Published February 2004

Hiring winners takes effort from entire company

Q. For the first time in three years, our company enters the year with budget clearance to fill several newly created skilled and professional positions. As human resource practitioners, we are both excited yet concerned over this prospect. Having been out of the “hiring mode” during difficult financial times, we want to make sure that we approach this challenge with the importance it deserves. What specialized hiring guidelines do you recommend?

A. Hire winners.

Easier said than done, this philosophical approach is followed by most successful (low turnover) organizations. Here are some guidelines that the nation’s top recruiters employ to get the very best:

n Establish the goal of recruiting and hiring the very best. Recognize that I include recruiting as part of the equation. Organizations successful in hiring do not sit on their hands and merely wait for candidates to come to them. They take the initiative and search for them. Despite relatively high unemployment rates, the competition for top-tier candidates is intense.

n They develop their “brand” as an employer. “From the moment a candidate has contact with your company, they immediately begin forming an impression about you,” says Jenifer Lambert, a principal with Everett-based Terra Resources Group, an employment services and human resources consulting firm.

Consider that your “class” as an organization can be influenced by something as innocuous as the look of the office lobby, the paper quality of the application form or whether the receptionist smiles and greets candidates warmly. When advertising, identify your company as a “we are” rather than a “we want” employer, Lambert says. “We are a team of highly focused business professionals,” carries a more positive message than “we want a focused, professionally oriented employee who can hit the ground running.”

n Perform a “hiring marketing analysis” of your company. Ask your employees in an informal survey whether they would recommend your organization as a good place to work. If results are favorable, consider instituting an incentive program for referrals that pays after the new recruit passes the probationary period. If not, immediately begin a marketing program for hiring by asking senior executives what defines the company, what makes it distinctive from competitors as a place to work?

n Go fishing, in the right pond. Recruiting today goes beyond placing ads. Go where the best candidates are. Professional organizations are rife with energetic, unemployed persons trying to “network themselves into a good position.” Go find them; they may not know you are looking.

n Establish a hiring process. Define each step of the recruitment-hiring process and assign specific personal roles to each within the organization. Make sure the “hand off” of a candidate to the appropriate manager is seamless and transparent. Each job — even the highest-ranking managerial position — must have a job description. At any step in the process you find the “perfect candidate” who you think might need more than the outside salary range, make the offer, and hopefully get them on board quickly.

Hiring winners is ongoing, hard work that involves everyone in the organization.

Eric Zoeckler operates The Scribe, a business writing service with many Snohomish County-based clients. He also writes a column on workplace issues, which appears in The Herald on Mondays. He can be reached at 206-284-9566 or by e-mail to mrscribe@aol.com.

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