Review Your Hiring Process

Hiring someone is hard work — especially the first time. You'll make mistakes. After you've made the hire and the employee has been oriented, it might be time to sit down and make some notes about what went right with your strategy and what went wrong.

Some considerations in evaluating your success are:

• Did you get too many applicants? Too few? Maybe you need to think about tailoring your advertisement and recruiting to get the result you wanted.
• Were the applicants too qualified? Not qualified enough? Try rewording your advertising to attract more appropriate candidates. Using a job description can help.
• How cost-effective was your advertising? A simple way to measure is to divide the cost (not only in dollars but in your time) by either the number of total applicants or the number of applicants that you considered seriously.
• Were there questions you wanted to ask but didn't? Provided the questions are job-related and not in violation of antidiscrimination laws you are subject to, make a note and ask them next time.
• How did you do as an interviewer? Maybe you can ask your new employee to critique you. Give him or her a chance to get to know you and feel comfortable around you first, or you won't get any valuable information.
• Did your testing support or help you in your hiring decision? If not, maybe you should reconsider the kinds of tests you're administering, if you can do so legally. If so, make sure the cost and time involved in the testing is worth it. Would you have come to the same conclusion without testing?

Ensure that your selection procedures are in compliance with the law. Your hiring must be based on the actual requirements of the job. The ability of an applicant to perform a job is the major factor in supporting a hiring decision. Are you hiring without reference to a person's race, sex, religion, national origin, disability, or age? Can you prove it? Be sure to keep records showing why applicants were rejected for employment. Reasons should be objective, spell out the factual basis for not hiring, and be clearly written in order to avoid possible misinterpretation.