I have interviewed for tons and tons of employees throughout my career and unfortunately, the map is never the terrain. I mean everyone looks Rolls Royce when It comes to the resume however have you noticed when they are in front of you it you often wonder and ask yourself “ Am I interviewing the right person in front of me, or have I made a mistake with the name and the timeslot..cause what I’m seeing here can’t be the same person as what’s on the resume”
By the way, that’s even if they have the courtesy to show up. Time and time again I speak with employers telling me they’re lucky that one person even showed up. As we know as small business owners “ time is money” so getting the right person saves you a hell of a lot of money in recruiting but most importantly saves you a shit load of time.
So I started thinking about a better approach to the whole interview/ recruitment process. I thought how can I optimize my time and find the right employee in the process. I also wanted to know if there was simple technology that everyone has ( mobile phones) to literally do all the heavy lifting for me?
However, I needed to ensure the following 4 criteria
- I want to be able to see and hear them as if they were in front of me
- I want them to follow some simple tasks
- I want to see what they are like in their natural habitat
- I want to see how committed they are to getting the role
So with this in mind, I started with a super awesome software called Spark Hire https://www.sparkhire.com It allows you to populate questions that you want the candidates to answer and then shoot a short video with their answers. So all in all it cuts down time because now you have the person on file to show it to others in the company, compare them with other interviews and basically helps you fast track and narrow down to a few applicants.
Next, I wanted to get to know them a little more so I asked the suitable candidates to go to the next step by setting up a cool online video platform called Zoom https://www.zoom.us. Think of it as a cool Skype that you can have a private link for and multiple people can join by invite only. What this allows is for you to move through appointments quickly (30 min is more than enough) and be able to once again get a good feel for the candidate without having to take valuable time out of the office. I mean you can even get someone else to ask all the questions you wanted, hit record and give you a copy of the finished recorded interview.
Finally, after a series of interviews, I used a cool DISC personality profiling link ( just to see who and what personality I was really dealing with and how to communicate with them ) https://www.discprofile.com/what-is-disc/overview.
I used the test just help ensure that I have the right personality for the position. See in some cases the person is good at the interview but put them into a stressful situation and they crumble. Example: You don’t want anyone in accounts if they don’t like confrontation…right? I mean they could be the best bookkeeper or accountant but if you’re a small business and need invoices paid and money collected then you really need someone that knows how to handle that stress and deal with clients effectively and with care.
For me, the 3 tools just made it easier, less confrontational and most importantly used technology that cuts downtime and money and created a super simple and enjoyable process. See by the time the one or two narrowed down candidates got in front of you, you already had a pretty good idea of who they are, if they were willing to carry out simple tasks and also what type of personality you were dealing with. The most important questions being: Are they suitable for the job, can they get the job done and will they be the right fit?
To know more about the tools you can use to choose the right employees, book a discovery call or contact us at 1300 459 302 and get one on one advice from our business experts here at UpCoach.
Happy hunting!
