Hiring
If you ask anyone how to go about hiring people, most of them will tell you that hiring is a simple process. All you need to do is put on an advertisment that states clearly the requirements for the various job openings, mark a walk in date for the interviews, take the interviews and select the people you find suited to your needs.
Hmm, well, it isn't that simple. Not if you're a start-up without a millionaire funding your venture anyways. Just completed the first recruitment weekend, and the results are not encouraging. Come to think about it, I feel it was inevitable, maybe even its good that the event was not so good, because it definitely was an eye-opener, with a capital O..
Ok, so what have I learned? Well, they're listed below:
1. Make sure the people you invite for an interview do turn up. Even if it means confirming the date and time with the candidate a few times. On the first day the ratio of people who actually made it for an interview to the number of people invited was less than 40%. Not exactly what we wanted.
2. The interview calls should be only for people that you feel are worth coming for an interview. To give an example, none of the people who appeared for the interview on day 1, were even worth sitting for the test. Maybe, if we would have just called them up once and talked to them for a few min to just validate they actually are what they state in their resumes, both parties could have saved a lot of time and effort.
3. The venue should be easily accessible. Well, this was an issue that is easily tackled. All you need are a few signposts.
4. The office should be impressive. Now, I don't want to say that you should have a grand lobby with a stunning receptionist with the ambience of a 5 star hotel. No, not at all. Since, we're a start-up and a very recently established one too, we haven't finished shopping :). And hence, it doesn't have some of the things that are maybe good to have, or even essential for some. But, still the office should give a feeling to the people coming for an interview that makes them comfortable, impressed by what it has, rather than what it doesn't, and most essentially, its a place where it would be a joy to work at. So how can one do that? And that too without a couple of glass cabins or discussion rooms or a pool table? Well, for starters, the place should look like a office and not a room where a group of enthusiasts satisfy their hunger for good work and technology. You can make that apparent by simple things like a set of well kept, neat and clean desks, a good central discussion table, few nice posters and other articles that may show what we do in here, what we stand for. A nice book shelf with nice collection of books,magazines and newspaper creates a nice touch to the room. Make sure that there are no objects in view that are not needed on that day. A cluttered desk reflects a cluttered mind, i heard somewhere. A cluttered office reflects a cluttered work environment as well I feel.
5. Have a pitch that makes every potential candidate look at your advertisment twice.. Now thats very important for new players simply due to the fact that you don't have a standing, so the name is not enough (unlike Khaitan fans). Now that is something we have to work on, and we're aware of it.
6. Introduction. How you introduce your company to the candidates is also important, maybe though not as important as the offered renumeration, but neverthelss, it is something that can make or break the interest of the candidate towards your company. Unless you can impress the person with what you do and what is the company all about, its very hard to convince him that this is the place that will help him realise his dreams. The trick is not by lying, after all, once the candidate is in and he/she finds out that all that he thought about the place is actually a big piece of white lies, you can't have a face. Thus, the right way to do it is by highlighting the USP of your establishment with flair and confidence, and win over the audience. Once you win the audience, not only they would like to join you, they'll recommend their friends to have a look, and you win free publicity.
7. Targetting the right audience. Well, this might be something to think about a lot earlier than the points already discussed, but well, its something I want to make a point about. Resumes are not an accurate reflection of a persons knowledge/ability or even potential. A resume does reflect how well a person can sell himself though :). Well, I might sound overly critical here, but I haven't really been proved otherwise, yet, so I'll stand besides it. A persons ability can only be identified by personal interaction. So the big q is how do you reach the right people? MonsterIndia or Naukri are alternatives that need a lot of effort for bare min results. The most successful mechanism is referrals, or contacts. A good person has a good chance of knowing another good person. Similarily, a good person seeking a job is very likely to know another good person who is looking for a job :). So one needs to tap into this chain of right people. The hit ratio from Monster or Naukri haven't been very exciting for us. But, its terrific when it comes from a personal contact. And here, point 5 is what works for you..
Well, I hope that by thinking over the above, and actually doing somthing about it, the next weekend is more fruitful..
Hmm, well, it isn't that simple. Not if you're a start-up without a millionaire funding your venture anyways. Just completed the first recruitment weekend, and the results are not encouraging. Come to think about it, I feel it was inevitable, maybe even its good that the event was not so good, because it definitely was an eye-opener, with a capital O..
Ok, so what have I learned? Well, they're listed below:
1. Make sure the people you invite for an interview do turn up. Even if it means confirming the date and time with the candidate a few times. On the first day the ratio of people who actually made it for an interview to the number of people invited was less than 40%. Not exactly what we wanted.
2. The interview calls should be only for people that you feel are worth coming for an interview. To give an example, none of the people who appeared for the interview on day 1, were even worth sitting for the test. Maybe, if we would have just called them up once and talked to them for a few min to just validate they actually are what they state in their resumes, both parties could have saved a lot of time and effort.
3. The venue should be easily accessible. Well, this was an issue that is easily tackled. All you need are a few signposts.
