Recruiting Myth #7: It’s Really Hard to Find Good People

Editor’s Note: Humetrics CEO Mel Kleiman has been helping employers standardize and systemize the way they recruit, select, and retain frontline hourly employees/managers for over 30 years. He knows what works — and what doesn’t. This is the last of his “Recruiting Myths.”

By Mel Kleiman

It’s hard to find good people.

If you believe this myth, it can’t help but work against you and, in fact, become true for you. You might ask yourself if this “belief” is just an excuse or rationalization for the fact that you haven’t had any recruiting success or haven’t done any recruiting at all lately.

The truth is you can find good people everywhere if you’ll define what good looks like according to the CAPS formula (see Recruiting Myth #6: The Best Applicants Make the Best Employees) and create a “magnetic” company culture.

A magnetic company attracts the best and repels the rest. Magnetic companies empower their employees to do the right thing and make a point of having fun while getting lots of work done. Two well-known examples are Southwest Airlines and Disney. Even when there are labor shortages, these two employers always have more quality applicants than jobs available.

And don’t think you have to employ thousands in order to be a magnetic employer-of-choice. Just deliver what employees want most from their jobs (See Recruiting Myth #3: If We Make Jobs Hard to Get, People Won’t Apply) and the word will get out. Your employees, vendors, and clients will be happy to recommend you enthusiastically to their friends and families.

This was originally published on Mel Kleiman’s Humetrics blog. His last Recruiting Myth was “I Know Right Away if Someone Will be a Good Employee.”