hire the right person Archives

Let’s get back to basics about what we are really looking for in a career or even a job. We are looking for a way of making a living that matches your skills, strengths and weaknesses with the other people you work with and the responsibilities you have to fulfill.

To make this work you have to understand what you offer. You have to have a clear idea what is needed. You have to have a good way to make a match.

Maybe you want to take it further. You want to learn and grow. You want more responsibility. You want constructive feedback so you can grow. You want a lifelong journey.

Eleanor Roosevelt once said, “The purpose of life is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for a newer and richer experience.” THAT is a lifelong journey, isn’t it?

Finding a job or finding the right candidate is a journey. The purpose of the job search is to find the candidate that has the life experiences and mindset to be on the journey with the company, to take the company to the next experience to achieve goals.

It is about matching needs, experiences and life’s journey with a person who will add value to the organization because they fit.

Here are some questions for companies and candidates interested in making a great match:

Understand what you want. What is the job that needs to be done? What kind of job will use your skills in a way that will make you successful?
Make a list of knowledge, skills and abilities required to do the job very well. What kind of experiences should the right candidate have had to demonstrate that they can do the job that needs to be done? What kind of experience do you have that demonstrates you can do the job? What kind of people do you want to work with? What kind of person will enhance the team and get the job done?
Evaluate whether this person or company will be a good match for the job that needs to be done and the skills you bring. Did the meeting make you feel optimistic and hopeful? Can you see how the person will fit with the team? Can you answer yes to the 3 main questions any company asks: Can she do the job? Will she love the job? Will she get along with the team?

Making a good match is about more than hiring the person you want to have a beer with or taking the first job that is offered. Making a good match ensures that this next candidate hired or next job accepted will last a little longer than a year or two because you fit together well.

As we say in my house, I am searching for my kind of crazy! I won’t stop until I find it. Neither should you.

Why doesn’t good recruiting begin with the end in mind like Stephen Covey advises in his foundational work, “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People“?

It sure would save a lot of time.

I speak often about how hiring managers and candidates have the same goal – to make a great match. It doesn’t happen because one or another party does not begin with the end in mind. Hiring managers complain that they receive many unqualified resumes in response to advertisements for open positions. Of course you do. Your advertisements are too generic. Why do you advertise in that way anyway?

Candidates complain they do not get a response even when they meet most of the requirements. But does the candidate meet the right requirements?

The generic nature of the advertisement forces candidates to guess. At least some, maybe most candidates who respond will guess wrong so their responses will be tossed. The hiring manager has to sort through all the responses to find the few that match the real, perhaps unstated requirements.

What a waste of time! There must be a better way.

If both hiring managers and candidates want the same thing then why is it so hard to make great match? Because at least one of the parties is not being clear enough about what they want. I don’t mean purple squirrels, the elusive candidate that perfectly matches a long list of multi-faceted requirements. We don’t have to go that far.

What if the hiring manager took a bit more time to describe exactly what they want? What if the hiring manager had a clear vision in their head of the criteria necessary to be successful in the job? I call these “critical success factors”. Then qualified candidates would respond and unqualified candidates might just sit that one out.

Let me give you an example. The other day I was working on a resume for Jane, a talented benefits manager. Jane is a well-known Affordable Care Act specialist, knowledge that should be in demand in corporate America these days.

Coincidently a large company in the community was seeking a benefits manager. The advertisement was almost an exact copy of a generic Benefits Manager job description found on the Internet. It was hard to tell which of the dozen requirements listed were most important. We had to guess.

We structured the resume around the Benefits Manager job posting, highlighting Jane’s ACA experience in the hope that if the hiring manager wants a benefits manager who is an expert in Affordable Care Act then Jane is their candidate. Let’s hope we are right.

Why not be specific about the company’s needs? The right candidates can respond. Hiring managers can more easily compare candidates to the specific list of needs. Everyone wins. But until one or more of the parties to the hiring game are more specific from the outset, it will continue to be difficult to make a good match.

In the meantime, I advise candidates to structure their resumes and LinkedIn profile around their ideal job. In this way they can include keywords and phrases that hiring managers might use to describe the job the candidate wants. The candidate will look like a great fit because the candidate IS a great fit… if we guessed right.

Making a Great Career or Job Match

Let’s get back to basics about what we are really looking for in a career or even a job. We are looking for a way of making a living that matches your skills, strengths and weaknesses with the other people you work with and the responsibilities you have to fulfill.

Here are some questions for companies and candidates interested in making a great match:

As we say in my house, I am searching for my kind of crazy! I won’t stop until I find it. Neither should you.

Good recruiting begins with the specific end in mind

Why doesn’t good recruiting begin with the end in mind like Stephen Covey advises in his foundational work, “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People“?