When it comes to finding the right candidate to fill a vacancy, you’ll discover plenty of imperfections on a CV and naturally have a few reservations during the interview stages.
That’s why more and more recruiters and HR departments are starting to turn towards artificial intelligence to help remove these irrelevant preferences.
But if you haven’t added this kind of technology to your arsenal, it’s important to recognise when your opinion on a candidate is valid and is borderline silly!
The consequences of finding the wrong employee can cost you a lot of money in the long-run, so getting it right can save you unnecessary stress going forward.
Here are four common (and silly) reasons you should try to ignore.
1. Tattoos
According to a study conducted at the University of St Andrews in 2013, it doesn’t matter how intelligent or articulate a candidate is, if they have a tattoo on show, a lot of employers will rule them out of contention.
This is due to the employer thinking the candidate looks “dirty”, “unsavoury” or “repugnant”.
However, over 20 million tattoo designs are currently marking the population of the UK, so is this perception really fair?
We live in a diverse and open age where people love to express themselves in different ways. Granted, inappropriate ones should be noted, but a butterfly on someone’s arm or a leg sleeve you rarely see really isn’t a big deal.
If you do decide to push a candidate out of the running because of a tattoo, you could lose out on a top worker. The choice is yours.
2. Job hopping
This point might be a bit of a controversial one, but it’s worth thinking about.
Today, many young professionals come out of education hungry to develop and move up. The problem is that some businesses can’t offer this natural ladder of progression, or the particular industry doesn’t have many opportunities in a certain location.
My point is, people will move around in a bid to find the right position. It doesn’t necessarily mean they are disloyal or not good at their job.
In fact, there are four kinds of job hoppers in my experience:
- The unfortunate.
- The ambitious.
- The inexperienced.
- And yes, there are some bad eggs.
So before you rule someone out completely, have a think about which kind of job hopper they are and work out whether perhaps you’re misjudging them. Find out more here: 7 Positive Reasons to Consider Hiring Job Hoppers.
Recruiter pro tip The millennial generation is often unpredictable and tricky to please. According to research, 95% of them said they are more motivated to work harder when they understand the importance of a particular task within the context of a company’s future goals. Therefore, you should always try to run a transparent and forward-thinking business. If you give millennials the opportunity to grow, they will truly flourish, and so will your business. You can find out more about how you can make them tick in our previous blog: ‘How (And Why) To Attract Millennials to Your Business’.
3. No degree
A university degree may sometimes be needed to help candidates successfully carry out a certain position – but not always.
Unless a degree and training are required, don’t be quick to discard a candidates CV over their education. The whole issue boils down to skill versus attitude.
According to one study, only 11% of new employees failed in their first 18 months due to their lack of skills for the role. Whereas the main majority of people who didn’t succeed and left had problems motivating themselves or weren’t willing to learn new things.
Just because a candidate can tick every skill box from the outset doesn’t mean that they are more capable of filling a position over someone with less specific experience.
A positive attitude is contagious and can encourage other employees to work harder. As a rule of thumb, you should make sure candidates fulfil around 50% of the skills on the job advert.
The rest is all down to their attitude to learn and the intelligence to make their other experience relevant to the job at hand.
4. Location
A lot of employers will simply throw out a candidate’s CV if they find out they’re not in the right location. But it’s really important to actually speak to a candidate before doing this.
They might be willing to relocate, they may have a longer commute right now anyway and/or they simply might be so passionate about working for your company, they’ll be willing to take the commute anyway!
Arrange a telephone interview or casual chat to find out what their individual circumstances are instead of instantly ditching their application.
Recruiter pro tip Is it taking you too long to get through CVs? Picking out the important elements about a candidate should be easy and painless. However, if you don’t know how, you could end up wasting valuable time looking and more money advertising for the same position when they leave. In every CV, look out for:
- Typos
- Employment gaps
- The originality of the individual
- The truth of the information
You can find out more about this by checking out our previous blog: ‘5 Shortcuts to Finding a Brilliant CV in 30 Seconds’.
Final thoughts
However easy it is to let natural tendencies and prejudices take over, try to avoid them at all costs.
Sure, if there’s something that will genuinely make someone unable to perform the job or at least hinder them, then you should take that into consideration, but judging someone on silly things like tattoos and whether or not they’ve had more than three jobs in the last year is pointless.
It’s always good to find out more information about their personal circumstances, because you just never know how great they are without talking to them.
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