It’s 10am on a sunny Saturday and my wife and I are driving through the back roads of a random, heavily-wooded Boston suburb on the quest to find a new brunch spot. We revisit the same conversation we’ve had twenty times before.
Me: [Turns left]
Mrs. W: How do you always know where we are? I wish I had your sense of direction.
Me: It doesn’t have to do with sense of direction.
Mrs. W: What do you mean? We’ve never been here before.
Me: There’s a map, on the dashboard. (I leave out the part about how I also looked up the map before I left, just in case.)
Me: [Misses a turn and drives for 10 minutes in the wrong direction] Um… Can you just enter it into the GPS?
Whoops! Overconfidence and the thought that I had a general guide to where I was going got us lost in the woods when really, we just wanted some delicious pancakes. Of course, all of this could have been easily avoided had I just entered the address I was going to in the first place and stuck to the plan.
Too often though, we don’t do that. We think we know where we’re going and what we want but when we’re in the moment we get distracted by real-time decisions and information overload. No, I’m not just talking about a street sign covered by a tree limb. I’m talking also about the recruitment process. We hire blind. We start with a job description and then hope the ideal candidate falls into our lap—even though we haven’t been clear about what kind of person is needed for the job. But what if you knew exactly what you needed? What if you could find candidates whose behaviors are appropriate for the job you’re hiring?
Free Trial More accurate, efficient hiring with PI Hire
What I love about The Predictive Index (PI) is you can set a target for a job you’re looking to hire for. Understanding the behavioral and cognitive needs of your next hire ensures you’re not just going with your gut, but rather hiring with a scientifically-validated and proven methodology. When applied consistently in your hiring process you can see a reduction in time to hire, improved retention rates, and an increase in overall satisfaction. In fact, recently surveyed PI users that set job targets told us that not only are they more likely to recommend PI to a friend or colleague, but they feel more comfortable with using PI throughout their organization.
So, how do you build your proverbial map? Start with the job requirements. Having a detailed list of what you want a person in a role to accomplish will help you understand what their drives and needs are. When you’re ready, you or your hiring manager can use the PI software to answer a series of questions about what is expected for a person filling a given role. Through a series of algorithms, we’ll then present you with a target behavioral pattern for the job. If you’re very familiar with PI and its four drives, you can even tweak the target further Learn more about PI drives here. Now, when sifting through your candidate pipeline you can easily identify who you should focus your efforts on. How about when a candidate isn’t a match? You’re covered. The PI Interview Guide provides questions to help you better understand when there are gaps between a desired behavior and a candidate’s natural tendencies.
Finding the right fit for your company shouldn’t be difficult and you shouldn’t have to rely on instinct alone. Make smarter hiring decisions when you’re armed with the necessary information and don’t get lost in your own hiring woods. By the way, the pancakes were delightful.
