Too Many Job Options Can Cause Decision Paralysis

One of the nice things about using online hiring systems is that you have metrics, or measurements, that tell you what is going on.

When these hiring performance metrics go wrong you can dig deeper, identify the problem and change the process. Then the numbers go back up.

Right now in China those who have an online system can see their own hiring performance measurements. They are currently seeing a higher Quick Exit Ratio than before and a higher Job Offer to Refusal Ratio than before.

The Quick Exit Ratio measures the percentage of people who join your company but leave within, say, the first month. You can decide the length of time that equates to a Quick Exit.

The Job Offer to Refusal Ratio measures the percentage of people who receive a written offer from your company but refuse that offer, for whatever reason.

The fact that these ratios are going up makes sense in a growing economy where there are many options available to candidates.

No reason to worry, right?.

Decision Paralysis
Well, maybe there is something else going on here. Research in the UK indicates that we can have too many choices, and when we do it can tend to immobilise us so that we don’t make any choice at all.

This phenomenon is not going to affect the number of people who apply online for your open positions or the number who are willing to do a phone screen or an interview. But it might explain candidates who refuse jobs that are clearly career positions for them.

HR staffers always find it hard to believe when candidates do this because the candidates often just stay in their current job. So they don’t refuse the job because they have a better offer. They just don’t make a decision to change jobs.

It seems that people have so many job offers in China that they just cannot choose the best one. Or maybe they feel there are so many choices available to them that there is no rush to make one now. Having many choices is the norm for Star Candidates in China.

So let’s not blame them. Skilled and experienced people in China are the first generation to have so many choices in the labor market, and you are to an extent lucky if they make you one of their choices.

Or are they choosing your company because you thought out the hiring process and sold yourself well?

Source: I saw the report in the Financial Times but it seems that you need a subscription to see it so let’s just summarise. Basically, a researcher called Robert Matthews, who works in Aston University(UK) said that people can be overwhelmed by variety and this affects how they buy. Too many choices and they buy less. Fewer choices and they buy more. Sometimes if there are much too many choices they can be immobilised and not buy at all.

Comments to: frank.mulligan@recruit-china.com