HR And Business Discourse With Patricia Abena Kissi: Hiring The Right Way

Recruitment is the gateway to any organisation; and if this gate is not properly manned, unqualified and unsuitable people will gain access to the organisation; and eventually run it down. Engaging the right people from the start is very critical for the success of your business. Recruitment should be properly planned and executed to reduce hiring mistakes. The recruitment process involves identifying the skills, attitudes, and abilities required for the role; and then choosing the most effective recruitment methods to attract a pool of suitable candidates.

Because hiring the right people is such an important task, don't just post a job advert or engage any recruitment agency and begin to hire. Remember, the kind of people you engage will determine the kind of output you get from them. Therefore, before you recruit, do the following:

Have a recruitment policy in place. A recruitment policy simply defines clearly who you would hire and how you would do the hiring. The recruitment policy should be based on the business strategy and the overarching goal of the organisation. It seeks to attract talent into the organisation. Attracting talent is primarily aimed at the external labour market and involves the use of recruitment and selection techniques to identify the skills required and then attract and choose the most suitable people to meet the organisation's human resource requirements.

Next, clearly define your organisation and its values. What is your organisational culture? What values are important to your organisation? What is the vision of the organisation? What is the mission of the organisation? What are the attributes and qualities that make your organisation unique? These should be clearly defined so you know the kind of person you can work with.

Have a detailed job description. The traditional approach to defining the type of people an organisation wants to attract involves writing a comprehensive job description of the job to be filled. Therefore take time to prepare a detailed job description before you begin the recruitment process. This will help you to know exactly what the purpose, duties and responsibilities of the vacant position will be and its position within the organisation structure.

Next, have a detailed person specification in place. This defines the kind of person who will fit the role and the organisation. (What kind of person will fit this role? What attitudes must he/she possess? What values must he/she demonstrate?). The person specification must be based on the job description, and must identify the personal characteristics required to perform the job adequately. Characteristics that are essential must be clearly differentiated from those that are merely desirable.

The person specification forms the basis of the job advert; it can help determine the most effective selection methods and, if applied correctly, can ensure that selection decisions are based on sound and justifiable criteria. However, care must be taken when compiling the person specification to avoid anything that could be interpreted as discriminatory or unfair. In addition to the person specification, you should also have a comprehensive role specification. This defines the role (What skills does this role require? What is the future of this role? What skills will this role require in future?).

What we have discussed so far essentially looks at recruitment, which is primarily concerned with generating a sufficient pool of quality candidates. The next thing you should consider is the selection process which focuses on assessing the suitability of candidates. This process begins with shortlisting candidates. It is highly unlikely that all job applicants will meet the necessary criteria, and so the initial step in the selection process is categorising candidates as hopeful, promising or unsuitable. This should be done by comparing the information provided on the application form or CV with the predetermined selection criteria. These criteria should be explicitly stated based on the detailed person specification.

Potentially suitable candidates should continue to the next stage of the selection process. However, unsuccessful candidates should be informed as soon as possible. Various selection techniques are available, which includes interviews, tests, assessment centres, etc. A combination of these techniques could be used depending on the level of the position and its criticality.

The most frequently used selection technique is interviewing. Interviews are simply a purposive conversation that seeks to ensure that the most suitable candidate is selected for the job. There are various types of interviews, including one-on-one interview, panel interview, telephone interview, and luncheon interview. However, in conducting interviews, you should make sure that you avoid subjectivity and rather aim at objectivity. Competency based interviews that usually entail making candidates share their past experiences as a means of determining how they would perform in future is said to ensure objectivity during interviews. Competency based interviews seek to know what the candidate has done in the past, how he did it and what the outcome was. Candidates, who may not have any past experience, could be assessed based on their potentials.

In my next article, we will discuss in detail how interviews should be conducted. But in the meantime, let me stress that when conducting interviews, three important questions should form the basis of all the interview questions you ask. The first question should be “Can this candidate do the job? In other words, does he/she have the skills, knowledge and experience or potential to perform well in the job? Interviewers should spend some time probing candidates on this question.

The second question should be “Is this candidate the kind of person we can work with? This question assesses whether or not the candidate fits into the existing culture of the organisation. This is how you assess the candidate's attitude to work and their values in general. This question is very important because you don't want to work with someone with a bad attitude, no matter how skilful the person may be.

The third question you should be seeking an answer to as you interview candidates is “How motivated is this candidate? What energy levels and drive does he/she bring to the position? Does he/she have passion for this position? Indeed, highly motivated employees are assets to any employer.

Let me conclude by stressing that, do not hire candidates solely based on their academic qualifications and skills. Rather, hire them based on their attitude; and then train them for the skills. People are the most important asset any organisation can have. Therefore, plan your recruitment and selection process very effectively and ensure that you hire right. SEDAT consult exists to help organisations plan and execute their recruitment and selection process very well to attract the right talent. Let us help you hire right.

The writer, Mrs. Patricia Abena Kissi, is an HR and business consultant, and the CEO of SEDAT Consult Limited. SEDAT Consult provides business support in the areas of recruitment, staff and HR outsourcing, training and development, HR advisory, and business development to meet the business, staffing and training needs of start-ups and SMEs, as well as well-established companies in the country.

Our mission is to ease the business burdens of organisations through the provision of innovative, practical training, research, and human resources solutions using proven techniques to address the business needs of our clients.

You may contact us on: +233 (0) 24 4629245 / +233 (0) 50 8913333

www.sedatconsult.com.gh; [email protected]