Your company has a crucial opening, and you want to choose the right candidate. We are sharing three steps to evaluate job candidates effectively. This process can be a lot like putting a jigsaw puzzle together. You might have all the pieces in front of you, but what combination of technical, soft skills, and attributes will make for a good match?

1.Start at the Very Beginning

It is tempting to quickly put a basic job description together and start reviewing whatever resumes come in. But it is helpful to take a little bit more time on this part of the hiring process. You are usually hiring because a position is being vacated or your company has a new business objective.

Talk to key people in your company and find out what they need from the new hire. Maybe your company has a 90-day business goal this new hire will be responsible for -like increasing sales by 20%. If this is a replacement hire, what three job duties are the most important for the position?

Once you have taken some time to be more specific, add more detail to your job posting. Instead of saying a candidate needs five years of experience, clarify that you are looking for applicants with five years of experience in property management accounting. Agree on your compensation range so you can make an offer as soon as the right candidate is identified. Know if there is some room in the budget if the candidate requests a higher salary or additional benefits.

You will not be limiting yourself if you identify must-have qualifications, any special requirements, and attributes. Taking a little bit more time with the job posting part of the process will get you closer to your ideal candidate and save you time in the long run.

2. Translate Your Job Posting into an Interview Evaluation

Streamline your candidate evaluation process by translating your Job Posting into a set of predetermined questions to ask each candidate. The Society for Human Resources has an interview scorecard that you can download. This will let you gather specifics that can be compared across all candidates. You can use a shortened version for initial phone interviews and a complete questionnaire for your final three candidates. This is particularly helpful if several people are involved in the interview process – it can help you identify which candidates stand out and evaluate all of the job candidates equally.  Bonus – the specific job description and interview scorecards can be kept on file if you need to hire the position again.

3. Last Step – Testing

If your position requires strong technical skills, consider testing candidates to verify their skills. You do not want people to work for free necessarily, but you can ask a developer to make a specific small piece of code, a copywriting candidate to re-write a paragraph of your website copy, or a sales candidate to complete a mock sales call. Employment agencies can be useful at this stage too. Many agencies – including Proper Solutions Staffing – can help you perform software testing and a background check on your final candidates. Questions about candidate evaluation? Contact Us here. Good luck with your hiring process!