Overcoming the Challenges of Finding and Hiring the Right Marketing Candidate

Challenges to find and hiring the right marketing candidate cited by hiring managers:

“Managers often receive little guidance on how to make good hires, particularly within smaller firms that may lack human resources personnel,” said Tracey Fuller, executive director of The Creative Group.  “While identifying the most promising candidates may seem straightforward, it’s easy to make mistakes along the way.  Unfortunately, these missteps can be very costly if the wrong person is hired.”

Added Fuller, “Having a well-thought-out procedure in place for each task, including sorting through resumes and conducting job interviews, saves managers time and increases their effectiveness.  Many executives receive hundreds of resumes in response to classified ads, for example, and may feel overwhelmed.  An established evaluation system can make the task more manageable.”

Fuller offered the following tips for developing a strategic hiring process:

Use the right criteria.  Create a set of requirements that:

•  can be used to evaluate applicants.  It should outline the technical aptitudes, educational requirements and soft skills needed for success in each position. 
• Make the system uniform.  Each resume should be reviewed against the same standards.  Likewise, provide each candidate interviewed equal time and ask similar types of questions.
• Begin at the end when reviewing resumes.  Candidates tend to place the least flattering information toward the bottom of their application materials, so starting there may be useful.  
• Develop questions in advance.  Create a core list of interview questions to be asked of all applicants for a given position.  
• Don’t skip steps.  When you’re short-staffed, it can be tempting to rush through the hiring process.  If workloads are unmanageable, consider bringing in freelance or project professionals until you have identified a final candidate.

Source: The Creative Group, www.creativegroup.com