Unfortunately, the main effort to improve hiring—virtually always aimed at making it faster and cheaper—has been to shovel more applicants into the funnel. Employers do that primarily through marketing, trying to get out the word that they are great places to work.
Organizations are much more interested in external talent than in their own employees to fill vacancies. Here are the top channels for quality hires. Much better to go in the other direction: Create a smaller but better-qualified applicant pool to improve the yield. Every application also exposes a company to legal risk, because the company has obligations to candidates not to discriminate, for example just as it does to employees.
More than a generation ago the psychologist John Wanous proposed giving applicants a realistic preview of what the job is like. That still makes sense as a way to head off those who would end up being unhappy in the job.
Marriott has done the same, even for low-level employees. During the dot-com boom Texas Instruments cleverly introduced a preemployment test that allowed applicants to see their scores before they applied. How to determine which candidates to hire—what predicts who will be a good employee—has been rigorously studied at least since World War I. The personnel psychologists who investigated this have learned much about predicting good hires that contemporary organizations have since forgotten, such as that neither college grades nor unstructured sequential interviews hopping from office to office are a good predictor, whereas past performance is.
There is remarkably little consensus even among experts. There is general agreement, however, that testing to see whether individuals have standard skills is about the best we can do. Can the candidate speak French? Can she do simple programming tasks? And so forth. But just doing the tests is not enough. The economists Mitchell Hoffman, Lisa B. Kahn, and Danielle Li found that even when companies conduct such tests, hiring managers often ignore them—and when they do, they get worse hires.
The psychologist Nathan Kuncel and colleagues discovered that even when hiring managers use objective criteria and tests, applying their own weights and judgment to those criteria leads them to pick worse candidates than if they had used a standard formula. What are they doing instead? Seventy-four percent do drug tests, including for marijuana use; even employers in states where recreational use is now legal still seem to do so. Into the testing void has come a new group of entrepreneurs who either are data scientists or have them in tow.
They bring a fresh approach to the hiring process—but often with little understanding of how hiring actually works. John Sumser, of HRExaminer, an online newsletter that focuses on HR technology, estimates that on average, companies get five to seven pitches every day —almost all of them about hiring—from vendors using data science to address HR issues.
These vendors have all sorts of cool-sounding assessments, such as computer games that can be scored to predict who will be a good hire. That aside, these assessments have spawned a counterwave of vendors who help candidates learn how to score well on them.
Lloyds Bank, for example, developed a virtual-reality-based assessment of candidate potential, and JobTestPrep offers to teach potential candidates how to do well on it. Especially for IT and technical jobs, cheating on skills tests and even video interviews where colleagues off camera give help is such a concern that eTeki and other specialized vendors help employers figure out who is cheating in real time. The amount of time employers spend on interviews has almost doubled since , according to research from Glassdoor.
How much of that increase represents delays in setting up those interviews is impossible to tell, but it provides at least a partial explanation for why it takes longer to fill jobs now.
Just winging it and asking whatever comes to mind is next to useless. More important, interviews are where biases most easily show up, because interviewers do usually decide on the fly what to ask of whom and how to interpret the answer.
For example, does the fact that an applicant belonged to a fraternity reflect experience working with others or elitism or bad attitudes toward women? Should it be completely irrelevant? Letting someone with no experience or training make such calls is a recipe for bad hires and, of course, discriminatory behavior. Think hard about whether your interviewing protocols make any sense and resist the urge to bring even more managers into the interview process.
Culture fit is another area into which new vendors are swarming. Learn how to create your own school emergency preparedness kit here. Find out to maximize your Black Friday shopping experience this year!
See how office managers are addressing employee concerns about sanitation and what you can do to create a safer workplace today. By using this website, you are consenting to our use of cookies in accordance with our Cookie Policy.
