Hire The Right Person
For The Right Job, Every Time!

By Allyn Cutts, President
Cutts Group, llc

I could attempt to "Wow!" you with dramatic figures from the American Management Association. Figures like:

• $36 billion in annual workplace violence
• $15 billion in annual employee theft

Or this fact, from the US Department of Justice:

• the "average" employee embezzles $125,000 over the course of his career - that's a lot of pencils and paper clips!

These statistics highlight a universal problem: the incredibly expensive price and high stakes consequences of bringing the wrong person into your organization.

Far less dramatic, but more likely to directly affect your company's bottom line is the fact that it costs $10,000 to replace just one hourly wage worker and from $29,000 to $107, 320 to recruit, hire and train a middle manager.

In fact, some experts estimate the cost of replacing an employee at over 100% the employee's annual salary.

Profits and Competitive Advantages
Hinge on Hiring the Right Person

Almost every recent study points out that those organizations with the most effective, highly developed systems for hiring not only have higher morale, enhanced productivity and better overall working environment, but also higher profits.

It's easy to see why. When you hire the right person, you save money otherwise spent on recruiting, rehiring and training. You also save the extra energy, effort and man-hours that can be diverted by the revolving door of recruiting, hiring, training, firing and replacing.

Bringing the right people into your organization will help to ensure your return-on-investment for recruitment, hiring and training. In short, hiring the right person the first time keeps you advancing towards your goals more fluidly. Without interruptions and distractions.

The right person will shorten the new-hire learning curve. This means that employees will begin producing results for you more quickly.

When a new hire fits comfortably into the job, when the natural behavioral style the individual brings to a job is a natural "match" with the behaviors the job requires, its easier to focus energy on the completion of tasks rather than attempting to alter, or adapt, behavior.

As we pointed out in our article on employee retention, "You've Found The Right People - Can You Keep Them?" battling against natural style in order to "fit" into a job that demands a different, unfamiliar behavioral style wastes enormous amounts of energy.

This energy drain takes valuable time away from the tasks at hand and can result in stress and stress-related problems.

Finding The Perfect Fit

It's happened to all of us. We hire the dynamite candidate with the impressive resume only to find we can't light his fuse. Months later, we are wondering if the person who comes to the office every day is the "evil twin" of the person we think we hired. What went wrong?

Part of the problem may be the fact that we rely on "job descriptions" that tell us WHAT the employee needs to do to satisfy the job, but little about HOW. Don't get caught hiring for talent - and firing for attitude. That's the quickest way to lose money and waste valuable resources.

Many effective, high performing companies -the ones with the higher moral, higher productivity and higher profits--rely on pre-selection assessments and tests to predict how an individual will fit with a specific job within their specific corporate culture and environment.

Good, thoughtfully developed diagnostic tools can accurately indicate how closely a candidate fits the "style" associated with a particular job.

Good measurement tools can tell you how -and if--the candidate you're considering will fit with your company's values, environment and overall "culture," your organization's style; your company's way of doing things.

Pre-Hiring Assessments
And Evaluations Save Time,
Money and Energy

It's been proven time and again, that well conceived, well-developed, detailed assessment tools are effective indicators of job performance. Still many organizations fail to make these tools available for their managers and Human Resource departments. Do you?

Having these tools in place and understanding how to use them correctly can significantly increase your chances of identifying the person best suited for the job.

After helping hundreds of organizations, large and small, develop and implement programs that more accurately match candidate to job, we know first hand that the right assessment and diagnostic tools are an invaluable resource for any organization.

They provide keys to understanding human behavior. The best reports and programs include detailed, proven effect measurements and evaluations of behaviors, personal interests, values and attitudes affecting job performance for specific types of jobs.

When selecting a program, be sure that among the elements measured are the candidate's general characteristics, ideal work environment and predicted contribution to your organization.

A comprehensive toolbox of cutting-edge tools helps you determine in advance a candidate's talents, behavioral style, personal interests, attitudes, and values--all critical drivers of performance.

Good assessments also measure the more subtle but critically important "soft skills" --like risk tolerance and a willingness to accept challenges or assume authority.

Hiring mistakes are expensive. Yet most companies have more specific strategies and techniques in place for buying computers and software than for hiring the right person. If you're looking for a turnkey, proven successful system for more effective hiring, Proper People Placement (PPP) can help.

Proper People Placement (PPP) is a comprehensive system that utilizes the most advanced, accurate and in-depth diagnostic, assessment and measurement procedures and tools available. For more information, contact the Cutts Group at (800) 482-7280, or (610) 437-4106 outside the U.S. and Canada or visit us on the web at http://www.cuttsgroup.com.

The Cutts Group partners with clients who are committed to continuous growth. We provide the organizational development, team building, employee selection, executive coaching, and sales training resources our clients demand for measurable results and return on investment. Satisfaction and investment are always guaranteed, always.