How to Stop Bad Hiring Decisions Before They Happen

On this blog, we've covered extensively the consequences of bad hiring decisions and why these decisions go wrong in the first place. It's easy to place blame and to understand the consequences. But, it's much harder to prevent these problems from happening again, and to know exactly why the bad hiring decision was made. Hopefully, we can make things a little less complicated with prevention. Here's how to stop those bad hiring decisions before they are made and stop the wrong person from ending up in your organization.

Go Back to the Scene of the Crime

This is tough for many people, but in order to stop bad hiring decisions before they happen, you need to go back to previous bad hiring decisions (aka the scene of the crime) and analyze what went wrong. If you don't revisit these decisions and thoroughly assess what happened and why, then the steps you take to stop the problem could end up costing you instead of fixing the situation.

"There are always a lot of different reasons as to what the problem is," said Rachel Clark, a business coach with Synergy Business Coaching. "Making an assumption of why things have not been going right, and then taking that assumption and.. making a decision off of it can be very costly. If you knew [the answer], then why haven't you rectified it already?"

Clark also said that although executives may think, or feel, they know what the problem is, but executives really need to know. This is how you discover where the wrong resources are going, and how to reallocate them appropriately. If you make an assumption about the problem, then Clark says you run the risk of putting the wrong resources in the wrong places.

Have a Hiring and Recruiting System

"Business needs a cause and effect. You need to understand what you're doing to... get a certain result," Clark said. "If you don't get a certain result, then you can go back to what it was you're doing and innovate that."

Time need to be devoted to creating a hiring and recruiting system, provided that one was not created in the first place (or that your human resources team hasn't created on on their own). A hiring and recruiting system is comprised of layers that intricately feed into themselves. Below are the pieces needed to create this system:

• Identify the Brand
• Confirming Need
• Prioritizing
• Time Line
• Execution
• Implement Hiring System

"What we're shooting for is a productive and efficient system that is timely in gathering information, so that it can be executed very easily, quickly, and seamlessly," Clark said. "Remember the larger the position, the more sophisticated the role, the longer it's going to take to hire for that role. The system is going to be bigger. The resources and needs are going to be more."

Find the Breakdown, Prioritize Change

Once you have a hiring and recruiting system in place, it becomes easier to find the breakdown in good hiring decisions and determine the changes that need to happen so that bad hiring decisions aren't made (or aren't made as often). To apply your hiring and recruiting system, here are the three steps you need to follow:

1. Does your organization (or outsourced third party) have a system? - If not, get this done first. Especially with an outsourced third party, you need to put in the time and effort. You can't expect third party to do it all without any input from you.
2. If necessary changes are found, prioritize them.
3. Figure out, based on current resources and newly allocated, what should be worked on first.

"First, you want to see the steps. Then, you want to... go in and ask yourself, 'how efficient are these steps," Clark said. "Organizations, big or small, have to go through some process of fixing things in such an organized way... It's absolutely vital that you do this."

To begin building out a recruiting process, department and system, it takes time that leaders don’t always have. In this hour-long webinar, gain tangible strategies that can help alleviate the hiring problems you may be uncovering. Learn exactly how to capitalize on investments already made in your hiring and recruiting systems and what needs to be added for success. Download the slides and video here.