Oh God, What Have we Done?! There are certain moments in our lives when we all of a sudden become religious. In the world of HR, this usually happens when we think we just hired the the best talent with the perfect fit for our company, and then we get disappointed with their performance, early leave or termination. Sometimes, what appears to be a perfectly performed recruitment of a new star, the reality is not as great as we would like it to be.
Hiring the best talent by the book
We found the ideal candidate (a.k.a. candidate persona) for a job opening who seems to be the perfect fit for our company's culture.
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We did everything right. By the book. Professionally. We found him in the crowd. We took him out of the crowd. We fought the crowd. We managed to take him out from the crowd again. We followed him on social media and in his professional endeavors. We went after him into the cinema and even to bungee jump (because of which we still have severe nightmares).
After much time and money spent on finding high-quality candidates, we managed to have him for good.
We welcomed him as a star, as he is one, indeed. We did chase him using the allowed and half-allowed baits. That is what we do with our stars. And he is a star, proudly we claim.
His Induction went perfectly well. Everybody met him, and he met everybody. He got a great office, the best computer, and the best welcome present ever (we did our best, we gave him exactly what he wanted).
We gave him enough time to catch up, so he could start positively, bravely and hard.
And, now, we are waiting for our best talent to start performing. Well, he just needs more time. And, so, we are waiting. And waiting. And he does not move. He does not run. He does not fly. Nothing. He does work, but mediocrely. What he does, everybody could do. Especially somebody easier to find and employ. Especially, somebody cheaper.
Parents taught us that money spoils children. Later on, we learned ourselves, that money has the same negative impact on adults.
One of the possible reasons why your best talent does not shine is exactly this – he himself believes that he is a star.
And why wouldn’t he? You made so much effort, you gave him benefits, salary and bonuses that would make everybody dizzy.
If our first move was an amateur move of waving with banknotes (just so that they do not run away), it is likely that the rest of the battle would be just bargaining for a better offer. The bargaining itself should be a clear alarming sign. At that point, we should have understood that the candidate is not the perfect fit for us, and we should have given up on him. But, ok, we will do smarter next time.
We had no alternative solutions. The focus was only on him because he was perfect – as we taught back then. We had no bench with substitute players who would be ready to jump in upon his first “no”.
It is especially true when recruiting for top positions. We really need to make sure that we have a minimum of three stars, three candidates who are the subject of our desires, three stars to focus our time, effort and energy on. At the end of the game, there is only one winner. The other two give up or we give up on them. At least we know that we have got the right man.
This is the reason why everyone is talking about defining candidate personas before the hiring process even starts. Sometimes, what appears to be the ideal candidate, is not really that best fit that we are looking for. Yes, their skills may be over the top, but their personal characteristics also need to fit your organizational culture. That being said, take time to create your candidate persona BEFORE you start hiring.
Dear all, there are evil candidates who do their best to present themselves as good as possible. And they wrap themselves up very well. And we, the naive and fair ones, we sometimes just go for the packaging, hoping that what is inside is as shiny as the outside.
Our expectations were – wow! Yes, this is exactly what we expected - for him to come, and that everything will turn out to be – wow! And that is exactly what happened, just in the negative way. Wow – what a disaster.
All of us, sooner or later, come across a wall and we feel hopeless and desperate to find that perfect fit. Mistakes will always be there. We are all human beings. However, learn from your mistakes, and follow examples from others that have been following practices that work. The world of HR is changing, and you need to adapt to it in order to be successful. To begin, I would suggest you check out this list of books every HR professional should read.
Unsuccessful new hires will always happen. However, there is a way to reduce these mistakes to the very minimum!
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