You’re super busy. You need someone doing the work now!
Now is when you have to fight the urge to hire the first warm body you feel might be qualified to do some work and instead find the right person to get the job done.
OK, so where to begin?
First, decide what type of person you need: Success is rarely found via a resume alone. Resumes tell you what someone has done and not who they are. What you need is the right type of person to do your job – a perfect fit. I’m not saying their experience isn’t relevant — it’s just that experience alone doesn’t tell the full story of what you’re getting.
Ask yourself these questions:
- Do I need a leader or just someone good at following instructions?
- Will this person be interacting with customers?
- Will they mostly work in a team or autonomously?
- Do I need a problem solver or a doer?
- Do I need someone innovative and creative or someone who is organized?
- How motivated do I want them to be? What should motivate them?
- Is this the full potential of the job or is there potential to move up and/or take on more responsibility in the future?
There are obviously trade-offs with anyone you are hiring. The answers to these questions start to provide a basic framework for the type of person you’re looking for and the job description you must create. At ClearFit we have separate models for representing who the person is that we’re looking for and for defining the minimum skills and experience that person must have. When we combine those two elements in our decision process, we usually end up with a much better hire. We’ve also learned the hard way what happens when we’ve skipped part of this exercise.
Once you’ve outlined what this person should look like, compare that to the people currently doing the job well. If you don’t have anyone currently doing the job well, ask some of your employees that will be working with this person what they think. It may be helpful in both further defining the job description as well as having your team feel like they were part of the process.
OK, so now you’re done with the most difficult part — you know what you need. Now comes the easy part which is to spell it out in a job description.
A great job description is a standard/consistent one which describes your job internally and externally. We use the following job description template to help. Make sure you spell out the job today along with the career potential. Also, make sure to include both who you’re looking for as well as the type of experience that person should have.
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