Mis-hires are the biggest cost to an organization.

They cost you significant time, money and organizational momentum – which I believe is the biggest cost of all.

An epic fail.

Last week a peer group member shared with us an “epic fail”.

He had hired a manager who seemed to have great potential,

…but over time it became clear that the manager didn’t have all the skills needed, and he rubbed his peers the wrong way.

When they finally released him, the owner heard from the team what a poor fit this person was.

Everyone was upset by the chaos of this hire.

The owner realized he should have made a decision quicker to “promote this person to another company.”

Sound familiar?

To avoid this fate in the future, here are five tips.

5 Tips for Hiring with More Confidence.

1. Chronological question asking.

It’s common to ask someone about their most recent job first, and then the job before that – but it’s an awkward approach.

You get a clearer picture when you ask someone to take you through their history in chronological order.

It’s easier to grasp the arc of their career, look for holes, and understand the transitions from job to job.

2. No trick questions.

Everyone has their favorite interview question, but I believe there is no better question than to dig into the fundamentals.

• Have they achieved similar results before?
• What parts of the job and your company are they most attracted to?
• What do they value most?

To help with this, use a job scorecard.

Have the 5 top skills/responsibilities and the 5 top results listed out for the position, so that the candidate can be scored on their job fit by all people interviewing them.

3. Hold your interviews from different places.

It’s easy to get into a rut when you hold the interviews from the same spot, e.g. always behind your desk.

To help you form new impressions, hold the interviews in different places.

And if it’s for a field position, hold at least one interview in the field or shop or from your truck.

4. The Wisdom of the Team.

To help you identify if they are a good fit, have their new team members do some of the interviews.

To get clarity on the cultural fit, you need to have your core values written down and universally understood by your team — otherwise, everyone will be following their own compass.

Btw, you can develop some questions around each value by using Chat GPT, or an HR expert.

5. Hire with their first promotion in mind.

As you hire key positions, vet them for both the current role and their next role as well.

This will help you see more clearly if they are competent for today’s job.

It will also set you up for future success, by hiring people who are easily trainable for the next level.

Hiring better people may raise your payroll costs by e.g. 10%, but it will also help you earn a higher ROI and build a stronger organization.

Stay focused on the output!

“A poor hire will cost you money, and a great hire will make you money.” Jeffrey Scott

Your Challenge – slow down, so you can hire faster

There are of course many other tools you can use, like how you ask for references, doing back ground checks, etc.

My most successful clients are systematic with their hiring process.

• They have taken time to develop the tools and a methodology
• They are always hiring, looking for great people to help you scale.
• They cut bait quickly when they mis-hire.

Get team buy-in: more eyes on the candidate help avoid those epic failures.

Our secret interviewing technique.

Ask the candidate to videotape themselves answering a couple of key questions – about what excites them most regarding your firm and the job.

The ’secret’ is: they tend to gravitate/talk about what they like best, and it shows who they are at their core.

Like winning at any sport, it’s all about the fundamentals

Slow down, get the process dialed in, and then you can speed up by getting proactive.

Regards, Jeffrey Scott

P.S. If you are signed up for our Summer Growth Summit, you will learn more tips and tricks for recruiting and building a first class team.

It’s not too late to sign up for this powerhouse event!