Category Archives: The Recruiting Rules

The Single Biggest Truth in Hiring That No One Will Admit!

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I’ve had my mind changed about a lot of things over the past decade of writing. I look back at posts I wrote 5 years ago, and think, “Wow, that was a stupid way of thinking!” I’ve also consistently written about things that I can’t prove, but I know to be true with every ounce of my being.

So, every time I find data that confirms my bias, I like to share it! It makes me think I’m still correct in my viewpoints!

The more attractive you are, the more opportunity you’ll get in your job choice and career! 

Think it isn’t true? Here’s the latest study from 2021, from three PhDs in Economics from Cal and the London School of Economics,  “Do Looks Matter for an Academic Career in Economics?” Want the short answer? Yes! Of course, don’t be stupid!

“Using unique data on Ph.D. graduates from top economics departments in the United States we test whether more attractive individuals are more likely to succeed. We find robust evidence that appearance matters for job outcomes. Attractive individuals are more likely to study at higher-ranked Ph.D. institutions, are more likely to find themselves in private sector jobs than in government jobs or in academia. Within academia, attractive Ph.D. graduates are more likely to be placed at higher ranking institutions. More surprisingly, appearance also predicts research productivity on the job.”

What did the study find?

  1. The more attractive you are, the better schools you’ll get into.
  2. The more attractive you are, the better jobs you’ll get.
  3. The more attractive you are, the better you’ll actually perform!

Now, come on. I get pretty people will get into better schools and get better jobs, but why in the hell do pretty people actually perform better!?! This has to be a flawed study, right!

“Pretty Privilege” is alive and well, at least in the United States, where this study took place. Maybe in other countries, like Canada, ugly people still have a chance. But, I’m doubting it. (Also, shout-out to Maria Alvarez for the “Pretty Privilege” title!)

Can people really have “Pretty Privilege”?  (FYI – the title of my upcoming autobiography is, “Of Course I Have Pretty Privilege, Just Look at Me!”)

So, I’ve laid out my theory of this before, but how soon people forget. So, here it is again:

Step 1: Pretty person gets a great job. Is Successful.

Step 2: Success and Good Lucks, get you a great choice of Mates.

Step 3: Pretty, Successful people get married and procreate.

Step 4: Pretty kids get into the best schools.

Step 5: The cycle repeats.

So, yes, of course, there is pretty privilege. So much so, we pretty people actually talk about it behind the Uggs backs! There are only two privileges stronger than Pretty, being white and being rich! If you have the trifecta-privilege, well, you’re basically unstoppable.

Now, some will want to argue. “Tim, attractiveness is in the eyes of the beholder!” This is usually said by a person who is a six, or lower, on a scale of 1 (troll) to 10 (goddess). To which I could lay out countless studies on attractiveness and call bullshit, but hey, you’re not very attractive, thus, not really my competition, so believe whatever you want, I’m 2/3 of the way to the trifecta!

So, if you have never read my stuff and this is the first time, and you’re ugly, right about now, you’re pissed! So, let me say, the paragraph before is half-joking, I’m 3 for 3, baby! 😉

What can you do if you’re not Pretty? 

First, if you’re asking yourself this question, I’m sorry, you should have more confidence, high confidence is super pretty! But, I get it. We all can’t be the belle of the ball.

If you don’t have Pretty Privilege, you need to do some other stuff extraordinary well. Be way smarter. Grind and Hustle way harder. Network way better. You must outwork the Pretty People. Invest a lot in your outward appearance. You might not be super attractive, but you can definitely be prettier than a lot of other folks! Be the tallest of the Seven Dwarfs, is all I’m saying.

Let’s break it down.

You and the people at your company responsible for hiring aren’t always hiring the best candidate. Mostly, they hire the candidate who can do the job, which also happens to be the best looking of the candidates they interviewed. All things being equal, hire pretty, is the strategy. I’m not saying it’s the best strategy, I’m just saying it’s the strategy most organizations follow, but would never admit to.

We see this in organizations all the time. You walk into an organization and you start to go, wait, I think there’s a problem, everyone here is way too good looking! Almost always, those organizations are super successful as well. Back in the day, the c-suite would call this “image”. We are upholding an “image” of the firm. What they were really saying was, you need to be prettier to hang with us!

