For the first time in my career the other day, I was called a grumpy old man. I laughed, as I have never seen my self as a grumpy person. Rarely do you see me without a smile on my face.
Let’s talk about hiring for a minute. It is hard isn’t it? Finding the right culture fit. Finding the right match for your team. As a manager, hiring the right person reflects upon your image as a leader. Right???
I guess so.
You know I wish we could predict the future. I wish we knew how someone would do in a certain role. We try to control the uncontrollable. The funny thing about recruiting is that we are dealing with PEOPLE. People, my friends, are as unpredictable as the weather.
As someone who has been in recruiting and sales for 20 years I can tell you that people that I thought would be the best hire ever turned out to be the worst. I can also tell you someone I thought would be an awful hire turned out to outperform the rest.
How can we identify who is going to be successful? Sure, you can use predictive analytics. You can run multiple personality tests. In the end though, “people are going to do what they are going to do”.
You know, I am going to get slapped for saying this, but I wish people would stop trying to kill themselves to find the “perfect” hire. Ladies and Gentlemen, it doesn’t exist! If you look at someone hard enough, you are going to find SOMETHING WRONG with EVERYONE!!!
Hiring is nothing more than an educated guess. A hunch. A gut feeling. If you make a bad hire, you made a bad hire. SO WHAT! Do your due diligence and rather than over evaluating something, pull the trigger. Hire the person! The amount of time and lost productivity you are looking for the “perfect” candidate will eventually drive you crazy.
I would rather be aggressive, and make a well thought out decision any day of the week than no decision at all. I think the “no decisions” are the worst decisions of them all. Go ahead and go ahead with the hire. If it doesn’t work out, it wasn’t meant to be. People over analyze everything and I think it is ridiculous.
Call me grumpy or jaded or whatever you want. I have seen it all too often though.
What are your thoughts?
Have you been drug through a process only to have someone not make a decision at all? Pretty frustrating isn’t it? So I am going to ask you again. Why are you freaking out over a bad hire?
Will, your mouth to the hiring manager’s ear. I have been dragged through a few interview processes that went on for over many months.
The first was a few years ago and was an organization that is considered an employer-of- choice and is a very well-known company on the West Coast. After eight interviews the hiring manager could not make a decision (the cost of relocation would have been involved and I believe that was one of the stumbling blocks for her), so she chose to pass on me. When the recruiter called to tell me, she was skirting around the reason for her call by making a lot of small talk. She never really told me why, just that the decision was made. She said they were impressed with me and they felt I knew my stuff, but that’s all she knew. Oh and by the way, I was an employee referral.
The second time was last year. Another well-known organization on the West Coast contacted me and was “very excited” to speak with me. Once again, I had multiple interviews (5) via phone and HireVue. I was told upfront the hiring manager wanted to see many candidates which was fine with me if that was their process. During the three months of interview process, the recruiter and hiring manager would send me updates every week to week-and-a-half to reassure me that I was the top contender for the position. (I also sent them emails during the process to reassure them that I was very interested in the position and appreciated their continuing interest in me.) One day at about the three month mark, I received an email from the recruiter which was obviously very canned and impersonal that read they were moving in a different direction and thanked me for my interest in the position. I was, frankly, shocked. They were so up on me and very engaged, so the impersonal email took me aback. Not that hearing “no thank you” would have been pleasant under any communication mode, but after all the investment time and effort, I did expect a more professional outreach from them. And by the way, this was also an employee referral.
Job searching is surely a confusing endeavor.
Hi Cyndy,
Thank you for responding. I think companies are so consumed with getting “buy in” from everyone, they don’t think about who it is affecting (including the company). A “No hire” scenario benefits on one. It certainly does not help with the companies reputation and it costs serious time and money for the organization. I am hearing these scenarios all too often now. I am sorry this happened to you. Hopefully this post brings awareness to recruiting and HR professionals and helps them re-think their own practices. We can help give guidance to managers and help prevent events like this happening.
Will
Agreed Will. Any advice on the candidate experience should be taken seriously. Often times companies don’t realize the damage a poor experience has on the organization’s employer brand.