Your Top 8 Most Commonly Asked Hiring Questions … Answered!
/… Plus, Commonly Asked Questions About Working With Red Seat!
Over the years, we’ve fielded our fair share of hiring questions here at Red Seat. Here, we’ve compiled your most commonly asked hiring questions.
1. How Many Interviews Should I Have?
Because many top candidates interview with multiple employers, how quickly you complete your hiring process will have a direct impact on whether you have a shot at securing your top pick.
Given today's hot hiring market, we recommend conducting as few interviews as it takes to get the information you need to decide if you want to hire someone. This requires a well-oiled hiring process that helps you find qualified candidates and fill your open positions quickly and effectively.
Learn more about speeding up your hiring process in our recent blog.
2. When Should I Make an Offer?
In a similar vein, approach the offer process as if you are in a competitive situation.
Whether a candidate is actively interviewing or entertaining making a switch for their current position, keeping the momentum going in the hiring process is a big advantage of moving to an offer without delay. If the person you’re interviewing is expecting multiple offers, being the first to make an offer has a competitive advantage.
When in doubt, make an offer as soon as you know you’d like to hire the person.
Additionally, if you plan to present an offer in an interview, it’s helpful to tell candidates that an interview might result in an offer so they are prepared to give you an answer.
3. How Much Compensation Should I Offer?
How employers talk about compensation and determine what compensation to offer is changing due to Salary or Pay History Bans. Salary bans are laws that prevent employers from inquiring about candidates current and past compensation. Currently 22 states have instituted salary bans, as well as many local governments.
For our Minnesota clients, it’s important to note that on January 1st, 2024, a Pay History Ban, will go into effect for Minnesota. With this new law, employers may not inquire about past earnings history. Candidates may disclose past compensation figures if they wish, but they are not required to do so.
Prior to Salary Bans like this being issued, it was common for employers to take into account a candidate's current or most recent pay in determining what compensation to offer.
Now, it’s important for employers to be transparent with candidates about the salary range they’re offering and to ask the candidates questions to understand what compensation they seek for the position. This conversation can include an overview of benefits of value to the prospective employee and how those benefits will impact monetary compensation.
Even if you have this conversation with a prospective employee, determining what compensation to offer can be tricky. Here are three of the most common strategies:
A lowball offer almost universally results in a lack of trust and sets the relationship off on a rough start. (Can you tell we’re not fans of this strategy?) There are instances when a lowball offer is a gamble a company is willing to take, but for all but a few unusual circumstances, we don't recommend going this route.
A moderate offer can be a viable approach if you aren’t sure how high you need to go to secure a candidate. A moderate offer, if in striking distance of what the prospective hire seeks, presents an opportunity to negotiate a favorable number for both the company and the new employee.
A competitive offer is your best bet when you want to secure the candidate. Keep in mind that even a competitive offer may result in a candidate negotiating anything from increased pay to more vacation time.
Want to dig deeper on determining compensation for your open position? Check out our recent blog on the topic.
4. When Should I Offer a Hiring Bonus?
While not every position warrants a hiring bonus, there are certainly times when offering a bonus can give you a competitive advantage, such as:
When you’re struggling to find candidates for your position
When your ideal candidate is considering multiple job offers
When you need to bridge the gap between expected base pay, earned commission, anticipated bonuses, or other benefits
When you don't want to add to your ongoing salary expense
When you need to cover a waiting period before other benefits kick in, such as health insurance
When you want to make up for something the candidate is giving up by coming to your company, such as a cut in pay or benefits
These are just some examples of when a hiring bonus can make your job offer more appealing to a candidate. You can learn more about hiring bonus best practices in this blog.
5. In-Office vs Remote or Hybrid: What Are the Market Trends Around In-Office Requirements?
For positions that qualify for hybrid or remote working environments, we find that a majority of candidates prefer hybrid work options.
For the most part, these candidates are looking for positions that offer a balance between in-office and remote work, such as 2-3 days in the office and 2-3 days working from home. Some industries, such as financial and professional services, have a higher percentage of employees looking for remote and hybrid work than others.
Requiring employees to be in-office restricts your candidate pool. How much this impacts your hiring will depend on the skill sets you seek and the industry standards set by other companies in your vertical. We recommend being clear with candidates about your in-office expectations and asking prospective candidates to confirm that your structure works for them early in the hiring process.
6. I Have Two Positions To Fill: Can I Just Hire One Person To Cover Them Both?
Filling two different jobs with one new hire can seem like a good solution, but it’s generally not a great idea.
Even though it may seem easier to hire one employee who can cover the responsibilities of both positions, it can be hard to find the right candidate for a job that requires multiple skill sets. The more layers there are in a position, the more difficult it is to find prospective candidates who are both qualified for and interested in doing the exact variety of job duties listed.
Plus, you’ll need to pay the wage associated with the highest paid part of the job in order to secure the employee you want…which means you’ll end up paying a premium rate for the less skilled job duties. A highly skilled person is also less likely to have long-term interest in completing duties that wouldn’t typically be part of their job description.
