6 Steps To Hire Right

“We’re hiring.” You’re serving more people and have new opportunities for people to partner with you. It takes work to effectively hire someone. Here are the steps I put in place, perhaps they will help you.

In running my organization, hiring is one of my bigger challenges. So little information is exchanged between candidates and the organization it puts pressure on the decision-making process. The candidate tries to judge the position and their abilities to do the work based off your job description. But often job descriptions are too vague.

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From the organization’s perspective, you’re looking at a resume and speaking with only a person a few times. You don’t get to see them in action. You have to discern if the person is an organizational culture fit (will we work well together?), a skill fit (can they do or learn to do the work?), and a motivational fit (do they like doing this kind of work?).

To make hiring more successful, change the type of information shared between candidate and organization.

To make hiring successful, change the type of information shared between candidate and organization. Click To Tweet

6 Steps To Hire Right

1. Let’s start with the big picture. Write your mission and values. What do you do? Who do you serve? How do you help? Here’s ours. This lets candidates know what the organization is about and the larger meaning behind the work they will do.
2. List up the repeatable tasks. To hire someone for ongoing work, you need a list of repeatable tasks to be done. Those tasks, gathered together, become a job. If the tasks aren’t repeatable or don’t add up to a part-time or full-time position, then hire a contractor from fiverr.com. Create a set of SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures, a detailed how-to list for doing something) for how to do the tasks. 
3. Write a job description. I want to write, “do everything that needs be done,” but that’s not helpful! Write a description of how their work will be evaluated. What is this person expected to accomplish? What are the key results you want to see? Don’t forget to “sell” the position. Let them know why it’s important and how they will benefit from taking this job. There should be enough detail in the job description that someone who is a good fit will think, “I would love to do this,” while someone who’s not says, “Eek, this work would drive me crazy!”
4. Create an job application. I prefer something simple, because all their information is in their resume and cover letter.
5. Create an interview process. How will you determine each candidate’s fit to the job? Use multiple interviews with several people. 
   1. The first interview is short. It’s for organizational culture fit and skill fit. Is this someone I would like to work with? Does this person represent themself in ways that match the needs of the position? Do they have the skill requirements?
   2. Before a second interview, we ask candidates to take a couple of assessments, a personality assessment and a Kolbe A assessment. This gives us a better understanding of the person’s communication and work preferences.
   3. A second (or even third) interview is to explore further with candidates who match the job requirements. Never be the only person interviewing. Have someone else join you. They will see things you don’t. If you can create an exercise that duplicates some part of the job, use that with candidates. For example, if you’re hiring someone to manage your social media, right before the interview give them a link to one of your blog posts and ask them to create 2 social media posts about it. This allows you to see them in action.
6. Create a training and feedback process. This is perhaps the most important step. Don’t expect to show your new hire an inbox of emails and say, “take care of all these issues.” For the person you hired to be successful, you need to train them in how things are done in your organization (culture) and to do the job (skill). And then don’t disappear, manage them. Frequent interaction with them allows them to pick up the DNA, the culture, of your organization. Provide feedback, encouragement and correction, so they can dial in their work to meet your expectations.

6 Steps To Hire Right – After you hire someone, the work of training and managing begins. Click To Tweet

Hiring and employment laws differ between countries and states, so be aware of your local rules.

When you hire a person who is motivated and skilled for the work you need done, you will see them flourish. They will be happy, you’ll be happy, and your customers will be happy.

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