Most people go with something which is tried and tested rather than trying out something new. When it comes to hiring people, this usually means posting a job description or an advertisement, looking through resumes, calling people in for interviews and hiring the one who seems the best to you, based on your subjective opinion at that moment, after running a background check. But the fact is that this method is not very reliable.
The Effect of a Time Lapse
Have you ever had the following experience: you read a book one day and you love it. Then, you pick it up, just out of curiosity, a few months or a year later, and you find that it just doesn’t keep your attention.
What was it about that book that attracted you so much the first time around? And why aren’t you able to get into it the second time? The book hasn’t changed. After all, it’s a book and not a human being. So the thing that has changed is you. Maybe you’re just in a different mood when you pick up the book the second time. Or maybe you’ve gone through experiences in that time which have changed your outlook. Either way, the result is the same: you just can’t make it through the book.
Hiring Based on Subjective Criteria
When it comes to human beings, the circumstances are not exactly the same. Human beings do change, unlike books. But this is likely to make the situation even worse. A few months or a year after you hire someone, you may have changed. In addition, the person you hired has also changed. While the two of you might have seemed like a great fit at the time of the interview, this is now no longer the case. Not unlike a couple which has “grown apart,” you can’t work together anymore.
Hiring Based on Objective Criteria
Imagine a different scenario in which you hired a person not just based on your subjective experience of them but based on objective criteria i.e., their education, their work experience, their integrity and their overall cognitive skills. What if this candidate was interviewed, not just in a random manner, depending on what questions came to your mind but in a structured way which gave you a complete understanding of their abilities?
In this case, you might end up hiring someone whom you don’t love at first sight, so to speak. But you’ll still end up with a solid hire who is likely to work out for you and your company in the long run.