Yesterday we looked at Monster’s Small Business, Big Hire survey, which discusses how businesses handle bad hires. Today, more from that survey, plus some tips to avoid bad hires in the first place.
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Experience Needed
While many of today’s small business owners continue to devote more of their own time and effort to finding the ideal candidate, some are actually not improving their search whatsoever. Of those who have hired the wrong person before, 56% are investing more time to make sure they don’t do this again, but only about one in five aren’t doing anything at all (18%).
Although nine in ten (89%) small business owners find the hiring process time consuming and three-fifths (61%) wish they had more help in finding the right person for the job, significantly fewer owners are currently hiring an outside service to help recruit (11%). Monster’s goal is to make small business owners aware that these resources and solutions exist, all within their budget.
“Monster has been able to reach the type of person we want, in the way they’re searching for jobs, be it a smart phone, social sites,” said Brian Bailey, co-founder of Old Carolina Barbecue company, another of Monster’s small business customers.
As the small business industry and recruiting process continue to evolve, owners will need to expand their current approaches to find the right candidates. Specific tools, such as social recruiting and talent customer relationship management-targeted e-mails, as well as campaigns and alerts from potential candidates, can increase their search results, ultimately saving time and money.
Survey Methodology
Monster commissioned Braun Research to poll the views of a representative sample of 639 small business owners in the United States who have 1–50 full-time employees. The survey was fielded between March 16–21, 2016, and was carried out online. The margin of error was +/- 3.88% at the 95% confidence level.
How to Avoid Bad Hires
BLR® has a lot to say about bad hires. Here is just a short list of what you can do to avoid regrettable hires:
Identify false information on résumés. Once you have narrowed your applicant pool to likely candidates, do some fact-checking. Call references, look up company names—do your homework. If things don’t add up, don’t extend an offer. After all, you don’t want to hire a liar.
Assess your candidates. Even stating on your job offer that applicants might have to take a small test to prove their abilities should automatically weed a few bad ones out.
Look out for complaining. If the employees being interviewed complain about their last job, especially if they point out their last supervisor as a source of the problem, that is a major red flag. Maybe that person’s supervisor was a bad boss, but a good employee knows how to remain professional.
Jumping from job to job. If candidates have worked at many different jobs in the last few years, that’s something to look closely at. They might have a good reason, or they might not be great at maintaining jobs. It is best to check up on some of those references.
Can’t think of any weaknesses. We all have them, and what’s more, we are all aware of at least some of them. If your candidates are too proud or not self-aware enough to talk about their weaknesses, they probably won’t be a great fit.