0:07

Welcome to the Entrepreneur to Employer podcast

0:09

. I'm your host , brian Montes , founder

0:12

of Scalocity Works , and the Entrepreneur

0:14

to Employer coaching and membership community . So

0:16

congratulations is in order . If you've built

0:18

a successful freelance business that has grown to

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the point where you need to hire , you have achieved

0:23

a huge milestone . If you're

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already past the point of making need to hire and you

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have achieved a huge milestone If you're already past

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the point of making your first hire and your team is now growing

0:31

well , congratulations is in order to you as well . So , regardless of where you are with scaling your

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team and your business , whether you're at employee number

0:35

one or employee number 100 , this

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podcast focuses on everything related to people

0:40

operations . We'll cover best practices

0:42

, strategies and solutions to help you build a

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sustainable and scalable business that is fueled

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by great people and a great culture

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. So if you're enjoying listening to this Entrepreneur

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to Employer podcast , please subscribe

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, give us a like and give us a review . Your feedback

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will help us grow this podcast and we'll

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be able to positively impact more employers to help

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them build better work environments work

1:03

environments

1:08

. Welcome back to another episode of the I Share to

1:11

Employer podcast . I

1:17

am your host , brian Montes , founder of Scalocity Works . Today , we are going to

1:19

talk about something that is very important and I don't think enough business

1:21

owners or employers put enough emphasis on what we're going to

1:23

talk about today , and

1:31

what that is is . It circles back to the conversation around hiring and that

1:33

theme of that and that feeling by business owners and hiring managers and leaders

1:36

that I can never find the right people , nobody wants to

1:38

work right , I'm recruiting and I can't

1:40

fill the role and the right people aren't applying

1:42

, and there are so many things when it comes

1:44

to your recruitment that are in your control

1:47

, and the key

1:49

to this is making sure that your employer brand

1:51

is strong , because without

1:53

a strong employer brand , you're going to have a hard

1:55

time recruiting . Today , we're going

1:57

to talk about how to transform your hiring process

1:59

and how you , as the business

2:01

owner , as the hiring manager , as

2:03

the business unit leader , can build a

2:05

better , authentic candidate experience

2:08

. This is so important that

2:10

we focus on creating a really

2:12

good candidate experience , because whether

2:14

or not they come to work for you is irrelevant

2:17

. You want them to have that good experience

2:19

so that they walk away from your company

2:21

feeling good about your company . Away

2:25

from your company feeling good about your company . All right . So let's talk about how you're going to

