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The High Importance of Objectivity in Strategic People Analytics

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As John F Kennedy said, “Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future.” That’s why organisations increasingly recognise the value of leveraging data to drive decision-making across the business. HR, being at the forefront of managing an organisation’s most vital asset – its people, has been quick to tap into the potential of strategic people analytics.

Today future ready organisations need to think critically about the assessments they use to ensure they provide the necessary objective data for effective people analytics, ultimately enhancing their existing HR systems.

Most organisations today have great technology that efficiently handles the people logistics aspects. Still, one area on the back burner is the advances made in assessment technology.

Many assessments in use today were developed before hybrid work, wellbeing, and burnout became part of the modern people challenges that HR must manage. Some liken older reviews to the equivalent of using the mobile phone technology from the late 90’s in a world where smart phones exist.

Traditional fixed “one size fits all” solutions for attracting, assessing, selecting, developing, and retaining people are no longer sufficient. That’s why it is crucial to be familiar with the latest assessment technology and the flexibility and employee lifecycle tools they offer.

What are People Analytics?

People analytics, also known as HR analytics or workforce analytics, refers to collecting and analysing employee data to gain insights and make data-driven HR decisions.

HR professionals can identify patterns, trends, and key indicators by utilising vast amounts of employee information. In short, indicators influence:

  • strategic workforce planning,
  • talent recruitment and retention,
  • diversity and inclusion initiatives,
  • performance management, and
  • succession planning.

Objectivity at the core in people analytics

Recent studies highlight the significance of finding measurable connections between HR and business objectives.  While at the same time reducing subjective decision-making in measuring HR and corporate performance.

However, in today’s data-driven world, HR professionals can mitigate bias and make more informed decisions by relying on objective data. Modern and flexible assessments provide access to raw data containing validated, objective data and insights, enhancing HR’s ability to make sense of data.

The power of assessments

New assessment technology enables HR professionals to analyse and better understand their workforce quickly and easily. These assessments provide objective data on various aspects of an individual employee’s profile, including:

  • competencies,
  • personality traits,
  • cognitive abilities,
  • behavioural tendencies,
  • development areas, and
  • skill levels.

By leveraging these assessments, HR professionals can gain valuable insights into an employee’s fit with:

  • the role,
  • the manager,
  • the team, and
  • the organisational culture.

Enhancing HRIS Systems

The seamless integration of APIs ensures that the factual data collected from assessments is easily accessible within the HRIS. This combination of information, supported by its objectivity, helps predict the immediate and future requirements regarding personnel and capabilities.

By incorporating this objective data into decision-making processes, HR professionals can minimise bias, improve employee experiences, and drive the growth of the business.

In conclusion, combining the potential of people analytics and modern, adaptable assessments means enhanced HR information systems with accurate individual data for more informed and strategic choices.

Contact us to power your strategic people analytics.

How high does your new employee onboarding rate?

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In today’s highly competitive business landscape, hiring top talent is no longer enough to ensure long-term success. Companies must also focus on effectively integrating new employees into their teams and cultivating a sense of belonging from day one through their new employee onboarding process.

According to research and studies, there is considerable work to be done in this area. The failure rate for new hires within the first 18 months ranges between 25% and 46%.  Studies also tell us that Gen Z (born from 1995 to 2009) and soon to represent almost one-third of the Australian workforce have “itchy feet”, with over one-third (39%) planning to leave their job within one year.

It’s a given that training and development have always been important for employee engagement, and 63% of Gen Z agree! Based on these figures, it’s easy to see why the crucial process of new employee onboarding can make or break the success of an organisation’s retention goals. And if done poorly increases recruitment costs dramatically.

Companies must go beyond paperwork and logistics 

New employee onboarding goes beyond the paperwork and logistics of getting a team member up to speed. It is about:

  • creating a positive first impression,
  • setting clear expectations,
  • providing necessary resources, and
  • fostering a supportive environment for growth.

A well-executed onboarding program can help new employees feel welcomed, empowered, and motivated, leading to higher retention rates and productivity.

One critical aspect of employee onboarding is the selection process. Companies invest significant time and resources in finding the right candidate. However, the importance of providing feedback on assessments conducted during the selection process is often overlooked. Sharing the results of these assessments with the new employee can be immensely valuable as part of their onboarding and employee journey with an organisation.

Providing assessment results to new employees allows them to understand their strengths and areas for development. This feedback not only helps individuals gain self-awareness but also aids in aligning their goals with the organisation’s objectives. By sharing the assessment results, companies demonstrate a commitment to the growth and development of their employees right from the start.

