After reading a couple of blogs from the Harvard Business Review Blog Network–“Don’t Hire the Perfect Candidate” and “Why Employers Aren’t Filling Their Open Jobs”–it’s apparent that the recruiting process is broken…and not just for the reasons mentioned in these posts. The problem starts with our love of lists: grocery lists, to do lists, wishlists, top 10 lists, you name it. Companies and recruiters tend to believe they can apply this list mentality to finding the best people for a given role. So what do they do? They create a list of everything “the successful candidate” must have. There are two major reasons why this doesn’t work.
- It ends up wasting a lot of people’s time.
- It forces people to be lazy about assessing candidates.
Time gets wasted in numerous ways: people trying to figure out if they check enough boxes to get in the door; job seekers stretching the truth about their experience, hoping for that interview; recruiters and hiring managers discussing or interviewing candidates who don’t really meet the list criteria; and on and on. It’s a mess.
When the recruiter or hiring manager has this massive list of credentials, that’s exactly what they use to determine how viable a candidate is. It’s not efficient; it’s lazy. Worse, they are likely missing out on exceptional candidates because they don’t have the exact experience or pedigree enumerated in the job posting. Remember that the leaders of Enron and most of the recruits to the investment companies and mortgage houses that led the way to the recession also checked a lot of boxes on a lot of job posts. Look where that got them.
Just because people match the list it does not mean they will have automatic success in the role. How do they contribute to culture? How do they respond to certain situations?
Both authors of the HBR blog posts recommend a mix of investing more in recruitment and retention, reassessing the market and lowering expectations. While there may be validity to those, I would start with a much simpler premise–ditch the list. Instead, create a profile that matches the individual with the role. Doing so successfully really requires three things:
- A brief narrative (about 100 words) about the characteristics valued in the person
- The strategic intent of the role (no more than three bullets; more than that and you’re getting too tactical)
- What a typical day in the life looks like
This is a challenging process, no doubt, and takes time to get it right. But the beauty of it is that it forces you to truly think about how the role contributes to the overall success of the organization and the kind of person who will be the best fit.
More qualified candidates will apply. You will review their cover letters and resumes differently. Your interviewing process will change as well. Most importantly, you will do a much better job of bringing real talent into your organization, not just a bunch of box checkers. And the organization will, in turn, be even more successful.
Finding Greatness 