2:27

curate an honest , efficient and engaging recruitment process that is going to

2:29

help you set your company apart from everybody

2:31

else , and if you do this , it will

2:33

become one of many competitive edges

2:35

that you can have in your business . All

2:39

right , let's get into it . So the recruitment

2:41

process is often the first glimpse of a company's

2:43

culture , right ? So as much

2:45

you know , as a company is always

2:47

assessing talent , all of your

2:49

prospective hires are also assessing

2:51

you . These hiring

2:53

processes are no longer one-way roads

2:56

. People that are serious about their careers

2:58

, people that are , you know , taking their

3:00

career path and have a plan

3:02

for it . They are looking at the opportunities

3:05

and deciding do I want to go work here ? What's

3:07

in it for me if I go work for this particular

3:09

employer ? And that is why

3:11

it is up to organizations to create

3:13

an honest candidate experience . And

3:16

this experience it does not start

3:18

when the candidate interview starts . It doesn't start

3:20

at the beginning of the interview process . It's well

3:22

before that . Okay , that candidate's

3:24

first perception happens way

3:27

before they ever apply for your organization

3:29

, and that perception is going to be reality

3:31

. And if the perception isn't

3:34

good , the great

3:36

candidates that you want are

3:38

never going to hit the apply button , or they're never

3:40

going to respond to your LinkedIn message or respond

3:42

to the recruiter , or , however you're recruiting , they

3:45

are not going to even respond , so

3:47

you'll never even know that they're out there . Now

3:49

. Candidates have access to a lot of data points

3:52

, so when they're evaluating their next opportunity

3:54

, they are going through data and they are looking

3:56

you up . They assess company websites

3:58

, they go for word of mouth , they look at

4:01

company reviews and they look at a whole

4:03

host of other data that's available to them

4:05

. Organizations need to think

4:07

about the message they are conveying , especially

4:10

if your goal is to attract talent and , let's face

4:12

it , if your company is growing and

4:15

you are at the point of hiring

4:17

and building your team , then

4:19

you are always going to be in the hiring process . You'll

4:21

always be in talent acquisition mode . You

4:24

don't want to wait until you have to fill a role

4:26

to have a talent pipeline

4:28

right . You always want to be cultivating this and

4:31

if you don't have a strong employer

4:33

brand , you will lose them well

4:35

before you even get to say hello . So

4:38

let's talk about the importance of

4:40

setting the entire and managing

4:42

and setting the entire candidate experience

4:44

. So recruiting is both

4:46

an art and a science . It's figuring out

4:49

who you want to attract , finding people

4:51

from different talent pools , selecting folks

4:53

that are qualified to do the work and

4:55

then finding that talent well before it's needed

4:57

. And you're also looking for people who are going

4:59

to add value to your organization , value

5:02

to your culture , value to the mission

5:04

, value to the why right . So you're

5:06

looking , that's what you're looking for . So

5:08

let's focus on managing these expectations

5:10

, and a lot of organizations

5:13

fumble this . So if you are

5:15

able to master managing these expectations

5:17

, you are going to have a competitive

5:19

edge . So first , the

5:21

candidate experience . Many companies

5:24

don't give the candidate experience enough

5:26

thought . They don't give it enough effort . Now

5:28

, in my career , I have interviewed hundreds of

5:30

people and I've assessed interview packets

5:33

. I've done interviews , run

5:35

through skills tests , you name it , I've done it , and

5:38

there's a level of formality that's present

5:40

, but it has very little value when

5:43

employers ask potential hires to fill

5:45

out incredibly long applications with full

5:47

job and educational history , to

5:49

write cover letters , to provide writing

5:51

samples and all this other stuff

5:53

up front . To what end is that

5:55

? You're making them jump through a lot of hoops

5:57

before you even had this conversation

6:00

. Now , in most places that I've

6:02

worked and now in my coaching

6:04

career , you know I really recommend

6:07

the resume and or LinkedIn page . Is

6:09

what you actually want to work with . All

6:11

the other materials are typically not . You're

6:14

not going to look at them , right ? They're unnecessary

6:16

and they're a waste of time for both you and for

6:18

the candidate . So don't make

6:20

them jump through all these extra hoops because you're

6:22

busy . Are you really going to go through all

6:24

of that stuff , right ? Your job is

6:26

to remove some of the friction from

6:28

the hiring process . Now . Employers

6:31

are wasting talent's time and their own

6:33

when you continue to ask for these items and

6:35

then you don't make decisions based off of it

6:37

. Right Drawn out application

6:40

processes make for an extraordinarily bad

6:42

candidate experience . It shouldn't

6:44

take us four weeks to make a decision when

6:46

we have a candidate pool at our hands , you

6:49

know , at our fingertips . So

6:51

what's missing from this equation is congruence

6:53

. It's a very one-sided process

6:56

. Candidates put in a lot of time and they

6:58

get very little results . The process

7:00

needs to be a lot more efficient and

7:02

you need to focus on streamlining it to

7:05

ensure a better candidate experience

7:07

, which will also make a better experience

7:09

for you , because your time is valuable . So

7:12

when a company has a poor candidate experience

7:14

. It can hamper the ability to attract talent . Now

7:17

, there's a lot of contributing factors , but here

7:19

are my top five . One

