Selecting right! - Part One
Its is often said that business is all about people. That statement is true more often than not. People form a critical part of the value chain that is an organizations lifeblood. Yet too often it is given the least importance. Poor processes and systems can perform better when staffed with competent and knowledgeable workers. Yet it is often this area that gets the least attention.
In the information technology arena the malady displays the same basic symptoms. These are high turnover, high absenteeism and work related injuries, under performance and a penchant for gaming 'the system'. When one considers the time, effort and resources spent by an organization in recruiting, training and compensating an employee, one realizes quickly that a software architect and technical project manager cannot relegate the hiring process to the human resources department alone. Indeed even business managers more often than not lack the knowledge to effectively evaluate employees via the blunt tool of an interview.
In the next three essays I will attempt to enumerate what I believe to be the essentials for selecting right.
1 - Understand the role
Perhaps the most important ingredient to success in any endeavor is preparation. Towards this end before one even looks at the resume of a potential hire one should read and re-read the job description. This helps you get a good grasp of what the job entails. Next understand the role. Some of the question that will help you understand the role include:
What will that employee being doing on a day to day basis?
What are the characteristics of successful individuals in that role?
What are the demands and rewards it offers?
The answers to these questions will act as a reality check. They should be used to vet the job description you have been furnished. A manager I knew said "I do not have the time to research what goes on in her department, I am too busy with my own. She should just give me the A members on her team". Essentially this person is saying that he prefers to spend more time training, being frustrated with, firing and then asking for a new person on the team. Indeed selecting right is not just about doing yourself a favor it is about doing the potential recruit a favor. An employee invests as much time into a firm as then firm does in him/her.
2 - Define the goals
When recruiting for a position an effective manager must ensure that the goals that the individual must meet are clearly understood right at the outset. This is where a lot of body shop and recruiting firms fail. A lot of these smaller firms are very resume focused. Accordingly, they strive to present resumes that are an "exact match". Some of these attempts lead to hilarious results while others can border on being fraudulent. Indeed an individual with a resume that exactly matches the job description should be regarded with a grain of salt. More often than not these resumes are the byproduct of a "keyword search" driven business environment rather than a diligent and extensive search.
3 - Set expectations
I find this phase to be key in the preparatory stage of the interviewing process. While pre-set expectations can lead to a bias they are a double edged sword. A savvy architect must be willing to go in with a minimal set of expectations because of the benefit that comes with them. When one goes into the interview process with a clear idea of what you want from a potential recruit you will find the courage to reject an entire set of candidates if they do not meet your needs. This can be a very tough thing to do. The pressure from the human resources department can be intense. Indeed the pressure from stakeholders can be worse. Your project's stakeholders will want to see results and nothing worries them more, at times, than seeing empty chairs.
In fact, as a client, you should be especially wary of a few ploys your consulting firm will use to induce an acceptance from you. For example, you may be presented with an initial set of sub-standard consultants followed by a decent one. In such an event, the relative qualifications of the last candidate may tempt you to ease the pain of having to reject yet another candidate. Indeed some human resource managers will screen you out from some selection steps if they believe that you are a "high bar" or, less euphemistically, "difficult" interviewer.
to be continued
posted by vivek pinto @ 2:39 PM
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