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Without people you simply don’t have a business. Your success, growth and culture are determined by who is leading your company.
So what can you do to hire the best people?
Here are the 10 steps to get hiring top talent right:
1 - Self-Awareness
Who are you? What’s important to you? What are your values?
You need to hire people who are better than you, people who compliment you and who plug the gap in the skills you don’t have.
If you don’t know this you won’t know what to look for in the people you meet and candidates you interview.
2 - Clarify Your Vision & Culture
What is your why? What is the purpose of your business?
What problem are you trying to solve? What is your big picture blue sky vision?
What culture do you want to create?
Write it all down.
3 - Define What Success Looks Like
There are more words in the English language to describe failure than success. And our brains are wired to pay attention to the negative.
That’s why it’s so important (and hard) to define what success will look like for your business.
Is it becoming the number one in your market? Being profitable or is it the pace of growth?
4 - WHO Do You Need in Your Business?
What skills, qualifications and qualities do the key hires need to have to achieve success?
Define the HARD skills they will need - things that the candidate will either have or not have - e.g marketing, operations, working with excel or photoshop etc.
Then, define the SOFT skills and ATTITUDES - such as how someone handles creatives differences, uncertainty, working with limited resources, how hard they push an innovative idea, communication skills, persuasion, resilience
Create a score card.
5 - Get All Stakeholders On Board
Let’s face it, it’s lonely at the top, and making decisions on your own leaves a lot of blind spots.
Get all stakeholders on board, your advisors, chairs, other founding members, senior leadership team, everyone that has an opinion about and interest in who gets hired.
6 - Standardise Your Recruitment Process & Beware of Your Unconscious Bias
You’ve got everyone on board, you’ve put the sign outside your door saying “hiring’, you’ve put an advert on LinkedIn, asked family and friends for recommendations, or heaven forbid you hired a headhunter.
The candidates are pouring in and now you need to interview them.
Ask the SAME questions to each candidate and RATE them on the score card.
Use Behavioural Questions - for example if you are looking for Resilience - you can ask - “Tell me of a time when a project was failing, and you went above and beyond for this client?” send me an email if you’d like to have a long list of these questions.
7 - Compromise On Skills But Not On Culture Fit
Skills can be taught but changing a person’s attitude is extremely difficult.
Interview for the type of behaviour you require for your culture - for example, if you’re interviewing for how a person handles making mistakes - listen for things like - do they take responsibility for their actions or do they always find someone to blame?
It will help you avoid hiring people based on what they wear and what schools they went to.
8 - Get The Candidate To Accept The Offer
In a competitive market job acceptances are 70%. So 30% of the time it’s a ‘no’.
Don’t take the first ‘no’ as an answer. Try to understand what it takes to be a ‘yes’.
And remember that Candidates are also Buyers so sell your business at every step of the interview process not just when you are making an offer.
9 - Future Proof Your Talent Pool
It’s very tempting to stop recruiting when all the immediate roles are filled, but hiring shouldn’t be a last minute necessity, it should be a constant effort.
The best companies continuously develop strategies to identify and map talent. They also take it one step further and maintain relationships with them.
An excellent headhunter can do that for you, but you can also build your own.
10 - Take Care Of Your People / Foster Psychological Safety
If people don’t stay - you won’t be able to grow your business. Not only will you need to replace them, but people talk. In the social media age - news of toxic cultures spread like wildfire.
So take care of your people, because they will take care of your customers, growth and if you’re lucky talk about you to their neighbour who might just be your next rockstar candidate.
So what did I miss in these 10 steps to hiring high performing teams?
Are you looking for help growing your team? We can help. At HVO Search, we work with Founders and CEOs across beauty, luxury, fashion, and wellness, and understand what (and who) it takes to elevate their businesses.
If you’re looking to hire an agile, innovative, and dynamic leader, head over to www.hirewithmaria.com