Recruiters spend all day recruiting, right?! Square pegs, round holes, any other dimension you care to consider, a good Recruiter will find the right candidate to fill that role. But how good are Recruitment Company directors at recruiting the right people to work for them?!
From Resourcers and Consultants to Senior Management, it goes without saying that when hiring for your own company, it is crucial that you too recruit the right people. Obviously hiring the right person can advance your company, but hiring the wrong person can actively hinder it, and come with many consequences. Hiring mistakes waste a lot of time and resources that could have been invested elsewhere. A high employee turn over rate can demoralise a company. But by creating a reputation that shows you are serious about your own recruitment and retention, you can make yourself a highly attractive company to work for. Look at Apple & Google, to name but two companies that attract top quality talent without even advertising. They are synonymous with being companies that candidates want to work for. So don’t you want to be the “go to” Recruitment Company to work for?
Most Recruiters (which is what most Recruitment Company directors formerly were and still are at heart) have good instincts about whether a candidate will or will not be right for the job. Having these instincts is a good trait and have no doubt served you well, but you shouldn’t solely rely on gut feelings. To successfully recruit the right people, the decision should be founded on solid, objective factors. I know that’s what all lawyers will say but it’s true.
It doesn’t always work to have preconceived ideas of what type of employee you’re looking for. If you go into an interview already discriminating against a candidate you are potentially breaching the Equality Act 2010 (“The Act”) and may overlook a great candidate.
The Act legally protects people from discrimination in the workplace and in wider society. Everyone in Britain is protected from unlawful behaviour by the Act. The protected characteristics under the Act are:
- Age
- Disability
- Gender reassignment
- Marriage and civil partnership
- Pregnancy and maternity
- Race
- Religion and belief
- Sex
- Sexual orientation
It is vital that you as an employer do not use these characteristics to decide whether or not the candidate should be hired.
However, having said you shouldn’t pre-determine what sort of person you want, to recruit the best people you need to know what your company needs and what role you are trying to fill. Trying to recruit people for a role will be quite difficult if you don’t know what you’re looking for. Ask yourself these questions about your company:
- What is its mission?
- What are its values?
- What culture are you seeking to create?
Once you’re sure about what you’re all about, it’s far easier to establish what your new recruit needs to be all about. After deciding what your company is looking for, the selection process is going to be much simpler.
You should try to interview as many people as you can. Most smaller companies interview at least three candidates while larger companies tend to interview at least ten. This will give you a larger selection to choose from and a stronger possibility of recruiting the right person. Although you may really like the first candidate you interview, there could be someone better out there.
When it’s time to interview, it can be beneficial to have more than one conversation with strong candidates. Including other people in the interview process, such as a different manager or someone of a senior position, can give you multiple perspectives on the candidate. They might see something either positive or negative that you didn’t see. Having a couple of different senior employees involved can also help you see if the candidate is likely to fit into the company in terms of personality.
When you involve different employees in the interview process, those people tend to become invested in the candidate if they get the job. Because they were a part of the employment process the existing employee will want to see the deal through by helping the new employee to be successful. This will help your company retain a great employee, and empower your existing staff.
It’s also incredibly important to look beyond the CV. The candidates that have many qualifications on paper may not be the best fit for the job. Nowadays employers are looking past A-levels and a university education. Asking about the candidates’ interests and ambitions can help you learn more about them and how they might be a good or bad fit for your company.
Along with being capable of performing the role, the candidate should possess great social skills. Being able to work well with others and navigate themselves through different social situations is a vital trait. It might be more beneficial for you to hire the candidate that is only missing a couple of work based skills on their CV but has better social skills. You need to find the right candidate who fits the personality of your company For example, if everyone goes to the pub on a Friday after work, an introvert may not be equipped with the best social skills for your company, regardless of their impeccable A Level results.
Equally, just because a candidate has all of the skills you are looking for on paper, that doesn’t mean that they are the right person for the job. Remember that people can be trained. If you can’t find the right person to work for your company, then grow your own! Apprenticeships could be the answer to some of your hiring problems. Being able to train someone on how your company works, rather than them bringing old habits from their previous employer can be very beneficial.
Have you thought about an internal referral system? Like attracts like, so asking your current team to recommend candidates positively boosts morale. Especially if there’s a cash incentive!
What about offering a good candidate the opportunity to come in & work with some of the team for an afternoon? That’s a good way to check if they’re going to gel before getting too far down the line.
Smart candidate recruitment increases your staff retention rate. Persistently hiring the “wrong” staff sends an unsettling message to existing team members, as well as the outside world.
But what about once you’ve got them on board? Your job’s not over! I’m sure you’ll be surprised to learn that you as an employer only have five days to impress a new recruit. These five days are vital for you to make sure they are happy.
The top reasons for new recruits leaving a job within the first week are unfriendly work environments and lack of opportunity for progression within the company. It’s so important to make sure that your new recruits are being treated with respect, feel invested in, and that they know there is a chance for advancement with the company. This will help your new recruits stick around. There’s no point in putting all that hard work into recruiting the right candidate and having it all go down the drain because you didn’t think about what happens after they get hired. The recruitment process doesn’t finish after the interview, it’s important to keep up the morale during the first week and show them how great it is to work for your company.
There are different types of employees but lets stick with the ones in recruitment that we know best, A players and B players. A players are more self-sufficient and they have a hunger for success. B players are less consistently strong than A players. They don’t have the same amount of motivation. We all know both of those type of Recruitment Consultants.
A players only get attracted to places of employment that have other A players so these will always be your best candidates to hire. Hiring B players will harm your company. I’m not saying that they won’t do the work for you, but it won’t be done anywhere near as well as it would be done by an A player. Keep your company running to the best it can by focusing on the right type of player to hire.
These steps should lead you in the right direction to finding the candidate who best fits into your company. Having and keeping the right people on your team will make all the difference in running a productive and successful company. After all, if you can’t recruit the right talent for your company, how can a client trust that you’ll recruit the right talent for theirs?
If you need any further information on this, or if Cognitive Law can be of any assistance, please do not hesitate to get in touch with Lucy Tarrant on 0333 400 4499 or lucy.tarrant@cognitivelaw.co.uk.