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Want to hire faster in this new decade? Take these 3 steps

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Much is being written about hiring more quickly and the benefits of a faster process. Unfortunately, people often resist change (even positive change), especially when you try to modify a longstanding way of doing something. This is certainly true in recruiting and hiring. Speeding up the process can be met with intense resistance. Case in point…

At a meeting of a company’s leadership team, Paul thought the idea of fast hiring was “repulsive.” As we discussed how to plan the process, Paul started making passive-aggressive comments. After he said, “What’s next? We’re going to replace our employees with robots, like in that Will Smith movie?” I knew our discussion wasn’t addressing all of his concerns. I asked Paul to explain.

“People aren’t products,” he said angrily. “I can’t believe we’re even discussing such a dehumanizing approach. Picking the right people takes time. Interviews, even if they last all day, are a good investment of our time. We must make sure we’re picking the best people. Besides, good candidates won’t want to be rushed through the process. I’m finding this whole conversation repulsive. I’m sure my team will feel the same way.”           

Instead of trying to convince Paul to change his mind, I decided to let him change it himself.

“Paul, thanks for your honesty. I bet you’re not the only one with concerns about a faster approach.” Two other leaders nodded their heads in agreement. “What would you need to determine if this could work for the company?”

Paul thoughtfully paused before responding, “I’d need to see proof. Absolute proof that this will work for us.”

That led to a conversation about rolling out a faster hiring process on a limited basis to start. Two leaders, who didn’t share Paul’s concerns, agreed to test the process. Choosing a job common to both of their departments, we designed a plan and timeline that could be implemented without interrupting day-to-day business. Two other leaders, including Paul, were designated as auditors, outside observers who would monitor and document the pros and cons as the process was rolled out.

I met again with the leadership team after the beginning of the rollout. The two managers testing the process gave updates, sharing mostly positive news. They had made a few missteps along the way; however, both were upbeat. Both had filled two open jobs and lined up several additional candidates in their pipelines as potential future hires.

During their updates, I watched Paul out of the corner of my eye. He spent the entire time looking down at his notes. He appeared angry, even angrier than when he shared his concerns in our first meeting. I learned why when it was Paul’s turn to share pros and cons as an auditor of the test.

“I hate being wrong,” he said. “But, there it is. I was flat out wrong. There was nothing dehumanizing about a faster approach. If anything, it enabled interviewers to focus on people, not process. This shorter, simpler process allowed them to get to know each other better. Our new hires told me they loved our efficient process, and that it was a factor in choosing to work here.”

When recruiting and hiring, speed and accuracy are not mutually exclusive. Nor are speed and intimacy. A well-designed, well-executed recruiting and hiring process allows people to be fully present and have conversations that matter. These interactions build trust as candidates learn they are dealing with confident professionals, and hiring managers discover which candidates are ready to make a job change. This trust becomes the foundation for the employment relationship, one built on a professionally intimate and efficient hiring experience.

To help navigate through resistance as you work to speed up hiring in your organization, take these 3 steps:

Step1
Support people in changing their own mind

Trying to convince someone to see things differently is hard, sometimes impossible. Instead, let him or her do the heavy lifting. Ask a question like I did of Paul: What would you need to determine if faster hiring could work for your team? Integrate the responses into additional questions until you understand the root of the resistance and what will make it go away.

Step 2
Suggest a limited approach

Resistance isn’t always about the change itself. There are times when people want to change but are fearful of the overwhelm it may cause. A limited scope can help. Start with one role; run a short-term test; bring in outside help to lighten the load. By working together, you can drive forward a faster hiring process without driving people crazy with overwhelm and fear.

Step 3
Take the easy way out

Often the path of least resistance is in picking the right person. Seek out an early adopter in your organization, someone who’s known for being first in line to implement new ideas. Work together to plan and execute the rollout. Make adjustments as you learn what works and what does not. Once the speedier process is in place and producing positive results, ask your early adopter to share their experience with others. Nothing enrolls doubters faster than proof positive.

This new decade should include addressing the most vital part of your organization—its people. Having the right people, doing the right things, right when you need them is integral to your organization’s success. That’s why hiring quality people faster than ever is so important. Just don’t go it alone and avoid doing all the heavy lifting by taking the 3 suggested steps. Effective hiring is a team sport. Speeding up hiring requires a team effort.

Scott WintripWant to hire faster in this new decade? Take these 3 steps
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Harnessing the Power of Collective Effort

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A few blocks from my apartment in Osaka is a lovely park. Coming here is part of my morning routine as I spend this month in Japan.

