Luck in Hiring

Happy March!  Spring is upon us!  With March also comes St. Patrick’s Day. How often have you heard about the “luck o’ the Irish” at this time? This made me think about the need for luck in hiring. Strong companies rely on solid employees if they want to provide high-quality service to clientele as well as to spark new ideas and bring diversity to the table. However, weaker employees can not only prevent such success, but can actually cause harm to the process. I have heard business owners and managers lament such situations: “Everything would be perfect if I didn’t have to deal with employees!” How can this situation emerge? What is the difference between hiring employees that create life for the company over those that drag the company down? The answer is often this: companies find themselves in a perceived rush to bring in help that they fail to assess whether a potential employee really is the best fit. The result: they hire people who do not truly belong. Talk about some bad luck!

A bad hire not only disrupts the positive flow of the company, but it can be incredibly expensive. I have seen many statistics tossed around about just how expensive a bad hire can be. For instance, I have seen that it can cost a company three times the annualized salary of that person. Think about the implications of a bad hire: you pay for their base salary, computer expenses, office supplies, and training—not to mention the loss of productivity that comes with bringing in any new person. And if that new person ends up being a bad hire, other team members’ productivity can suffer. You can imagine how expensive a bad hire can be. And this is not to mention that if they do not fit, you may have to replace them sooner than you would a good hire—and then you have to repeat this whole expensive process.

The question you are likely wondering, then, is: How can I increase my chances of making a good hire? ProRecruiters provides two options. First, we have created the contract-to-hire option. This option will cost money upfront, as you pay our firm a markup, but the total cost is much less than the estimated cost of a bad hire. With this option, you get to take the employee for a “test drive.” The employee may look like a great fit on paper, but perhaps they do not fit with the culture of your company (seventy-five percent of all terminations are behavior-based). In this option, realizing that the employee does not fit will not cost you what it would if you hired outright.

The second option is our ARRIVAL screening service. Since we deal with small- and mid-sized companies, we are fully aware that such companies are not in the position to move through two or three interviews with each applicant. For a cost between $400 and $550, we do the screening for you. You will receive an unbiased scorecard along with the equivalent of a hiring team to help you discern whether an employee is the right fit. Again, you may seem to pay more upfront than if you were simply to do a direct hire, but in the long run, you can save literally thousands of dollars—not to mention the effects a bad hire has on company emotion and ethos.

As we close out the first quarter of 2017 and move into the second quarter, I encourage you to consider these two options if you are considering expanding your team. Your company’s success hinges on whether you build a solid team at the foundation. You need people on your team, but not just any person will do. You need the right people. ProRecruiters wants to help you increase your “luck” in hiring.