Article from PREFERRED Network News (PNN) October 2003, A PREFERRED Therapy Providers Newsletter

Great Recruiting Practices--Not Technology--Make Great Recruiting by Harry Griendling-hr.com

The Web has given birth to new recruiting media and tools that make some aspects of recruiting faster and less expensive. Job boards have effectively improved upon the help wanted classified ad model for job advertising and application, and some of the web-based applicant management systems bring speed and process efficiency to previously slow and manually-burdened hiring operations. To effectively compete for talent, every growing company should subscribe to one or two job boards.

But by itself, the Web won't make any organization better at attracting, hiring, or keeping talent. Why? Because the bottom line of hiring success is the quality of the human beings doing the hiring, not the superiority of the technology they may use. In the rush to automate and web-enable their recruiting operations, employers sometimes overlook an inescapable, fundamental requirement for success: Great hiring begins and ends with great hiring practices and well-trained recruiters. Period. Here are some critical steps in building a solid foundation for great recruiting:

Document your recruiting processes: This may seem fundamental, but over 90% of the companies we've consulted with have not documented their recruiting processes. Often, companies have as many different hiring processes as they have hiring managers. Further, most hiring is delegated to first line managers. These are, by definition, the least experienced leaders and the most likely to make mistakes in the difficult process of assessing and hiring talent. Creating a documented, replicable, and measurable recruiting process is a fundamental requirement for establishing company-wide recruiting practices that can be improved with each hiring transaction.

Use reliable selection methodologies: Most companies rely on interviews as the principle, and very often only, assessment method for selecting new talent. Yet, research done over the last 40 years has consistently shown that interviewing brings only about 50% accuracy as a reliable predictor of job performance. And, that accuracy rate drops quickly for managers with less experience. The best selection processes we've seen use a combination of assessment techniques, such as formal behavioral and work style assessment tools, structured interviewing, skills testing, and traditional interviewing. The key here is to determine the selection methods that produce the most reliable results for your unique culture, use them religiously, and continuously measure results and improve them.

Certify interviewers: Most companies provide precious little training in selection. Research consistently shows that most managers select talent using two criteria: they hire people they like and people who will be easy to manage. The problem with hiring is that every manager thinks they are good at it, while in fact, few really are. The best practices to minimize hiring mistakes are to provide meaningful training and to require certification in selection for anyone making hiring decisions.

Use the best to recruit the best: In the armed forces, only the top 10% of performers are asked to join the recruiting team. Why? Because their research shows that the best current performers recruit the best future performers. And, other research consistently shows the best workers want to work for the best leaders. It is great practice to have your best talent fully engaged in recruiting new talent.

While the Web will help you find candidates faster and cheaper, it won't help you improve your success at evaluating or hiring talent. To do that, improve your practices, processes, and people.