What and Who you need in your Organisation

By: Mike van der Burgt 25-10-2016

Categories:Improve your recruitment and selection process,

WHAT and WHO you need in your Organisation

A non-functioning employee can make for a lot of costs. A Forbes article by David K. Williams states that the costs could lead up to $50.000. Themost used reason for firing a non-functioning employee is, after disappointing performance, that there is a bad match between the skills necessary for the job and the skills of the hired employee. This reason is then directly followed by "unclear functiongoals". These are reasons and costs for having to let employees go that could have been prevented easily. On top of that, Harvard Business Review states that 80% of the times that employees decide to quit their job are due to a bad recruitment and selection process.

Clearly planning out the recruitment and selection process, together with defining the factors that lead to success within a function is thus very important. What could help you in doing this is a function analysis.

blog_image:article_career_1477396714580f48ea48971.jpg:end_blog_image
Function Analysis


What kind of experience, personality and education is required for the job? Answering that is is the aim of a function analysis. Which qualities, skills, mindset and knowledge should a candidate possess to make them successful within the specific position in your organisation? You can find a lot of checklists for this online. They usually cover the following subjects:

These lists can be very useful, but they mostly concern subjects that you would have thought of by yourself. The real advantage of these lists lies in thoroughly working through them. You should be giving much attention to mapping out the core qualities needed. For example, a data-analist should not only be good with number, but should also be able to report and communicate his findings in a clear and concise manner. A data-analist is also probably working exclusively behind a computer, so he should have a long attention span and be able to sit down for extended periods of time. This is only a small piece of what seperates a good data-analist from the best.

blog_image:article_career_1477396778580f492a89f8b.png:end_blog_image
WHAT and WHO?

If you are having difficulties in going through these steps than it may help to not think of the candidate as a person. Think about What you need but don't think about Who yet. In this blogpost I will be referring to WHAT when i mean the objective tasks, diploma's or certificates that a function may require (education, necessary experience etc.). I will be referring to WHO if I'm talking about what personality trats someone should have for the task (personality, appearance etc.). Does your organisation require a leader or do you need software improvements? Try to think of what tasks you need to have done without thinking about a specific function or person. For example: I want that the tasks of the department are clearly distributed amongst the employees and that the employees will be monitored without feeling watched. Or: I want the software I am using to perform faster and I want it to be easier to navigate through all the functions it provides. When you are clear about WHAT you need, you can move on towards WHO you need.

If you need a leader like in the first example, than he/she should be friendly, open, approachable but also have some authority. Someone who develops software usually doesn't have to communicate with a lot of people, so you can adjust the needs for his/her personality to the few persons he/she will be in contact with. Regardless it is always a good idea to involve people who are connected to the function in your function analysis. They can tell WHAT they expect from someone in the position (which tasks he/she should fulfill or manage) en WHO they think would be good for doing these tasks (someone with authority or maybe someone who likes to have clear orders etc.).

Conclusion

Having the right people at the right places. That is how an organisation functions best. The first step in this is identifying WHAT your organisation needs (this defines the tasks of a position). the second step deals with WHO would be most capable in doing these tasks. The best function analysis and, with that, the best match will be found by people with experience. Therefore don't hesitate to ask people in similar functions about WHAT and WHO they think could be beneficial for your organisation. Asking colleagues, and in particular, those that are connected to the function is very recommendable.

Career Result

At Career Result we know that the best recruitment and selection is performed by those with experience in the relevant fields. That is why Career Result operates with Recruitment Experts, who have experience in both recruitment ánd the field there recruiting for. Every organisation has á specialisation and ours is dedicated recruitment. You determine WHAT and WHO you need and we will provide you with the appropriate candidates. Interested in our services? Please contact us and learn more about how you can attract the best employees.

For further questions or remarks about Career Result or the topics of this blog, you can mail to mike@careerresult.nl or react down below.
If you know others who might be interested in this post? Please share this with them!