Mark Hamade

As our workforce expands it becomes more complicated for companies to find the right employees for the job.  People who are looking for jobs know how to make a resume (and if they don’t they hire someone who does).  The workforce is has become familiar with typical interview questions and they are prepared to answer them the way they think we want them to.  While the resume and the interview will always be a part of the hiring process, it is time to look to other means to find the best suited person for the job.

The resume and the interview are rarely effective at evaluating a person’s work ethic and personal attributes.  Values and behaviors are less measurable so we need to turn to less quantitative means of evaluation potential staff and find more qualitative measures.  How can we do that?  How can we determine a potential employee’s work ethic?  How can we tell if they have heart?

One way we can get more insight into values and ethics is to expose them to more people.  When employers, managers, and other staff have the opportunity to meet them they are able to give valuable input.  Take interviewees on a tour of the building that they would be working in.  Introduce them to staff members.  Observe how people respond to them and how well they interact with other people.  Watch for signs of enthusiasm (smiling, asking questions) and knowledge.   Do they look confused when you show them the equipment the will be working with?  Do they look comfortable in the environment they would be working in?  These things can give you more insight regarding how well they would fit into the company culture.

More frequently, human resources departments are using social media as a means of learning about potential employees.  Sites like Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook can reveal a lot about a person’s true personality.  They can tell you how that person lives their life and what is important to them.  Social media sites can also tell you what others think about a person.  You can get informal references that can be more valuable than the formal references you get from calling people they have worked for.  Many people have a web presence through their interactions online that they don’t even know they have.

By using hiring strategies outside the norm we can often learn things about the people we are considering hiring that we may not have seen otherwise.  No one is going to tell you that they don’t fit into a culturally diverse environment very well, but when you see them in that situation you can see for yourself.  No one is going to tell you that their work ethic is questionable but when you examine their online world the truth can be revealed.  We should continue to use resumes and interviews in our hiring processes but to separate those who can afford a good resume from those who will be a true fit for our company we need to think outside typical hiring strategies.