I can’t find “good” talent!

“I’ve always been able to find top talent for my team, its easy.” says no one ever! The talent shortage is REAL and companies are feeling the crunch, I can’t speak for anywhere else in the world, but certainly in Canada and US. During my time working in HR, I’ve come to witness talent shortage rampant across industries, maybe you experienced it too?

The irony is rich in this topic because job seekers feel the same way about available jobs! So how can you have both sides complaining? The culmination of my personal and professional experience led to this short answer “mismatched expectations due to extreme selection”. So let’s first talk about Extreme Selection.

Okay, paint drawn bell curve, but you get the point. This is where the hiring manager are being extremely selective about candidates. They only want candidates with strong technical skills, interpersonal skills, cultural alignment, went to a good school, worked at a particular company, fits within hiring budget, and a plethora of other factors that may or may not be required for job success. The candidate pool shrinks really fast when you put all of these criteria together, 3000 profiles to 100 profiles is good, 3000 to 3, is no bueno! Evidently, employers have issues “Finding” good talent because they handicapped themselves (or recruiters) to go after only a limited number of top candidates. These candidates are also very sought after by other employers and have choices. Therefore, unless you have a very competitive offer, you most likely wouldn’t be able to attract these talent. (Competitive offers are another topic I will write about in another article).

“I don’t want to hire second rate candidates!” as some of you are thinking. I agree that you should hire only the best candidate, one addition I would make is “for the position”. If the position is in a small team, serving a critical function, with loads of learning and advancement opportunities, then yes hire the cream of the crop. On the contrary, if the role has very low visibility, with little room to grow, then do you really need a top performer? Or rather, can you keep them even if you get one? It is important for employers to really think about a hire not only in terms of technical skills and experience, but also in terms of personal alignment to the role.

Cool, so we talked about extreme selection causing issues, but say you are hiring for a small team or a startup company where every hire needs top performers. Fair enough, this is where you run into the second obstacle to finding great talent – Mismatch.

I came across a dating example in a book called “Calling Bullshit: The Art of Skepticism in a data-driven world” by Carl Bergstrom and Jevin D. West (I have no affiliation with these fine gentlemen, but it’s a book I highly value). I repurposed it for recruitment purposes to explain the mismatch concept.

The axis of this graphic indicates the performance level of the candidate and how easy it is to recruit them into your company (increasingly easier as you move along the X-axis). As a hiring manager, you do not want to hire anyone in the bottom left area, but candidates in the top right area don’t want to join your company. So what you are left is a narrow strip in the middle. First, the talent pool is significantly reduced by this mismatch. Second, what you are left with in this pool are high performers that are very finicky, low performers who join as soon as you call them, and lots of average performers that are kind of easy to recruit.

I believe it is important to show hiring managers that top talent have options and may not want to join. This also helps to start discussing competitive offers and framing the opportunity to push back the top red line.

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If you know me at all, you’ll know that I’m no negative Nancy, I don’t just write about problems without solutions. Here are a couple of things I’ve seen companies use to overcome mismatch expectation due to extreme selection.

Mindset Shift – there is no perfect candidate

Perfect candidates don’t exist, everyone’s got their own kinks. Even if you manage to find the “perfect candidate” you most likely won’t be able to afford them and most likely uncover some kinks after you hired them. So get away from the “perfect candidate” mentality and identify technical expertise, experience and personal traits that contribute to job success.

Get recruitment team involved early – strategize together

Remember what I said earlier about recruiters giving you a dose of reality? Recruiters know what it takes to attract good talent, so getting them involved early will help reduce mismatch and correct extreme selection, which ultimately help you hire the right talent, faster. When I say early, I mean when you are periodically assessing your hiring needs, not when you actually need to hire. Another mindset shift here is viewing your recruiter as a talent advisor rather than an order taker. Recruiters have specialized knowledge in obtaining a scarce resource.

Specific – broad hiring criteria – a paradoxical approach

I mentioned above how difficult it is to articulate what good looks like, here is a framework to help you think about developing hiring criteria, a recruiter or HR professional can act as a sounding board in this exercise. Start by thinking about specifics that contributes to job success, such as education and professional designations, experience with products/services/projects, technical expertise, personal attributes. Brainstorm as many as you possibly can here. Then go broad on each one by identifying any alternative names, substitutes, or examples that demonstrates particular traits. As an example, software engineers may go to school for software engineering program or computer science (alternative names), you may substitute a Masters in Taxation for an In-depth tax course, and find ways to determine if someone demonstrates creative thinking.

This approach may sound complicated, but with practice, you will see many hiring criteria are not absolute. It also helps the recruiter broaden the search criteria while staying true to your needs.

Have a plan for the candidate before you hire

Since we assume that no candidate is perfect, it means there will always be a need for training and development in order to mold them into effective colleagues. This also helps to show the candidate that you are committed to their success, even before they are hired. Candidates want to know what they will learn in the new role and future growth potential, it’s a big part of the sales pitch to attract a candidate. It will be very difficult to sell growth opportunity if there no plan. When you say “we’ll tap you on the shoulder when we think you are ready”, candidates hear “you got no plan, I’m taking my career in my own hands rather than your subjective whims”. The plan doesn’t have to be concrete but lay out general steps will demonstrate to the candidate what you have in mind for them.

Be realistic with your job offer

Working with a recruiter early will significantly reduce the work in this area. Ideally you want to be competitive in the market but not overpay for the appropriate talent. If you have budget constraints, then you probably level set on the experience level you can afford. A recruiter’s job is to help you get the most value for your money. Job offers isn’t just about money, it includes benefits, perks, training and learning, professional growth, prestige, exciting work, and good culture. So there is a lot that goes into a job offer. Its important as a hiring manager to know what qualified candidates want and what you can reasonably offer to attract them.

You probably noticed that some items are tangible (salary, bonus, benefits, perks) and others are intangible (training and learning, professional growth, prestige, exciting work, and good culture). Don’t make the mistake that these are equally weighted. Meeting market standards in tangible items gets you to the table, the intangibles are the differentiators. Unless the work is cutting edge research leading to cold fusion (or something on the same scale), candidates are not going to be willing to take a pay cut to work for you, they still got bills to pay, just like you.

Be solution oriented with candidates

A solution-oriented mindset means we look for ways to overcome problems, so why do most hiring managers take the opposite approach when it comes to hiring? Rather than finding ways to work with a candidate with some kinks, some hiring managers find every reason not to hire a candidate. Sure, there are some qualities that are non-negotiable, but vast majority of requirements are trainable and teachable. This concept ties all the previous points together, accept there are no perfect candidates and there will be compromises, partner up with recruiters early, define appropriate hiring requirements, have a plan how to mitigate gaps in candidate profile and hiring requirements, and put your best foot forward when extending an offer.

A bit of empathy goes a long way in recruitment. While hiring managers may feel hiring the wrong candidate is risky business (and its true), candidates also view working for the wrong employer as very risky. Let’s recognize that both parties are taking a risk and find ways to reduce the risk as much as possible.

Thanks for reading until the end, hopefully you got some useful information! Interested to hear if you face other issues or what solutions worked for you to overcome the talent shortage!

***My views are my own***