Now is the time of year that people look for a new career, last year is over and bonuses paid, holidays are over and leave is taken, its the start of a new year and often people seek new horizons, so now is probably the time of year when YOU may be looking for new team members.
Rather than go the typical way of hiring your staff… if its worked for you keep going, but if you need some inspiration, here it is.
This is from my experience of how to find employees that will make a business stronger- not only my personal experience but the shared experience of people I worked with. Here’s the four steps I used to identify and hire exceptional people, which apply not just to the food and beverage industry i was in, but all small businesses.
1. Identify who you want to work with. Rather than relying on just a job description that simply quantifies various positions’ duties and then seeks to correlate them with matching experience as a tool for identifying and hiring great employees, consider using a more holistic approach? Consider thinking of eight adjectives and descriptive phrases for the person you are seeking in that particular role. Remember to describe the person in the role- are they servicing customers, doing accounts, working in a support area. Describe what you want in THIS role. It’s a great exercise to get you thinking of an actual person that you would love to work with rather than just a name who’s qualified on paper after ticking a few boxes.
2. Properly advertise the role. It’s important to describe the ideal employee in your job posting. You’d be surprised how many companies post generic employee descriptions that would never appeal to highly talented people. Many companies go back to the post they made last time, no matter the person needed, and repost it online or in the press. Consider keeping the application as simple as possible, limiting requirements to the absolute minimum you’d need before getting a feel for the candidate in an in-person interview. remember you are hiring a person not a long list of attributes.
3. Find a winning personality. Only when a person’s personality and interpersonal skills seem right, does their past experience become relevant to the discussion. In my time running a business we’d hire a lot of sales people; I would also look for “fighter pilots” young people who you could imagine taking initiative, having outgoing personalities, maybe they crash and burn but they would set the business alive while they were there. We succeeded in hiring quite a few of these, based on personality not on experience and then training them up- most of these have become very successful business people, and they were great for my business while they worked with me. So while you are in the interview keep a list of the description you came up with in the first step of this hiring process and note anytime the candidate meets one of the criteria. Use what is called the “three Cs” as the foundation of an interview: have a Conversation by asking questions that require expressive answers; demonstrate Conviction about the company and the job on offer to gauge if the candidates passion matches mine; and show Curiosity about the other person.
4. Select people who are going to make your business better. Selecting your new team members is the biggest opportunity you have to impact your business in a positive way. That means that you need to always keep your customer in mind before signing a new team member if they are servicing customers. Only consider candidates who fulfilled at least six out of eight of of your adjectives or phrases, and then consider which traits are absolutely essential to make them successful in that particular role. Above all never make a hire just because you need to quickly fill an empty position.
Good luck in hiring your Fighter Pilots!