Points to note when hiring young employees

Every organization has a fundamental purpose it aims to achieve which sets it apart from others.

For the actualization of that purpose, it suffices to say that of all the factors of production, human resources are the most critical.

Whenever your business niche includes the young generation, you might want to consider hiring younglins into certain aspects of the organization. These might be some of the guidelines to adhere to;

• Hire for attitude, Train for skill

Business owners should not be carried away with applicant’s credentials when hiring, instead, they should focus on the young person’s character and attitude.

Character often simply affects inter-personal relationships amongst co-workers. Attitude can cover a range of attributes from personality, values, work ethic, ambition, enthusiasm, to general outlook on life.

The deficiencies in credentials can always be accommodated and corrected through training but an attitudinal deficiency is difficult to correct.

• Hire for cultural fit to the organization

Imagine a young actress being made an intern at a bank, while someone of that career was sent to NASA.  The culture of an organization holds it together. It is a key trait to look for when recruiting employees.

Cultural fit is the likelihood that someone will reflect or be able to adapt to the core beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors that make up an organization.

According to the Society for Human Resource Management, the result of poor culture fit leading to employee turnover can cost an organization between 50 to 60 per cent of the employees annual salary.

It explains that in order to increase the success rate of the hiring process, business owners must first define and articulate the organization’s culture, it’s values, goals, and practices, and then use such to measure every potential employee during the hiring process.

• Hire for more of experience/inexperience

Every employer must always be concerned to hire an employee based on the expected ‘value’ the employee would add to the organization.

In interpreting ’employee value’, business owners must look at it as either educational qualification (potential value) or work experience (experiential value).

Potential value is fully measured by an employee’s intellect or educational qualification while experiential value is measured by how much of an employee’s intellect or educational qualification has been put to work to produce results.

Someone willing to prove his mettle might prove ingenuous in research or design assignments, especially with the right potential value.

While a community relations or political company roles might be sections of the organization which could benefit from other young employees who have experiences to replicate.