Moreover, incorporating the results of psychometric assessments into the onboarding process can provide detailed insights to both the new team member and their manager. High quality psychometric assessments go beyond measuring skills and qualifications. They delve into personality traits, work styles, motivations, cognitive ability and behavioural tendencies. By understanding these aspects, managers can tailor their approach to supporting the individual employee’s development.

Information for strong new employee onboarding

A psychometric assessment should provide comprehensive information on the individual’s development areas. This information includes areas where they may need additional support or training to excel in their role. Armed with this knowledge, managers can create a well-defined development plan for the new team member, addressing their specific needs and setting them up for success.

Therefore, it is crucial to evaluate the effectiveness of your current psychometric assessment tool. Does it provide valuable information and insights to both the new team member and the manager? Does it offer actionable recommendations for development?

Assessing these aspects ensures that your onboarding process starts strong and sets the foundation for long-term success.

Reach out for a free psychometric assessment trial or to discuss a tailored approach for new employees in your organisation.

What’s the actual cost of replacing top performers at work?

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As a CFO or finance professional, to help determine what’s the actual cost of replacing top performers at work, what if I asked you to rank your team members from top to lower performers?

Your estimate will likely come up with numbers (give or take) that are approximately:

  • 25% of your team are high performers,
  • 50% are average performers, and
  • 25% are below par.

What distinguishes top performers at work?

According to a McKinsey study, high performers are 400% more productive than average performers. And the productivity difference might reach 800% in sophisticated professions such as management or software development. These outstanding performers have distinct cognitive, behavioural, and personality traits.

Identifying these traits and hiring outstanding individuals is likely to result in considerable financial rewards for your company.

These employees not only boost productivity and income production, but they can also improve:

  • staff turnover,
  • management workload, and
  • investor and consumer confidence.

A terrible hire could result in hidden costs, such as

  • lost corporate credibility,
  • greater stress, and
  • worse employee morale.

What’s the bottom line or actual cost of replacing your top performers at work?

The bottom line is that hiring the wrong person can have long-term implications for your organisation. So, getting it right the first time is essential. And it’s scary these costs are not captured in the P&L and that actual costs can show as staggeringly high.

Making another smart investment for your organisation

As a senior finance professional, you recognise the critical nature of making wise investments that yield a good return. However, in my experience, one area in which many firms frequently struggle is how they hire their people. That is, having a consistent replicable process across the organisation that results in the right outcome- a top performer.

Hiring the incorrect individual might cost you far more than you think, with estimates ranging from 30% to 250% of the employee’s compensation.

To solve these recruitment problems and significantly increase the hiring of top performers at work, our award-winning GR8PI assessments can help. The platform provides an easy approach to measuring and qualifying the attributes of high performers. Advanced analytics are employed for a thorough insight into a person’s cognitive ability, behavioural patterns, and professional interests and motivations.

As a result, making it simple to discover outstanding performers and avoid undesirable recruits and costs.

Investing in a recruitment strategy that easily and reliably identifies high performers is critical to the success of any firm. Senior executives we work with improved their ability to identify top performers by 300%.

Renatus Capital Partners, a private equity firm, says it best:

“We use GPI assessments for our own company and all our portfolio companies. Not only do they have tools they can customise for practically every HR situation but the diagnosis around same, advice on which tools to use and the outcomes are priceless.”

Mark Flood , Director – https://renatus.ie/

So, why not contact us today to learn more about how we can assist your company in identifying and hiring top performers?

How to measure values alignment to strengthen your organisation

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It doesn’t matter whether you’re a small family business or a large multinational; values alignment is at the heart of an organisation’s culture. A strong set of values can help build a positive work environment and foster:

  • trust,
  • integrity, and
  • accountability.

Values provide a sense of purpose and direction to clients, stakeholders and employees. Both are vital to you as a business, identifying business identity and as an individual. Values represent your inner voice reflecting your morals, scruples, and integrity. They are what you stand for. They are the personality of your business, which in turn affects your decisions. So, what you do and how you do it; your culture.

Importance of values alignment

Most business owners and leaders proudly feature the organisational values:

  • on their websites,
  • in job advertisements, and
  • during company presentations to stakeholders.

While your company’s values define your culture, how can you be sure that everyone in your team is on the same page? Think back to when you experienced a situation where you were required to compromise your values. How did you feel about it?