Engaged with Your Vision Not every new hire has to be ecstatic about your product or service, but they should be passionate about the way you do business. Eager to Learn The ability to learn new things is essential in a small business employee. Willing to Take Responsibility All employees have to pull their own weight and then some in a small company. Easy to Like Working in a small company means employees can't avoid each other. Ambitious Ambitious employees are assets to any team, as they're always willing to take on new tasks and projects.
Skilled at Multi-Tasking Employees need to be able to wear many different hats and perform a variety of tasks in order to succeed in the fast-paced, often challenging small business world. Not Exactly Like You Have you already experienced a close call with a business disaster because you missed something important? Happy to Be Noticed People who prefer to be a number on a time card aren't the best employees to hire for a small company.
Hot Hiring Tips Once you think you've found the perfect employee based on the qualities above, you have to work through the rest of the hiring process. Follow these tips before officially extending an offer of employment: Always Check References: The interview went well — so well that you're ready to hire the candidate on the spot.
Make sure to call his references and get confirmation that he's just as great as he seems and that his r? The extra effort could save you from having to rehire for the position in a few months when you learn that he twists the truth on the job as well as on his resume. Take the Job Candidate for a Test Drive: Once you're ready to hire, consider starting with a short-term contract. This will give you the opportunity to evaluate the person's level of commitment, attitude, work ethic and overall fit in your company.
There's no way to truly know if a candidate will be a match until she's on the job. Listen to Your Gut He's experienced, wrote a lovely cover letter and answered every question competently in the interview. He seems like the perfect candidate, but for some reason, you hesitate to hire him.
Take pride in your work and others will take notice. Ways to demonstrate work ethic: 1. Put away distractions 2. Ask for help to identify areas for improvement 3. Spend your time wisely on tasks that align with goals 4. Organize your notes, inbox and workspaces for increased focus, motivation and time management 5. Take breaks throughout the day to avoid burnout 6.
Identify motivators such as tasks, goals or colleagues 7. Practice time management to complete quality, on-time work and be more present in meetings. Persistence is an important work trait, and employers often ask a question to gauge the determination of applicants in an interview. Be equipped with a story that shows how you overcame a challenge and highlight the tenacity that it took for you to accomplish your goal.
Employers are looking for more than brainless drones to do their bidding. They want people on their team that can pinpoint a need and address it, so be sure to recount instances when you recognized an issue and developed an effective solution.
Positive people create healthy work environments and are often valuable members of a team. A positive attitude usually signifies resilience, and an ability to overcome setbacks.
Find new ways to truly understand how a person thinks. Be challenging. Put the candidate in situations where they are more likely to show their true selves. Allow your employees to help. You are not the only person who is going to have to work with this candidate. There is likely already a team of employees you trust that will have to interact with him or her every day. Their opinion should matter. Do they treat people as equals, regardless of their title?
Take Them On a Tour Stay in the building and show the candidates around your company, and maybe introduce them to some colleagues. Things to pay attention to: Are they asking questions about what everybody does and how things work? Are they curious? Do they treat everyone they meet with respect, and show interest in what they do? Share A Meal Take a candidate out for lunch or dinner.
Things to pay attention to: Are they polite to everyone who is serving them? Do they look people in the eye a sign of respect? Are they irritated or flustered by problems? Can they keep a conversation going, with smart questions? Do they barrel through the restaurant, or let others go first?
Throw Some Curveballs Unusual questions will get candidates to open up and provide insights into what makes them tick. January 9, How to write a cover letter people will actually read October 21, Get the latest industry updates, delivered daily. Your email address Sign up now. Get a Second — and Third — Opinion Talking to other people about a candidate can help you confirm your perceptions or prove you wrong.
Make Them Run the Gantlet To get different perspectives on candidates, ask a number of your colleagues to meet with them. Go Beyond References It may take some effort, but with a little bit of internet sleuthing, you can probably find a couple of people you know, or whom your colleagues know, who have worked with the candidate. Push for Diversity Hiring an innovative team starts with finding people who think differently. Things to consider: Is your job description limiting you?
A simple web-tool, textio, can help analyze the language you use in job descriptions to help attract the best candidates.
0コメント