TCII :: Management Consultants

When the economy's in trouble, many organisations look to cut costs via a recruitment freeze. But you still need to fill essential roles, and if your competitors aren't hiring you may have an opportunity to snap up some high calibre talent.

It's even more crucial, though, to ensure that you get the right people. So you need to avoid the top ten recruitment mistakes, which include:

• inadequate job descriptions that focus solely on skills and experience
• superficial interviewing, with no verification of claims
• screening out qualified candidates by over-emphasising specifics early on
• snap judgments based on first impressions
• fishing in shallow waters.

Recruitment mistakes are usually the result of a combination of factors such as:

• poor preparation - relying on job specs rather than defining success factors
• lack of information - HR managers not trained to recruit at executive level
• human nature - recruitment teams too easily influenced by preconscious perceptions and non-verbal cues.

One solution is a structured approach like the seven-step methodology developed by TCii to help companies avoid high-level recruitment pitfalls. Among the numerous benefits of this strategy are:

• deep sourcing to reach selective and sleeper candidates
• identification and verification of success prospects
• structured dossiers to aid objective evaluation
• a "magnifying glass" technique for panel interviews
• streamlining of compensation and benefit negotiations.

When applied consistently and systematically, TCii's recruitment methodology significantly increases the chances of a successful hire.