For most people, it makes them uncomfortable, and they struggle to reconcile the differences.

But why should we be bothered if not all employees align with corporate values?

Aren’t values just a guide?

After all, it’s not like they are a government regulation!

Values and company culture are important because they significantly impact the success and longevity of a corporation.

Leaders should be concerned. Your culture, the heart of your business, can quickly become a liability if the core organisational values are not accepted, embraced, and practised by every team member in your company. A lack of alignment by team members with your values can interfere with the ability of your business to deliver its strategic goals. As a result, this position can negatively impact the overall productivity and success of the organisation.

Team members must align with organisation values to avoid misunderstandings, miscommunication, and a lack of trust among team members. Without solid values, alignment can lead to:

  • reduced morale,
  • decreased motivation, and
  • lower levels of job satisfaction.

It can negatively impact the overall performance of the team and the organisation as a whole.

Current methods used to measure alignment at interview

Discussions about values often come up during the interview process. And most hiring managers have their own approach to checking alignment. This approach may include:

  • articulating the organisation’s values and their link to operations,
  • asking the candidate about their decision-making process, or
  • inviting them to state their interpretation of the organisation’s values.

No matter what questions you ask, it’s not an objective measure. Especially given that research for SEEK shows that almost half the candidates say they haven’t been sincere in their interview.

You could flip a coin as you have a 50/50 chance of getting it right. If you fail to verify alignment, the issues arise months after the employee joins the team when it’s too late.

Therefore, it is critical to understand which values align with your vision of the company.

Values alignment and cultural measuring tools are essential for organisations to assess the potential candidates’ values and cultural fit. By using these tools, organisations can identify candidates who share the same values and beliefs as the company, leading to:

  • increased job satisfaction,
  • higher levels of employee engagement, and
  • better overall performance.

Additionally, values alignment and cultural measuring tools can help to reduce turnover and increase the likelihood of a successful long-term employment relationship.

Objective information will inform your decision

Our flexible values alignment assessment solution scientifically measures more than 13 different values, so you can choose which ones to include for your organisation. We start by benchmarking values alignment in your business. Then you compare potential candidates to determine a “fit” for your company.

Typically feedback we receive from our clients says:

“The flexibility of the tool is impressive. It has helped us hire people who fit as we can develop custom benchmarks and assessments that measure our precise role requirements and ensure alignment with our values.”

 

“GR8PI has improved our hiring success and reduced employee turnover by 76%.”

When values align, employees are motivated, engaged, and committed to the company’s success.

To learn more about our values assessments, email with “values” as the subject, and we will be in touch shortly.

 

 

How do people management skills improve your business success?

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People management skills are one of the essential soft leadership skills a leader should possess.

While working from home in some form is accepted will remain after COVID, managing teams remotely has, for the contemporary leader, added the need to develop new skills.

Now may be an opportunity for your business to increase focus on this area with employees recognising the value of these skills.

These skills help overcome challenges in the workplace and build your team and business for several reasons:

  • handling interpersonal conflicts
  • leading employee training
  • managing deadlines
  • communicating and distributing information between employees working remotely and onsite
  • building a solid company culture, and
  • developing your employees’ maximum capability.

Leaders who adopt people management skills provide constructive feedback and mentor employees to grow and succeed in their positions. Goals will also be able to be established and achieved.  And overall, this results in a positive influence on the work environment.

A leader who has an in-depth understanding of their employees can evaluate:

  • the strength and weaknesses of their team
  • the resources required, and
  • set realistic deadlines.

This approach encourages the employees to strive for success and not set them up for failure.

In addition, leaders are able to build rapport, ask the team for constructive feedback, and take actionable steps to make positive changes in the work culture. As a result, this benefits everyone.

Below are four critical people management areas to help you understand your team and individuals at all levels. From onboarding, developing new skills, preparing them for other roles, to working on specialised projects.

  1. Understand Human Behaviour And Acknowledging Diversity

It is crucial to understand one simple concept – we are all different. Each individual will react and behave differently in any given situation.

A leader needs to realise that family, environmental and cultural influences have shaped some beliefs and behaviours. Understanding and learning some behavioural types and conditioning will allow leaders and managers to treat their employees with respect. In return, the business will be rewarded with best work practices, a motivated team, and valued ideas and opinions.

  1. The Individual’s Purpose

It is also imperative to understand how the individual team member sees their own purpose in their role and how they can contribute to the business. This can lead to improvements at both the individual employee and business levels.

