The average cost per hire for new employees is around $4,000. This isn’t immediately apparent because most of that cost is hidden in training, supplies, and etc. Finding the ideal employee is going to save you a lot of time and money.
To hire the right employee, you’ll need to prepare, analyze, and follow-through with the goals of the company. Staffing company Polite Promotions advises that you won’t know whether you have the right candidate until they are hired. Keep that in mind when sorting through your prospects.
The interview process needs to have all the right questions, tests, and people involved. This guide can help you focus on key elements and hiring techniques to get the best results. Here are seven proven ways to improve your hiring process.
1. Preparation Starts Early
Before the background checks start, before the applications are handed in, you need to build your team. You need to prepare who will handle what and for how long. You’re managing them, but ultimately you need to trust your team.
Avoid taking part in any of those hiring events or group interviews. You want to have control over your environment during the hiring process. Using a recruiter, your own hiring manager, and top-level employees are ideal.
2. Finding That Commitment
This is a trait that is the most difficult to find in new hires. People will tell you how much they love your company until they’re blue in the face. Once they’re hired, all that bravado could go out the window.
One way to filter out the least committed candidates is by work history. Look at applicants that stayed at least 2-3 years with each company. Candidates who are coming from a place they stayed in for 10 years+ aren’t automatically considered.
Commitment and loyalty are tricky emotions. Someone who has a long work history of jobs in the 3-5 year range is committed. People leave and get laid off for various reasons.
Someone who has a work history of one job of 10 years and a couple of smaller ones for 1-2 years tells a different story. They may not have ambition, they may only care about the paycheck, or they might have become cynical.
3. Test and Analyze Skills
Ideally, you want to have all your applicants take a test either provided by your in-house assessments or outside apps. If they are coming in with a LinkedIn resume filled with certifications, that’s a bonus. Move these pre-qualified applicants through quickly to the next stage.
Remember, the weight of qualifications and skills should not form a bias. Other applicants may look less qualified on paper, but have that “it” factor. You want someone skilled and has the killer instinct.
4. Personalize the Interview
How do you weed out multiple candidates with nearly identical resumes? Asking personalized questions. By adjusting your interview based on the personality of the applicant, you’re challenging them.
Remember, most applicants know which questions to expect. Administer your personality testing for employees to get a feel for their strengths and weaknesses. Then, hit them with questions that aren’t on every application.
This is one of the biggest missed opportunities for employers. They set up a formula to filter out personality test results and leave it there. If you follow up with those results, you’re going to find higher quality applicants.
5. Refine Your Job Ads
Job ads are so by the book these days, it’s no wonder so little has changed in the hiring process. You’ll keep catching bad fish and releasing them if your bait is bland and unremarkable. Quantity of applicants is important, but not more important than the quality.
To improve your quality of applicants, stay away from stating the obvious. Your job ad should only contain the minimum of position role details. Instead, dip into more psychological questions posed before applying.
Create a benchmark question that applicants must respond to when sending in their resume. This will weed out bots and mass-replying applicants. A simple quiz on a work-related scenario will do.
Clearly state job qualifications and requirements, but don’t labor over “skill levels” because these aren’t useful qualifiers. Most people think highly of themselves, so of course, they’re going to reply as an “advanced” user.
6. Consider Interns/Contract-to-hires
While you may need to hire some dedicated full-time employees, don’t neglect short-term investments. Temporary workers and interns are better than part-time hires. People who are hired as part-time will actively seek other work no matter what.
Temp workers often expect a quick turnaround with their employment. Either they get hired on full-time or they don’t. This means that they are willing to work more flexible hours in hopes of moving up fast.
As an employer, this is a win-win. You discover great employees with low risk and make decisions much faster and intuitively. Objectively, these interns are the hardest workforce in the pool of applicants.
7. Screen with Social Media
You should both screen current applicants and look for new prospects via social media. You don’t need to spend a lot of resources focusing on social media applicants, either. By focusing on niche keywords, job-related hashtags, holding open discussions, and following profile links, you can learn a lot.
Hire the Right Employee Today
In order to hire the right employee in a short span of time, you need to prepare. Outsourcing your entire hiring process isn’t doing you any favors. Give your hiring managers the blueprint by using these tips.
Start by protecting yourself with background and credit checks. Personalize your interview process to find committed candidates. You’ll minimize your losses if you follow these steps.
Become an expert at managing your business with more guides like these at Mena Entrepreneur. They have an entire section dedicated to running a business, big or small. Read more professional tips here.
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