In the end, hiring one person for two jobs is more likely to result in an unhappy employee, lower morale, and higher turnover than hiring the right person for each position separately.
7. What Are Today’s Job Applicants Looking For?
There are a number of things today’s candidates look for in a job. This isn’t an exhaustive list, but here are a few things to keep in mind when hiring for your open position:
In your job ad, provide clear, concise information about your company and the position they’re applying for, including the salary range for the position and some basics about perks and benefits.
Make your application process quick and easy.
Keep things moving: Follow up with applicants in a timely manner, schedule interviews promptly, and don’t draw out the hiring process.
Provide opportunities for employees to use and expand on their skills.
Give employees a voice in the company — a say in how they perform their jobs and how their position evolves, and the opportunity to solve problems and have an impact on the company, their coworkers, and the wider community.
Offer flexibility — specifically, hybrid or remote options, where applicable.
Make sure pay and benefits are in line with industry standards, and to communicate with candidates about their expectations in this area.
Communicate your company values throughout the hiring process. Today’s candidates want to know they share values with the company they work for.
Make diversity, equity, and fairness a clear priority. Candidates want to see authentic action — proof that their employers actually care about creating an inclusive workplace.
In addition, candidates look for companies with strong leadership, a clear vision for the future, and a plan for growth.
Is your business a great place to work? Find out in our recent blog.
8. Should I Ask for References? Aren’t They Always a Good Idea?
Yes. References are a hiring best practice, and we encourage contacting references for every hire. However, given today's tight hiring time frames, you may opt to extend an offer that is contingent upon successful references.
Creating reference questions that ask for specific examples will provide the most useful information, as the examples the reference giver provides will often relate to topics your new hire has talked about in the interview process.
While there is rarely a really horrible reference, most range from good to awesome. The more you check references, the more you are able to gauge the authenticity and content of the conversation.
Bonus: Top 3 Questions About Working With Red Seat:
1. What Can You Do That We Can’t? (i.e., Why Should We Work With You Instead of Handling Our Own Hiring?)
Red Seat's hiring experts partner with companies and take care of every stage of the hiring process, from finding, recruiting, and vetting applicants to conducting assessments and completing background checks.
Red Seat typically works for small- to medium-sized companies that either:
Do not employ HR or Talent Acquisition professionals
Or
Don’t have the HR capacity to devote adequate attention to finding and landing the right employees
If your business lacks the staff or time needed to invest in finding the right fit for your open position, that’s where Red Seat comes in.
We work closely with our clients to ensure the candidates we find will be a great fit for their businesses. Our personalized hiring process saves our clients time and money while keeping them in control of the outcome and enabling them to make the right hire with much less hassle.
2. What Is Monthly Fractional Recruiting?
Exclusive to Red Seat, our Monthly Fractional Recruiting services include full management of your recruitment process for hourly, skilled, staff-level, and management positions. You’ll benefit from our tenacious approach to finding and securing top candidates for your open positions as well as time-saving help scheduling and confirming interviews, checking references, and extending offers.
For clients interested in having Red Seat manage their recruiting and hiring process, the monthly fee price point is, over time, much lower per hire than if you were to work with us on each position as separate retained recruiting projects. This allows companies with more extensive hiring needs to fill their open positions at a lower cost.
Red Seat’s Fractional Recruiting service suits companies who:
Are hiring multiple positions over a period of time
Are looking for a different fee model
Don’t have a person in-house to drive or manage hiring projects
Are hiring for hourly non-exempt and staff-level through management-level positions
Fractional Recruiting works especially well for hourly staff and recurring hires. It’s ideal for companies that have projected multiple upcoming hiring needs or have a couple of positions they’re always marketing for.
3. What Kind of Positions Do You Hire For?
We help our clients hire for all kinds of positions, from entry-level professionals to senior management, across a wide range of industries such as manufacturing, professional services, construction, and home services.
Some examples of common positions we’ve helped hire for include:
Administrative: Office Management, Clerical, Receptionist
Accounting: AP/AR, Accountant, Accounting Manager, Controller, CFO
Customer Service: Inbound and Outbound Customer Service, Field Service
Labor: Manufacturing, Installation, Construction
Engineering: Mechanical, Electrical, Controls, Manufacturing
Financial planning: CFPs, Client Service, Operations, Advisor
Marketing: Marketing Assistant, Specialty Marketing, Marketing Manager
Operations: Operations Associates, Operations Manager, Director of Operations
Project Management: Construction and Manufacturing Project Managers
Sales: Inside and Outside Sales, Territory Sales, Business Development, Account Management, Sales Leadership
Think your needs are too complex or niche? Try us. Many of our clients are in specific verticals with narrow requirements, and we excel at this challenge!
These are the most commonly asked hiring questions we get at Red Seat, but we know you might have more. If you have questions we didn’t answer, we’d love to hear from you! Contact the team at Red Seat with your questions or to discuss hiring for your open position.