7:21

lengthy decision making and lack of

7:23

communication . I've

7:26

personally known people who have interviewed for roles and

7:28

the process has dragged on for months without

7:30

a decision being made . It's crickets

7:32

. They don't hear anything back . This

7:34

prolonged process not only leads to a loss of interest

7:36

for the candidate , but it also encourages

7:38

a viable candidate to explore similar

7:41

opportunities elsewhere . They're not going to sit around and wait

7:43

and all this is doing is showing

7:45

that your company is indecisive

7:47

. And then , similarly , I've

7:49

seen candidates spend extensive time in preparation

7:52

, scheduling , sitting through multiple interviews

7:54

. You know the once . Timely updates

7:56

and feedbacks were replaced with silence . And

7:59

then the candidate starts wondering about the status of their candidacy

8:01

and whether their time has been wasted . Okay

8:03

, so don't have these lengthy decision-making

8:06

timelines and do

8:08

not have a lack of communication right

8:10

. Communicate with your candidates and be very

8:13

dialed in on what

8:15

your timeline is . From the time you

8:17

start recruiting , what is your goal to hire

8:19

? Two weeks , three weeks , set a timeline

8:21

and work within that timeline

8:25

. Number two , in terms of what we see , that

8:27

leads to a very bad candidate experience , is ghosting

8:30

. Some companies don't let

8:32

candidates know when they didn't get the role and

8:34

they fail to ever follow up . In

8:36

my opinion , ghosting is one of the biggest forms of

8:38

disrespect because it discounts all the time

8:41

the candidates put into the process , it shows

8:43

them that their time is invaluable and it makes the whole process

8:45

messy and that candidate also

8:47

loses respect for you and your

8:49

company . So here's

8:52

an easy solution for you Automation

8:54

Calendar prompts and tools

8:56

that can help you avoid ghosting and

8:58

avoid the lack of communication . There are some wonderful

9:01

applicant tracking systems out there and

9:03

so if you're hiring a lot , you can utilize

9:05

an applicant tracking system to help you stay on top

9:07

of things and put automation

9:09

calendar prompts and use the tools to

9:11

remind you hey , I need to follow up with this candidate , I need to

9:13

close the gap on this , I need to update them

9:15

right . Reaching out to someone doesn't have

9:17

to be labor intensive . It could

9:19

be a quick email , it could be a call , it could be a text . The

9:22

most important element is not so much the medium

9:24

but the timeliness and effectiveness

9:26

of your updates . People appreciate

9:29

being kept in the loop . They shouldn't have to run down

9:31

the recruiter or the hiring manager or the business

9:33

owner to understand where they're at in

9:35

the hiring process . Number

9:37

three an overly complex application

9:39

process . When the process is needlessly

9:42

complicated , candidates are probably

9:44

going to give up . Right , your strong candidates are certainly

9:46

going to move on . Now

9:48

, not only will you lose out on potential hires , but

9:50

your employer brand is going to get harmed

9:53

because the process is going to be perceived

9:55

as a reflection of company

9:57

inefficiency your inability to make a decision

9:59

. If you can't make a decision about hiring , how are

10:02

you making decisions about the rest of your business ? So

10:05

here is a solution for you Assess what

10:07

information you truly need . Streamline

10:09

your process around the information required for you to make

10:11

an informed and timely decision . This

10:14

is part of your strategic planning . Before

10:16

you ever go to market , right , you have to sit

10:18

down and plan out the hiring process for

10:20

that position and be very clear

10:22

on what you need to make a final

10:24

decision . Number four

10:26

unprepared interviewers and clarity

10:29

on the job descriptions . There is nothing

10:31

worse than sitting down for an interview and

10:33

the person that works for the company doing the interviewing

10:36

is not prepared to have a

10:39

comprehensive and meaningful conversation

10:41

. And I've gone through these

10:43

processes where the interviewers were clearly unprepared

10:46

, the questions , didn't assess the actual

10:48

qualifications , and I walk

10:50

away from that conversation feeling that

10:53

the company didn't take the hiring process very seriously

10:55

and they weren't even sure what the qualifications

10:57

were that were going to be required , and they weren't

10:59

even sure what they were looking for . They were all over

11:01

the map . Now I've also

11:03

seen job postings and job descriptions

11:06

that do not accurately represent what

11:08

the entire role actually is . Effectively

11:11

managing candidate expectations is paramount

11:14

, so you need to really

11:16

sit down and figure out what is the actual

11:18

role , what is required ? Is it only one

11:20

job or only one position ? Or should

11:22

this be split into two positions ? Is it full-time

11:25

, is it part-time ? All of this needs

11:27

to be done long before you invite

11:29

your first candidate for a conversation

11:31

. Me personally , I'm

11:33

a big believer in telling people what it's really

11:35

like , so that the candidates can make the

11:37

best informed decision possible

11:39

. Inviting someone to join a company

11:42

should be a sales pitch for them . It's a conversation

11:44

to find alignment on values , alignments on motivation

11:47

, alignments on ability to

11:49

future potential . That's what this is about

11:51

. It shouldn't be them coming in to do the sales

11:54

pitch . This

11:58

is about it shouldn't be them coming in to do the sales pitch One of the big recommendations

12:00

when I'm coaching clients is encouraging them to allow the final pool of candidates

