Companies put a lot of effort into their hiring practices, and for good reason. A bad hire can end up costing a lot of money. In fact, replacing a bad hire can end up costing more than the position’s annual salary. That’s why we’re seeing a lot more focus on hiring and candidate evaluation metrics. These practices tend to make it easier to weed out bad candidates, and prevent bad hires. What’s not as simple, however, is picking the absolute best candidate from a handful of promising people.
Say you’ve narrowed down a list of applicants to three people. All of them have great resumes, relevant experience, interviewed well, and they seem like good cultures fits. How do you pick which candidate gets the job? None of them are going to be bad hires, but you want to hire the absolute best. Sometimes it’s up to chance. Just look at the historic 1984 NBA Draft.
[ibimage==37262==Original==none==self==ibimage_align-right]A Legendary Hire
For those unfamiliar, the 1984 NBA Draft featured some of the greatest basketball players of all time. In fact, the single greatest player of all time, Michael Jordan, was drafted by the Chicago Bulls in this draft. Surely His Airness was picked first overall before going on to be the undisputed greatest, right? Actually, Jordan was drafted third, behind Hakeem Olajuwon and Sam Bowie. Sure, Olajuwon was a very solid pick for the Houston Rockets, and the Portland Trail Blazers had more need for a guy like Sam Bowie, but looking back both teams would have taken Jordan in less than a heartbeat. Hindsight is 20/20, sure, but what was it the Bulls saw that other teams didn’t see? How did they make the decision to draft Jordan?
Fate Plays a Hand
It’s hard to say what Chicago would have done with the first pick in the 1984 draft, had it been theirs. Likely, they would have taken Hakeem Olajuwon, who was largely considered the best player in the draft. He wasn’t though. The Bulls didn’t have to make that decision, however, because of a coin flip. The NBA tossed a coin to see whether Portland or Houston would pick first. Houston won and took Olajuwon, but had they picked second, they probably would have taken Jordan before the Bulls had a chance. Fate plays an interesting role in hiring sometimes.
To an extent, this can happen in your hiring processes as well. While there aren’t actually coin flips to decide your hires (hopefully not, anyway), but the unpredictable nature of hiring tends to rear its head from time to time. Candidate availabilities change, people come and go, and your evaluation processes can’t always keep up.
What is Evaluation Really Worth?
We do everything we can to evaluate our job candidates. Tools like Hireology are great for eliminating bad hires, and they certainly help a lot in determining who the best candidates are. That said, practically every scout and expert who evaluated the 1984 NBA Draft class had Olajuwon ahead of Jordan. That was incorrect, obviously, as I reiterate that Michael Jordan is the greatest player of all time. When you have two candidates of supreme talent, is it even possible to determine who the better of the two is? You can’t necessarily account for their growth after you’ve hired them, you can’t be certain they’ll stay with your company for an extended period of time, there are countless variables that affect whether or not they’re a good hire. It might not be possible to know the definitive correct answer in every case, sometimes you just have to take a chance.
The science behind hiring is being examined with more diligence than ever before. It makes sense, the war for talent is ongoing, and has a serious impact on the success of your company. Relocation is playing a role as well, considering that sometimes the best talent for an open position resides out of town. Whether you’re relocating your new hire or not, however, bringing in the best person for a position can be tough to do efficiently. Just look at the 1984 NBA Draft. Who knows where you’ll find your Michael Jordan, or if you’ll even know them when you see them.