So, keep ignoring Pretty Privilege if you want. It’s alive and well and most likely determining your next hire.

 

 

 

What Does Tim Sackett Actually Do?

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So, besides my beautiful wife asking this question, frequently, I get asked this question all the time! During the spring and fall conference season, I’m out and about all over the world speaking. At almost every stop I’ll have at least one person come up to me and ask,

“So, what do you actually do?” 

Ugh! It’s the single biggest failure of my life! How did I do so well to “brand” myself, but then have so many people not know what I actually do for my job?!

I probably should start each conversation like an AA meeting:

“Hi, my name is Tim Sackett, and I run a technical staffing company!” 

BTW, I think that’s actually Step 13 of AA! Staffing firm owners will agree with this!

That’s the real job. That’s the money maker. I run a recruiting shop! Like most of you, I have to go out and buy a recruiting tech stack that works. I need to decide if I spend money on Indeed, or LinkedIn, or ZipRecruiter. I need to hire and train recruiters. At the end of the day, I’m in the weeds finding talent.

Unlike most Staffing Firm executives, I can’t really hide. I’ve been blogging and speaking for ten years in our industry. When I meet with new clients who want to use my team, I try and tell them, “I think we’re better than most, but the one thing I can guarantee is I won’t lie to you, or take advantage of you! I’m too public! You could kill my brand overnight if I was one of those cheesy staffing guys selling you a load of bullshit!”

The name of my company is HRU Technical Resources. I own the company, now, but in reality, my Mom started the company in 1980. (Check out her profile pic from the 1st day! She looks like Farrah Fawcett!) She’s the original OG Recruiter! In her 70’s, she still could out recruit probably 99% of Recruiters in the world! Old school and proud of it! I like to tell people I was “born” into staffing, as my Mom started the company when I was a boy and I would sit on her bed as she made interview calls at night and watch TV with the sound off.

Want to work with me? I want to work with you! 

Here’s what we do:

  • Contract staffing – helping organizations for 40 years build that part of their company that they want to maintain as contingent to add flexibility to their workforce.
  • Sourcing Projects – we will your funnel with talent and let you do the recruiting
  • Project RPO – we bundle some critical hiring for you and do the entire thing end-to-end
  • Traditional Direct-hire staffing

But, wait! What else do you do? 

I also do a bunch of Talent Acquisition consulting with corporate clients as well, helping them build out their own recruiting tech stack and just flat out execute better when it comes to their own direct hiring and figuring out what’s the best way to get the most out of your recruiting team. It usually starts out like this, “Tim, can we talk? Our talent acquisition department is broken and we need some help!”

I’m also an influencer, advisor, and analyst in the HR Technology industry. I work with tech companies in a number of ways from brand awareness, to product marketing and development, sales strategy, etc. As a reader, you see this in the demos and reviews I do, over 100 per year, but behind the scenes, that’s actually working with these organizations in a number of ways.

So, yeah, I write a lot. I speak quite a bit. I do webcasts, etc. But that’s not the full-time gig. I wrote a post a few years ago titled “What would it take to get you to work 80 hours per week?” I don’t work 80 hours per week, but I probably work 60-ish. A lot of nights and weekends to make both my full-time and my side gig work.

The reality is, if I don’t work my full-time gig, my bills don’t get paid. That’s real life. So, let’s work together! I would love to get to know more of you and work with a bunch of you. Send me a note and let’s connect – sackett.tim@hrutech.com.

2021 Workforce Report by @iCIMS – 84% of HR Pros Believe Their Diversity Recruiting Sucks!

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I love workforce data and you love workforce data, so I’m super excited to share my breakdown of iCIMS’s latest report on the 2021 Workforce. Of course, we anticipate there will be a ton around remote workers and virtual hiring, and we can also anticipate the level of focus on DEI hiring and culture initiatives are only going to increase in 2021.

Let’s breakdown the iCIMS 2021 Workforce Report: 

– iCIMS hiring data seems to point to a moderate economic recovery when you look at the overall job postings, hiring activity, and employer sentiment to hire more in 2021 with 91% of employers stating they will be hiring in 2021. That’s a big number!

