April 25th, 2008 by kchristmas
In the last blog, how the Applicant Tracking System can make or break recruitment efforts and impact retention was discussed. Another issue that has a strong impact on retention is who stays at your organization. If superstars are working alongside poor performers, you may have a large problem. And this could be impacting who remains in your organization.
Keeping marginal performers for months – or years- sends a strong message to your best employees. The message is, ‘It does not matter how you perform on this unit. If you can fog a mirror, you can stay.’
Although it is a fact that not everyone has the potential to be a star performer, everyone should be making a valid contribution to the work of the department. There must be minimum standards of competence, attitude and aptitude that apply to ALL employees. If they are not met, there should be a systematic way to either help marginal performers improve or move them along in their employment journey.
Retaining poor performers does not help them. If a person is not suited to a role or is not performing, deal with it. Although it may be disagreeable to confront individuals who are under-performing, doing so shows your best performers that they are valued. For if it unpleasant for a manager to discipline an marginal worker, imagine how difficult it is to work a shift beside someone who is unengaged, uninvolved, unsuited for the position or unsafe?
And the fact is, if you do NOT deal with marginal performers, you will lose your best. When they become fed up with how certain individuals are allowed to slide while they are held to a higher standard, a typical response is to leave the department to seek a work setting where performance is valued and rewarded.
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April 15th, 2008 by kchristmas
If your ATS (Applicant Tracking System) does not allow you to screen out inappropriate responses, it is time to sit down and have a serious conversation with your vendor. Most systems have the capability to add ‘knock out’ questions on the front end. If your ATS does not, there are products out there that can be added to enable screening. Some even rate the ‘best’ candidates based on specific criteria.
This screening helps the recruiter to respond rapidly to the best, and bring them in to meet with hiring managers, thus cutting down time to fill and minimizing the possibility that you will lose great candidates.
Another question about your ATS – has it been purged lately? How often do you scour the database to check for good candidates who have ‘slipped through the cracks’ and to remove duplicates? This should be a regular event to keep the size of the database manageable and to enable quick searches.
Interview Process
Interviewing is an area where recruiters can make a huge impact, but fewer and fewer do formal interviewing. When recruiters simply screen applications and pass them on to hiring managers, they have lost much of their ability to add value to the process, and burdened the hiring manager with the brunt of the work.
Recruiters need a solid understanding of each of their areas of responsibility, and the ‘fit factors’ for each area. In addition, recruiters who are in touch with their hiring managers know those managers’ goals for their areas. If you have never done interviews, you will need to be trained. Many consider interviewing a ‘natural’ ability, but the best have had formal training.
This objective assessment provides a framework for candidate referral that encompasses the basics (such as the job requirements) as well at the ‘big picture’ (or ‘fit factors’) for the unit or department. Recruiters may be called upon to ‘sell’ the candidate to the hiring manager as well as selling the candidate on the opportunity. If you are out of the loop in this integral part of the process, ask for more responsibility.
Recruiter screenings and preliminary interviews ensure that hiring criteria for the system will be uniform and will bring continuity to the process.
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April 10th, 2008 by kchristmas
One of the major sticking points in hiring for retention is receiving and sorting through responses. In most organizations today, candidates are driven to the web to apply online. That is fine, but it can really make more work for recruiters. Here are a few things to keep in mind.
Let’s start with the:
Applicant Tracking System How does yours stack up? Does it allow candidates to easily maneuver through the application process with a minimum of hassle? Can it help you find the best candidates for the positions you post, or is your system a free-for-all that leaves the recruiter sorting through cyber stacks of unqualified submissions?
Does your system allow you to send comprehensive pre-screen or interview notes to the hiring manager along with candidate resumes? If not, much of your value as a recruiter is being lost. Recruiters screen to ensure a candidate meets qualifications and evaluate whether they appear to be a fit. It is as vital to have good interview notes as it is to keep applications on file for a certain period of time.
Just finding the answers to these few questions can help you to uncover whether your ATS helps or hinders in quickly responding to the best candidates.
Too many systems do not have the capability to limit response, so you can literally have people who do not meet even the barest minimum of qualifications getting through the application process. This creates vast amounts of work on the recruiter side, not to mention time lost sorting through garbage. It is a great way to lose candidates or to lose out on the best candidates to other companies that can respond more quickly.
If you are not responding to the best of your candidates within 72 hours, it is time to re-think your approach.
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