Today I want to talk to you about recruitment, because recruiting the right staff can be one of the biggest enablers to building a successful business.
If you get it right, you can increase productivity, add to the positive culture of your company and introduce innovation and creativity. Get it wrong and it’s going to be costly and disruptive.
So, here are my top tips for recruiting. First of all, you need to be really clear on what the job is that you are recruiting for.
It sounds obvious but good people in the wrong job don’t work out so have a clear and comprehensive job description.
The process of developing a job description will help you focus on what you really want that person to do. Even if it’s an existing job, it’s a good time to revisit that description and make sure that what you are expecting from the new person is in line with what the description says. A job can evolve over time, so this is a really good time to think about updating it.
Now, a good job description should contain all of the following: it should have a clear and accurate job title that reflects the role, It should have a concise overview of the position together with a detailed list of tasks that that person is required to complete; then the qualifications and skills that you believe are necessary, these should include formal qualifications and also soft skills as well as the salary and benefits that the recruiter can expect.
Tip number two is all about recruiting for current skills versus future skills.
There are some jobs that need a specific set of skills from day one. I’d suggest that being a pilot is probably one of those, right? Flying a plane is not a skill that you can learn on the job but in many circumstances, you can and should increase your recruits skills once they’ve joined you.
Ask yourself if you need somebody who is oven ready or can you take someone that needs a bit of developing. Oven ready people might cost more and that money might be well spent, but developing staff into a role can be hugely rewarding. Whichever route you decide to go, you should always apply my third rule, which is to recruit round pegs for round holes. I’ve got another Six Minute Entrepreneur episode that talks about all of that in a lot more detail, but in short, you need to make sure that your new recruits fit with your company culture.
You need to have the right attitude because whilst you can build someone’s skills up over time, you’re very unlikely to dramatically change their attitude, which can be disastrous if it’s not the right fit for you.
The next consideration is where you find your new recruits.
There are plenty of recruitment companies out there, but be aware that they earn money through placing candidates in jobs so they do have a commercial interest. This factor doesn’t make them bad, it’s just worth remembering.
The good news is that they can also be really good at conducting a lot of the pre-interview work. Conducting their own interview process means that the people you interview should already have been shortlisted.
Now here’s my fourth tip – always be recruiting.
I don’t always mean you should be hiring people that you don’t need. What I mean is that you should always have your eyes open to the idea of future recruits. When you meet somebody that really impresses you, get their card and get their name, it can end up with another conversation in months or even years down the line when an opportunity might arise and you think of just the right person.
And don’t be afraid to reach out via your own networks, posting job opportunities on your website, on social media, and asking your existing staff for recommendations.
My fifth tip for successful recruitment is take time to screen and shortlist potential candidates.
Spending time at this stage is going to save you loads of time later by reducing the number of interviews that you need to conduct. It can also be time really efficient to start off with to do telephone or virtual interviews that can give you an initial impression of a candidate. Also, make sure you take time to look at application forms and cover letters because it gives you an indication of their communication skills and their attention to detail.
At this point, you’re probably ready to start conducting some sort of interview. Now, whether you’re going to be formal or more relaxed, you do need to be prepared so tip number six is know what you need to find out from the interview.
Write down some questions that you want to know the answer to. Think about what information you want to share with the candidate and then decide how you’re going to structure that meeting or that interview.
You might want to see that someone’s doing the job and it’s something you see a lot in restaurants, actually seeing how someone performs on a trial shift. It’s going to tell you loads more about the candidate than sitting down at a table talking about their GCSE results from goodness knows how long ago.
So, those are my six tips that will hopefully help you recruit the right people. I don’t want to overload you with information, but I do want to say one final thing – never make recruitment just about the money.
This works two ways, if you recruit on the basis of who’s going to be the cheapest, then you’ll almost certainly regret it. And, if the person joining your company is only joining because of the money, then they are also likely to leave your company if someone else offers them even more money so just always be aware of that.
You want to be competitive with your salary but you want to make sure there are other reasons for them to want to join your business, whether it’s the potential for growth or the employee benefits, things like your holiday allowance and pension contributions.
Make sure that the person joining your business is actually as excited about the role in the business as you are.