– Recruiting tech stacks are evolving in 2021 in a big way to accommodate the ongoing trend of being able to hire virtually. 97% of organizations stating they will invest in virtual interview technology. That’s a lot of video interviewing tech buys! And, online assessment buys! Probably some video job posting buys as well.

– Gig hiring isn’t going away anytime soon, in fact, it’s growing internally. 60% of organizations are relying on contingent labor to help meet workforce needs, which tends to go in the opposite direction of the economy. Meaning, as the economy weakens, we usually see growth in contingent as organizations get nervous about the future. In strong economies, we less growth in contingent. Also, organizations are posting more and more internal gigs for their own staff as development opportunities.

– 84% of organizations are concerned that their current strategies and tools are not reaching diverse and inclusive pools of talent. Hmmm…should be an excellent opportunity for sourcing and recruiting technology that states they can reach DEI talent, but be careful. Most of those tools, just reach back into the same pools you have already been trying to get talent. DEI recruiting starts and ends with real recruiting and outreach, professional apprentice programs, paid internships for DEI talent, employee advocacy programs, etc. There is no magic technology that will pull DEI talent out of a hat. Most fail at DEI recruiting because they keep doing the exact same thing they’ve always done, but added a picture of a person of color to the job posting.

– Probably one of the most overlooked tech items of 2020 from a recruiting standpoint. Internal collaboration tools like Teams and Slack had massive increases in usage. Recruiting teams that can figure out how to leverage these tools best, will have a distinct advantage at leveraging their employees to help them recruit better and faster. 90% of organizations started using these tools over the past year!

– Finally, 2.7 million candidates applied to jobs via Text Messaging in 2020, and that number is increasing every single month moving forward. Anytime I present and mention utilizing text messaging in recruiting it always gets more questions than anything else! Applying via text, communicating with candidates via text, is the new norm, not innovation. If you’re not doing it as a recruiter, you should be fired.

Go download the report, it’s packed with great information and data around how organizations of all sizes are moving forward with their recruiting technology and strategies.

Hiring for a High Give-a-Damn

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Josh Zywien, the CMO of Paradox, made a great hire recently, and I sent him a note telling him so. I like to do that. He knows he made a great hire, but it’s always nice to get a note confirming your belief! If you don’t know Josh, you should give me a follow, he’s one of the good guys in our industry.

Josh responded to my note with a statement I wanted to share because it’s profound:

I like to hire people who have a ‘high give-a-damn’! 

I absolutely love that and told him I was stealing it!

What does hiring for High Give-a-Damn Mean? 

It’s one of those intangibles you know when you see it. Like porn. Hard to explain, but when I see it, I know what it is. High Give-a-Damn (HGD) individuals don’t just care about their job and their company. HGD is pervasive in all aspects of their life. You’ll see it come out in other ways away from their career as well.

The High Give-a-Damn Traits:

  • High attention to detail
  • Live an orderly life
  • Most likely, they have a well-kept house, clean, and probably make their bed every single morning.
  • Classic fashionable dress styles that don’t stand out, but you notice them
  • They say the right things and the right times
  • They can be counted on
  • Follow-through is impeccable
  • They give a shit about stuff that matters
  • Have a habit of taking care of their physical & mental self more than the average person.

People with HGD don’t drive around in a messy car with a coffee stain on their shirt. They might not have a lot of money, but what they have, they take care of. They do more with less because part of HGD is not to waste resources, both professionally and personally. So, you take care of your stuff. Part of your ‘stuff’ is your personal self.

I’ve written about organizations “Hiring Pretty” in the past. Scientific research shows that organizations that tend to hire more attractive people actually have higher results. There is a bit of this in HGD. Individuals with HGD most likely get the most out of the attractiveness they have.

It doesn’t mean the person has to be naturally ‘pretty,’ but think of the time when you took that one selfie, that one time when you were feeling super cute, had that one hat on, the light was right, and now it’s your favorite IG photo. Yeah, that, but now what if you did that every day? That’s HGD. “Felt cute, not ever gonna delete!”

Now, at this point, you might be saying, “Tim, all of this seems superficial. There is nothing here about skill or performance, about actually being able to do the job.” Yeah, I’m not only hiring for HGD and nothing else. This is about what if I had three people who had similar skill levels, education, and experience. At that point, my tiebreaker is, who has the most HGD?

