5 Steps to Recruiting and Retaining the Best
There are strong signs that while we may still be in for some interruptive fits and starts, on the whole, the economy is getting better. As a result of this long awaited business up tick, you may be experiencing the kind of productivity and delivery pressures that have you thinking about adding some new talent to your organization.
If that’s the case, and you haven’t been in a hiring mode for awhile, you may be surprised at the market conditions that make star quality talent in extremely short supply these days. One key factor is the 77 million baby boomers closing in on retirement. In addition, the changeover to a knowledge economy means that occupations requiring post-secondary training or college degrees will increase to 42 per cent by 2010 according to Bureau of Labor statistics. By 2030 the Bureau estimates that number will be closer to 65 per cent. Currently, only 38 per cent of the American labor force has a two-year college degree or higher.
In addition, if you’re like many businesses, it’s been so long since you’ve faced an employee-driven job market that the strategies and programs necessary to recruit and retain star quality talent may be sorely lacking in your company’s operating environment. So you ask, what’s an employer in need of an infusion of star quality talent to do? For starters, kill the idea of being in a hurry. Take the time you need. These kinds of decisions are too important to rush into haphazardly. And they’re too costly and painful to fix if your candidate fails.
Don’t jump to interviewing candidates. Start the process by reaching an agreement with your management team on exactly what this new star will be responsible for accomplishing--not just today and tomorrow but down the road a ways. With that decision in place you can begin your Star Search.
Here are five steps that any company can take to help separate the star or potential star from the ranks of average, "just do what’s necessary" kinds of candidates.
1. Define Star Qualities
Don’t confuse skill and knowledge with talent. Skill and knowledge are both somewhat easily transferred; talent is not. Star employees are innately talented and the job, their boss, or the organization isn’t going to change that fact one way or the other. They tend to be loaded with integrity, they are self-aware, and their values are stable and consistent. While they are inquisitive, open, flexible and intelligent they are also self-motivated, disciplined, thoughtful and considerate.
The truly talented aren’t hard to spot. In fact, when we miss them it’s usually because we’ve got a particular notion of what kind of peg will fit into what kind of hole. Star employees will wow you because of who they are as well as what they’ve done. That is, assuming you are looking for star qualities and not just at the everyday skill and knowledge a candidate brings to the table.
2. Profile the "Right" Star
Not all star performers are going to be right for your organization or the position you’re trying to fill. That’s why you need a clearly defined profile of what "star employee" means in your workplace, marketplace and management culture. Keep in mind that while results are important, so is the way results are attained. Bullies and intimidators can get results. But the star employee engages customers and fellow workers alike in achieving superior results.
It’s also important to build the star employee profile based on the competencies and performances of top and bottom tier performers within the organization.
Interview both in order to fully understand how they approach and accomplish their individual responsibilities--similarly, and differently. Draw comparisons and clearly identify the traits of the high performers. Then interview your management team to determine their views concerning these high performer traits. Get your team to work with you to project which of these traits and qualities will be most important in meeting future business objectives. A real star employee will be one both today and tomorrow. So don’t create the star profile in a vacuum. Keep your management team and other star employees involved in profile development at every step along the way.
3. Ask the Right Questions
In conducting candidate interviews, use a combination of highly structured interview techniques and fact gathering questions where every candidate is asked a similar set of questions. Responses should be evaluated according to a hard edged, singular rating scale.
Portions of the interview should be behaviorally anchored in that they need to explore how an individual has handled certain real situations in the past. For instance: "Tell me about a time you were able to successfully deal with someone who didn’t like you." This will give you insight into how the candidate is likely to think and to react in similar situations in your environment.
Candidates should also be asked to choose between two or more mutually exclusive courses of action in real and imaginable scenarios. For example: "Your boss has emphasized the need for a strong fourth quarter financial performance. You have heard rumors from people you trust that a major customer is considering taking his business to a competitor. As you consider whether to discuss the issue with this customer, he contacts you by phone and invites you and your team to join him on a fishing trip hosted at the customer’s organization retreat. Your company’s written policy states that you are to say no, but this policy is seldom discussed by anyone. Accepting this invitation may be your best chance for salvaging this business relationship. WHAT WOULD YOU DO?"
To find out what motivates a candidate, ask questions about why they made certain career-decisions. For example: "What were you hoping to achieve by moving from company XYZ to ABC?" The answer to questions like this also gives insight into their planning skills and how they go about setting and achieving career goals.
Finally, interview questions need to be relevant to the position and the business. Ask questions that probe specific functional, industry and management knowledge, and experiences. For instance: "What is your experience coordinating cross-functional teams and task forces?" Or, "How familiar are you with the Sarbanes-Oxley regulations?"
4. Assess Star Qualities Rigorously
While picking a star employee can’t be done without some degree of chance, scientifically-based assessments need to be a major part of the decision making process. There are two key assessment methods that have generally proven to be most reliable.
A great many consultants and software packages will claim to help an organization find "the right candidate." Aside from the fact that a "right" candidate isn’t going to necessarily be a star employee, you need to make certain the assessment tool you use measures candidates against the profile you’ve created. The tool should also correlate the star profile with enhanced revenues in workplace applications.
In-box exercises will also provide you with data that can be evaluated objectively. Conducted during the interview process, the exercises assess the strength of key business, operations and management competencies. Judgment, decision-making, leadership, analysis, problem solving sensitivity, customer orientation and communication capability can all be assessed using in-box exercises. The form can be as simple as a case study or as complex as simulation games.
5. Train Your People and Evaluate Your Process
Anyone involved in identifying and hiring star employees needs training on how to conduct the interviews, how to position questions, how to be effective with follow-up questions, and how to accurately rate responses. Don’t assume that people within the organization can conduct or should conduct this training. Make a thoughtful assessment of what skills you do and don’t have. Finally, never assume that your first effort will provide you with the model for all your subsequent attempts at identifying and hiring star employees. After six months test your process with the stars you’ve hired. See if the profiles you’ve developed are still appropriate. Examine the traits you valued the first time around. And never hesitate to change or refine your process if outcomes tell you that you must.
Our Conclusion
Every organization’s success depends on how quickly it responds to the needs and changes of the marketplace. With competition going global, a tightening employee pool, a more demanding customer, and more job and workplace satisfaction being integral to retaining your best people, identifying and hiring star employees is becoming increasingly difficult. The process can no longer be left to "seat of the pants" instincts and standard approaches. Star employees possess special talents and special talent deserves special handling. While it takes time and focus, the return on the time you spend recruiting stars will almost always greatly outweigh the cost.
