10 things to look for while hiring winners

Like most industries, ours also is a talent deficient industry. You do get people, but it is always a challenge to get the right person for the right job. Now who’s the right person for the right job? Besides the usual stuff like relevant experience, etc., there’s a checklist I use for figuring that one:

1. Is the person really hungry for the job? How needy is he? Does he live with his parents, because of which he has little need to retain the job? Or is he ‘just-married’, who has to ensure that the home fires continue to burn? Does the candidate’s spouse also work? If the spouse is the wife, then this is a good sign, because, mostly, husbands are unlikely to live off their wives, but if the spouse is the husband, then you need to explore further for other signs, though exceptions, too, have come my way. There’s this young-ish copywriter who’d worked in the Gulf and joined us. He came in one day, and didn’t turn up the following morning. When we explored, we figured out that he’s done this repeatedly, and subsequent to his not reporting for work, his poor wife makes the calls to her husband’s office to make excuses for him. If a candidate is not hungry, he ends up wasting your time by first accepting your offer and then not joining.

2. Is the person ambitious? Is he considering change because he’s not being given a clear understanding of which direction his career is headed in? Is he leaving because he’s doing the same job over and over again, and the learning has stopped? These are interesting signs to look for.

3. Has the person bothered to read up about the company he’s seeking to join? What’s his level of knowledge and how clearly or vaguely does he articulate it?

4. Is he curious to find out what he will be expected to do/deliver in his new job role? Or is he just looking for a new job, for the sake of moving on from one place to another, as a means of increasing his remuneration?

5. How willing is he to learn if he doesn’t know something? Is he the type who is prone to remaining in his comfort zone, or is he open to taking on new challenges which go beyond what he’s done till now? Does he have the conviction to follow this through? What has he done in the past which reflects this trait? For such people, I sometimes make an exception of not even looking at relevant experience.

6. Ask him for a few things that he’s proud of during his professional life. This is a sound reflection of the kind of things he will be good at. Some candidates are proud of doing some operational job well, while others are proud of more cerebral stuff. That gives you a good fix of where you can slot him, or whether you can slot him at all.

7. Ask him for things he's done during his professional life which he wishes he’d done better. Beware of those who don’t have anything to share. This is one disconcerting question which reveals the candidate’s true self – his candour, his nervousness, his confidence and his conviction in himself. Of all the things mentioned above, this one probably reveals the most about the candidate.

8. Does he ask questions? You need to wary of those who don’t.

9. Does he turn the interview into a chat, or does it remain an interview? How well does he pick up the conversation strings and build on them to his advantage? Such articulate people will always remain an asset in our business.

10. And last but not least, go with your gut feel. There are enough seemingly sound candidates whom I have rejected because my gut feel told me to, and I have discovered later that they weren’t as sound as they were coming across. Similarly, there are enough candidates I have picked up on gut feel, which some others would have rejected. And more often than not, these gambles have paid off. Reason: If such a candidate’s credentials don’t seem right and he knows it, just the faith you show in him makes him start to deliver at near-100 per cent efficiency. This is a near-100per cent fail-safe observation.