Who is going to bring the most HGD to the team? Because in the end, when I’m going to war with my team, I want people who give a damn. Yeah, we might be making widgets for crackheads, but I still want people who want to make the best widgets for crackheads. People who want to make sure that crackhead has the best experience with our product and service. (Right now, Josh is like, WTF, how did I get in a Tim Sackett Blog Post with Crackheads!?)

Not enough Hiring Managers are hiring for HGD. In fact, as a society, we have kind of gone soft on HGD. We have this belief that you can be HGD in your personal life but not your professional life, or vice versa. The reality is true that HGD is always on or never on as a personality trait. You either give a damn about your life, or you don’t. I want to be around and work with people who are HGD.

You’re an Idiot if You Still Check References!

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One thing really hasn’t changed in hiring in like fifty years. Before we hire someone, in certain higher-up levels within our organizations, we do this little dance. The dance is us asking you for “professional” references, that we must check before we can “officially” hire you, and you giving us such references, which are basically your friends.

Don’t think it’s a dance? Think it’s truly helpful in finding noticeably better talent? Answer me this one question:

How many candidates have you rescinded the offer to because they received a bad reference? 

Wait! WAIT! Let me first take a guess at your answer…Let me see thousands of candidates, hundreds of hires, divided by the square root of 73, and my answer is: ZERO!

I’ve asked this question to thousands of HR and TA pros, thousands of candidates and basically it’s like one out of a thousand, and even that “one” has a story! “Oh, sure, just last week Tim we rescinded an offer. So, we checked the references as usual, and everything came back that this candidate was Jesus-like, could walk on the water, all of that. But, our receptionist knew someone who went to school with this guy, who happens to know his girlfriend’s mother he broke up with two years ago and come to find out, he’s a loser!”

So, the references were fine, but…

Checking References in the traditional way that over 90% of organizations still use is a complete and colossal waste of time and resources! 

Look, I get it. It’s always been done this way, but the reality is this isn’t a quality of hire check, this is am I hiring someone who is stupid enough to not give me people who will at least say good things about me check. While you might still think that measure is valuable, it’s not. Traditional reference checking does not filter out enough candidates for it to be worth the amount of time and resources you put into it.

Now, I am a big fan of Reference Checking Technology, automated reference checking because this technology, on average, will eliminate around 10% of the candidates you want to hire, for very good reasons! Modern-day reference check technology is about helping you select candidates you see as technically a good fit, but you want to double-check the cultural fit.

Reference check technology also has a low resource impact. It’s automated so you aren’t having a real person track other people down to see how well you can all lie to each other. The questions that are asked, usually through email, are about a candidate’s preferences. I like to work in “X” way. The reference then is asked how they feel the candidate likes to work best on a spectrum of answers where both spectrums are positive. So, it’s hard for a reference to “game” the system.

Look, I hate calling you an idiot! 

I know you are checking references. Or at the very least, your executives think you’re checking references, because, let’s face it, they know nothing about hiring and science. They had their references checked back in the 1990’s, so they feel it’s something we must legally do or we’ll get fined or something. They have no idea!

Be better.

Stop checking references, manually. Start checking references using technology that will actually help you make a better hire. Also, don’t just take my word for it, or the word of one of the many reference check technology companies, prove it to yourself. Make some baseline measures you believe are important, test the technology on your next “X” number of hires, then check those measures again. Did you get better? Awesome. Did you stay the same or get worse? Hmmm, interesting, let’s dig into that! Continue to test and improve. Stop doing shit that makes you look like an idiot!

 

Bad Hires Worse!

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If I could take all of my education and experience and boil it down to this one piece of advice, it would be this:

Bad Hires Worse.

In HR we love to talk about our hiring and screening processes, and how we “only” hire the best talent, but in the end, we, more times than not, leave the final decision on who to hire to the person who will be responsible to supervise the person being hired, the Hiring Manager.

I don’t know about all of you, but in my stops across corporate America, all of my hiring managers haven’t been “A” players, many have been “B” players, and a good handful of “C” players.  Yet, in almost all of those stops, we (I) didn’t stop bad hiring managers from hiring when the need came. Sure I would try to influence more with my struggling managers, be more involved but they still ultimately had to make a decision that they had to live with.