As I sit watching this neighborhood in Fukushima Ward awaken, I notice movement out of the corner of my eye—a stream of people coming my way. Rakes and bags in hand, dozens of locals descend upon every nook and cranny and corner of the park.

Individually, they each gather up the leaves around them. Collectively, they bag all of the fallen leaves in 10 minutes. Work done, they stream back out, leaving the park clean and ready for others to enjoy.

I’ve noticed that this kind of collective effort is often overlooked in professional and personal endeavors. Instead of asking for help, we bear burdens and shoulder responsibilities by ourselves.

Why do we do this? My own reasons have varied. Pride kept me from asking for the help I needed. Concern that others wouldn’t meet my standards barred me from making requests. Fear that I’d be rejected kept me stuck doing more than one person should do.

Today I’m grateful that I’ve acquired a healthy habit of asking for help. Do I do this perfectly? Hell no! I’m still very human and very much a work in progress. But I’ve made progress and continue to do so.

How about you? Where in your personal or professional life could you benefit from some help? How could some collective effort move things forward faster? Who might assist you with a project and experience some benefits in doing so?

Scott WintripHarnessing the Power of Collective Effort
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Patrick Beharelle–Hiring Hero of the Week

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Meet this week’s Hero of Hiring–Patrick Beharelle. Patrick Beharelle is the CEO of TrueBlue, a publicly traded $3 billion staffing and recruitment services provider supporting over 160,000 clients across 70 counties. Patrick has over 20 years of experience in the staffing and recruitment industry and has leveraged that experienced for the good of thousands of people. Annually, TrueBlue places over 800,000 people into a mix of temp and full-time jobs. TrueBlue also hires over 30,000 military veterans into full-time careers annually. Patrick is leading the company’s digital transformation strategies, including an on-demand opportunities app for jobseekers (JobStack) and an award-winning cloud-based platform to improve candidate experience (Affinix). Because of his impact on people and companies, he was inducted into the Staffing Industry Analysts Staffing 100 Hall of Fame in 2018.

Patrick and TrueBlue are committed to supporting local communities and employment groups, including veterans and their families, by embracing a corporate theme of “doing well by doing good.”

Thank you Patrick for the heroic work you and your team do each day!

You can connect with Patrick on LinkedIn and Twitter.

____________________________________

ABOUT THE HEROES OF HIRING

We’ve all heard it said that a company’s most important asset is its people. When we say we love a company, what we’re really saying is we love the work being done by the exceptional people in these organizations. Talented employees who do outstanding work are the secret ingredients that make their companies great. That’s why recruiting and hiring is so important. Each person involved in the hiring process is influencing the future of their company. These individuals are also impacting one of the most important aspects of people’s lives—their careers. The individuals who play a role in the hiring process are changing companies and lives, making hiring a heroic act.

The hiring heroism of a select group of people goes above and beyond. These unsung hiring heroes are making a lasting difference on a grand scale. That’s the reason for this distinction—the Hiring Hero of the Week. The hope in bestowing this honor is that people across the globe can celebrate and learn from these truly amazing human beings.

Scott WintripPatrick Beharelle–Hiring Hero of the Week
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Beth Casey-Bellone–Hiring Hero of the Week

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Meet the latest Hero of Hiring–Beth Casey-Bellone of BCB Consulting. Beth is a Certified Human Resources Professional and Executive Career Coach who guides professionals in their quest for career fulfillment. During the past 8 years, she has led the design, development, and implementation of a corporate recruiting and human resources program for a company that provides residential services to luxury condominium, co-op, and rental communities throughout New Jersey. Starting with just 20 employees in 2011, Beth has led the hiring efforts of this fast growing organization, expanding the staff to 350 employees. To top it all off, the company more than doubles the industry employee retention average and gets 85% of its hires from employee referrals.

Thank you Beth for the heroic work you do each day!

You can connect with Beth on LinkedIn.

____________________________________

ABOUT THE HEROES OF HIRING

We’ve all heard it said that a company’s most important asset is its people. When we say we love a company, what we’re really saying is we love the work being done by the exceptional people in these organizations. Talented employees who do outstanding work are the secret ingredients that make their companies great. That’s why recruiting and hiring is so important. Each person involved in the hiring process is influencing the future of their company. These individuals are also impacting one of the most important aspects of people’s lives—their careers. The individuals who play a role in the hiring process are changing companies and lives, making hiring a heroic act.

