Understand the Hiring Process
From INSIDE the Company

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The better you understand how the hiring process works from inside the company, the more equiped you are to launch a quick, successful job search.

Step 1: The Need

The very first thing that happens in the hiring process is a manager determines he needs an additional employee in his department to either pick up the additional workload of his current team; or to come in and perform a very specialized function that is needed but not currently being performed by another team member. In some organizations all a manager has to do is say he needs someone and BAM he gets to hire. However, that is not the case in most organizations. Typically, a manager must do a lot of convincing.

Step 2: The Selling

In order to get approval for a new team member (what is often referred to as head-count) the manager must perform a through analysis of his department and present this information to his direct manager.

If the manager agree's and approves then the hiring manager moves to the next step of the process.

Step 3: The Requisition

Since the manager received headcount approval for one person when she requested three, she must now determine how to structure her department to meet the departmental and organizational goals. Also, she must hire one person for the most critical need. Once she has determined the critical need she will put together a “Personnel Requisition”. This is the official organization document that will be circulated for approval in order for the manager to move forward with hiring.

The first step in writing a requisition is for the manager to meet with the department Human Resource Manager. They will discuss the position description, education and experience required, etc. The Human Resource Manager will then assign a title, job code and salary grade, and stock grade for the position. He will also give his signature approval for the position on the Requisition.

Next, the manager takes the requisition to the Financial Analyst. He knows the Financial Analyst will most likely give approval because he already had the prior discussion and gotten verbal approval for the position. Nevertheless, he must take the requisition to the Financial Analyst (FA) for approval. At this point the FA documents the requisition in her database, notes the financial impact to the department, adds an unknown person to the organization chart and then gives signature approval to the requisition.

Now, the department Vice President (VP) reviews the requisition and signs her approval. Once the manager has all of the approval signatures he can turn in the requisition to his department Recruiter and schedule a meeting with her.

Step 4: The Recruiter

MYTH: Recruiters get in the way of job seekers.

Avoid them at all costs. Do whatever you can to get around them. If you have to speak with a recruiter you will not get the job. Try to find a way to go directly to the hiring manager.

I have heard many of my Career Counseling colleagues give this piece of advice to job seekers. Having been a Recruiting Manager, I disagree with it. By striving to avoid the recruiter, the job seeker may actually hurt her chances of landing the position.

Why does a hiring manager use a recruiter?

Hiring the right person for the position can be a full-time job. The hiring manager already has a full-time job. He doesn’t have the time to do a thorough recruiting process. Thus, he partners with and relies on his Recruiter to help him hire the right person.

Quite often when job seekers are successful in reaching the hiring manager directly (a very difficult thing to do), they are told by the manager to contact the recruiter. The manager simply does not have the time to listen to hundreds of “why I’m the best candidate” speeches from job seekers.

The job seeker who has been told by his career counselor to avoid Recruiters or Human Resources at all costs is now confused. She may feel like she is being forced to consort with the enemy (the Recruiter) and since she was not able to “sell herself” to the manager, she will never get the job. Or, if she does not get the job she will think it is because the recruiter blocked her way. Those are incorrect assumptions.

When the recruiter and hiring manager (HM) meet, the recruiter will spend up to an hour striving to understand the following:
- position description
- ideal educational and experience level
- the companies and schools the manager most desires his candidate to have on her resume
- technical skills
- phone screening questions
- career advancement opportunities for the position
- salary range
- internal equity (what other employee’s performing a similar position with similar education and experience are making in salary, bonus and stock options)
- projects the new employee will be involved in
- benefits of working in the department
- other pertinent information

Step 5: Getting the Word Out

Now that the recruiter has all of the approvals and the relevant information, he will start to “get the word out”. He will post the position to a number of internet sites. For example:

- Internal employee intranet (sometimes included with the job description is the amount paid for the employee referral program).
- External company website (such as www.ebayjobs.com)
- A number of professional job boards such as: monster.com, hotjobs.com, careerbuilder.com.
- College job boards such as: Monstertrak.com
- Professional organization sites such as: Society of Women Engineers, etc.
- Networking sites such as LinkedIn.com or SVLink.com.
- Employee referrals
- Purchased research
- Stealth sourcing

Step 6: Receiving and Screening Resumes

Once the position has been posted and communicated, the recruiter now starts to receive resumes. Large, well known companies can often receive thousands of resumes in a single day! In order to keep up with the demand for new employee’s and the numbers of resumes received, recruiters and the hiring team will spend only a few seconds on each resume before deciding what to do with the resume. The recruiter will look for the candidates who meet the requirements laid out by the hiring manager. If a candidate does not meet the requirements, his resume will be rejected.

What if the recruiter does not receive any resumes meeting the requirements?

Typically the organization will not “settle” for a partially qualified candidate. Usually they will employ other techniques to find candidates, and they will wait until the right candidate is found.

Step 7: Phone Interviews

The recruiter, hiring manager or a team member will conduct the phone interview. The purpose is to gather critical information such as salary expectations, technical ability, and level of interest.

Step 8, 9, 10: First, Second and Third Round, On-site Interviews

Many employee's from the hiring team as well as cross-functional groups will participate in the interviews and provide their feedback. All of the feedback from each interviewer on each candidate is analyzed and a decision is made.

Step 11: Application, compensation approval, reference checks, background checks and drug screens.

At this stage the recruiter will collect your application (separate from your resume), start the background check, drug test (when applicable) and reference checks. He also much get the compensation package (salary, stock options, bonus, relocation, etc.) approved by the Financial Analyst, Hiring Manager and department V.P. He must give justification as to why you should receive that particular comp. package.

Step 12: Offer

The offer is extended and (we will assume) accepted.

Step 13: Getting ready for the new employee

Now the company has a lot to do to prepare for you. Set up your computer, phone, email account, cubicle, etc.

As you can see, hiring a new employee is an extensive amount of work on the company's end.

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