Hiring By Public Relations

Over the last few years here has been a push amongst HR experts and pundits to move hiring across to the marketing department.

The logic is that the marketing department is a more appropriate place for hiring because hiring is about branding, marketing and selling. The sales department is busy selling widgets so the obvious choice is marketing. It is also noted that the company website is normally controlled by the marketing department so the foot is in the door already.

I think its a good idea because what I see in the market is that the branding and marketing aspects of hiring are currently controlled by PR thinking.

Marketing would be a big improvement.

This thinking was prompted when I was introduced to the Edelman Trust Barometer (2005) which is an annual world-wide survey of attitudes to the PR business, and PR people.

The results of the survey show that while PR people see themselves as the people who facilitate communications between different parties, many other people see them as gatekeepers. Or worse íSpin Merchantsí, weaving a tale of deception and deceit.

Honesty is the Best Policy

And so we come to the hiring process, and Job Descriptions.

Job Description: íYou will be responsible for new business opportunities in an exciting enviroment......í

Real Story: íBusiness has fallen over the last few years and you will assume the risk of getting the numbers back up. Oh, and no, we never did figure out why sales went down. We just want them back up again.í

Or

Job D: íXYZ is a dynamic, fast growing company with an innovative product......í

Real Story: íWe have something new, not sure if it will sell, but the team has faith in the eventual success of the product. I could take more than 2 years to take off but if you are willing to take the risks the rewards could be very high. At least you would learn a lot.í

Yup, guilty as charged. The Job Description as a Press Release.

People instinctively do not trust PR-speak so it should be no surprise that people like Lou Adler have long been banging the drum for a more honest presentation of jobs to candidates.

Itís not rocket science to suggest that this would improve your chance of hiring someone. If you tell a candidate openly what they would face in the role you might be pleasantly surprised when they opt to take on the challenge. They have self-selected the right profile for you.

Research would back you up in this. There was research in the US where researchers created two different job profiles and presented them to HR Managers as potential candidates. The two candidates had the same background, experience etc. Both people were fake and they were both given a Letter of Reference.

One guyís letter was very positive but the other guy, letís call him Fred, was given a reference letter that was more íhonestí, and even a little negative. íFredís is not always a team guyí or íFred can be a little hard to manageí

The letters were sent out and Fred was chosen by most HR Manager as the one they wanted to see. Why? Because they trusted the reference letter about Fred because it seemed more real. The ígoodí letter looked like just another reference letter written by someone who was obliged to write it ie. it was written in PR-speak.

Hire by Press Release. I donít think so.

Frank Mulligan is the Managing Director of Talent Software, which is based in Shanghai, China. The company is a producer of Talent Management Systems (TMS) for a broad variety of industries. The flagship product is simply called Talent and is a fully featured, bi-lingual English/Chinese Applicant Tracking System (ATS)

Talent offers support for Skills Testing, Phone Screening, Job Interviewing, Psychometric Profiling, Reference Checking, Exit Interviewing, Job Offers, Background Checks and Recruitment Metrics & Analytics.

This article first appeared in Talent China