The hiring heroism of a select group of people goes above and beyond. These unsung hiring heroes are making a lasting difference on a grand scale. That’s the reason for this distinction—the Hiring Hero of the Week. The hope in bestowing this honor is that people across the globe can celebrate and learn from these truly amazing human beings.

Scott WintripBeth Casey-Bellone–Hiring Hero of the Week
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Eliminate This Common Issue That Undermines Effective Recruiting and Hiring

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Most leaders agree that implementation and follow-through are required for business success. Organizations that execute their well thought out plans succeed, those that don’t fail. So why don’t people follow through on plans, especially for something as important as recruiting and hiring the right people? The answer may be staring you right in the face.

Take a look around your office or cubicle. Do the same when you get home tonight. When’s the last time you paid attention to the art or decorations you’ve put up at your home or office? Not just a quick glance, but really taking a moment to appreciate the beauty of a piece or remembering what attracted you to it in the first place. Most people admit that the only time they take notice is when someone asks them where they acquired a particular object or its significance. Simply put, after a while everything blends in, even things that are especially meaningful to us.

This is commonplace blindness. Once we get used to something, it becomes commonplace. We stop noticing it.

Smart product manufacturers understand commonplace blindness, which is why they change their packaging from time to time. They want us to keep paying close attention to their products. Last year, I remember seeing a soft drink can that had the colors of a well-known competing product. Just above the label on the can were the words “Great new look. Same great taste.” Did the new packaging work? It got my attention enough to mention it here.

Commonplace blindness happens every day in organizations across the globe, and it’s not only the art that’s being overlooked. Those signs espousing your recruiting best practices haven’t been noticed in months. The hiring process document that you ask people to keep on their desks is collecting dust. The interview checklist that was put on tablets for convenience is ignored after just a handful of meetings. Seeing these items becomes part of the routine. These items blend in, causing us to take them for granted and stop paying attention to them.

Leaders often have to remind people to do the very things noted on the walls, process documents, or screens because of commonplace blindness. The cure is relatively simple: change the packaging. You do that by altering the look, location, or liability.

You can alter the design, color, or formatting—the look. Moving the location, just like moving furniture, often recaptures attention. To shift the liability, delegate responsibility to team members for regularly modifying the look or location of key items of workplace significance.

What happens when organizations counter commonplace blindness by changing the look, location, or liability? Check out these recent successes:

  • A large tech company all but eliminated turnover during the first 90 days of employment as interviewers consistently followed every written step of the hiring and interview process.
  • A boutique ad agency tripled its flow of top talent when managers remembered to follow their proven and well-documented recipe for writing job posts.
  • A mid-market staffing firm doubled the number of candidates placed on assignment each week when staff stopped overlooking the very simple and powerful workflow for taking and validating job orders.
  • A global manufacturer sourced more quality candidates than they needed for hard-to-fill roles when the talent acquisition team stopped relying on their memory and followed their checklists for tapping into all of the streams of talent.

You’ve worked hard to build a company with hiring processes and interviewing systems that drive your business. By avoiding commonplace blindness, you’ll have your recruiting and hiring best practices doing what they are supposed to do.

Scott WintripEliminate This Common Issue That Undermines Effective Recruiting and Hiring
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3 Steps That Will Improve the Productivity of Your Recruiting or Staffing Team

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Are you struggling to improve the productivity of your recruiting or staffing team? Struggle no more because in this episode I’ve got 3 steps that will make that problem go away and stay away.

Scott Wintrip3 Steps That Will Improve the Productivity of Your Recruiting or Staffing Team
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Improve Candidate Experience and Engagement by Asking Better Questions

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We all love to hear ourselves talk, and we appreciate when others listen to us. In interviews, we can use this to our advantage by asking better questions. Questions that swiftly help us spot and avoid bad hires while also improving candidate experience and engagement.

What makes a question better? When it’s easily understood. Too often, our questions are confusing. We use too many words, overwhelming the listener.

There’s a science to asking great questions. Questions posed in the right manner are easily understood, allowing listeners to think carefully about their answers. You can actually see this happen. When people are asked compelling questions, they pause, think, and then respond. Their response is more thorough, accurate, and satisfying for everyone in the conversation.

The most effective manner of querying candidates is using “launching” questions. These provocative, open-ended questions are 12 words or less. Their brevity ensures that they are easily understood, launching people into giving detailed answers. Launching questions create conversational quid pro quo: The questioner wants to understand, and the respondent gets to be understood. Every response by the candidate can be turned into a new launching question, allowing you to develop an even deeper understanding.

What do launching questions sound like? Here are three such questions often used during a telephone interview.