A continued effort in understanding their sense of purpose, whether they are in the office or working from home, ensures the individual and business goals stay aligned.

  1. Transparent Communication

When there is open and transparent communication, it creates an atmosphere of trust. In effect, by employing people management skills, this communication works both ways, i.e., you tell, and they listen, and you have to do the same – listen to your employees.

This area is more critical than ever for businesses undergoing managing teams remotely. Video-based onboarding and mentoring and a remote communication strategy are essential for employee skill development and project delivery.

  1. We Own This Together

While leading with example is great, it also benefits when you entrust team members with specific tasks which best fit their skill sets. It shows that you are acknowledging their skillset and allowing them to demonstrate their capabilities. As a result, the team is closer and creates an environment of ownership and positive experiences.

In a remote setting, delegate tasks through shared online platforms that allow for the employee’s autonomy while still maintaining a sense of community in the workplace.

Responsibility and accountability on both ends improve overall morale and reduces people management skills coming across as complicated, unnecessary at times, and time-consuming.

Ongoing people management for development and retention

Just because you have hired a superstar does not mean you don’t have to continue managing and developing them to maximise their potential and business outcomes.

Development should start from day one of an employee’s journey with their new company. The rapport the new employee develops with the company can have long-lasting effects on the business, including the employee retention rate.

Trends have seen employees become more focused on developing their individual skills. Placing importance on their progress can help connect their goals to the more significant objectives of the business. Supporting these goals can be achieved remotely from the onboarding stage and continue through employment by hosting video workshops and online training seminars.

Many reasons cause an employee to leave an organisation, such as:

  • a lack of training
  • development
  • engagement
  • progression opportunities.

Quantify top performance 

Many assessments compare candidate results against generic benchmarks or no benchmark at all. In other words, this leaves the user with either no reference point or, at best, a near enough is good enough benchmark.

At GPI, we believe assessing an individual’s job performance as accurately as possible requires benchmarks built specifically for each role. Assessments can apply to both positions operating onsite or remotely. By identifying the success DNA of your top performers, you can create job benchmarks based on what success looks like in your business. Further development of your existing team members can be implemented where appropriate, including a coaching option.

As the employer, benchmarking flows through promoting and succession planning of your people to measure candidate profiles against the relevant top-performing role profile in your organisation.

Given these points, assessments that treat people as multi-faceted complex individuals we are, open a world of possibilities with both your new and existing people. You will find yourself in the stronger position of identifying your people’s true potential and providing opportunities for laser-focused development.

If you’d like to trial our assessments for consideration as part of your organisation’s people management strategy – contact us.

How people capability in organisations is impacted by assessment types

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Taking a punt on a one size fits all approach to recruitment

Most managers and leaders know hiring a new employee for best people capability is an expensive exercise.

I’ve never actually met anyone who set out to hire a less than ideal employee on purpose. However, it always bothers me that statistics tell us we hire the right person only less than 25% of the time.

Think about that for a moment. Imagine you have a process in your business that only delivers the right outcome with such a low level of consistency. What would you do?

I’m thinking you’d change the process and look for new ways to deliver better outcomes. Good. Then read on.

Roll the dice and take your chances

The goal of recruitment is to hire a new employee that will add value, contribute to the business, and enjoy their work. All this leads to high people capability and engagement.

But it’s not that easy. You gamble $30,000 EVERY time you start the hiring process because humans are complex beings.

For starters, there is the deep-seated unconscious bias that comes with being human. To add to our responsibility, some candidates:

  • lie on their resume,
  • fudge their referees, and
  • turn out to be more of a lone wolf than a team player.

The potential pitfalls are endless! As my mother used to say, “you’d need eyes in the back of your head”!

Typical behavioural assessments for people capability

Many businesses use psychometric assessments to help in predicting the behaviours and ability of candidates.

Assessments are not new. Most have been around since the last century.

However, the issue is that most psychometric assessments are ‘off the shelf’ packages of measures selected by the test provider, not the buyer.  This leaves buyers with no opportunity to vary them in any way.

Consequently, this approach means that buyers measure things they do not need to and fail to measure elements that are critical to their business’s success.

This traditional ‘one size fits all’ solution used across the employee life cycle does not meet the needs of modern organisations. As a result, the ability to attract, assess, select, develop and retain the right people is negatively impacted.

