10 Steps For Hiring The Right People

This process has provided great hires with longevity.

What does it cost your organization to replace an employee? According to the Society for Human Resource Management, replacing an employee can cost 6 to 9 months of the employee's salary. The numbers can go up depending on the specific role.

For this reason, last year EnergyCAP, Inc. introduced a ten-step hiring process for open jobs. Since implementing the new process, we've seen zero percent turnover by employees. With this said, no hiring process is perfect. Even the best organizations experience employee loss because people leave companies for reasons beyond the organization's control. However, designing a thorough process helps to give hiring its best shot.

Organizations have a choice: they can spend a little extra cost hiring the right people up front or they can spend a lot more replacing people later. As the Chief People Officer, I've decided to do more upfront.

Here are the ten steps we take in hiring the right people.

Step 1: Job Description

The starting place is creating a behavior-based job description. To create the job description, I give the supervisor a list of behavioral traits. The supervisor circles the traits he believes are most indicative of success in the position. The description also includes skills and education requirements, expected outcomes, and sample activities.

Step 2: Cover Letter, Resume, and Application

When candidates apply, we receive a cover letter, resume, and application. These provide the first pieces of data about the candidate. I'm looking for a fit between the data and the open position.

Step 3: Social Media Screening

If we see enough of a fit, I'll do social media screening of the candidates' publicly-accessible social media accounts. I establish criteria ahead of time for what I'm trying to discover. If all checks out, we'll schedule the first job interview. Beware: what happens in Vegas doesn't always stay in Vegas!

Step 4: Job Interview #1

In the interview, we ask questions relating to desired behavioral traits—questions such as “How do you keep yourself organized?” and “How do you typically deal with conflict?” We also ask about work experience, technical skills, and attitudes. We use software with an interview guide, so we can record details about the interview.

Step 5: Behavioral/Technical Assessments

After the interviews, our hiring committee selects candidates to bring back for second interviews. We invite the candidates to take the RightPath behavioral trait assessment, which measures innate traits like compliance or dominance. The scores help us see if the candidate’s traits correlate with the job description, which was created with certain traits in mind. We might also administer a technical assessment based on the type of job.

Step 6: Candidate Brief

After I receive the RightPath results, I create a brief on each remaining candidate. In the brief, I share thoughts on where there’s a fit with the job description (the gold) and where are concerns (the gaps). From these insights, questions for the second round interview are developed. Just because a candidate doesn’t score highly for a certain trait doesn’t mean they can’t behave that way. After all, behaviors can be learned.

Step 7: Job Interview #2

The goal of the second round interview is for candidates to talk about their gold (areas of fit) and their gaps (missing areas). Each candidate is asked customized questions based on their assessment results. This is how we discover if they’ve learned certain key behaviors over time, even if they’re not naturally occurring.

Step 8: Team Meetups

After the second interview, the candidate meets the team on which they'll be working. The goal is to see how they get along as a group.

Step 9: Reference Check

For favorable candidates, we perform a reference check to see if what we've learned matches with references.

Step 10: Criminal Background Checks

In addition, we also perform a criminal background check for top candidates.

Although this hiring process takes longer and requires more effort than a simpler one, getting the right people up front is good for everyone. The employees are engaged, the company is successful, and the customers are getting the value they deserve.