Hyper-competition has put a premium on ensuring that hi-potential talent is performing to standards (given today's high compensation costs) and serving the strategic need of the business to keep a lean workforce.

                                        GUIDE   TO   SELECTING
          SCARCE   MANAGERIAL   TALENT



New technologies, rapidly changing business models and globalization of markets and a growth oriented economy  have all increased the demand for talent. This problem is acute ... in certain critical job families where the attrition is high or the competency set is scarce . Hyper-competition has further put a premium on ensuring that hi-potential talent is performing to standards  (given today's high compensation costs) and serving the strategic need of the business to keep a lean workforce. Therefore selecting, retaining, and developing talented people is the biggest challenge for any business today.

The following  few  guidelines help you design and implement effective talent attraction and selection approaches:

A WELL-DEFINED STRATEGY. The foundation of any recruiting effort is a clearly defined and communicated strategy that illustrates the brand message, target candidates, primary sources, and most-effective closing approaches (the who, what, when, and how). Poorly defined or communicated strategy elements results in wasted resources and weak hires. In addition, the best strategies have the capability of “shifting” as the economy and the demand for candidates change.

 PIPELINE APPROACH. The most effective recruiting approach is to build a steady stream of applicants (a pipeline). In order to build a continuous “talent pipeline,” use a “pre-need” approach that includes workforce planning, branding, continuous sourcing, and onboarding. 

EMPLOYMENT BRANDING. The approach with the highest impact and the only long-term recruiting strategy is employment branding, the process of building your external image as an excellent place to work. By proactively making it easy for potential applicants to read, hear, or see the factors that make working at your firm exciting, you can dramatically increase the number and quality of your applicants over a long period.


 ENSURE A SPEEDY PROCESS. Making fast hiring decisions is essential whenever a candidate in high demand decides to make a job switch. Top candidates must be hired using “their” decision timetable. Research shows that top candidates are off the market in less than half of the normal corporate time to fill. 

BUILD A CULTURE OF INVOLVEMENT. The most effective approaches build a corporate-wide “cultural of recruiting” where every manager and employee is a recruiter. Because of their continuous contact and interaction with outside talent, everyone must play an important supplemental role in identifying talent and in spreading the employment brand. The most effective recruiting strategies convince employees to be 24/7 talent scouts, making every employee a recruiter. 

A CANDIDATE-CENTRIC APPROACH. Focus the process on the candidate’s needs, their job selection criteria, and the candidate experience. A significant part of recruiting is “selling” the candidate on applying for and accepting the job. At least in part, recruiting must follow the customer relationship management (CRM) and the sales and marketing models. Often, the number-one reason why candidates reject job offers is the way that they were treated during the hiring process. It’s also important to note that candidates may be current or future customers, so treating them poorly can directly impact future revenue. 

LINE MANAGERS ARE THE DELIVERY SYSTEM. Although corporate HR DEPT  designs the process, managers “deliver” and execute a significant part of that process. As a result, hiring managers must understand its elements and support its precise execution. You must effectively demonstrate to individual hiring managers that they will suffer whenever a bad or “butts in chairs” hire is made. managers that convinces them of the importance of executing the process Therefore, recruiting must make a strong business case to individual hiring precisely. The most effective way of influencing hiring managers is by converting recruiting results into their dollar impact on that individual manager’s revenue and profit.

TOP QUESTIONS TO EVALUATE  MANGERIAL POTENTIAL

·         You have been assigned a project but you have not been given a clear picture of it; its pretty hazy. Can you still proceed and complete it? Did you do something like this in your earlier jobs? 
·         Are you a good implementer, an action person? Are you also a good thinker and planner? What is more important for you? Why? 
·         Can you give an example of any process improvements you achieved recently and what was its impact on various factors? 
·         Tell us about an important assignment you handled. How did you manage it and what were the results? 
·         What is more important to you; processes or results? What ever is your answer, why do you think it that way? 
·         How do you set up the priorities for your day-to-day work? 
·         Do you like to take the challenges involved in fire fighting or would you rather be more cautious and eliminate such emergencies? 
·         Have you worked on any cross-functional project? What were your experiences on it as compared to a purely internal or departmental project? 
·         How do you rate yourself as a decision maker? Can you describe any decision making situation where you were at cross roads; a dilemma situation, and you came out as a winner? 
·         If any of your projects derails, goes behind schedule, how do you pull it up to bring it back on track? 
·         Can you construct your decision making process and share with us? Take your time to think and then tell us. 
·         Can you confidently communicate with your superiors your professional ideas? Do the persons high up in the organization hierarchy intimidate you? 
·         How do you update your knowledge and skills? Do you have any specific approach to it? Can you elaborate it? 
·         Do you encourage participation of your team members or do you push your decisions through them? Provide some examples to illustrate your style. 
·         Can you describe your conflict handing process? Give an example. 
·         Did you ever have significant difference of opinion with your boss? What was it? How did you deal with it? 
·         Has it ever happened with you when your basic values were put to test in an organizational situation? What did you do? 
·         What are your leadership qualities? Do people work for you with enthusiasm by taking initiatives? Then, you must also be delegating lots? 
·         Sometimes it happens that if you work for perfection or 100% quality, you may lose an opportunity, time is of essence. Would you rather push an imperfect product or solution so as to make the most of the opportunity? What's you take on it? 
·         Can you narrate the problems you faced in implementing any solution that you recently introduced? How did you tackle them? 
·         Can you sell your concept, ideas and solutions to others who matter? Share your experience with us on this. 
·         Do you have any experience of conducting or coordinating the meetings, either in a room or using teleconferencing facilities? Give one such example and how did the meeting go on various counts?

Best of luck
Dr Wilfred Monteiro

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