HireBetter Blog

What Will 2012 Hold For Hirers?

December 30th, 2011 | by | hirebetter, hiring, human resources, recruiting, talent

Dec
30

As we enter the New Year, employers are starting to staff up.  Careerbuilder’s end-of-year survey shows that 23% of employers expect to hire permanent, full-time employees in 2012.  And if history is any guide, even more companies will actually make hires than that.

So what does this mean for you and your company?  As the economy continues to improve, the hunt for great talent will get tougher and tougher.  So you’ll have to be at your best if you want to recruit and retain the best talent that the market has to offer.

A shifting marketplace

Now’s not the time to fall into the old hiring traps and come up short in the hunt for top employees.  Competition for A-players is increasing, as employees who may have just taken a job to ride out the Great Recession are more and more ready to move to better opportunities.

 

Opportunities and dangers

This is the perfect opportunity for you to supercharge your hiring process.  The market is full of great talent, but it most of those workers won’t be accessible for long.  Start hiring, sooner than later if you want to take advantage of this unique opportunity.

 

HireBetter, your partner in the hiring game

How can you improve the hiring process?  How can you improve your chances of making a solid hiring decision?  Contact HireBetter and we can help you take advantage of the unique opportunity that the marketplace has, right now.

HireBetter is unique — a significant portion of HireBetter’s fee structure (or compensation) is success-based and is only payable at the one year anniversary of the new hire because, at that point, the company will have achieved an ROI (return on investment) for the new hire and they will have had adequate time to assess whether the employee was going to work out or not. 

HireBetter also encourages you to utilize all resources available to make the right hire…whether its your network, LinkedIn, even other recruiters — we feel passionately about helping you make the RIGHT hire.  Its why our clients are raving fans.

 

Image used via Creative Commons from sir_watkyn.

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Two Ways to Avoid Bottlenecks in the Hiring Process

December 15th, 2011 | by | guest post, hiring, networking, recruiting, technology

Dec
15

From time to time, HireBetter’s blog will feature guest posts from writers with a unique insight into a particular talent issue.  Today’s post comes from Kyle Lagunas of Software Advice:

A business is a well-oiled machine, relying on the seamless execution of a number of processes to drive it forward. Disruptions and delays (bottlenecks) will occur unless you keep these processes in ship shape. In the hiring process, bottlenecks are more than just an inconvenience. They can damage company culture and tarnish your brand – making it more difficult to attract and hire top talent. Smoothing out bumps in the road before they turn into more serious issues is essential to the ongoing success of your recruiting and hiring efforts.

Kyle LagunasThat said, here are a couple leading causes of bottlenecks in the hiring process – and ways to avoid each one:

 

 

Sequential hiring style

You post the same ad you used last time, find three candidates to interview, and hope one of them has what you’re looking for. If not, you go back to square one–you post the ad, find three candidates, and the cycle repeats. But relying on the same old iterated process to meet myriad staffing needs is more than shortsighted, it’s inefficient.

The greatest value lies in having a working process. By designing a hiring process that works in tandem with talent management and supports your business strategy, your recruiting efforts will be much easier to manage. You don’t have to read every book ever written on hiring strategies, but you do need a uniform process that meets your organization’s culture, values and needs.

 

Living in the Dark Ages

Without the proper technology, the sheer volume of applications a single online job posting attracts can be nearly impossible to manage. As such, many organizations experience delays at the onset recruiting–which is frustrating for candidates and hiring managers alike. Accepting resumes and screening for experience and qualifications are a part of the process, but applicants perceive that nothing is happening until an interview takes place.

Online application and screening tools help companies maintain momentum by reducing time spent in this initial stage. If you don’t have an applicant tracking system, you need to get one. The first step toward minimizing bottlenecks in hiring is automating the most menial aspects of hiring so you can focus on engagement.

 

Best Practices are the Cure for Hiccups

Strategic staffing requires the cooperation and shared effort of multiple parties, and as with any business process, hiccups and delays in hiring will happen. With a sound process in place that keeps stakeholders informed and engaged, however, bottlenecks will be fewer and further between. By incorporating the best practices that make the most sense to your organization–and by leveraging solid technology–you’ll be better prepared to deal with any other flaws that emerge.

 

About the Author: Kyle Lagunas is the HR Analyst at Software Advice – a company that reviews human resources systems. For further reading on ways to avoid bottlenecks in the hiring process, this article can be found on Kyle’s HR blog in full: http://blog.softwareadvice.com/articles/hr/four-ways-to-avoid-bottlenecks-in-the-hiring-process-1120911/

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How To Become A “Recovering Job Description Writer”

December 8th, 2011 | by | hirebetter, hiring, human resources, job descriptions, recruiting, talent, videos

Dec
08

Jonathan Davis, HireBetter’s founder, considers himself a recovering job description writer.  And in this video, he explains why and how you can become one too.

Traditionally, to write a job description, you probably piece together attributes that you’d like in a new hire.  You start from the beginning and work forward.

 

Start at the end to know where you should be

But what we do, and what we encourage our clients to do, is start at the end.  Determine what this person should accomplish in their first 90 days, six months, or year on the job.  Now, when you look at your candidates, ask yourself whether they’ll deliver the success that you’ve just described.

