Old Hiring Foxes vs. The Hedgehogs

You are about to compete for the best people again. The recovery is happening. Labor statistics indicate over 280,000 new jobs were created in the U.S. last May. Is your company's hiring process a competitive weapon-or a ball and chain? If you're not sure, here are some places to look:

1. You abdicate hiring responsibility to an HR person or executive recruiter. That's their job, right? Wrong. The job of HR is a support and advisory role. The role of a recruiter is to help you build a stronger pipeline of available candidates and advise you on key hires. For key positions, take a proactive role and implement a recruiting and interviewing process.

One software client of mine once relied on HR to design their job descriptions. For years, they attracted people with the right education and skills for open positions. The bad news is that the job description did not help a hiring executive assess a person's behaviors or cultural fit for that division. Two Directors who were hired under the old model were demoted after much customer uproar about missed deadlines on product launches.

2. You think lunch appointments and golf outings are great settings to conduct interviews. How much do you spend time wooing high-flying producers this way, yet cannot seem to get any decision from the interviewee? Listen for the much-dreaded response: "I'll think about it (which is a polite, wimpy way of saying no)."

3. You become attached to specific candidate(s). Do you ever hear yourself saying things like, "she would really do well in our culture