Startup Hiring- Putting Together an A-Class Team

Every budding entrepreneur belies that the success of his venture solely depends on developing and marketing a breakthrough product/service. However, they soon realize that there comes a time when it becomes difficult to run a one (or two) man show. And that is the time when they realize that the success of the startup is not about the product or the technology but “it’s about the team.”

So you go about the task of hiring for your Startup by putting a word out on your website, social media or other recruitment channels. And lo and behold! You get mountain loads of resumes (global unemployment rates are high and working in startups is all the rage these days). You manage to dig out a stellar resume with great credentials-A candidate whose experience and education fit the job requirements like a glove. You call him in for an interview, and sure enough he comes out as competent in person as he does on paper. Without batting an eyelid, you make the decision. For sure, he is hired!

A few weeks down the road, you are vehemently questioning your choice. The purportedly brilliant candidate is not passionate enough about your breakthrough idea. He/she struggling in interacting and communicating within the team, his working style are incongruent with yours and he is having a tough time fitting in. Right now, you are figuring out a way to resolve this problem and mentally writing down the sunk costs of recruiting the candidate in question. And you keep berating ourself where did I go wrong?

The consolation is that you are not facing this imbroglio alone! A 2012 CareerBuilder poll revealed that 41 percent of companies have incurred a cost of at least $25,000 for a single bad hire, while another 25 percent have experienced a bad hire that cost $50,000. That is money that most startups cannot afford to do away with! But the question confronting you and many others facing a similar situation is how does a startup aiming to go big prevent this from happening?

The answer lies in a simple yet powerful phenomenon; which is assessing the candidate for culture fit. Conventional recruitment processes tend to assess for job fit i.e. whether the candidate’s competencies match with the requirements of the job. Culture fit brings in a totally different dimension in which the candidate is also assessed on his behaviors and attitude and most importantly on whether his values match with that of the organization. So how does one go about the task of assessing for cultural fit? Below are some tools and techniques which can be successfully employed in your startup hiring process to help increase the probability of choosing the best and the “right” candidate!

Behavioral Interviews

Its standard practice to ask questions related to a candidate’s past experience and education during an interview. So why not start questioning candidates on behaviors, values and attitudes? Questions assessing for behavior or cultural fit can help assess an individual’s reaction to difficult coworkers, conflicting situations and so on. It’s important that the questions you ask are aligned with your organization’s values. Another recommended, but by no means mandatory, practice is that these candidates should be assessed by multiple people ( partners, angel investors etc.) so as to get a holistic view of the candidates’ behavioral tendencies. A good repository of questions which can help you get started with your behavioral interviews can be found here.

Assessment Centers

Assessments centers comprised of simulation exercises intended to assess behaviors are also a popular tool for determining cultural fit. It provides the organization with an opportunity to observe how a particular individuals works within a team (as an assessment center is a mix of individual and team tasks), how he (or she) communicates with seniors, peers etc. and so on. Assessment center are erroneously though to be elaborate and expensive solutions to determining cultural fits. But to be

Referrals

Now days, referral programs have become pretty common as a tool for recruiting the right candidate. They use the collective networks of employees and at times other important stakeholders (e.g. Suppliers) to help find the right candidate for the open position. Referral programs could either be voluntary or may also have a financial reward attached with them. They also help in determining cultural fit, as employees as bastions of corporate values, tend to recommend candidates who would have the same personal values as their own and would be more amenable to the organization’s culture.

Cultural fit surveys

Culture fit surveys are also another popular and way of assessing candidate fit. Through this tool, candidates are required to respond to situations described in the survey. Their responses are then tabulated and the assessed for proximity to organization’s desired behaviors and values. These surveys can be made part of the recruitment process to ensure that the final candidate fits into the organizational culture and does not turn out to be a bad hire cost.

By employing some or all of the above techniques, you can strengthen your Startup’s hiring process to ensure that the best and the “culturally right” candidate has been chosen and save yourself from incurring costs which are a consequence of a bad hiring decision.