I know I’m not the only one, it happens every single day.  Every day we allow bad hiring managers to make talent decisions in our organizations, just as we are making plans to move the bad manager off the bus. It’s not an easy change to make in your organization. It’s something that has to come from the top.

But, if you are serious about making a positive impact on talent in your organization you can not allow bad managers to make talent decisions.

They have to know, through performance management, that:

1. You’re bad (and need fixing or moving);

2. You no longer have the ability to make hiring decisions.

That is when you hit your High Potential manager succession list and tap on some shoulders.  “Hey, Mrs. Hi-Po, guess what we need your help with some interviewing and selection decisions.” It sends a clear and direct message to your organization we won’t hire worse.

Remember, this isn’t just an operational issue it happens at all levels, in all departments.  Sometimes the hardest thing to do is look in the mirror at our own departments. If you have bad talent in HR, don’t allow them to hire (“but it’s different we’re in HR, we know better!” No you don’t – stop it).

Bad hires worse, over and over and over. Bad needs to hire worse, they’re desperate, they’ll do anything to protect themselves, they make bad decisions, they are Bad. We/HR own this. We have the ability and influence to stop it. No executive is going to tell you “No” when you suggest we stop allowing our bad managers the ability to make hiring decisions they’ll probably hug you.

It’s a regret, I have something I will change. If it happens again, I won’t allow it. I vow from this day forward, I will never allow a bad hiring manager to make a hiring decision at least not without a fight!

Is More Efficient Recruiting Always Better?

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If you’re in HR or TA and read this blog on a regular basis you know I’m all for making our recruiting process as efficient as possible! Primarily, because so many of us are woefully inefficient in using our technology and the belief that a more involved process must be a better process.

I’m a little nervous about the future and recruiting efficiency.

I think in our rush to become ever more efficient we might miss out on some great talent. At this point in the recruiting tech stack, I can actually automate every single piece. Anything you have a person do in recruiting I can automate. I can even ensure that candidates “don’t” get dispositioned if that’s how you like to play it! I mean about 50% of you don’t do that now, so it seems like that is probably the way you like it.

If recruiting was only about taking a requirement, matching that requirement to available talent, screening that talent, interviewing that talent, assessing that talent, and onboarding that talent, well then, technology can do that better and more efficiently than humans at this point. But, I think recruiting has always been about getting the best talent for your organization.

Available vs. best is where the technology starts to fall down if talent truly makes a difference in your organization. Honestly, for many, “best available” will work just fine, and it has for decades. The vast majority of organizations are hiring the best available at this point.

Technology is exceptional at hiring the best available. Technology hasn’t figured out how to hire the best talent that isn’t openly available at this point. If you don’t have that talent in your database, and that talent isn’t active on LinkedIn, or other job boards, technology has a really hard time getting your message in front of them.

The future of recruiting isn’t about efficiency. That is already here. The future of recruiting is about your organization’s ability to actually go out and discover who is the best talent for your organization. That person might not actually be in the “jobs internet”, or they were but that was five years ago so you’ll never see them as someone you want because the five years ago person isn’t your person you need today.

Efficient recruiting is great until it isn’t. If you suck at recruiting, then becoming more efficient at best practice recruiting (which recruiting technology can definitely make happen) will elevate your function for sure. But, efficient recruiting isn’t world-class recruiting. It’s just efficient.

The best talent acquisition in the future will be able to go out and discover the talent that hasn’t been discovered by everyone else. We like to believe that everyone who is anyone is on LinkedIn, or Indeed, or you name the site. But they are not, or they haven’t been active for a long time, so this is a hidden talent.

Too many TA shops are currently working too hard at becoming efficient and not hard enough at becoming experts of the talent for their industry and their marketplaces. You know I love technology. So, be great at technology, but don’t forget to be great at recruiting.

Finding Qualified Diverse Talent is NOT Your Issue!

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During 2020, I’ve spoken to a lot of leaders who are concerned with their diversity recruiting. Every single one of them will say something like, “Tim, we just can’t find the ‘qualified’ diverse talent we need!” Sound familiar? Feel familiar?

