iCIMS Hire Expectations™

The customer is always right – especially when it comes to what they want to see in the product they use every day. In this case that product is the iCIMS Talent Platform, and iCIMS has always been committed to taking our clients ideas and feedback, and turning them into our newest features. While our annual surveys, client user groups, Product Experience Panel, and daily interactions with clients help us garner an idea of our clients are looking for, iCIMS has also created the Customer Advisory Council (CAC) – a two day conference held each year where an elite group of clients get together with the iCIMS team to discuss ideas and improvements for the system as well as upcoming trends in HR.

This Monday, September 10th marks the start of iCIMS’ 9th Annual Customer Advisory Council . The CAC gives us the ability to work face to face with both everyday users in the system and their executives to not only hear what new features they would like to see, but also things that they feel might not be working to their full potential. It’s a simple, proactive way to keep a pulse on how clients are using the system, ways that we can better the user and candidate experience, and share with our clients where iCIMS is headed as a company.

This year’s CAC is slated to allow for even more free flowing conversation between clients and iCIMS employees. With the largest CAC head count to date, new conference tracks, smaller break-out sessions, and one-on-one meetings all being hosted at iCIMS’ brand new HQ in Matawan NJ, we can’t wait to see the feedback we gain!

I recently read an article titled “Our Employees Are Our Most Valuable Asset”, which was proceeded by the sentence “This (standard) cliché is repeated over and over by the world’s public employers in their most valuable marketing piece, their annual report. We know it’s B.S. You know it’s B.S. … and so does everyone else.”

Which got me thinking – could this really be true? As a person lucky enough to have landed a job at a company with a truly fantastic work environment that values its employees, and encourages them to grow, the idea that I’m not my company’s most valuable asset seems a bit foreign to me. When companies like iCIMS and their 1,000+ clients seem to truly take pride in creating fully branded, engaging career sites, I can’t help but wonder why these companies would go through all that trouble if they don’t really care about their employees?  Of course I know that iCIMS would still thrive without me sitting in my - still heavily decorated with “Happy Birthday” decorations thanks to my co-workers (one month later) - cubicle in the marketing department, but from day one you could have had me believing otherwise.

Now in getting to my point, hopefully, besides being in awe that I am not the single reason that iCIMS continues to be a leading provider of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) talent acquisition software solutions, it made me wonder why more companies don’t take advantage of branding their career sites to showcase what sets their company apart from others. One of the main reasons I decided to apply for a position at iCIMS was absolutely because of the culture they promoted on their career site. Not only does having a branded career site help potential candidates identify with your company before even applying, but you can also give them a Realistic Job Preview (RJP), if you will, of the culture of your company.

Career sites enable you to easily show potential candidates upfront what type of work environment they would be entering, the qualities your employees must possess, and so much more. If an RJP can greatly reduce turnover for individual jobs by showing potential candidates exactly what they can expect in their new position, why not give them a realistic preview of the work environment they can expect to enter as well?

While the recent economy has made it harder to find a job, it’s also made it even harder to find and retain top talent – we can’t afford to have high turnover (30-50% of the annual salary of entry-level employees, 150% of middle level employees, and up to 400% for specialized, high level employees) especially if there are simple ways to decrease it. If you want to grab the attention of the best possible candidates, you need to be able to quickly show them why your company should be their company, and what better way to do that than branding the career site provided to you through your ATS. Candidates can easily learn all about your company, and then go straight to applying – growing your talent pipeline seamlessly, and showing employees what the standards at your company are before they even walk through the door.

We’re all guilty of doing it - buying those fancy new shoes without trying them on, only to find that they give you blisters within 5 minutes. Letting the salesperson talk you into falling in love with a car you can’t really afford because you need the GPS in your dashboard – only to discover that you might have been better off plugging in your five-year-old outdated GPS that seems to work better anyway.

We all can make impulse decisions when at-a-glance something (or someone) appears to be the perfect fit, the cream of the crop, the once in a lifetime opportunity – but let’s pause, take a step back, and really look at that pair of shoes.

Hiring Mistake #1 – Admiring a single accomplishment too much

Yes your candidate may have an accomplishment from their past work experience that is more impressive than anything you’ve ever seen, but what else have they done? Don’t assume a candidate is a perfect match because of one thing that truly impresses you. Of course they may have done something extraordinary, but what have they been doing since then that would make them an asset to your organization? Do make sure that their skill set matches up with your other hiring qualifications. Why not check out their LinkedIn profile or have them submit their LinkedIn profile as a resume to your ATS, and make sure this aligns with the resume they have submitted. 

Hiring Mistake #2 – Falling in love with the candidate

It’s important to feel that person you are going to hire will be a good fit for the company, both culturally and in their work contributions. However, you can run into a problem when after the interview you like the person so much you’re ready to hire them based on personality only. To make sure you are not basing your decision off of how much you want to be friends with a candidate, it’s important to get the opinions of others to help validate your decision. It’s easy to do this if you have a workflow of people within your company who will also be looking at the candidate. Make sure each person in that workflow has access to the candidates resume before meeting them, and it’s best to have the same group of people evaluate each person for a specific job. Having a group of people who are also looking for the same qualifications may help to stop you from hiring someone who might be great to go out with on a Saturday night, but most likely doesn’t have the skill set you are looking for in any given position. 

Hiring Mistake #3 – A great talker

Be wary of the person that gives you a stellar speech on why they would be a good fit for a position. Don’t let a great sales pitch sell you into thinking a person is “the one” for a job. Some people are born to talk, and if you don’t take a deeper dive – asking questions about specific examples of not their past successes, but times that they have failed too, you might end up hiring a person who is all talk and no action. If talking is what they do, they have probably worked on their responses, and will have very polished answers, but by asking very specific job related questions, you should be able to see if they are the real deal or not. 

Most hiring mistakes are made when we are awed by a candidate at first glance, whether it is a single past accomplishment, their charisma, or their mesmerized standard interview responses. It’s always important to make sure we are getting a bigger picture than just an outward appearance, or single event. Of course there will be candidates who will not only be a perfect match for the job, but will have and outstanding personality to go with it. Knowing what to look out for, and having ways to check that you are not getting swept off your feet by a candidate, will help ensure you are making the right decision in hiring anyone!