Stack the odds in your favour for your organisation’s people capability

Great People Inside (GPI) appreciates that every organisation both large and small is unique. Organisations spend millions on defining, developing, and implementing for the commercial advantage of their successful business. Some aspects include:

  • those specific leadership competencies,
  • that unique culture,
  • that state-of-the-art customer service,
  • those well-known values and dynamics.

We understand that the uniqueness and greatness of your organisation cannot – and should not – rely on a ‘one size fits all’ approach.

That is the reason GPI invested hundreds of years of collective, international know-how to create technology empowering you to embrace the complete life cycle of employees and executives. From talent acquisition and onboarding, talent growth and development to employee assessment and performance management.

Guided by our easy-to-use platform, the buyer can select from a menu of more than 60 validated and reliable psychometric dimensions.

This same flexibility applies to our 360° surveys, where you can choose from more than 50 managerial skills and competencies. In addition, suggestions for future improvement and development are available.

In effect with GPI, you can easily create totally customised assessments and surveys specific to your needs. From the competencies, values or objectives of any role, department, or organisation – anywhere in the world.

To learn more about the dimensions available suited to modern organisations, or if you’d like to trial our assessments – contact us.

VUCA Leadership today: how to identify great VUCA Leaders

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VUCA leadership is paramount, with the world facing an uncertain future today.

The VUCA acronym (Volatile, Uncertain Complex, Ambiguous) has been around since 1987. It was the US Army War College’s response to the collapse of the USSR in the early 1990s.

No one was forecasting Covid-19, even in January 2020.

Without a doubt, it has been the most disruptive event in our lifetimes. It has devastated:

  • countries,
  • economies,
  • businesses,
  • individuals,
  • families, and
  • communities.

But it is likely there may be other disruptions waiting in the wings that, as yet, we know nothing about.

What does VUCA leadership and uncertainty mean for organisations?

The BIG questions for organisations are:

  • which elements will affect you,
  • to what degree, and
  • how will a combination of consecutive catastrophic disruptions alter the change.

Despite the deliberations of many so-called thought leaders and experts, the truthful answer is no one actually knows what’s going to happen in the future!

What you can rely on, though, is that there will be significant change. VUCA leaders in your organisation means the capability of anticipating, responding and reacting to change when it happens in turn, reacting again and again when it changes again (and again).

 

“THE ONLY CONSTANT IN LIFE IS CHANGE.”  – HERACLITUS (C535BC – C475BC)

 

What makes an effective VUCA leader?

Effective VUCA leadership is demonstrated by those who can give their company more than an abundance of skills and experience. Traits of VUCA leaders are that they can:

  • develop and communicate a clear and motivating vision, based on an understanding of the constantly changing economic environment, and
  • apply it through quick decisions, well-adapted to ever-changing conditions.

In addition to skills learned for a role, experience, and qualifications gained, there is no substitute for the enthusiasm, motivation and vision these great leaders possess. VUCA leaders can mean the difference between an average team and a high performing team in an organisation. They are the leaders every company wants to keep, nurture and develop to their full potential.

VUCA leaders are acutely aware of the strategic goals they are striving for, and what they need to do to get there. They share:

  • company values,
  • strive to be the best at what they do,
  • identify areas for improvement, and
  • actively engage with their own leaders to perfect their craft and leadership method.

Leadership style isn’t a perfect science – but what all great leaders have in common is their ability to be authentic.

Future proof your business through VUCA leadership

Thinking back to the beginning of the Covid crisis, who among your managers disappointed you with their response? Who impressed you? Were any of these a surprise to you (either positive or negative)? Those who responded well are, potentially, your VUCA Leaders. If you manage to retain them they are the people who will guide you through future change events.

Using the Great People Inside customised VUCA leadership assessment, you can identify and quantify which team members and potential candidates possess the required attributes. Gaps that may be obstacles to your organisation’s success can also be uncovered.

Click here for a free trial.

Your ideal candidate when hiring – what’s on your wish list?

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We usually see various words and phrases in job ads that describe an employer’s wish list for hiring an ideal candidate.

This statement below I came across recently brought a smile to my face as it reminded me of this.

 

Can you perform under pressure? asked the recruiter. 

No, said the candidate, but I do a mean Bohemian Rhapsody!

 

Some more standard features you might see employers looking for in hiring an ideal candidate are:

  • Ambitious
  • Resilient
  • Bubbly personality or Can-do attitude
  • Clear thinker and have a Strong work ethic
  • Share our passion
  • Accuracy and Attention to detail
  • a Team player, a Strong Leader, and yes, Perform Under Pressure!