4. The office should be impressive. Now, I don't want to say that you should have a grand lobby with a stunning receptionist with the ambience of a 5 star hotel. No, not at all. Since, we're a start-up and a very recently established one too, we haven't finished shopping :). And hence, it doesn't have some of the things that are maybe good to have, or even essential for some. But, still the office should give a feeling to the people coming for an interview that makes them comfortable, impressed by what it has, rather than what it doesn't, and most essentially, its a place where it would be a joy to work at. So how can one do that? And that too without a couple of glass cabins or discussion rooms or a pool table? Well, for starters, the place should look like a office and not a room where a group of enthusiasts satisfy their hunger for good work and technology. You can make that apparent by simple things like a set of well kept, neat and clean desks, a good central discussion table, few nice posters and other articles that may show what we do in here, what we stand for. A nice book shelf with nice collection of books,magazines and newspaper creates a nice touch to the room. Make sure that there are no objects in view that are not needed on that day. A cluttered desk reflects a cluttered mind, i heard somewhere. A cluttered office reflects a cluttered work environment as well I feel.
5. Have a pitch that makes every potential candidate look at your advertisment twice.. Now thats very important for new players simply due to the fact that you don't have a standing, so the name is not enough (unlike Khaitan fans). Now that is something we have to work on, and we're aware of it.
6. Introduction. How you introduce your company to the candidates is also important, maybe though not as important as the offered renumeration, but neverthelss, it is something that can make or break the interest of the candidate towards your company. Unless you can impress the person with what you do and what is the company all about, its very hard to convince him that this is the place that will help him realise his dreams. The trick is not by lying, after all, once the candidate is in and he/she finds out that all that he thought about the place is actually a big piece of white lies, you can't have a face. Thus, the right way to do it is by highlighting the USP of your establishment with flair and confidence, and win over the audience. Once you win the audience, not only they would like to join you, they'll recommend their friends to have a look, and you win free publicity.
7. Targetting the right audience. Well, this might be something to think about a lot earlier than the points already discussed, but well, its something I want to make a point about. Resumes are not an accurate reflection of a persons knowledge/ability or even potential. A resume does reflect how well a person can sell himself though :). Well, I might sound overly critical here, but I haven't really been proved otherwise, yet, so I'll stand besides it. A persons ability can only be identified by personal interaction. So the big q is how do you reach the right people? MonsterIndia or Naukri are alternatives that need a lot of effort for bare min results. The most successful mechanism is referrals, or contacts. A good person has a good chance of knowing another good person. Similarily, a good person seeking a job is very likely to know another good person who is looking for a job :). So one needs to tap into this chain of right people. The hit ratio from Monster or Naukri haven't been very exciting for us. But, its terrific when it comes from a personal contact. And here, point 5 is what works for you..
Well, I hope that by thinking over the above, and actually doing somthing about it, the next weekend is more fruitful..
posted by Who me? | 12:57 AM
6 Comments:
I would do following to advertise for jobs apart from naukri, monster etc.
1. On my blog(or company's blog), a post on the recruitment drive with requirements and link to company website.
2. Ask all my friends(right one) to link to this post from their blogs, or may be ask them to blog about the drive...spreading the word.
3. Right ppl visit sites like delicious,digg for seeing the popular stories/posts/articles on Internet. So make your blog post appear on this sites, that would really let the world know about you.
U started ur own co.?? (gulp..gulp...) :o)
Jatinder,
Blogging gives you global reach to a niche audience. I am talking about local candidates here. And I am talking about quick fixes. The ideas u have posted above do provide me an audience, but not targeted or local to the place.
Dumpy,
Cough Cough ..
http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/FindingGreatDevelopers.html
berry berry interesting read.
Swaroop
Hi Dost,
I had similar experience while we were recruiting for Pune office.
It took me 3 months to hire 4 QA, 6 Tech Support and 2 developers.
Only 15% were referrals. Rest came from Naukri and Monster.
Here are my stats:
1. Looked through close to 400 resumes
2. Selected resumes = 200
3. People available = 150
4. People selected after my first 15 minutes chat over phone 100
5. People showed up for inoffice or telephonic interview = 60
6. Selected = 17
7. People finally joined = 12
The few important principles we followed were:
1. Call people on phone and talk to them for 15 minutes. This is where you will come to know if the person is worth calling. I talked about their experience, interests and checked if they are really interested in shifting and reasons for shifting
2. Follow up with selected candidates, send email reminder before interview dates. Talk friendly so that they can not say NO to come down. Sometimes senior people try to ignore you.
2. Don't interview them for what you want. Interview them for how fast they can learn and how good is their apptitude.
3. Dont give offers to people just to give them offer. Make sure they understand the value of it.
4. Followup with them till they join.
Even when we had been doing continuous follows, we have had at least 3 last day drop outs . but at least 2 had valid reasons.
So market is hot.
Sell yourself as much as you can. You should be a good sales person.
Be true for most of the things.
Stock options is oen good tool you can use.
I know what you are feeling. For 3 weeks my development work was screwed. Its tiring and frustrating. Especially when you call people with lot of hope and they turn out to be fucking stupid.
Good luck!
Vij
"how to Hire a developer with only 3% raise" Unleashed ;)
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