Surprisingly Simple Secrets to Solving your Hiring Puzzle

Solve Your Hiring PuzzleLife is filled with puzzles and solving them can be both exciting and challenging. To relax, I do traditional puzzles where you put together a picture with a few hundred tiny pieces. However, there are other kinds of puzzles, and they are everywhere when you stop to think about it.

Have you ever tried to fit everything you need into a carry on for a business trip? Pack the car for the family vacation? Coordinate the schedules of your friends for a group outing? Like I said, puzzles are everywhere and solving them is one of the things I love about being a business owner.

However, one puzzle you may find difficult and frustrating is hiring the right people. Like a more traditional puzzle, hiring the right people takes time and a healthy dose of patience.

My tablet has an app with mystery puzzles. You choose how many pieces you want and get to work. But, you have no idea what the final puzzle will look like. You go in blind. That’s the way many of us hire. We go in blind, without knowing what our final picture will be.

The key to good hiring is to have a process in place to remove some of the uncertainty about the final picture.

For example, you may have an idea of the skills and experience you want; however, you have no idea who will apply to your job posting and whether your applicants will be qualified.

To overcome the unknown, your job posting is key.

When you write an ad that attracts your ideal candidates, you have more control over the quantity and quality of your applicants. For more on how to create a great job posting, click here.

A common way to start a puzzle is to complete the border. Those pieces are pretty easy to put together. The hard part comes when you have to start filling in the rest of the puzzle. Many pieces look similar and look like they will fit, except when you attempt to place them, they don’t work. When you are hiring, many applicants will look similar and possibly be a good fit for your team.

Because there is no crystal ball that will tell you whether a candidate is who they say they are, you need to have a good strategy in place for taking the uncertainty out of your hiring decisions.

One way to do that is to ask Insightful InterviewÔ questions is important. To learn more about how to ask Insightful InterviewÔ questions, click here.

Another frustrating aspect of puzzles is the number of pieces involved. Many pieces look great, except you are not quite ready for that piece. So, you put those pieces off to the side in a holding area.

When you are hiring, you will often find great candidates for which you do not currently have a need; however, you may in the future.

These candidates become your pipeline for future openings. This is an important tool that many hiring managers overlook. Building relationships and creating a pipeline of prospective candidates is one of the ways to ensure you are able to find the people you need.

You will also find that many puzzle pieces look like they belong in a certain spot, yet something is just a tiny bit off. Your puzzle has to be an exact match to create the final picture. However, hiring can be more flexible, and an exact match is only one way to create your picture.

Your hiring needs can be flexible and accommodate a candidate who has the perfect cultural and personality fit yet they lack some of the skills or experience you need.

Remember, personality is something you are unable to train. Skills, on the other hand, can be learned especially when you have a candidate with a solid personality fit who is intellectually curious and willing to learn.

The best part of doing a puzzle is when you can see the final picture and the pieces quickly fall into place. That’s also the beauty of hiring the right people. When you find the right person and see how they will fit into your team and help achieve your business goals. That’s a picture worth waiting for!

Want help solving your hiring puzzles?

Allow me to be your guide. Click this link to schedule a complimentary Insight session. It’s an investment of 20 minutes of your time that will pay huge dividends.

Read The YOLO Principle: The Ultimate Hiring Guide for Small Business. It’s packed with tools, templates, and step-by-step instructions to solve your hiring puzzle. Purchase your copy here or on Amazon.com.