As an illustration, the typical wish list for the “perfect employee” often reads something like this:

“We are looking for someone ambitious who will demonstrate initiative and resilience has the maturity always to remain calm and professional. You will have an excellent work ethic and have outstanding communication skills. 

You are respectful and enjoy working in a team in a fast-paced environment in which you will be able to prioritise and handle multiple tasks while meeting deadlines”.

Job advertisements will also include what the work involves, and the qualifications and experience needed to be a successful applicant.

 

Consider the total recruitment cost of hiring a non-ideal candidate

Despite rigorous selection processes, many studies tell us that up to 50% of new hires fail within 18 months.

For Australian businesses, the cost of these failures is indeed high. Recent research discovered the direct recruitment costs to hire ONE employee are on average a staggering $19,000!

Add to that another 30% to 50% of the annual salary with the total cost of induction, orientation, training, maintenance, termination, and lost opportunity.

There would be “skin and hair flying” in many management meetings if all these costs showed up on a Profit and Loss Statement line.

Your choice

So, what gets in the way of more consistent selection outcomes when it comes to hiring an ideal candidate based on a wish list? Most would agree that even the most basic selection process can get it right with the required qualifications and experience for a role.

However, when it comes to attributes similar to the examples below, the ability to precisely assess if the person sitting in front of us possesses these is close to impossible:

  • Tenacious
  • Ambitious
  • Resilient 
  • possesses Initiative
  • will Remain calm and professional, and
  • has an Excellent work ethic.

People tell us what they think we want to hear; after all, they are looking for a job!

Consequently, many of us make our hiring decisions based on our “gut feel” and what we “liked” about the candidate during the interview. In essence, we hire people we like.

Given that research tells us that more than 40% of Australians think it’s okay to lie during an interview, this stacks the odds against us. We need to add some objective data to our “gut feel” to help us get it right more consistently.

The way forward for hiring more ideal candidates

The next generation award-winning Great People Inside (GPI) customisable assessment platform now available in Australia allows you to choose those specific attributes on your recruitment wish list.

Therefore, if you want to assess certain attributes, these can readily be selected. For example, attributes like:

  • Resilience
  • Tenacity
  • Ambition
  • Discipline
  • Customer Focus
  • Closing sales.

Thanks to https://unsplash.com/@fiteka for this image

Over 60 validated psychometric dimensions are available to precisely evaluate the crucial traits for both your business and the specific role. And if we don’t have what you need, we will build it for you. We call this full customisation.

With this in mind no longer are you restricted to relying on your gut feel and hiring people you “like”. You can easily create GPI assessments as short or as long as you wish.

By adopting this approach, specific objective data can be added to your selection process and increase your success rate by up to 300%.

Don’t take our word for it!

We were delighted to recently receive the following feedback from one of our clients who has been using with great success the Great people Inside (GPI) platform for more than 18 months. This client uses the GPI platform to assess alignment to the company values of both internal employees and new recruits.

They tell us, “We are observing through using the GPI profiling tool to test for values fit, we are naturally defining critical success factors to base our hiring decisions on.

The more we benchmark our top performers and see success in our new recruits, the more we learn about what are the critical behaviours and interests that make a person a successful cultural fit in our business.

Whilst we would like to think we were good at picking this up before, GPI provides us with an evidence-based, tangible tool to confirm this and has been a real value add to our hiring decisions”. 

If you’d like to learn more, we’d be happy to let you try us for free. Click HERE, and we’ll be in touch straight away.

 

Diversity and culture fit – how to hire for your business

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When recruiting a new team member, I have never met any business owner or manager who set out to deliberately hire a substandard performer. Then, why is it that studies tell us that we get it “right” (i.e., hire a top performer) only 25% of the time? The answer is that traditional recruitment processes, (resumes, interviews, and reference checks) are just not meeting the modern business needs.

In Australia today, we are lucky that we have a highly educated and well-trained workforce, which logically means that most employees in Australia have the skills and competencies to perform their jobs well. But if this is the case, why is the hiring success rate so inconsistent?

Most new employees fail – not because they are incompetent or don’t have the required skills – but because they don’t “fit” with the practice owner, the manager, or their colleagues or due to other factors.

What is fit?

