Hiring the Right People For Your Company

By: Dominique Singer
As a business owner, you might often wonder how do I hire the right people for my specific company? Sure many candidates might be qualified for the position, but are they the right fit to work for you?

There are many ways you can ensure you always hire the right person. Whether you are the CEO of the company or a hiring manager, starting with understanding your own company’s culture is the first step. Accessing your company’s mission can help match candidates' personalities with the overall values of the company as well. As a boss, what mindset are you looking for in a potential employee? What specific qualities would best fit with other members on your team? Asking yourself questions like these first can help make certain they perform well once hired.

Continuing on, creating a well structured job description reflecting the responsibilities, level of skill and experience required can also secure a candidate that fits all the traits you want them to have or tasks they need to perform. If you do not know exactly what you are looking for in a candidate it is going to be more difficult to hire the “right person” for the job.

Furthermore, when the interview comes around, having more than one interviewer helps weed out bias and encourages collaboration. Including those that would be directly working with whomever is hired is highly suggested since they will have the most individual time with them. Structurly, throughout the interview process you want to develop a way to rate all potential candidates whether that looks like a scorecard or a simple vote for your company. Having a way to compare all potential employees will help in the long run. Lastly, while interviewing, it is best to use behavior based interviewing techniques. You may even present them with a scenario based question in which they are put in a difficult situation. This approach allows candidates to describe past experiences and challenges they have faced. Not only can these anecdotes relate to problems they may face in your company, but they also help get a sense of the candidate's personality. The way someone handles conflict says a lot about them, which difficult questions can help tap into that side of someone. Past performance most often than not reflects future performance.

Post- interview, every position and company is different. Another tip to ensuring you have hired the right person for the company is providing a test of some sort if that fits the job description. If an employee is going to be using Excel on a daily basis, why not test them in their knowledge of the program. This applies to any skills an employee would have to perform ranging from presenting sales pitches or even just driving a truck.

Circling back to your culture and values as a company, only focusing on someone's resume and cover letter does more bad than good. Asking questions about their ambitions, interests and priorities can help ensure they really value and want to work for your company. Studies show asking for references also helps really capture the individual's personality and work ethic as a whole which you want to have access to as well.

​Once you think you found the one, bring them onboard! Having a developed onboarding and welcoming process can increase your retention rate as a company. In the end, every company and every position within a company is unique to one another. Hiring is like dating, it is a long and tedious process, but helps you find the eone! These tips can help personalize the interview and hiring process when searching for the perfect candidate.