The second session of Talent Acquisition League, 2017 conducted by People Matters unveils some of the paradoxes that Hiring Managers and Recruiters face and how organizations can deal with these paradoxes. This session was hosted by Ester Martinez who interviews Lorraine Rodrigues, Country Manager of Fidelity India.

Here are some of the key insights from the session:

Keeping short term hiring strategy relevant for future hiring

When hiring managers can’t articulate what they are looking for in a candidate, it becomes a huge challenge for recruiters. Organizations need to train hiring managers on articulating what the potential required for a business need. Most of the time we have observed that when organizations are working on a project, leaders spend a considerable amount of time on business requirements. We need to apply the same discipline and same amount of time when it comes to understanding and articulating the capabilities you require to hire i.e. the technical as well as the soft skills which are essential to deal with this dilemma of short term vs long term. So if we get the right soft skills then those candidates will survive in the longer run. 

Justifying compensation for right talent

Articulation is also instrumental in solving another paradox, i.e.  Compensation capability of an organization to hire the right talent.  Hiring managers need to have a right conversation by articulating the reason why the organization needs to pay enough.

Expectations before and after a candidate join 

There is always a risk associated with the candidate you hire. You cannot predict how the candidate will perform after you hire him or her. You’re taking a gamble when you hire someone for a position but you can mitigate this risk by taking a series of interviews, internal hiring and employee references. 

Using technology vigilantly

Lorraine gave an example of how we are leveraging technology to hire candidates using Assessments. She says we really need to be careful while using technology by being aware of the possible biases we can program into it. So if you set up an aptitude test that only certain type of candidates can clear than it is a certain type of bias.

At the end, Lorraine advice hiring managers and recruiters to start having strategic conversations by gathering information and data. They shouldn’t align themselves with someone who takes instructions.