Culture fit (the alignment of values, beliefs, and behaviours between the employee and employer) has become another one of those also overused cliches in business-speak. While it is essential, the issue when hiring is that it means different things to different people. As a result, hiring for culture fit alone can be difficult to measure and is not a reliable predictor of high performance. When we speak of ‘fit” we are talking about much more than culture fit alone. Our definition of “fit” is as follows:

  • Can the person handle the mental demands of this job?
  • Will they enjoy the environment and the people they must work with?
  • Are they highly motivated by this type of work?

Hardwiring

Psychologists tell us that our core traits and beliefs about ourselves and the world are hardwired into our brains by the time we are 10 or 12 years of age. Of course, as people we evolve and develop, however our deep-set inner identity and core beliefs about ourselves, others, and how the world works are intensely cast in our DNA and are hard to change.

As we go about our daily work in the business, many of us will have observed our top-performing employees going about their jobs quite differently. Still, despite different approaches, they consistently deliver top outcomes and results.

Achieving these top outcomes and results is the DNA we refer to, the four or five key qualities most important to your business and that are possessed in abundance by your top performers. These qualities are the heartbeat of your company. We call this success DNA and when it comes to hiring new team members, they are non-negotiable.

The importance of fit

The low hiring success rate clearly demonstrates that if the right potential employees who share these critical success qualities are not found and employed, and you select a person who doesn’t fit, it’s unlikely this person will deliver top performance for your business. In fact, it’s estimated that 46% of newly hired employees won’t survive for a year because they aren’t a good fit for the job. Poor DNA matches are the number one reason why people become disengaged, dislike their managers or colleagues, and eventually fail or leave their jobs.

 

Modify your process by benchmarking your top performers

Unless you understand your top performers’ DNA success attributes, then the traditional selection process will continue to deliver less than 25% of top performers. The science-based Great People Inside customisable profiling tools we recommend will enable you to identify and quantify the success attributes they share greatly contributing to your business. When recruiting, you can measure your potential new recruits against these attributes to ensure they also have the required success DNA fit for your business.

Our easy-to-read plain language reports will also help you take your interviewing approach to new heights. Our Management Coaching and Onboarding reports will make sure your new team member contributes as quickly as possible.

Great People Inside assessments are customisable – so what?

Compared to assessments you may have used or taken yourself previously, Great People Inside assessments are the next generation – think original Nokia phone and iPhone 12!

You may be familiar with assessments that have been around for many years where you measure the dimensions the assessment provider has configured; you have no choice and no control. As a result, you may be measuring (and paying for) what you don’t need. Our customisation feature allows you to design an assessment that measures what you want to measure best suited to your business, which means you are in control, and most importantly, you decide what you want to pay. Even with its unique customisation features, GPI will usually be at the cost of comparable assessments (where they exist).

Don’t just take our word for it

For the second year in a row, the Great People Inside platform has been in the top 10 best rating tools in the world.

It is a huge honour for us to find ourselves among the best yet again this year.  In July 2020 Great People Inside was also ranked #16 assessment tool in the world by AHRI.

If you’d like to find out more please click here to contact us or email [email protected]

 

What attributes do top salespeople have in common?

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Better sales staff equals more sales. It sounds simple, doesn’t it? Increasing the productivity of your salespeople, however, is a complex task fraught with misunderstanding.

Finding high performing staff involves a specific hiring approach which targets those with precisely the right attributes for the job in hand.

Once you have the right players, it doesn’t stop there. It’s a question of matching them to the right sales roles, managing them and developing the sales team in an ongoing way to ensure maximum efficiency and results.

Remember the old maxim ‘If you can sell, you can sell anything’?

Well, times have changed. Not all sales positions – or reps – are created equal.

According to studies analysed by Herb Greenberg, Harold Weinstein and Patrick Sweeney in their book How to Hire and Develop Your Next Top Performer, around 50% of those working in sales lack the fundamental traits necessary in effective salespeople. A further 25% are selling the wrong thing, for the wrong managers, in the wrong place.

That leaves just 25% of salespeople operating to full capacity and producing great results.

So one size doesn’t fit all when it comes to finding the right salesperson to sell your product or services.

Financial benefits of hiring the best salespeople

Having a sales team composed of star performers can make a significant difference to your bottom line.

In a study of 100 businesses, Sales Force of Top Producers – A Manager’s (and Owner’s) Dream, reported in Employer’s Advantage, the company’s top performer outsold the bottom performer by a whopping average of 5.7 to 1 – with a range of 3:1 to 9:1.

Just imagine what kind of results you’d get if your entire team worked at the lower margin of 3:1, not to mention 5:1 or higher.

