Michele Harmon
This month I’m going to talk with you about hiring the right people. In October, I reviewed the basics of hiring and firing but I want to talk about making the right hire. Why the reference to the Ides of March? It is because Julius Caesar was assassinated and if you also remember your Roman history, Caesar was warned over and over again by the soothsayer to beware the Ides, or at least Shakespeare said so. Caesar ignored him, went to the Senate, and met his demise.
Who do you think was really to blame for Caesar’s death? While you ponder that question—because there is never a simple answer for most tragedies—I would like to you to consider how you make your critical hiring decisions.
Everyone knows that the smartest person in the room is the guy or gal that surrounds themselves with the smartest people. The successful guy or gal is emotionally intelligent (EI), right? I summarize EI as the ability of an individual to demonstrate good judgment and act for the greater good of the organization. Leaders with EI encourage a great workplace culture. Therefore, they hire the best and brightest that will not just fit their organization but who will also have the ability, courage, and drive to move the organization forward.
I encourage you to always look beyond the packaging of the applicant. You need to hire someone with the meat and potatoes first and foremost to do the job and not someone that can just talk the talk. When you hire a salesperson, have another salesperson sitting with you. If you have never been a salesperson, then you may not be able to see the red flags. If you want to hire a future controller, then the current controller needs to interview the candidates. The red flags will be flapping in our West Texas wind like nobodies business. Watch for the flags and don’t ignore others’ warnings because, if you do, then nine times out of ten you will make a poor hiring decision.
I recently assisted in hiring a critical position for a fast growing, stable company with thoughtful leaders. I met with several applicants and came to the same conclusion as the others who had interviewed the candidates. There was a well-qualified candidate with a long record of stable tenure with organizations in the oil and gas industry, someone who was only looking for a new job because, after many years, that person had been laid off.
Let’s diagnose that sentence. One, they were well qualified. Second, they had long tenures in a sometimes-volatile industry. Third, they were only looking for a new job because they had lost their job after many years. What a perfect candidate, right? That individual should have been selected but was not. The decisionmaker for hiring—or, shall we say, the executive who was the buck-stops-here person—hired someone else. I knew in every fiber of my being, that it was going to happen. Only time will tell who was right but if the decisionmaker was incorrect, how much did it cost that decisionmaker to hire the wrong person?
So how do you get it right?
I recommend that you do what you can to avoid any type of bias in the hiring process. Start by reworking the job description. Job descriptions are not written to fit a person, they are written to reflect the skills, expertise, and education that is minimally required to do the job.
Post your job on job boards with a brief job description. Use an assessment to screen out those without the basic skills and expertise. If you post a job on Indeed.com, and I am not advertising for them, you get to select at least one set of questions geared to the job title. I have tried it and it works well to eliminate the wrong candidates.
Review resumes without looking at the applicant’s name. Names alone may indicate a person’s background. Train or at least discuss with those involved in the hiring process what bias is and acknowledge that we have many unconscious biases against those that are different from us. The interview committee absolutely must have representation from different ethnic, racial, age, and gender groups. If everyone is over 50, the Millennial has less of a chance of getting the job. There is nothing worse than walking a female candidate into a room of all white men between 45 and 60 years of age. If she is an awesome candidate, she will also know that her chances are slim to none in getting the job because of interview bias. Odds are those guys are going to select someone they will feel comfortable with. We just do not live in a perfect world and have to acknowledge it when it comes to bias.
When you hire, involve those with similar roles, as well as others at similar levels in the organization, and have a great HR leader present throughout the hiring journey. Get objective input using a structured interview approach and score the candidates. A structured interview asks every candidate the same questions and you have the same interview committee for every candidate. This process helps you select the right applicant and can also prevent you from a claim of discrimination. Retain the structured interview questions and answers for all the candidates you interviewed for one year in case you have a discrimination claim made against you to the EEOC. Train your interview team on what to write on those forms. Do not allow them to make personal comments on the form because it is in writing and can be subpoenaed. If the person says a cuss word then write it down but do not allow them to write down that the person looks like the Green Hornet or, worse, Wonder Woman.
With the candidate’s written permission, check references—and friends are not good references. You need to speak to or receive written feedback from at least two supervisors whom the finalists have worked for in the past ten years. If the person on the other line, or on the computer, does not respond, then you have your answer. If the previous supervisor works where there is a policy of only telling potential employers the dates of employment and the title, then, if there are good things to say, you will often still hear them. This works as good advice for you too. I have a true war story where a candidate’s previous employer discredited him and the candidate had a friend call the same former employer, with the friend posing as someone seeking a reference on the same candidate. The anwers were, again, discrediting answers. In came the lawyers. If you don’t have anything nice to say, then don’t say anything at all.
Hiring the wrong person costs time and money because of the cost of posting the job, the cost of a recruiter, the time it takes away from managing your business to interview, etc.
If you realize you have made a poor hiring decision, then you have several choices. You can try to coach the person, which takes time and money and the longer they work for you, the more unemployment it will cost you if you terminate them. If you fire them without spending time training them, then no harm no foul right? Texas is an At Will state but federal law prohibits you from discriminating against a protected class. The list can be found on the TWC site, but the only non-protected class is a white male under 40. So, fire away at your own risk.
However, don’t keep the wrong person around too long. You cannot put lipstick on a pig. I can almost guarantee the culture of your organization will suffer, your employees’ productivity will decrease, key employees will leave, and you will lose customers and revenue.
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“Your employees are the heart of your organization.” Dr. Michele Harmon is a Human Resource professional, supporting clients in Texas and New Mexico that range in size from five to more than 3,000 employees. She is also President of the Permian Basin Society of Human Resources. Email: micheleharmon1@gmail.com