I’m not a diversity recruiting strategy expert. I leave that to my friend, Torin Ellis. I do think I’ve got a bit of knowledge when it comes to overall recruiting, though.

When I break down the response I get from most leaders, regarding diversity recruitment I usually have one cringe, and one response. “Qualified?” What do you mean by that? I hear it as, you can find plenty of diverse folks interested in coming to work for you, but none of them, or few of them, are actually qualified to work for you. Is that how you read/hear that?

It makes me cringe a bit because what you’re actually saying is we don’t have a supply problem, we have a training and development problem, but you don’t even realize that. You could have your perfect diverse mix of employees if you just invested a bit in training and developing these great hired into great employees. But, you don’t see the value in that, which makes me think you probably don’t see the value in a diverse workforce, to begin with.

What I actually say to them is this, “You don’t have a diversity recruiting problem. You have a diversity pay problem because finding diverse “qualified” talent is easy. Finding ones that will accept your job, culture, location, and/or average to low pay is really hard!” 

Finding talent has never been easier in the history of humanity. We have more technology and tools than ever before. Finding is easy. Recruiting is hard..

Successful recruiting takes some skill. A success recruiter will find the “qualified” diverse talent you are looking for and then they’ll do a few things:

  • They’ll get them interested first. They will make them feel desired and wanted by the organization. By the hiring manager. By the team. Being Desired is a powerful drug!
  • Next, they’ll discover what that talent actually desires in their career. Quickly, efficiently, like a sniper.
  • Then they’ll make a determination: 1. Are we going to meet those desires. or 2. We won’t meet those desires.
  • One, you obviously move on to screening, assessing, etc. Two, and you move on to giving something back to this person. “I can’t help you right now, but I’ve taken notes and if I have anything that ever comes close to meeting what you need, I’m going to contact you back.” 99% of recruiters will never say that to a potential candidate.

Honestly, about 25% of the time when you tell someone “I can’t help you, but…” they’ll actually state a desire to keep going. You taking the potential away will make some reveal they actually have an interest. Doesn’t mean you will still move forward, but it’s a nice outcome.

I can easily find you “qualified” diversity talent. Don’t think so, call me. I can find anyone. The problem we’ll run into is that some of that talent is rare and will cost a premium to get. It’s a simple economic proposition, you can buy talent or build talent. They each have their costs and benefits. I find most organizations claim they want to hire diverse talent, but aren’t doing what it will take to make it happen.

Breaking Down the 2020 @Jobvite Recruiter Nation Survey with @Kris_Dunn and @KellyWLavin

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(Project fans – sharing a podcast called The Best Hire Ever – this week I was on it with my buddy, Kris Dunn, and Jobvite’s Chief Talent Officer Kelly Lavin! Check it out!)

20 – Breaking Down the 2020 Recruiter Nation Survey – Kelly Lavin and Tim Sackett

In Episode 20 of BEST HIRE EVER, Kris Dunn breaks down the 2020 Recruiter Nation Survey from Jobvite with Kelly Lavin (SVP of Talent at Jobvite) and Tim Sackett. The survey is a leading piece of research on how recruiters are feeling and working annually, and this year’s release speaks volumes about how recruiters are feeling in the middle of COVID.  Serious stuff as well as recruiters use of IG and TikTok, as well as recruiter turn-offs when viewing candidates on social.

Please subscribe, rate, and review (Apple) and follow (Spotify) to get the latest delivered to you.  Click here if you don’t see the player below!

SHOW HIGHLIGHTS

2:40 – Kelly talks about her love for the HR Capitalist blog, etc. Kris wants to hear more. Tim doesn’t.

5:10 – Kelly breaks down the reason for the Recruiter Nation Survey – the reason for it, what is is and why it is important.

6:48 – KD talks about the survey size and the MARGIN OF ERROR – in a shoutout to an election year.

7:30 – The gang talks about the biggest downwards shifts in where recruiters are no longer spending their time and money during COVID (pipelining, time to hire, employer brand, candidate experience, and increasing retention rate). Wow. So much honesty in 2020.

13:55 – The gang talks about the upwards shifts in time spent and investment (managing layoffs and diversity hiring).  Kelly, KD, and Tim wonder why the focus on diversity hiring didn’t trend upward more.  Lots of honesty in the report from recruiters.