This lets you be able to look at their background and determine if they have the skills to be able to do that, rather than them trying to convince you that they have the attributes that you asked for.

 

What kind of employee do you really want to hire?

No one really wants to just hire a “go-getter” or a “real closer,” you want someone who can successfully achieve specific results for your company.  So find out what “success” means in your role, and your accuracy will go way up.

 

For more, take a look at HireBetter’s YouTube Channel, and stay tuned to the HireBetter Blog for more information on how to attract, recruit, manage, and retain top talent. 

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The Three Reasons a Hire Doesn’t Work Out

November 30th, 2011 | by | hiring, human resources, job descriptions, recruiting, retention, talent

Nov
30

In this video, HireBetter’s founder, Jonathan Davis, explains why so many hires don’t work out.  He boiled it all down to three simple reasons:

 

Reason 1:  You failed to clearly articulate what you need someone to do

Reason 2:  You failed to tell that new person what you needed them to do

Reason 3:  They failed to agree that that’s what they need to do

 

If you want to start making better hiring decisions, you’ll have to avoid these three pitfalls.  And even though there are three reasons, remember, if you don’t get the first one right, the whole process falls apart.  So make sure you always properly define the role.

For more, take a look at HireBetter’s YouTube Channel, and stay tuned to the HireBetter Blog for more information on how to attract, recruit, manage, and retain top talent. 

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Happy Thanksgiving from HireBetter

November 24th, 2011 | by | hirebetter

Nov
24

This time of year, many individuals, companies, and yes, blogs too, like to talk about why they are thankful.  Some will talk about how they are thankful for their good fortune, their new opportunities, or their strong teams.  Some will sound heartfelt, and others are probably just form letters.  And even though so many others are doing the same thing, this seemed like a good chance to recognize one of the many things for which we at HireBetter are thankful.

We’d like to take a brief moment to thank our clients.  It is, has been, and continues to be our pleasure to serve you.  Hearing our partners turn from simple customers into raving fans is what we are all about.  So from the HireBetter team: Thank you!

Here is a quick clip of Sam Marshall from Tocquigny, one of our repeat customers, saying a few kind words about HireBetter.  Client testimonies like this are music to our ears.  If you want to start hiring A-Players too, drop us a line and we can talk about how HireBetter can help your company today!

 

Happy Thanksgiving!

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When Your Start-Up Outgrows You: Hire Up or Sell out?

November 17th, 2011 | by | hiring, human resources, management, recruiting

Nov
17

Some would say that entrepreneurs like you and me care about our companies as much as (or more than?) our own children.  I think that comparison is fair.  We create businesses out of nothing, work tirelessly to equip them for success, and sometimes, we hold on too tightly.  Like sending your high-school grad off to college, often you have to give up some control to let your company graduate to its next step.

Caught in “No Man’s Land”

Successful entrepreneurs are great at building new ventures and growing them into viable companies.  But that doesn’t always mean that they are the right people to lead their companies into that next phase of growth.  Many entrepreneurs get into real trouble when they reach the stage where their company is “too big to be small but too small to be big.” 

That’s what Doug Tatum, a former colleague of mine and founder of Tatum, calls “No Man’s Land.”  In his book of the same name, he explains how many companies in No Man’s Land (which for most companies is when they have between 20-100 employees and $5-$50 million in revenues) fail because they don’t have the right team to make the leap to a “big” company.  He goes on to say that you either need to sell your business to a larger company with the resources to get to the next level, or you need to build out your team with leaders who have the experience to drive the business forward.

 

Know when it’s time to let go

No man’s land, as the name suggests, is no good place to be.  The issue is, most entrepreneurs will have to give up some or all of the control of the companies they’ve worked so hard to build.  I’ve had to do it myself (when I sold my baby to Doug’s company, Tatum, just as he was ceding control to a new CEO), and I can tell you, it’s not easy to do.  But if you want your company to grow out of that phase, then you’ll most likely have to empower someone else to help take the reins.

 

To hire, or to be acquired?

The idea of “selling out” to a larger, more experienced company is nothing new in the entrepreneur community.  It’s tried and true and it often does work.  Your new parent company already knows how to be big, and they’ll have great resources to help you grow…and you can take some money off the table and enjoy some of the fruits of your labor .  The downside is, you usually lose the individuality and freedoms that you enjoy as a smaller venture, controlled by you.

But that’s not the only way.  If you still want your business to remain independent while it grows, then upgrade your senior management team.  Hire a new CEO, bring in a strong COO, or acquire other key VP and C-level talent…and give them a real say in your strategy (or its execution).  Properly vetted and hired, they’ll have the skills you need to scale your business that you, and your core team who got you to this level, usually lack.  Many of your new hires will have been in similar situations before, and they’ll know what needs to happen for your company to make “the jump.”  Hiring leadership is both an art and a science and you’ll probably want to enlist external assistance.  Again, properly done, it’s a great way to grow your company without losing its character.