12:02

to talk to existing employees

12:05

. You know , if you are truly building

12:07

an organization that is running well and

12:09

again , every day is not utopia

12:11

. We all have bad days . Employees

12:14

have bad days , but if , for the most part , they

12:16

are happy at the job they do and they are happy

12:18

working at your company , let

12:20

them talk to a couple of the employees . Let them find

12:22

out , hey , what's it like to work here ? Because , believe

12:24

it or not , your employees are going to be honest , so

12:27

they're not going to share code it . They're going to be honest

12:29

and , you know , hopefully they're telling

12:31

them look , most of the time , it's great we get

12:33

to do this , we have this . This is what we're focused on

12:35

. Give your candidates an opportunity

12:38

to talk to existing employees so that they can get

12:40

a firsthand information

12:42

about what it's going to be like to work their day in

12:44

and day out , because they can actually

12:46

sell it better than you can . Right

12:49

, it's just like a

12:52

restaurant owner doing his own review . So of course it's going

12:54

to be biased , right ? You as the hiring manager

12:56

, you as the business owner . There's

12:59

a bias there , of course . You think it's a great place

13:01

to work . Let candidates talk

13:03

to your employees when they get to

13:05

that final stretch of the process

13:07

. Here's another solution for you In

13:10

terms of preparing create

13:12

a document that outlines the key responsibilities

13:14

of the role , the desired qualifications

13:16

and a set of standardized questions that assess

13:19

those qualifications . This is going to help

13:21

ensure that you or your interviewers are

13:23

prepared and that they are asking relevant

13:27

questions

13:29

that accurately represent the role

13:31

. The other reason why I recommend you

13:33

create a set of questions is so that you level

13:35

the playing field . If you do not

13:37

have a preset bank of questions to

13:39

ask candidates , the chances of you

13:42

asking different questions for the same

13:44

role but with different candidates is very high . I

13:46

know because that's how I used to operate . I

13:48

didn't sit down and prepare a bank of questions . I'd

13:50

interview 10 different people , I'd ask a bunch of

13:52

different questions and when all the interviews were

13:54

done , I no longer had a baseline

13:57

in which to compare data and

13:59

it wasn't a level playing field for the candidates

14:01

because nobody was getting asked the same set

14:03

of questions . All

14:05

right , number five discrimination . Early

14:08

in my career , I was asked how old I

14:10

was . In an interview , I was also asked

14:12

what my religious preference was . And

14:14

while I ultimately got the job and

14:20

which I declined , actually after I got the job

14:22

, because it really gave me some insights to how they operated

14:24

it definitely

14:27

was not a good practice to have those

14:29

questions being asked . So

14:31

you are going to want to make sure , as the employer

14:33

, that you avoid the look of

14:36

impropriety . You need to know

14:38

which types of questions are illegal

14:40

and discriminatory to ask and

14:43

you don't ask them . And actually , technically

14:46

, they're not illegal to ask . It's illegal

14:48

to act on the information . But why

14:50

ask if you can't use the information ? So

14:53

make sure that you have a list

14:55

of questions that are not to be asked and

14:57

make sure whoever is doing the hiring is

15:00

trained on that , because if

15:02

it gets out there that you are asking

15:04

questions that are discriminatory in nature

15:07

, you know that shouldn't be getting asked . I

15:09

got news for you that's going to get back

15:11

out into the world and it's going to damage your

15:14

employer brand . So

15:16

your solution train people on what

15:18

they can and cannot ask , to ensure that

15:20

your interviewers are well-informed and

15:22

educated about the questions that they are legally

15:24

permissible to ask , and

15:26

also train them on how to conduct fair and unbiased

15:29

interviews . And these are some of the things that

15:31

we work on when we coach business owners . We

15:33

help coach on how to create

15:36

a bank of questions . What questions

15:38

can they legally ask ? What questions

15:41

can they not legally ask ? We help

15:43

coach on all of this stuff

15:45

, because recruiting at its core is

15:47

about curating an experience . At

15:50

the end of the day , what kind of experience are you

15:52

creating for your candidates ? If you

15:54

create a world-class , four

15:56

seasons type recruitment

15:59

experience , even if they don't come

16:01

work for you , they will become fans

16:04

of your company . They may become a

16:06

customer , they may refer future candidates

16:08

to you . You never know how your paths

16:10

are going to cross again , so why

16:13

ruin it right ? Especially

16:15

if they give you a glowing review on

16:17

Glassdoor Indeed . Hey , the interview process

16:19

and the recruitment process was excellent . The company

16:21

treated me great . Ultimately , I didn't get

16:23

the job , or I didn't take the job , but they are

16:25

a class act . That's the type of information

16:28

you want out there about your company

16:30

. All right , I hope you've enjoyed this episode

16:32

of the Entrepreneur to Employer

16:35

podcast where we talk about the importance

16:37

of developing a top , world-class

16:40

candidate experience to help your employer brand

16:42

. If you've enjoyed this episode , do

16:44

me a favor like , subscribe to the podcast

16:46

, leave us a review . I read every review

16:49

and use it to make sure that we are improving the information

16:51

each week that we share . And if you have a

16:53

fellow business owner that you believe would benefit

16:55

from this episode , grab the link to the show

16:57

, text it over them and say hey , I think you should listen to this

17:00

particular episode . It's only about 16

17:02

minutes in length and you'll get a lot of value

17:04

of it . The more you share this podcast

17:06

with everybody , the more business owners we can

17:08

help and the more employees and

17:10

great businesses we can help build . All

17:13

right , that concludes this week's episode . Hope

17:15

you've enjoyed it . We will

17:17

see you next week on the Entrepreneur to Employer podcast .