Tips for Hiring the Right Candidate

Estimated Time to Read: 3 minutes

Business leaders will often proclaim that employees are their most valuable asset. It is true. The success of your business depends on your employees. A bad hire can ruin the productivity of a team and lead to an unsatisfactory work environment for your current staff. This is especially true for small businesses and even more important today for RIA business owners, given the macro-environment we find ourselves in.

Seemingly every RIA survey or white paper you read today talks about Talent. Charles Schwab's RIA benchmarking study continues to point to recruiting talent and developing employee skills as top strategic priorities, alongside adding new clients. CityWire wrote an article last year titled "The RIA industry is headed into a war for talent."

The demand for talent in the RIA industry outweighs the supply.

This is why we feel it is as important as ever to develop a Talent Strategy. This means everything from how you hire to new employee onboarding to compensation packages.

Hiring is not just about filling an open position. It is about finding a candidate with the skillset and values that match your business’ goals. The right employee contributes to the productivity and growth of your company. When your clients engage with your business, they will be engaging with your employees. These interactions shape the perception of your business and successful interactions lead to growth.  Why go into it without a plan?

Benefits of Having a Strategy for Hiring the Right Candidate

Cuts Cost

Turnover can be extremely costly for an organization. There are heavy costs associated with recruiting, onboarding, training as well as lost productivity and knowledge depending on the tenure of the employee that left the organization. Employees that are not a right fit will not stick around. Hiring the right person from the start will save significant money.

Saves Time

Managing the employees in your organization takes time. Managing poor performers vastly increases the time due to an increase in coaching, counseling, and training. When you hire the right fit, managers can focus on their role instead of micromanaging employees to ensure their job duties are properly performed.

Customer Satisfaction

Your employees are the face of your business. Organizations strive to create a positive, stress-free experience for their customers. Hiring the right person will contribute to an enjoyable customer experience. Unfavorable customer service experience largely contributes to customers or client turnover.

Culture & Morale

High turnover and low performers will affect company culture and morale. Businesses thrive when teams collaborate efficiently towards common goals. Filling a role with a strong team player will contribute to your culture. The wrong person can disrupt team collaboration and workplace environment.

Hiring Tips

• Advertise your job right.
  • Really contemplate what the role requires, the qualities your new employee would ideally have, and how an individual would positively contribute to your business and culture. Provide a clear job description that explicitly summarizes what your company does and the expectations of this role.
    
    
• Conduct a Comprehensive Interview.
  • Tailor interview questions to the role and specific candidate. It is important to go into the interview prepared with on hand questions. A helpful tip is to bring a checklist to the interview on criteria you would expect your new hire to meet in the job and company as a whole.
  • Ask open-ended questions. In an interview, the candidate should do most of the talking. Your job is to learn as much about them and their professional background as possible. Simple yes or no questions will not give you the details you need to make an assessment. Interview questions should require candidates to go into detail about their previous work experience and professional history. See how they have handled situations common to this role in the past.
  • Find an employee that is also a cultural fit. It is easy to like a candidate, but we want to ensure the candidate is compatible with your company’s culture and their values match your business’ values.
    
    
• Be a Competitive Employer.
  • Review market data to ensure the compensation you are offering is competitive.
  • Money is not the only thing that makes you an attractive employer. Total compensation includes traditional benefits (healthcare, vision, dental), voluntary benefits (disability insurance, life insurance, critical illness coverage), bonuses, stock options, retirement plans, PTO, work life balance and more.
  • Advertise your total rewards package and ensure your candidates have an inclusive view of all compensation and benefits that come with the role.
    
    
• Communicate well and often regarding the interview and hiring process.
  • For many candidates, lack of communication is the most frustrating part of the recruitment process. It is important to be open regarding turnaround time and timelines. Gaps in communication can lead to losing a high potential candidate.
    
    
• Be Patient.
  • When your organization has a gap, it can be difficult to be patient. However, taking your time to find the right fit means you will not need to revisit searching for a candidate any time soon.

Hiring can be frustrating and difficult. It is crucial to take your time and determine what your business needs. Finding a candidate that is a right fit for your organization lays the foundation for long term success. By diligently focusing on hiring top talent and candidates that are a good fit, your business will steadily climb towards growth and profitability.