide to apply for this position
2. What aspects of the job appeal to you?
3. What strengths will you bring to the position
4. What has been the most difficult situation you have ever had to deal with
5. Which of your previous jobs have you enjoyed the most? Why?
6. What area of experience or skill will you need to develop if you get the job?
7. Where do you want to be in five years time?
8. What type of person do you find the most challenging to work with?
9. How do you go about organising your day?
10. What are your hobbies and interests?
11. What are some of your techniques for handling personal stress?
12. What self development activities have you undertaken?
13. What support would you require from the Directors?
14. Who has been your best boss ever? Why?
15. Which company do you consider is the most progressive? Why?
16. Have you any questions?

Conducting the interview

You are going to learn far more about me by asking about my actual experience. If I relax enough to chat honestly about situations similar to your work environment, you will be able to use the past behaviours I tell you about to predict my behaviours in your working environment.

In short, my previous behaviour is your best indicator of my future behaviour.

To elicit my narration of these previous situations, you will first need to describe the situation for me so I can remember something similar in my experience. 

For example, if you want to predict how I will behave with your difficult clients, ask me about my previous experience with clients by including some descriptions to match your current situation.

I might not realize you are talking about your clients, but I will be remembering my actual experience rather than imagining what I might do in some hypothetical situation. 

Your question might have several sections and sound something like, ‘Tell me about a situation when you previously dealt with clients who were hard to satisfy?’

When I describe a situation that closely matches your current client, you may add the second part to your question as, ‘What actions did you take to deal with that situation?’ 

After I have described my previous actions, you may be interested in the outcomes. You can ask another very simple question, ‘What did that achieve?’

Your questions have had three parts relating to the:

1. Situation
2. Actions
3. Outcomes 

This three-part (S-A-O) formula may also be extended to discover what I learned from my previous experience and if I have been improving the outcomes I achieve.

You might ask me, ‘If you were in the same situation again, what would you do differently to improve your outcomes?’ 

My answer to your fourth question will tell you if I'm learning and improving or just habitually repeating behaviours.

I might also blame my outcomes on others and claim there is no scope for improvement. This sort of answer will help you predict if I will take initiatives or not on the job.

 As you can see the recruiting process has a rigour that needs to have your full attention if you are to recruit successfully.  Where skill and time prohibits such attention you might need to consider using a professional recruiting agency. The investment is well justified when compared to the potential cost of getting it wrong. (Check with us regarding a trusted alliance in this area)

If you require more information to do with people management and people development  click here to contact the Partnercorp Business Consulting Team. Or fill out our online enquiry form and our Business Consultant will get back to you.