17:45 – Kelly, Tim, and Kris talk about what the survey says about video interviewing and where recruiters think candidates struggle with video interviews.  95% of recruiters think they are good at viewing interviewing. Tim thinks most of the recruiters think they are good at it because they’ve never been on the candidate side in a video interview.  Kelly breaks down the issues with eye contact in a video interview.

24:30 – Tim talks about where recruiters are spending their time via the survey – social media and LinkedIn. Tim hates it. He rightfully points to the candidate database and referrals as where the hires are.

25:55 – KD mocks the uptick in the use of Instagram and TikTok for recruiter purposes. Kelly learns about how KD gets the best TikTok videos in next to no time spent.  Kelly and Tim lead a real conversation about how TikTok might be used in a smart way by TA teams.

28:43 – KD leads a conversation from the survey results about the biggest “recruiter turnoffs” when viewing a candidate on social media (skin shots, use of pot, and of course – spelling errors. LOL).  Stalk much?

RESOURCES AND SHOW NOTES:

————Kelly Lavin, Jobvite and Tim Sackett

Kelly Lavin on Linkedin

Jobvite

The 2020 Recruiter Nation Survey

Tim Sackett on Linkedin

————Kris Dunn

Kris Dunn on LinkedIn

Kinetix

The HR Capitalist

Fistful of Talent

Boss Leadership Training Series

Kris Dunn on Twitter

Kris Dunn on Instagram

Does Your Hiring Process Have Diversification Bias? (Diversifi-what!?!)

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One of the really great things that have happened in 2020 is the giant spotlight D&I has gotten in organizations, especially around hiring a more diverse workforce. Obviously, organizations have been working on this for a while, but with limited success.

What researchers are discovering is that many organizations might have “Diversification Bias” in their hiring process. What is Diversification Bias?

Diversification bias describes the tendency to choose more variety—to diversify—when making a simultaneous decision, and to choose less variety when making the same decisions sequentially.

For the non-technical definition, we tend to hire more diversity when we hire a bunch of people at one time, verse when we hire one person every once in a while.

This actually then gives a really good explanation around why so many organizations struggle to increase their diversity hiring because most of us don’t hire a bunch of people all at once. Most organizations have one opening for let’s say an Accountant. When that hiring manager goes to hire, they’ll most likely hire someone who is similar to them.

Now, if that same hiring manager was going to hire 3 Accountants, they are forced to look at that panel of hires and they’ll notice that everyone looks the same, thus increasing the chances they’ll offer positions to a more diverse set of candidates. I’m not saying that our traditional way of hiring is appropriate, in fact, it’s just another form of bias, it’s just a researched explanation of why this is happening.

How can we hire a more diverse and inclusive workforce? 

Let’s be honest for SMB organizations this will be difficult because you’ll never really have the headcount numbers to do any type of mass hiring, so SMBs have to have a special focus on each hire and why each decision is being made, if they want to move the needle. For larger organizations here are some tips:

1. Understand your turn over data by position and require hiring managers to hire in multiples verse one hire at a time.

2. Ensure you have a diverse and inclusive interview panel where every person on the panel has an equal vote.

3. Understand your market demographics by position and make the organization aware of where you are falling short. Great you increased your D&I hiring by 18%, but if it’s mostly in an area where you already had great diversity, you really haven’t done anything to solve your problem. Also, if your market demographics tell you that there are 15% diversity candidates in a certain segment, and you are meeting or exceeding that number, executives should know your successes. I find often executives will say, “well we need to be at 30%” without knowing what that really means for the skills you’re hiring.

Awareness and focus solve a lot of issues.

Here’s the reality. Some of your hiring managers believe that hiring a D&I candidate is a risk. They believe that a diversity hire won’t perform as well. Is that bad? Hell, yes! But it’s also reality. So, when they hire one person at a time, they are less willing to take a “risk”, in their eyes, on a diverse candidate. Again, that’s their Diversification Bias, among others, showing up.

We fight this battle on multiple fronts. We address biased hiring manager behavior when we know it’s happening, but we can also address it by changing our own processes and making it easier for hiring managers to make the right decisions.

The more you know.