Working Wounded: How to Avoid Hiring Mistakes
March 17, 2006 — -- DEAR WOUNDED: I'm about to hire my first batch of new employees. What are the most important things to remember as I go through the hiring process?
ANSWER: I always try to remember the Tony Hinrichs rule when I think about hiring new employees. Hinrichs came to my attention when he was arrested for burglary of the Extreme Surveillance shop in Arizona. I read about him in the News of the Weird. Yep, it never crossed his mind that the security firm might actually use its own products. He was identified and convicted based on the surveillance video of him burglarizing the store. Might have helped if he would have thought ahead.
And that's the philosophy you should adopt when you conduct a job interview -- that the interview is being recorded and everything you say can, and probably will, come back to haunt you. I've included the major mistakes that most organizations make during the hiring process below. For more, check out "Top Grading" by Bradford Smart (Portfolio, 2005).
Do you avoid asking illegal questions? Most interviewers would love to know everything that they can about the potential job candidate. The problem is that there are a bunch of questions that are illegal to ask -- questions about kids, age, religion, etc. Two simple rules: Know what you can't ask, and don't ask it.
Do you cover all aspects of employment with your company? A job interview is an effort to screen the candidates to bring in the best talent. But it's also an important opportunity to explain what employment with your company will really be like. For example, if you are an employment-at-will company, and most are, it's important to tell the candidate during the interview.
Do you give the candidate back-up materials on employment with your company? Brochures, annual reports and a personnel manual can all be very helpful to share with a potential employee.
Do you avoid making promises that you are not authorized to make? Job candidates tend to have long memories when it comes to promises made in a job interview. Wouldn't you remember if you were told you'd get frequent raises, increases in responsibility or access to perks? More than getting in trouble with the law, you are potentially creating future problems by making promises that you, or your company, can't keep. If the employee feels that you misrepresented the job, you'll have problems with them in the future as long as they work for the company.
Do you avoid getting too comfortable during the interview? Smart believes that it is dangerous for an interviewer to get too comfortable with a candidate. Professionalism and a bit of formality during the job interview are the safest ways to stay out of trouble.
Lucky for you, the job interviews you conduct won't be taped. But it's a good rule of thumb to act like they are, or you might face some unhappy consequences. Happy hiring.
We'd like to hear your strategy for hiring a great employee. I'll give an autographed copy of "Working Wounded: Advice that adds insight to injury" (Warner, 2000) to the best submission. Send your entry, name & address via: http://workingwounded.com or via e-mail: bob@workingwounded.com. Entries must be received by Wednesday (March 22).
Here are the results from a recent workingwounded.com/ABCNews.com online ballot:
How do you feel about mergers?
- They're usually a great opportunity, 9.7 percent
- They're usually a mistake, 29 percent
- They're a reality, get used to it, 61.3 percent
Our winning strategy for hiring people who are overweight comes from M.M. in Los Angeles, Calif.:
"I read both columns you wrote on hiring overweight people. The problem that I see is nowhere do you mention the increased health care costs that are generated by overweight people. I think that no company should have to shoulder this burden. Put simply, if they don't care about themselves, why should a company care about them?"
Trust me, this is what to do…Advice from employees for a boss that they don't trust:
- Being honest about what they can and cannot do, 36 percent
- Recognizing my achievements to both peers and higher-ups, 34 percent
- Giving me authority on challenging assignments, 16 percent
- Asking me for ideas and input, 10 percent
From: DDI / Badbossology.com
Bob Rosner is a best-selling author, speaker and internationally syndicated columnist. His newest best-seller, "Gray Matters: The Workplace Survival Guide" (Wiley, 2004), is a business comic book that trades cynicism for solutions. Ask Bob a question: bob@workingwounded.com or http://graymattersbook.com. ABCNEWS.com publishes a new Working Wounded column every Friday.
This work is the opinion of the columnist and in no way reflects the opinion of ABC News.
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