Having Problems Finding Qualified Candidates?
By Dana Borowka, MA
[dropcaps type=”circle” color=”” background=””]W[/dropcaps]elcome to the 21st Century! We are hearing from many of our clients, both domestically and globally, that it is getting to be more and more difficult to find qualified candidates. A number of years ago while attending the Milken Global Conference, one of the speakers projected this very issue and 
commented that it would likely get worse. With so much unemployment, that didn’t seem to make sense, but that is what we are starting to see right now.
According to Barry Deutsch of Impact Hiring Solutions a number of factors are causing this situation:
“Fewer top talent candidates are using job boards to respond to job advertisements, which are the primary method by which companies use to attract candidates. Increasing top talent is turned off and disgusted by the traditional approach of a posted job description masquerading as an job ad. Many companies are recognizing the importance and impact of top talent, are doing everything within their power to motivate, empower, engage, and stimulate their best performers. Finding and attracting these “game changers” requires a completely different approach to sourcing and recruiting. If you desire to attract better performers, you’ve got to have a hiring process designed for top talent. Great performers respond to compelling marketing-oriented ad copy, they get excited to learn about the challenges and obstacles in their new job, and they want to know they’ll have a significant impact on the success of your company, department, or team. A process lacking the ability to communicate and discuss these issues in-depth results in hiring average and mediocre candidates.”
A New Perspective
Many companies are realizing that they are going to need to look from within and identify potential talent that they can nurture. Albert Einstein provides some insight as to what an organization needs to do when looking at future talent: “The significant problems we have today cannot be solved at the same level of thinking with which we created them”. Talent acquisition will need to be reviewed through a new set of eyes and ears. The following is an exercise that you can use to begin this process.
Pick three A, B and C players that are currently in your organization and list out their key characteristics:
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Exploring Different Avenues
Take a close look at the characteristics and look for commonalities. In order to attract those individuals, you will need to market, brand, network and reach out to those that reflect what you want. A few questions to ask:
- Why are those individuals staying with our organization?
- What attracted them in the first place?
- Have they grown from within and what helped them to get to the next level?
- Why would they leave?
In order to begin to develop a coaching plan, you can consider what would it take to help a C Player to become a C+ Player or a B Player to become a B+ Player, etc. To design a retention and succession plan, you’ll need to know your people by understanding why they are with you, why they stay, where they want to go and then manage to all three areas. It is vital to know the strengths and weaknesses and to help them to fulfill their vision.
Some Tools To Cultivate Your Future Team Players:
- Define who you’d like onboard – look at the characteristics that you want in your organization.
- Define expectations by creating a 30-60-90-180 day expectation list (3-6 items under each timeline).
- Develop a PR and advertising plan around what you want to attract.
- Interview to those standards.
- Manage to the individual’s vision and help them to succeed based on their strengths and weaknesses.
A Perceptive Tool
In-depth work style and personality assessments can reveal deep insight into new hires and mentoring current team members. Assessments can help in:
- Gaining insights into strengths and weaknesses of candidates and staff.
- Providing probing interview questions that might be overlooked.
- Identifying potential red flags for human behavioral issues during the hiring process.
- Reducing the learning curve for understanding how to manage individuals for greater work performance.
- Comparing the dynamics of teams, departments and candidates.
One of the best ways to learn how to use an in-depth work style assessment as part of the hiring, mentoring and managing process is to take a few minutes to listen to our podcast interviews at the following links:
“How to Lose your Most Valuable Resources” – This interview is about keeping employees engaged, respecting them for their talents and allowing them to contribute and participate in the growth of the company. Please click on the link below or copy and paste the link into your internet browser address bar. It will start Media or Quicktime Player and play the interview for you.
https://lighthouseconsulting.com/Radio/Vistage-HiringRecruitingandRetention.mp3
“Putting In-depth Work Style & Personality Assessments to Work” – This interview is about utilizing in-depth work style and personality assessments in the hiring process. Please click on the link below or copy and paste the link into your internet browser address bar.
It will start Media or Quicktime Player and play the interview for you.
https://lighthouseconsulting.com/Radio/2005-11-07.mp3
If you would like to learn more about in-depth work style assessments, please contact us at [email protected] or (310) 453-6556, ext. 403.
Final Thoughts
Finally, hiring the right people is key to future growth. If you would like additional information on raising the hiring bar, please click here to see an article on this subject. By using these tools and exploring the characteristics and needs of your top performers, you can then design an effective plan to finding and cultivating qualified candidates.
Permission is needed from Lighthouse Consulting Services, LLC to reproduce any portion provided in this article. © 2014
Dana Borowka, MA, CEO of Lighthouse Consulting Services, LLC and his organization constantly remain focused on their mission statement – “To bring effective insight to your organization”. They do this through the use of in-depth work style assessments to raise the hiring bar so companies select the right people to reduce hiring and management errors. They also have a full service consulting division that provides domestic and international interpersonal coaching, executive onboarding, leadership training, global options for expanding your business, sales and customer service training, operational productivity improvement, 360s and employee surveys as well as a variety of workshops. Dana has over 25 years of business consulting experience and is a nationally renowned speaker, radio and TV personality on many topics. He provides workshops on hiring, managing for the future, and techniques to improve interpersonal communications that have a proven ROI. He is the co-author of the books, “Cracking the Personality Code” and “Cracking the Business Code”. To order the books, please visit www.lighthouseconsulting.com.
If you would like additional information on this topic or others, please contact your Human Resources department or Lighthouse Consulting Services LLC, 3130 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 550, Santa Monica, CA 90403, (310) 453-6556, [email protected] & our website: www.lighthouseconsulting.com.
Lighthouse Consulting Services, LLC provides a variety of services, including in-depth work style assessments for new hires & staff development, team building, interpersonal & communication training, career guidance & transition, conflict management, 360s, workshops, and executive & employee coaching. Other areas of expertise: Executive on boarding for success, leadership training for the 21st century, exploring global options for expanding your business, sales and customer service training and operational productivity improvement.
