Top 10 mistakes in hiring people

Hiring is a complex and time-consuming process. As a small business owner, you know hiring the right people can help in the success of your business. Likewise, hiring the wrong candidate can slow production, create team friction and cost your business money.

Unfortunately, even the most seasoned business professionals make hiring errors. But being aware of the most common mistakes can improve your next hire. Check out these ten common hiring mistakes that you should avoid during recruiting.

1. Not creating an accurate Job Description

Finding the talent you want starts with knowing what you want. That starts with an accurate job description that outlines the work and not the worker. A good job description should communicate to the candidate what the specific role is about and what the company expects from the candidate. So, a detailed job description should contain the required educational background, knowledge, skills, and job nature like position name, roles & responsibilities. Adding additional info on the company’s business background, services offered and environment gives better clarity to the candidate while applying.

2. Relying too much on the interview

Using an interview to validate an applicant is not good because someone who seems outstanding during the interview may lack the skills needed to flourish in the company. Also, some candidates may inflate certain experiences or misrepresent their contributions to a project just to get the job offer. To find a good candidate consider giving him/her a test or exercise to discover how the applicant will perform at the job.

3. Hiring only less qualified people than the interviewer

American entrepreneur Guy Kawasaki in an NYT interview had once mentioned:

‘A’ players hire ‘A+’ players, but others hire below their skills to make themselves look good. So, ‘B’ players hire ‘C’ players & ‘C’ players end up hiring ‘D’ players.

Some recruiters or hiring managers avoid hiring someone who is much more talented because they feel that they can be a threat to their position. It’s true that hiring a confident and talented candidate can bring strength to driving your business forward.

4. Rejecting an overqualified candidate

It’s quite normal for managers to reject an overqualified candidate because they want to avoid being overshadowed by them or feel they will become bored and leave the organization for a more satisfying challenge elsewhere. However, it’s important to note that these candidates may have the skills and ability to give their best for the organization. So try to hold these candidates by giving them a better work-life balance than their previous employer.

5. Rushing the hire

In certain scenarios, speed hiring may happen. During such a case, the interview process would be driven faster. This may tend to reduce the effectiveness of the screening process and the process may not be enough to fully judge a candidate. This leads to hiring the wrong candidate for a particular position.

The best solution is to have a well-structured hiring process for any position or in any situation. This will help us to find out the right candidates.

6. Hiring without testing candidates

Generally hiring process contains at least two levels of screening to evaluate a candidate. The most common practice is conducting a preliminary test to evaluate the analytic skill of the candidate, followed by a secondary test specifically to understand their domain expertise. But rarely, do companies hire people without any tests, this may affect the company’s performance later if the candidate is not performing well. In short, make sure you test your candidates one way or another so that you can determine who’s the best of the best.

7. Holding candidate for a long time for the final result

Generally, after completing all the stages of screening, the candidate may be on hold for a few days before declaring the final result. In some cases, the waiting time is extended more than a week without any strong reason, in such cases candidates lose interest with each passing day, and the potential of another company coming in with a better process or opportunity increases over time too. If a candidate is short-listed, it is good to inform them within two or three days after the last screening, so it will helpful for them for further process or decision making.

8. Not casting a wide enough net

When hiring new candidates, to get the best worker you need to cast a wide net. To capture a wide array of candidates you can post the job openings on sites like ZipRecruiter, Monster, Indeed, Glassdoor, and LinkedIn. Encourage your employees to share these posts with their networks to further expand your reach. You can also post the job on your company website, and make it navigable and easy to find for people who are curious about your business. You can narrow down your pool by mentioning things like minimum requirements such as certifications.

9. Talking rather than listening

The goal of an interview is to hear if the candidate is the right fit for the position. This becomes counterproductive when you don’t allow them to speak. You can frame your questions in a way that a candidate would give a detailed explanation. Ask open-ended questions allowing the candidates to think more and come up with a more detailed response.

10. Hiring only based on recommendation/referral

In the current scenario, recommendation/ referral is one quick way to move a particular candidate’s profile closer to the hiring manager. Recommendation/ referral must be encouraged based on real talent or knowledge rather than just based on the referred person.  The recommendation is fine but selecting a candidate must be purely based on their knowledge, talent, and skills.

While the recruitment and hiring process is long and complex, by being aware of the most common hiring mistakes you can avoid them and improve your hiring process.