 

Giving up control is hard, but it’s the best move for your company

You’ve done a great job getting your company this far, but now it’s time to let it grow.  Give up a little control, hire up, and watch your baby grow up to the next stage in its life.

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It’s Your Responsibility: Using CSR to Recruit, Engage, and Retain Top Talent

November 9th, 2011 | by | employee relations, hiring, human resources, management, recruiting, retention, talent

Nov
09

Last week, we posted the first half of our interview with Aman Singh.  In it, she explained how employees in today’s workplace demand that their employers be good corporate citizens.  Furthermore, she showed how companies that embrace Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and sustainability are more attractive to job-seekers.

In the second part of our interview, she explains how CSR helps companies attract young employees, improve employee retention, and engage their workforces.  She also warns us about some of the pitfalls that firms may encounter when implementing new socially responsible and sustainable policies.

Follow the jump for our conversation:

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What Goes Around, Comes Around: How Corporate Social Responsibility Helps Your Recruiting

November 2nd, 2011 | by | employee relations, health, human resources, management, recruiting, retention

Nov
02

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) isn’t on the front of most hiring manager’s minds, but it should be.  Today’s best workers care about the impact that their companies have on the world around them.  A-players love helping companies that do good, do well.

Companies that care about sustainability and CSR benefit in many ways, but some of the biggest gains lie in employee engagement, recruitment, and retention.

 

In Good Company: Aman Singh

I was fortunate enough to get to ask Aman Singh some questions about the subject last week. While working with The Wall Street Journal, Vault.com, Forbes, and many others, she’s studied how corporate social responsibility and sustainability help the companies that embrace it.  Now she runs Singh Solutions, her own CSR consultancy, and maintains the In Good Company blog.

Her insights make quite a compelling case for CSR from a talent perspective.  Anyone who wants a strong, well engaged workforce should take note.  Have a look at our conversation after the jump:

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The Three Huge Hiring Mistakes You Didn’t Know You Make

October 21st, 2011 | by | hirebetter, hiring, human resources, job descriptions, recruiting, talent

Oct
21

Every company can improve their hiring in some way.  And given how important successful hiring is, it’s scary to think that two-thirds of companies continue to make bad hires.  Here are three key hiring mistakes many companies make when hiring a new employee.  Are you making any of them?

 

Mistake number one: You pass off hiring duties to the wrong people       

You wouldn’t let an office manager design a factory or a chemist balance your budget.  You leave those jobs up to the experts.  But when it comes to hiring, many companies let just about anyone take charge of a hiring task. Building a great workforce is too important to leave in untrained hands, so make sure that only skilled talent experts run your search.

 

Mistake number two: You improperly define roles

The second big mistake is just as dangerous.  Maybe you are hiring good people, but the job just doesn’t match up with their skillset.  Or you’re settling because you can’t imagine what an ideal candidate even looks like.  If you can’t properly define a role and come up with an actionable plan to fill it, you’re doomed from the start.

 

Mistake number three:  You insufficiently assess the person you hire

When you make a hire, you’re not just bringing a collection of skills and experience onboard, you’re teaming up with a person.  Many companies get into trouble because they only look at easy to compare, conventional metrics and then hire the person who interviews the best.  You have to know how to thoroughly assess a candidate to get a good idea of who they truly are, and that’s not easy to do!  Very few know how to vet a candidate like that.

 

Bad hirers: There’s hope!

Luckily, these three mistakes are very curable.  HireBetter is committed to delivering the systems and expertise companies need to confidently make great hiring decisions.  We work with companies to define exactly what role they need to fill, determine what that ideal candidate looks like, and then deliver the very best candidates to you.  If you’re ready to start making great hires, contact us, and see how we can help you HireBetter.

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How Can Your Website Hurt Your Hiring?

October 12th, 2011 | by | communication, hiring, networking, passive recruiting, recruiting

Oct
12

How much does your company care about its online image? The blogosphere is full of tips helping job seekers craft an online persona that will aid their search, but the other side is largely ignored. Does your website attract or repel A+ talent?  What do star candidates see when they look your company up online?

Pretend that you’re the job seeker

Imagine you’re a rising star salesperson and you get a call from a real estate company that wants to consider you for a position.  The job sounds good, so before you hang up, you offer to send in a resume and have every intention of doing so.  Then, while doing your due-diligence on the company (as any savvy person like yourself would), you come across their website.  It looks like this.  How likely are you to send that resume now?  “Thanks, but no thanks.”

 

Think of top talent as customers

Your company (hopefully) always puts its best foot forward for new clients, and job candidates deserve the same consideration.  Even if your company doesn’t do much, if any, business online, if you have a website, it’d better be one that your proud of.  Your online brand is where future hires will establish most of their initial opinions about your company.  So make sure your site encourages the reaction you want.

 

“About us”

Candidates will go to your site to find out what kind of company you are, so make sure it leaves the impression that you want.  And this isn’t just about the words that you say.  Though it may seem trivial, an ugly, confusing website will make prospective employees think that your company culture is just that: ugly and confusing.

You probably won’t attract new candidates just because you have a nice website, but you definitely stand to lose some with a terrible site.  So take a look at your online presence and make sure that it’s one you’re proud of.

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