The title of this article is a variation of the statement: “Do it right the first time,” made by John Wooden, the legendary UCLA coach that won ten NCAA basketball championships in twelve years. No one can argue with his success or the principle of doing it right the first time.
However, we all make mistakes; none of us are perfect. Often, we say, “I wish I had done that” or, more often, “I wish I hadn’t done that.” Inevitably, anyone who has hired several people in the past has regretted hiring someone. In most cases, the individual was “not bad” but was just not as good as you hoped they would be. In today’s highly competitive business environment “good enough” is simply not good enough.
When it is necessary to replace an individual, independent of whether it is the company’s or the individual’s choice, the costs associated with filling the vacancy quickly come to mind. Quite often, the true costs of replacing an individual are rarely understood.
Severance pay, advertising, job posting costs, and recruiter fees are the obvious costs that come to mind. There are many other costs that can dwarf the four costs just mentioned. Probably the largest cost category is time. There are several aspects to the time cost that need to be considered.
First, is the time involved in searching for quality candidates, finding them, interviewing them, and bringing them on-board. Think of all of the people that are involved in that process and the opportunity-lost cost associated with their other activities. With the exception of full-time, in-house recruiting staff, all others involved in the process have other tasks that need their attention. We all become masters of the metrics used to evaluate us. It is easy to understand that the individuals that are involved in the recruiting process do not consider it their number one priority – it takes time to review resumes, interview people, write up interview notes, and perform reference checks. All of these activities take time away from each individual’s primary responsibilities.
Similar to the problem noted above, if there is a vacancy, someone else must step in to fill that vacancy until a new person is hired and becomes productive. Often, that latter factor is not considered. Instead, a collective sigh of relief can be heard when the new person arrives. However, the time it takes for the new hire to have a positive impact can be longer than the time it took to find and hire them. If that person is a manager, many of their subordinates may, consciously or unconsciously, take a risk-averse position out of fear of making a bad impression on the new boss. Initiatives and decision making may significantly slow down. Meanwhile, competition moves forward.
What makes the time-cost of non-conformance so problematic is that time is not fungible; once it is gone, it is gone for good. Think of every hour of every day for every involved employee as a silver bullet; once fired it is gone.
Imagine if a CEO issued a statement that said: “From this day forward, only hire the right person the first time!” Of course, this is silly. Instead, new methods need to be introduced that can move the company toward that goal. Fortunately, new methods, based on new technology, are available that can help companies meet that goal. Simultaneously, the same technology will also help candidates make the right decision as well. As important as the time variable is for companies, it is even more important for candidates for obvious reasons.
The new tools that are available today to help find the right person the first time are based on mining data.
This concept has already proven its effectiveness in many other operations in most organizations. The same approaches have shown to be equally effective in filling vacancies with the right person, the first time. There is no question that personal interaction between candidates and company personnel is, and always will be, a crucial part of the hiring process.
However, machine learning algorithms that examine and extract data from a variety of sources can significantly speed up the candidate identification process and help ensure there is a bi-directional “right fit” for the company and the candidate.
GeniusMesh has developed several artificial intelligence-based tools that have proven to be highly effective both in speeding up the hiring process and identifying highly qualified candidates that “fit.” The systems examine fifteen personality and leadership traits and ten motivating factors in assessing a candidates’ potential for a particular position of interest. Other techniques identify the traits and experience of individuals in similar roles to identify key common characteristics. No matter how well-intentioned a recruiter can be, this type of deep data analysis is simply beyond their capabilities.
The fundamental difference between the “old way” and the “new way” of hiring can be easily summarized as the difference between identifying “qualified” candidates and identifying candidates with a bi-directional “fit” into the organization.
And doing it in a fraction of the time. With human variability always present, there is no guarantee that the right person will be found the first time, every time. However, using new methods can dramatically increase the odds.
Just as companies realized that high quality became table-stakes instead of a competitive differentiator, companies must invest in new recruiting approaches to find the best candidates before their competitors do. We all know that employing the “right” people is the true business differentiator. Finding them quickly and, more importantly, retaining them is crucial. If the bi-directional right fit is present, the problem is solved.
