When you are looking to hire a new team member, it may be incumbent upon multiple members of your staff to examine resumes and cover letters, conduct interviews and sign off on hiring decisions. For obvious reasons, you want them to be in a position where they are both empowered and trained to make the best possible decisions based on a number of factors.
The question you may have, then, is how to do that effectively, from the lowest-ranking stakeholder in the process to the person who will render the final decision. First and foremost, everyone should be on the same page as to what constitutes an ideal candidate and what qualities they should have, according to Workable. This will likely take plenty of meetings, emails and conversations, considering not only a person's qualifications and experience, but also the soft skills they possess and how everything aligns with what the position demands.
In this way, you will be able to craft a clear picture of your "ideal" candidate, and this can be put into a document that you can refer back to. That way, you can always check a resume against that expectation, and tailor your interview questions appropriately.
Attracting top candidates
When you get a lot of applicants for an open position (which should be fairly common in a tough job market like this one), one thing you have to keep in mind is that even if you have a lot of options, other companies are likely also courting the absolute best candidates at the same time as you are. As such, you need to make sure that once you nail down what you're looking for in an ideal candidate, you need to get that in writing, Business News Daily recommends. Put another way, the first external step in identifying the top talent is making it clear exactly what you're looking for and why.
If you do it correctly, when someone reads your listing they will be sure that they're more than a vague match, and can throw their hat in the ring with confidence.
Digging deeper
Finally, once you have interviewed based on the questions and criteria you collectively decided on, it's time to talk to their references, and this can be a key determining factor. The Balance Careers noted that you need to turn over as many stones as you can here, asking all the right questions — and talking to all the right people.
You can certainly expect candidates to list people who will paint them in the best possible light, but if you can get to the heart of the matter with a strong line of questioning, you'll be in a better position to succeed.
It can also be helpful to bring recruiting professionals into this decision-making process to make sure you're not only getting the best possible pick, but also finding as many ideal candidates as you can. To see some of the roles that we at YES Partners have already successfully placed, click here.
Finding people is easy, but finding the RIGHT people is not. YES Partners helps companies FIND the right people for all company functions, across many industries.
