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Management Training: Tips for Recruitment Management

02 August 2013
effective-recruitment

Selection interviews are synonymous with the recruitment process but are interviews alone the most effective method of finding the right person as part of your recruitment management process?

Many people are recruited on their ability to perform well in an interview, whereas in fact the actual role they will be performing has little or nothing to do with being interviewed. Statistically, if your recruitment mangement strategy involves interviewing alone, you have no more than a 40% chance of finding the right person, assuming of course that you are using a competency based interview.

Many people are recruited on their ability to perform well in an interview, whereas in fact the actual role they will be performing has little or nothing to do with being interviewed.  Statistically, if your recruitment management strategy involves interviewing alone, you have no more than a 40% chance of finding the right person, assuming of course that you are using a competency based interview.

 It’s interesting that Google have recently given up on the so called extreme interviews, where candidates are asked questions such as “how many golf balls can you fit into an aeroplane?” 

Whilst you may gain an insight into how creative your candidate is, there is doubt as to how this type of question will help you to predict how well somebody will perform in their role. This type of interview leaves you with no more than a 24% chance of selecting the right person.

Here are some ideas to significantly enhance the likelihood of finding the right person for your business when recruiting:

  1. Consider up to 6 talents or traits that the successful candidate needs to be good at in order to be successful in the role. For example, you may require somebody who is tenacious, client focused, creative with excellent written communication skills.

  2. Design a competency based question for each of the traits you have identified. Look out for a follow up blog which will focus on how to structure an interview and ask effective competency based questions.

  3. Identify a task or activity that you could include in the recruitment management process to test the candidate’s ability. For example, you may ask somebody applying for a financial based role to look at a set of accounts and draw some conclusions from them. Combining a well-structured interview with an ability test will give you a greater than 70% chance of finding the right candidate.

  4. When you do conduct the interview, ensure that the interview itself is conducted by a minimum of two people. This will increase your chances of gaining an objective perspective and will enable the interviewer to focus on asking the questions without having to worry about taking notes at the same time.

  5. You may also wish to consider other recruitment tools such as personality questionnaires, numerical and verbal reasoning tests through to less obvious techniques such as graphology and astrology. Whichever route you take, ask yourself whether this tool is directly related to the specific role you are recruiting for and how it adds value.

For more tips on recruitment, or to learn more about our recruitment management training, please call us on 01295 675506 for a free consultation.

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