12 Rules for Recruitment

Hiring can be a hit or a miss. While there is no set formula to hiring good candidates, there are some practices that can be used set up a good hiring process!

Here are 12 "rules" that have helped me grow my teams.

1. Attract the right candidate
   One of the first steps to hiring is creating a pool of good candidates by gaining attention of suitable candidates. An accurate job description, an outline of the day-to-day work and expected outcomes at the three, six and twelve month mark, attract candidates with relevant experience and interests. During the recruiter screening phase, sharing details on the interview steps and the onboarding plan (created for new hires) further provide clarity and help keep candidates in the interview loop.

2. Develop a bias towards a short interview loop
   A quick and efficient interview process is highly desirable, both by candidates and hiring teams. Lengthy and involved interviews tend to push candidates away. It also means a continued engagement from your team. While it is not easy to contain all aspects of evaluation in just a couple of rounds, it is possible to trim redundancy and tighten the process.

3. Design the early rounds of interviews to test for well-roundedness
   With a bias to shorter interviews, it is critical that early rounds test for a variety of traits and skills. An interview that evaluates cultural fit through value-based questions gives a peek into a candidates' thought processes and mindset.
   Screening for the desired attitude and pre-dispositions early on, can be valuable.

4. Define an ideal candidate profile
   Each one of the interview rounds help build a perceived profile of a candidate. Having a reference that defines what an ideal candidate looks like, helps keep the evaluation accurate, fair and unbiased.

5. Recruit a diverse interview panel
   A hiring manager and the team may best understand the requirements of the role, but only a diverse panel can judge the many aspects that make someone successful at work.
   Include technical and non-technical folks in the interviews.

6. Provide a sneak peek into the team, org culture and upcoming projects
   Recruitment is always a two-way street - It is important that both the team and candidates see the role as a good fit. Candidates understand what it takes to flourish in your team, if the culture is a match and they see themselves succeeding in the team. I have found that sooner an applicant meets the hiring manager, the better it is to address and discuss team culture and goals.

7. Involve the team and set up candidate-team interactions
   Getting the team to meet the candidate and vice versa ensures the candidate can validate the culture as described by the hiring manager, it is also an opportunity to build consensus on the candidate within the team. If your team is large with many members, then it is important that at least the people expected to interact the most with the potential hire meet before hand.

8. Explain the role of the team and its importance in the org
   Everybody is looking to make an impact through their work. Let candidates have clarity on how their work can create an impact from within the team. For this, the role of your team in the org and how it contributes to business goals is an important detail to share and discuss.

9. Explain Org Goals and Strategy
   Organizational strategy and business goals create excitement and help candidates picture their growth. It gives them a chance to evaluate if the org strategy aligns with their long term interests and to see a future in the organization.

10. Provide details on tech stack, tech maturity and complexity of the team's tasks
    Candidates rarely are an ideal fit. Most applicants have experience in a different set of processes and practices. Discussing these details allow both the hiring manager/team and the candidate to compare and contrast methods and approaches. It helps with identifying gaps. It also helps with assessing parts of their experience that can be leveraged and skills that are transferrable.

11. Don't rely solely on ATS
    There are too many examples of recruitment gone wrong due to the errors and biases introduced by automation. My favourite is the fiasco AI assisted ATS created for Amazon.
    Human-in-the-loop screening is time consuming, but in many cases worth the effort. In my experience, there are many variations in documents that candidates submit and screening is best not left to the ATS alone.

12. Iterate on the 11 steps mentioned above
    The most important of all rules, perhaps, is the last one - Iterate on your hiring process and strategy. No two roles are the same and no two times are the same.
    Adapt and adopt!