Beyond the Hiring Basics: Details You Need to Know
Online recruiting is fast, inexpensive, and can increase your pool of candidates. Recruiting software can help you with this and make the material found on the Web more manageable.
Professional recruiters can save you time. Although they come at a price, if you engage a competent one, your money will be well spent. Specialized firms have active networks of key people in the industries they serve and can get the word out quickly and confidentially to qualified people.They also screen respondents so that only qualified candidates are presented for evaluation.
We considered the use of the “case interview” method—a useful way to measure a candidate’s problem-solving ability. This method subjects a job applicant to a scenario and business problem similar to those encountered on the job. If you use this method, look for how candidates approach the problem, identify alternative solutions, and organize their thinking.
Evaluating job applicants on the basis of embedded life interests is a macro approach to matching people up with jobs at which they will excel. Unless specific technical training is a prerequisite, many companies are better off hiring based on embedded interests than basing candidate choices on skills, which can often be easily taught.
Hiring for cultural fit may be just as important as any other evaluation parameter. Culture defines an organization’s ways of doing things, general values, and the ways in which people relate to one another.You want to avoid trying to fit a square peg into a round hole.
Many companies are using psychological tests to learn more about people in the final candidates’ pool. But exercise caution: Only deal with tests—and testing consultants—that can safely pass muster on the antidiscrimination front.
Broaden the pool of candidates.
Focus on the best sources
Set yourself apart.
Use recruiting software to avoid being drowned in data.
Attract candidates.
Build a recognizable brand by using a recognizable “look” in both recruiting and product ads.
DesignyourWebpagetowoopotentialrecruits:Citework- place awards you’ve received (for example, Fortune’s “100 Best Companies to Work For”) and highlight links to information about your firm’s perks and values.
Encourage employees to e-mail job ads to qualified friends.
Sort applicants
Electronically screen applicants with simple online questions, such as,“Are you willing to relocate?” or “When could you start work?”
Use online tests and games to elicit information about appli- cants’ interests, attitudes, and abilities.
Make contact
Connect a “live” person with a desirable applicant imme- diately.
Get your recruiters to think and act like entrepreneurs.Thus, it may be advisable to take online recruiting out of the hands of old-line HR managers, who may be unused to moving quickly.
Give line managers a larger say in hiring. Decentralization allows candidate-seeking business units to go directly to online job boards to seek their own candidates.
Close the deal
Select a consultant, not just a firm
Be aware of potential conflicts of interest.
Work as a team
application of technology
quantitative analysis
theory development and conceptual thinking
creative production
counseling and mentoring
managing people and relationships
enterprise control
influence through language and ideas
Microculture
Macroculture
It gets as close to real-life situations as possible. It’s a chance to see someone’s mind work with little or no preparation.This allows you to evaluate interviewees who have well-polished answers to conven- tional questions such as “Where do you want to be in five years?”
It helps candidates gain a better understanding of the job. I have had many candidates end a case and say,“I was a little unclear about the job before the interview; this gave me a better sense of what’s involved.”
It tests a variety of skills. Case interviewing can test competen- cies such as strategic thinking, analytical ability, and judgment, along with a variety of communication skills, including active listening, questioning, and dealing with confrontation. Particularly for positions where there is no “right” background or “typical” candidate—that is, no requirement for specific degrees or experience—case interviewing allows you to put everyone on the same footing
an organization’s way of doing things, its general values, the ways in which people relate to one another, and so forth.
cul- tures that characterize different departments or job functions. For example, to the outside world, a particular organization may appear to have a very formal macroculture, with employees in serious- looking business suits and adhering to strict rules of conduct.
the software product-design department, for exam- ple, may be home to shaggy-haired engineers who dress in jeans and sneakers and who routinely play practical jokes on one another.
Specify your hiring needs
Don’t rely on tests alone
More is better (up to a point)
Psychological testing is not for amateurs
Beware of pitfalls