It’s Time to Stop the Insanity of Bad Hires

Hiring the right people for your team is never easy. But it’s even harder when unemployment is at record lows and we’re facing a skills shortage. There’s a reason why talent attraction and retention are now some of the most commonly cited concerns for CEOs. 

If we had to make a guess, we’d wager that you’re feeling the squeeze as well. Hiring will always be tougher during labor shortages…but truth be told, the way companies hire is also completely crazy! 

The Same Old Broken Cycle 

If you’re a leader, you’re familiar with the classic scenario. 

1. We identify a need to hire a new team member, and the best time to hire them was yesterday. 
2. Our recruiter sends us some candidates, but none of them quite fit. 
3. We ask for more candidates, but still, none of them are what we’re looking for. 
4. We hire the best out of the candidates, even though it feels like we’re settling – the position just has to be filled. 
5. We pay the price for that decision 6-12 months later (18 if we’re lucky) 
6. And we’re back to step one. 

And so we start the process over again, rushing to find quality candidates that weren’t there before and hoping something will be different this time around. 

We get hit with all the same consequences of bad hires or open seats. Team morale takes a big hit. Our performance suffers. And worst of all, we can see our bottom-line sagging. It’s high time we worked out a proactive solution to this vicious cycle. 

It’s time to stop the insanity. 

We Need to Rethink the Way We Hire 

Have you ever heard the saying, “the nine most dangerous words in business are “We’ve always done it this way?” 

At face value, everything about the traditional recruiting process makes sense. But let’s dig a little deeper – there’s more cracks here than a lot of people realize. 

• Companies still work with agencies that charge commissions, even though that clearly sets up a conflict of interest between cash flow and quality of hire. When they work by commission, recruiters are motivated to rush the process rather than take the time to vet and engage the best candidates. Why take a few more days to find the best candidate when you can submit a passable candidate for your check today? 
• Leaders still work with recruiters that don’t take the time to understand their unique needs. We wonder why we’re not getting better candidates, when the recruiter never asked us in-depth questions about what we need for a position. Great recruiters serve as talent consultants to learn about our needs and make suggestions about what candidates would best fit our team. 
• We make hiring decisions without any data, even though every other business process is now guided by data. People analytics are available that let us predict how someone will perform in a given position. Instead, we still select candidates based on gut feel, interview performance, and resume, even though we know these are notoriously unreliable selection tools. 

When you step back and take a look at the bigger picture, there’s only one conclusion…it’s insane to expect positive results with the traditional recruiting process. 

Time to Stop the Insanity 

It’s high-time we stopped accepting the status quo. When 50% of all new hires are failing within 18 months, it’s time to try something new.