Far Out Scout’s Approach To Hiring
The biggest mistake hiring managers make is judging candidates based on their ability to give good interviews. A confident interview can hide weak execution. A quieter candidate can still be excellent at the work.
To hire well, start with what the job actually requires. Then screen candidates against the same criteria:
- Performance profiles - Use the job's duties, outcomes, and responsibilities as your criteria instead of relying only on skills, experience, or personality traits.
- Objective evaluations - Use basic questions to assess an interviewee’s competency accurately. Look at how well the person has performed in the past since that is the best predictor of future performance.
- Wide-ranging sourcing - Treat sourcing like targeted outreach. Understand what would make a strong candidate want this role, then write to that.
- Emotional control - Dampen your natural tendency to rely too much on your intuition and emotions when you make a hiring decision. Personality is an important consideration, but depend on performance measures first.
- Recruit right - Treat the hiring conversation as consultative. Learn what the candidate wants, explain the real opportunity, and let both sides decide whether it fits.
Hiring for Job Requirements Rather than Skills
Before you evaluate people, define the work. Everyone involved in hiring should agree on what successful performance means, including a prioritized list of deliverables and outcomes. Use that profile to filter candidates, guide interviews, compare finalists, and review the new hire after they start.
Use the "SMARTe" method to set performance objectives that are specific, measurable, action-oriented, results-defined, time-based, and grounded in your company's environment. The point is to define the job itself, not an imaginary perfect person. Strong employees care about what they will do and learn, so focus on the results you need them to achieve.
- Macro Approach - List measurable objectives for each major element in the job, including technical skills, team skills and management issues.
- Micro Approach - Set objective measures for competency in each required skill.
- Benchmarking Approach - Examine the traits of the best people already doing related jobs and look for similar traits in prospective candidates.
The Four Key Interview Questions
A successful person is self-motivated, achieves intended results, solves real problems in real time, and can motivate and inspire others. Your interview questions should assess these qualities, of which self-motivation is the most important. These qualities predict high level job performance according to the Power Hiring Formula, which says that future performance can be forecast by estimating talent, energy, team leadership potential, comparable past performance and job-related problem solving ability.
To see if a person has these qualities, the key interview questions, in priority order, are:
- What is your most significant career accomplishment? Describe two or three other major accomplishments you achieved as an individual and as part of a team.
- How would you solve a typical problem on the job? Give the person an example of a real-time problem he or she might face. This is the "visualization question."
- What have you done in your current position and what is the biggest impact or change as a result of your work? This is the "impact question."
- What have you accomplished that is similar to the job for which you are applying? This is the job competency question.
Use a formal opening and close, and ask questions that reveal the person’s character and cultural fit with your organization.
How to Evaluate the Candidate after Your First Interview
Beyond the initial one-on-one interview, get additional information to help you make an objective decision. Check references, conduct panel interviews, assign take-home projects and give tests to assess skills, interests and motivation. Verifying the person’s background and references are especially important. This 10-point qualifying checklist can help you make a balanced assessment of a variety of factors, which are:
- Energy, drive and initiative.
- Trend of individual and team performance over time.
- Comparability of past accomplishments with your performance objectives.
- Experience, education and background in the industry.
- Skill in solving problems and thinking (technical, tactical and creative intelligence).
- Overall talent, technical skill level and potential for growth.
- Managerial and organizational skills, if relevant to the job.
- Team leadership in being able to motivate and persuade others.
- Character values, goals and commitment.
- Personality and fit with the culture of your organization.
Watch for repeated red flags: vague answers, weak ownership, poor listening, or a pattern of blaming others. At the same time, keep recruiting the candidate. Strong people are deciding whether they want the role, not just waiting to be chosen. Before you formalize an offer, test the important pieces: salary, start date, working hours, benefits, and any deal-breakers.
Hiring High Caliber Employees
Hire strong employees in the first place, because weak candidates generally never become very good employees, no matter how hard you work with them. To hire the best, create a systematic approach and use it at all levels of your company’s hiring process. Avoid the most common hiring mistakes, including:
- Using skill-based ads that ask for too many skills or filter out top candidates who don’t have every skill listed.
- Having poor recruiters who are trained as salespeople instead of as career consultants.
- Not explaining what the real job is.
- Emphasizing money and benefits rather than the job’s career growth potential.
- Qualifying a candidate based on interview performance, rather than on motivation and ability to do the work.
Since the best candidates seek careers rather than jobs, frame the jobs you offer in terms of "challenges, major accomplishments and team building needs," rather than just highlighting "skills, experience and requirements," which is how most employment ads are written.
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