Personality matters. A lot. There are few roles you would hire for where it wouldn’t.
Chieh Huang, co-founder and CEO of Boxed, has a particular strategy to avoid hiring jerks. When it’s his turn to interview, he focuses solely on personality. One of his favorite prompts during an interview is to ask the candidate, “Tell me all about yourself — but without mentioning any of the info I’ve already read on your resume.”
Of course, Huang first relies upon other interviewers to assess competency, skills and expertise. This is where a recruiter can really come in handy. We can screen or vet candidates for you so that the ones who land in front of you are all qualified. Then, you can decide for yourself whether they are a good cultural fit.
In this month’s newsletter, the status of seasonal hiring, labor hoarding: the new thing, and what kind of perks people really don’t care about or want. Read on.
Will There Be Enough Santas This Year?
For a lot of businesses, hiring seasonal employees is an important part of the business plan. Some of the old hands in this endeavor are updating their hiring practices to get a handle on seasonal hiring when hiring at all is pretty tough. For instance, Macy’s has turned the application process into a 5-minute online affair they hope will encourage more people to apply. UPS, too, has made changes to simplify the hiring process for applicants.
It might seem trivial, but a clunky hiring process will quickly alienate potential employees who have a lot of options right now. While this type of data is mostly relevant for hiring frontline seasonal workers, there’s a broader lesson to be learned for all kinds of companies struggling to hire right now. (HR Brew has more to say)
For every company I work with in my role as a Executive Recruiter I encourage them to find ways to streamline their hiring process as much as possible without sacrificing the quality of the process.
Labor Hoarding — The Next New Thing?
Inflation is out of control.
Recession is imminent.
The GDP is shrinking.
WIth all the economic hysteria in the headlines, why are so many companies still hiring?
The pandemic brought intense staffing shortages, and a lot of companies are still playing catch-up, trying to get back to a “just right” number of employees. Employees, for their part, are still pretty picky about where they work. As someone who talks to job seekers every day at Johnson Recruiting Group, I can confirm that.
Hiring is still so challenging that when the Wall Street Journal interviewed James Knightley, chief international economist at ING, he said:
“I don’t think we’ll see mass layoffs. We are going to see companies prefer to hoard their labor rather than do a quick fire and then rehire because the challenges of hiring right now are incredibly intense.”
Beware the Anti-Perks
Want to know what employees want and don’t want in a job? Ask Twitter. It started with a tweet from Jessica Rose, a developer relations advocate, and co-founder of Trans*Code, a hacker org:
“Been thinking about anti-perks in tech jobs. What perks *sound* good but are a hard no from you?”
The biggest response was around the idea of “unlimited vacation time.” Most employees consider it to be a myth. A company might offer it as a highly touted advantage, but who can actually take it? Not someone working for a startup or a super busy organization!
Other no-thank-yous:
In-office massage
Nap or yoga rooms and other special-purpose areas that don’t really get used
Free booze (dubious at best)
So what DO people want? According to recent Gartner research, they’re into location-agnostic pay that allows them to live anywhere without it impacting their salary. And they’re also into generous, concrete leave policies they are actually able to take — particularly around maternity and paternity leave.
As a Executive Recruiter I can confirm that dazzling talent with outrageous perks is no longer a viable way to hire. Today, you need to listen to what employees really want. And if you’re not sure, you can always ask a recruiter. Be in touch!
James Johnson
Quantum Hires