Lessons Learned in the Search Business

We've learned our fair share of lessons after 25 years in the search business. Some were learned the hard way, many times more than once. Save yourself time and trouble by heeding these tips.

• The best indicator of future performance is present & past performance. The shrinks refer to it as direct behavioral observations. We call it the Duck Theory: “If it walks like a duck...”

• Direct observations are better than inferred ones. The fact that John describes himself as a “people person” is encouraging. However, if he frequently slams his co-workers and supervisors during the interview process, it’s probably not true.

• “How did...” trumps “How would...” Hypothetical questions tell you what a candidate might do, whereas behavioral questions... focused on past actions... yield what they actually did. One is fiction until proven to be fact; the other is just plain fact.

• Recency, Recency, Recency. Like the adage "location, location, location" the best history is recent history. What someone did five years ago is less important than what they did last year.

• Rarely is anyone as good or bad as we think they are. Also known as the “divide by two...or three” rule.

• Everyone has hot-buttons which skew their objectivity, i.e. the attributes we like to see in people. Recognizing yours will help maintain objectivity.

• Never make a hire / no hire decision based on any one thing, whether it is an accomplishment or failure, praise or criticism, good or bad reference.

• If you don’t know what you are looking for, how will you know when you find it? The better you define what success should look like in a position, the easier it will be to assess those abilities in others.

• The more comfortable both parties are during an interview, the more open and authentic each will be. That means no more trick questions or acting like an armchair psychologist. Give candidates an outline of what to expect as well as “permission” to flip a question back to you at anytime, or to ask one of their own. (Learn more in our post The Naked Interview.)
  

• The interview and hiring process should be like a courtship: it starts with Attraction (dating), evolves into Assessment (learning about each other) and concludes with Acceptance (proposal). And like a marriage, it takes Adaptability & Alignment of expectations on both sides to make it work over the long haul.

• If a candidate needs more than 24-48 hours to accept/decline an offer, then something in the prior statement was not handled correctly. An effective interview process comprises more than one visit and plenty of opportunities for both sides to learn about each other. The decision should be pretty clear by the time an offer is made. Taking longer than a day or two will not make the decision any clearer or easier. Imagine proposing to your spouse and hearing “I really appreciate the offer. Do you mind if I take the weekend to think it over and get back with you?”

• Counter Offers tend to be short-lived solutions. Case in point: employee resigns in order to pursue another opportunity. Employer offers him a raise, bonus or promotion to entice him/her to stay, but never forgets how the employee leveraged the situation to his/her advantage. The relationship is never the same. It’s also a poor way to go about getting a raise or promotion. Historically, the relationship sours within twelve months and the statistics bear this out.