H U M A N R E S O U R C E S
What’s in
a Job?
How structured hiring
can boost the bottom line
By Evert Akkerman
Hiring and firing is an extremely
painful and expensive process
when decisions are based on emo-tion.
A structured approach will help hiring
managers determine which applicants are
the best fit and, therefore, likely to stay and
thrive. The first step is to introduce written
job descriptions.
A job description is, first and foremost,
a communication piece. The success of an
organization depends in large part on how
expectations are communicated internally,
and HR practitioners can help outline these
in a clear, unambiguous way. This is done in
the form of job descriptions, job postings,
employment agreements, policies and per-formance
reviews.
There are many examples of flawed
hiring, with employers choosing people
simply because they like them, or the
candidate “seemed like a nice person.”
Other reasons for flawed hiring include: “I
wanted to help out,” “I know the family,”
and “We’re on the same soccer team.”
Wonderful, but not necessarily a fit for
the work that needs to get done. Being a
great soccer player doesn’t automatically
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make someone a great salesperson, brewer,
receptionist or office assistant – there is
no predictive value in soccer skills other
than that the candidate is probably good at
other sports too.
First impressions are all about emo-tions
and assumptions. It’s human nature
to make highly positive inferences when
we like what we see. As Peter Collier and
David Horowitz wrote in The Kennedys: An
American Drama, “We’re always tempted to
impute unlikely virtues to the cute.”
Especially in North American culture,
looking good is associated with a range of
desirable traits, such as integrity, honesty
and competence in pretty much anything.
Much of pop culture suggests that perfect
skin and great hair equate to mental acuity
and keeping up in a fast-paced environment.
Job descriptions are key to managing
expectations on both sides. If position
requirements and desired outcomes are
not on paper, how do managers know what
to look for?
A hiring manager will have an idea of
what the job entails, but the candidate may
have a completely different idea. Acting on
assumptions is a recipe for trouble: it’s a
well-known statistic that people often quit
within their first few days on the job, typi-cally
because it wasn’t what they expected
– or had been led to believe.
In small and mid-size companies, it’s
rather commonplace to see a relative of
the owner handling the books, payroll and
HR. It’s usually the way things have grown
organically. Interviews are rarely more than
a conversation, with the boss doing most
of the talking. Rather than focusing on job
requirements and objectives, the conversa-tion
covers the weather, hockey and family
and may include questions like, “Do you
think you can handle the job?” and “Are you
used to a busy environment?” to which the
answer is always “Yes.”
The problem is, neither party knows
what the candidate said “yes” to.
To illustrate how dangerous assump-tions
are, here’s a real life example from a
recruitment process for a receptionist posi-tion
at a medical clinic. Each candidate was
asked if they were used to a high patient
volume. All of them said they were. Guess
what? The winning candidate quit within
SUMMER 2021 § POURED CANADA § 35