Most employers and supervisors have never been taught to interview and this can lead to ineffective interviews and employee selection. Recruitment is a costly exercise - both financially, with recruitment fees, but there are also the unseen costs of time spent reviewing CVs, conducting interviews, rejecting candidates, co-ordinating interviews and liaising with the recruitment agency. That said, your people are often not only the most important factor influencing your business success but also the most expensive; so it is critical to get it right.
Five things you must do with your recruitment strategy to ensure that your employees feel like they matter to you and your business:
1. Process – know the process that your organisation will follow and use it consistently across the organisation. This ensures effective due diligence but also the protection of your brand. A major ‘bug bear’ of mine is the number of organisations that don’t send rejection emails. The candidate has taken the time to apply so it is only courteous to respond. How do you think the candidate will speak about your business if they are ignored through the recruitment process?
2. Documentation – ensure that you have a job description which talks about the role and a job specification which talks about the skills of the individual required to complete the job. You need to complete interview notes and hold these on file for five years and be able to justify your decisions. The decision needs to be based on skills & fit rather than sex, sexual persuasion or religion.
3. Advertise – Seek is still probably the most effective way to attract candidates. Ensure that your ad sells the role and has no typos or grammatical errors. Remember it is a tight applicant market and you are attempting the win the war for talent. Make sure that you are paying a market-relevant salary and don’t ignore a non-traditional hire such as part-time permanent or work from home employees.
4. Interview questions - ask each candidate the same, set questions otherwise it is will be difficult to compare candidates and, more importantly, to justify your decision if you are called on to do so. Ask a combination of technical questions but also behavioural ones such as ‘tell me about a time when you had more work than you could manager, what happened?’ This type of question allows you to explore what applicants have done in the past and it is very likely that they will react this way again, if faced with the same situation. Use probing questions to get the level of detail that you require; avoid the temptation to skim.
5. Sell the role – tell the applicants about the role- what is the role? What are your expectations for the role? What might the future hold for the successful applicant? What are some of the challenges? What would success look like? What are the plans for the business over the next 12 months to three years? Let them ask questions and answer honestly. Don’t embellish but give a realistic overview. Remember you are competing with other businesses for the best candidates. You want them to pick you, if they have a choice, and in the current market it is more than likely that they will have.
So you have completed all of your interviews and it is decision time; remember that you are ideally looking for a candidate with 60-70% of the experience and skills to do the job. This way they can experience growth and development and will not leave quickly due to boredom or not wanting to wait for the next opportunity or promotion. Ensure that you send appropriately worded rejection emails to the unsuccessful candidates as you might want to look to hire them in the future as you grow.
Remember, getting the best people for your business is essential to your business success, ensure that you get this process right first time and reap the rewards. It really does matter!
By: Natasha Hawker
