Does Your Company Have A Pirate Ship For Employee Onboarding?

By Malcolm Rowlings 

Hiring employees, also known as employee onboarding, has often been compared to staffing a ship. Managers need qualified people for each job in order for the ship to navigate the rough waters of today’s business. But if hiring executives do not embrace responsibility for the company’s actions for a sustainable future, ask the right questions and make prudent hiring choices, then the company’s employment department may seem like a pirate ship that is muddying the waters.

To avoid walking the plank, and polluting the seas, human resource managers can do some things to avoid common pitfalls in hiring procedures:

1. Managers often do employee searches before they even decide on what kind of person they need to hire. By having a carefully-crafted job description and a list of desired personal character traits, it is easier to make a check sheet to mark for each candidate who is considered. Sometimes, hiring managers do not consider the full job description or if the candidate will be a right fit in the culture of the office. This leads to needless conflict and poor employee production.

2. Did you know U.S. offices use 12.1 trillion sheets of paper a year? This waste in office paper and other materials can be mitigated by taking advantage of new technologies. Whether it’s using HR software tools or communicating on new virtual channels, a little effort can go a long way to helping the workplace become environmentally friendly.  

3. There are many prospective employees who have the skills and education for the job opening. However, the right employee will be the one who has documented success in the field. Managers can look at each candidate’s vitas curriculum to see successful patterns. It is also important for them to as the right questions to see how candidates rate their own performance. It can make the difference in having an average employee or the right employee for the position. Regardless of how many degrees a candidate has, experience matters most and will enhance the employee onboarding process.

4. It can be a waste of valuable time, money and resources to dig through mounds of resumes of unknown people. Before wasting time and resources, hiring managers can talk to their friends and colleagues to find qualified candidates. Often, the perfect candidate may be working in a different department in the same office.

5. Even when managers decide to sift through cold resumes, they may waste time interviewing people who are not even qualified. In order to avoid this headache, managers should pre-screen the ones they want to interview before the official interview. A list of pertinent questions and capability rating are perfect tools to weed out those who would not pass the first interview. Pre-screening saves a lot of time and effort. This time can be better spent working with current employees and being responsible for their overall happiness and wellbeing.

6. Hiring boring people can give a sinking ship feeling to any office. When choosing between several qualified candidates, managers should look at the person as a whole. They should ask about hobbies and other interests outside the workplace. Often, prospective employees have more to offer in a job if they have talents in other areas. Someone who is active outside of the workplace whether it be in the community, nature or other public spheres brings a fresh perspective and feel to the office place.

7. It is a basic fact of life that some people just do not mix. While it is important to have an eclectic blend of talent and personalities, there are some people who just would not fit. Even though personality clashes can happen in any office, hiring managers may foresee problems in an initial interview and after people have been hired using easy HR software tools. It is great to be different; however, employees need to share the same passions and goals about the work that they are doing together. If not, there may be a mutiny on board.

Image credit: Pixabay

Malcolm spends his time elevating businesses through independent consultant work, with core focuses around; bigger ideas, bottom-lines and better business. When Malcolm isn't writing, or meeting with a board, he's gearing for the eventual ultra marathon he's been planning for years. Follow him on Twitter at @MalcolmRowlings.