It is time to start firing-up your hiring for 2020. Hiring this year has more variables to be aware of and prepare than 2019 had for employers. Some variables are going to give you new insights and deeper value, others will be new twists on key parts of the process.
The goal of this article is to give you a series of how-to’s for each one so you can get momentum going this year. Then you can leave old worn-out ways of approaching hiring in the past. And overcome new obstacles in your way moving forward.
You will learn the best approach to take to be even more collaborative this year than last. Saving you time, energy, and resources.
You will have efficient ways to identify your best candidate, and an action plan to go with it. You will take any guess-work out of determining the type of person you are thinking about hiring.
You will be more than ready if a recession shows up, with a unique way to out hire your competitors. And you will learn to leverage the power of your culture to find, hire, and keep the amazing people at the heart-beat of your business.
How to Hire using a Collaborative Process
Collaborative hiring has several benefits when done the right way. It takes pressure off of one person being responsible, begins connections in the company early on, and saves you time.
Collaborative hiring involves a series of people and/or teams to interview candidates. This can be across departments as well as with people at different levels in one department.
Some companies will also have many of the potential teammates join the process. This is great because it gives diverse perspectives and insights into the candidate.
Coordinating a collaborative process requires some work up front. First you get a deep understanding of the ideal candidate for the position. Then you identify who on the team or in the company is essential to the process.
Once established, you breakdown the roles and responsibilities of each person. When you define these and find agreement, next you identify when each person will take part according to your timeline.
From here, you develop the best method of communication to keep the process streamlined in real-time. After each of these steps is clear and concise you do one more thing vital to your hiring success – talk to your people.
Talk to your people about who they know that fits your current or potential open position. This is vital because collaborative hiring reaches far beyond the process alone. It reaches and affects every person in your organization.
And having your people aware of who you are looking for at all times creates an amazing amount of leverage. Because it increases the likelihood of finding a strong referral saving you time, energy, and resources long-term.
How to Hire the Best Candidate
Hiring the best candidate you can is essential on both obvious and deep levels. Logic dictates, if they are the best person you can hire, then you must hire them.
To hire anyone, or at least make an offer to hire anyone, less than the best is unethical. Settling for who ever you can find to fill a seat is no way to hire and build.
Identifying the best candidate can be simple or challenging depending on one thing. The one thing is how well you prepare. By preparation I mean how clear you are on what you need from them and the skills required.
Also, in what ways can they show you those skills during the process. To hire the best candidate, you must first understand if they are the best at interviewing or are the best fit.
Because often times people who put their best self forward in the interview, are showing you the best version of themselves for the one and only time. You must sort this out early on and upfront.
Next, give them something to do or a problem or task to solve. Then introduce them to people in the company to find out what insight those employees have about the candidate. Especially employees outside the collaboration process as they will have a detached perspective.
Last, notice how they behave throughout the process. Notice the language they use outside the interviews, the form of communication, and how they handle the process.
Because what a candidate does when they are “on” and when they think they are “off” says a lot about if they are the best candidate or not.
How to Hire for the Best Character
Hiring for character sets the tone for everything that follows if you hire them. The reason why hiring for character is so necessary is because the character is who the person is when no one else is around. Character reveals their integrity, their standards, and the risk versus reward of hiring them.
Character is the foundation of the type of person you are recruiting, interviewing, and possibly hiring. The best character is subjective based on the job you are hiring for.
The way to hire for character is much more simple than it sounds, yet it is not easy if you are not paying attention. Things you want to focus on is their language and tone. A great way to get this information is through situational questions.
These questions may or may not be position related, yet they give you insight into how they carry themselves. A job related question would be a scenario you could have seen happen or made up that gives them a moral/ethical to choose from. Another way is to ask how they exemplify the company core values in their daily life.
Character can be tough to sort out in a short period of time. Yet if you listen to how they respond to tough questions and see how they interact with others, you will have a better chance at seeing them for who they are.
How to Hire in a Competitive Market
Hiring in a competitive job market is no easy task. Yet your perspective on how to approach this situation is key to your success. The reason why is because there are advantages and disadvantages in every market.
If supply is high, and demand is low, there is a challenge finding top talent in a large pool of people. If there is low supply, and high demand, there is a challenge finding top people who are not already working.
So what can you do about the challenges of today’s market where most top talent is at work? Get creative. There have never been more tools to use to reach people than there are right now. With all the social and digital media networks, there are many ways to get your message heard and job opening seen.
Instead of you doing all the work, begin to leverage your efforts in new, fun, and productive ways. First create new types of promotion material using either graphics, video, or pictures.
You can do this by reaching out to people you know who specialize in those fields. (It does not have to be expensive). Then reach out to your department heads asking them to share your new materials with their teams to use.
They can then post them to social media or send them direct to people they know who may be a good match. Giving your people tools to help you find new top talent opens up your network and stretches you beyond just regular job boards.
Additionally, using means like this helps to make your position more mobile friendly by getting seen on the apps. If your website is also mobile optimized, you will come across even more appealing to potential new hires.
How to Hire for Cultural Fit
Peter Drucker has a saying, “culture eats strategy for breakfast”. What this means is companies tend to focus too much on strategy alone, and leave culture to chance. This is understandable because culture takes constant attention and cultivation.
This effort in cultivating culture is why it is so important. Because a great strategy within a culture lacking values and accountability will not get executed.
People want to belong to a culture that has strong values, purpose, and contribution. Where people have a sense of trust and community. Because in a culture such as this they feel safe as well as free to make mistakes on the path to growth.
When you create a culture like this, and a brand that speaks louder than any one person, hiring becomes much more simple. The people who make up the company enroll new candidates and new hires more than any job description or company feature.
So how do you hire for culture? First you make a conscious effort to be crystal clear on the values and mission of the company. Then when you are recruiting and interviewing people, you pay attention to the language and actions of the candidate.
Are they using words and giving examples of behavior aligned with the company culture? If yes, you are speaking with someone who may be a good cultural fit and it is worth moving to next steps. If no, then you have your answer as well, stop there, and save yourself much time and energy.
Without the clear sense of culture and the strength of your brand, hiring for cultural fit is tough.
With clarity of who you are and what you stand for, people will show you very early on if they are a match for your company or not.
So it is worth focusing as much on understanding your culture as it is understanding your hiring strategy.
What to do Next to Fire Up Your Hiring
Firing up your hiring is a big undertaking. Yet it does not have to be carried out like it has been in the past. Make a decision to commit to your hiring process. Then take some time to review, revise, and plan out your new process moving forward.
Identify key areas to change, update, and get creative using the areas mentioned above. It may seem like a lot of work at first, once you get things revamped and customized you will be glad you put in the effort.
Because finding the best people in competitive markets who fit your culture with the best technical skills and trainable character requires you to have the best process in place.
Recruiting, interviewing, hiring, on-boarding, and retaining top talent requires a top tier process and all-in effort. By being the rare few who do what it takes, you put yourself, and your company, in a position to attract the best people out there.