“Why us?”
Motives are important. Knowing if your candidate is inspired by your company’s mission or just needs a job will help you pick the best people.

“Why now?”
When a candidate is actively searching for a job, knowing what’s driving that decision is important. Is the candidate desperate to make a change, ready to leap at the first offer? Or, is she simply open to a new opportunity that could make life even better? Knowing what’s driving someone’s behavior is vital in choosing the right people for your company.

“What job suits you best?”
Too often, interviewers ask candidates about their perfect job. Such a question sets the candidate and the employer up for failure since jobs and companies are rarely perfect. Instead of asking about perfection, ask about personal fit.

The mutually beneficial experience created by these questions has a number of payoffs. In a matter of minutes, you’ll gain insights as to what’s driving the candidate’s interest in the opportunity. You’ll quickly experience her listening skills and hear how effective she is in responding to your query. Her personality will show up, letting you begin to determine whether or not she’ll fit your culture. At the same time, she has a positive and engaging of experience of being thoroughly heard, especially as you take her responses and ask additional launching questions.

Launching questions are particularly important when you speak with passive candidates. Since these individuals aren’t actively looking for work, engaging them in a meaningful conversation can be a challenge. Not so when using launching questions. For example, when someone says they aren’t looking for a job, you could ask, “Under what circumstances would you consider something new?” If someone says they’re happy in their current role, you could pose, “What would make you happier?” Both examples engage talented people in a conversation about possibilities.

Many efforts to improve candidate experience and engagement are time consuming and costly. Some of these efforts work well, creating a positive ROI. Others fall short, wasting time and money. Launching questions are a quick to implement cost-free way to create guaranteed ROI. The investment of time in asking better questions will inform and inspire both interviewers and candidates, creating an engaging and memorable hiring experience.

Scott WintripImprove Candidate Experience and Engagement by Asking Better Questions
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Natalie Singer–Hiring Hero of the Week

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This week’s Hero of Hiring, Natalie Singer, hails from South Africa. As a Recruitment Business Mentor and Trainer for Talent3sixty, she combines her talent management experience and marketing background to provide training, branding, strategy, business development and mentorship solutions to recruiters and recruitment businesses. Being of service is the hallmark of Natalie’s career. She was the CEO of South Africa’s professional body for staffing, APSO, from 2007 – 2014. Under her leadership, APSO won the inaugural South African Chamber of Commerce & Industry Association of the Year Award in 2011, and she helped APSO qualify for three professional designations with the South African Qualifications Authority. She’s also served the global recruitment community as a board member of the World Employment Confederation.

Natalie’s efforts in improving recruiting and hiring have not gone unnoticed. She received special acknowledgment from the South African Presidency for her work with the Joint Initiative for Priority Skills Acquisition Importation Advisory Group. Her involvement with the Confederation of Associations for the Private Employment Services has helped secure effective regulation and enforcement for the recruitment industry.

Natalie lends her informed voice to professionals worldwide by presenting at conferences and events, speaking on recruitment, talent management, world of work, equal pay for work of equal value, and labor law amendments. Recently, she was one of 12 global industry experts invited to present at the global recruitment conference Big Biller Summit.

Thank you Natalie for your tireless service and the heroic work you do each day!

You can connect with Natalie on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook.

____________________________________

ABOUT THE HEROES OF HIRING

We’ve all heard it said that a company’s most important asset is its people. When we say we love a company, what we’re really saying is we love the work being done by the exceptional people in these organizations. Talented employees who do outstanding work are the secret ingredients that make their companies great. That’s why recruiting and hiring is so important. Each person involved in the hiring process is influencing the future of their company. These individuals are also impacting one of the most important aspects of people’s lives—their careers. The individuals who play a role in the hiring process are changing companies and lives, making hiring a heroic act.

The hiring heroism of a select group of people goes above and beyond. These unsung hiring heroes are making a lasting difference on a grand scale. That’s the reason for this distinction—the Hiring Hero of the Week. The hope in bestowing this honor is that people across the globe can celebrate and learn from these truly amazing human beings.

Scott WintripNatalie Singer–Hiring Hero of the Week
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Here’s How to Get Staffing Salespeople to Book More Business

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Do you ever wonder why your salespeople aren’t hitting their revenue or profit targets? Or why salespeople in other firms are outperforming the people on your team? In this episode I tackle both questions and show you how to get the salespeople on your team to book more business and crush their goals.

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Scott WintripHere’s How to Get Staffing Salespeople to Book More Business
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