How To Recruit The Ideal Employee For Any Job

Recruiting the right person to fill a vacant position is a challenge for any type of business. Getting the right employee for the post can have a tremendous impact on your company’s success. If you employ the right candidate, you will see your business grow and thrive. However, the wrong decision can have serious repercussions for your organisation and team.

Identifying the ideal employee for any job is an important leadership skill to master. Getting the right person on the team is just as important as managing the team. Also, recruiting new employees is expensive and time-consuming. So, it really makes sense to get it right the first time.

To recruit the ideal employee, it is necessary to think beyond the interview process. Ideally, a job interview should only attract the candidates most suited for the vacancy. The worst position an interviewer can find themselves in is trying to pick the best from a bad bunch.

In this article, you will learn many ways to improve your recruitment success. You will also find out how out define the perfect candidate and how to make a final decision.

1. Recruitment starts by building a network

Ideally, you want to fill vacant job positions without having to advertise in the first place. To do this requires having a good network of industry professionals who can take up the vacancy or who know a suitable candidate.

One of the best ways that any leaders can build a ‘recruitment’ network is to use social media. In this regard, LinkedIn is great for networking with other professionals. You can also join industry-related groups, ask for recommendations, and stay in touch with former colleagues. These are also sources where you can recruit suitable candidates for any job.

2. Define the ideal candidate

Before you start any interview process, you need to have a clearly defined idea of what makes the ideal candidate. This is more than a job description listing a few tasks. It is essential to have in mind all the qualities that the ideal employee should have.

One way to do this is to get a group together of employees who are doing a similar job. Together with the recruitment manager, they can come up with an accurate description of the job. As well as listing the main responsibilities, they should also highlight certain characteristics needed to do the job well.

From their list, you can prioritise the main responsibilities and characteristics of the job description. Of course, you don’t need to include all aspects of the job that your group listed. However, having a clearly defined candidate will help you vet potential candidates during the interview.

3. Find the Ideal Candidate

The next step is to look for suitable candidates for the post. To help find the ideal candidates, it is important to advertise in the right places. How can you find out where to post?

If you have a good network of contacts, you could invite people to apply for the job. This has the advantage that you probably personally know some of them and have an idea of their skills.

Another way is to share the job description with others in your network. They could share the invite with suitable people they know.

You can also post a job opportunity on your LinkedIn network.

4. Assessing the ideal candidate for a job

When you start receiving a number of applications, the first step is to sift out the applications that are clearly not suitable for the vacancy. Many business advisors recommend only picking the best 2 or 3 potential candidates from the list. These are the ones you will interview.

Of course, the interview process doesn’t reveal everything about a candidate’s suitability. So, you may want to think of some additional ways of testing the interviewees. Some ways of doing this include asking them to do a presentation, make a written test or to spend a half-day with your team.

5. Making your decision

The most important part of recruiting the ideal candidate is, of course, making the right decision. After the interviews, you should bring together all the information you have gathered. This includes their CVs, interview notes, and feedback from your team or others who met them.

Compare the information you have with your ideal candidate definition. The one that matches up the best should be the ideal employee for the job.