Salesforce Work.com and the TAS Group drew some more shocking statistics from their research. These include:

  • Two-thirds of salespeople miss their quota.
  • More than half of all salespeople close less than 40% of potential deals.
  • Top-performing sales reps are 250% better at qualifying leads.
  • High performers are 2.5 times more likely to be effective qualifiers than the general population.
  • Around 40% of salespeople don’t understand their customer’s ‘pain’, addressing problems they don’t even have.
  • Revenue can be up to 25% greater at companies where sales and marketing are well integrated.
  • High performers are 57% more likely to come from companies where sales and marketing work in harmony.

Measuring an individual salesperson’s productivity

All this begs the question, just how productive is your own sales team? Can you measure individual productivity? And once you’ve measured it, how do you replace or improve poor and fair performers?

The answer is using the advanced science from the next generation of smart assessment tools. Our award-winning Great People Inside assessments will help you identify those essential success attributes for each sales role, enabling you to match it with the right employee.

Great People Inside’s dimensions assessment will tell you:

  • what makes your top performers so great
  • why your average performers are less effective
  • how to improve your least successful performers

How to hire the best people

 

The right assessment tools can help you find the right people for your sales roles.

Applied correctly, Great People Inside tools can  make your recruitment of future high performers up to three times more successful and also significantly reduce sales department turnover by more than 27%.

These results should be music to any employer’s ear when considering the statistics.

Figures reported in Employer’s Advantage, show that three out of four new sales employees don’t last the distance. They have, in fact, only a 25% chance of staying with the company for a full year.

Of those that do stick, only one in 10 go on to become a genuine top performer within three years.

So what is the essential DNA of these star performers? Many have fundamental traits and attributes in common, which help drive their peak performance for the longer term.

Using our validated and reliable customised sales assessments, we work with you and scientifically evaluate your current top-performing salespeople.

These measures enable us to create a customised job profile benchmark specific to your company based on your company’s top performers, not a random benchmark based on a collection of external organisations. A company customised standard means you can clearly see what sets your top performers apart from the rest.

This benchmark can also be used to significant effect when recruiting new sales staff, ensuring that candidates fit these rigorous criteria and carry the ‘work genes’ critical to success in their roles.

What to look for in sales job candidates today

There are plenty of things to consider when hiring, but it’s vital that new employees are a good fit with company culture and embrace their new work environment.

They must be able to cope with challenges, build strong relationships with work colleagues – especially in the marketing department – and understand the needs of your customers.

As if hiring salespeople wasn’t challenging enough already, in this new world we live in, where face to face selling may not always be the accepted way, how do you know if the candidates have what it takes to sell remotely. Interestingly, psychologists tell us the many attributes for in-person sales success don’t work effectively when remote selling!

So what attributes do star sales performers typically have? Behavioural science tells us that they commonly possess the following traits:

  • Agreeableness: Tendency to be friendly, approachable, and easy to get along with.
  • Conscientiousness: Tendency to strive for perfection, sometimes at all costs.
  • Stability: Degree to which one reacts positively to negative or stressful situations.
  • Openness: Willingness to try new ways of doing things.
  • Tenacity: Tendency to be determined and persevere.
  • Control: Tendency to take charge of people and situations. Leads more than follows.
  • Entrepreneurial Approach: The tendency to quickly seize and tenaciously pursue new opportunities for the organisation, taking calculated risks at a high level of autonomy. The right recruitment tools help you weed out unsuitable candidates and identify the cream of the crop.

Other benefits of hiring star sales performers

Revenue benefits are not the only advantages of building a high performing sales team.

By adopting a more scientific approach to recruitment, you remove much of your operational downside costs; costs that don’t always show up on your P&L:

  • Frequent employee turnover – even from good people
  • Time spent recruiting and training of replacements
  • Lost sales through an empty seat during recruitment and induction training
  • Wasted investment in salary and training for someone that doesn’t make it.
  • Inability to close deals when not face to face.

Try us for FREE

You probably wouldn’t make a significant purchase without doing your research and acquiring objective data about your future potential investment. Then why would you hire a new salesperson costing more than $100K per annum using nothing more than your “gut feel” and highly subjective references?

At the end of the day if you’re happy with your current sales team’s success rate don’t change anything.

However, if you want to significantly increase your business performance talk to Great People Inside about our sales assessments – we’ll even let you try us risk-free and fee-free. Just click HERE, and we will be in touch.