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Not unlike politics, who is to blame for the shortage of skilled workers depends who you ask. Employers blame schools. Schools blame government. Workers blame employers.

The Institute for Supply Management-New York reported this month that 20 percent of its members say the shortage of skilled labor is an obstacle to business. The National Federation of Independent Business reported a rising share of small business owners who say they have jobs that are hard to fill. A Manpower Group survey revealed that 52 percent of U.S. companies report difficulty filling jobs.

The list goes on and on.

First we need to end the finger-pointing. The truth is that no entity caused the problem and no one entity can fix it.

Let’s start with employers. Yes – despite 8-plus percent unemployment, employers can’t find enough skilled workers. Every day another publication, another industry highlights the plight of companies struggling with unfilled positions.

Part of the problem can be laid squarely at the feet of employers. Committed to maximize productivity, employers are expecting more from workers than ever before. That approach makes good business sense. But the need to fill open positions has such urgency that employers seek workers who can hit the ground running with little training and no on-boarding. In the past, new workers were observed, mentored and brought up to speed gradually. Today, employers expect the new hire “to have that job already,” according to Dr. Peter Cappelli, director of University of Pennsylvania Wharton’s Center for Human Resources. He recommends that employers need to “drop the idea of finding perfect candidates and look for people who could do the job with a bit of training and practice.”

That seems to place on the blame on education. While deserving of some of the blame, schools can’t be held responsible for all things wrong. The nature of work has changed. The number of available low-skilled jobs is evaporating faster than water on a hot summer day. According to Edward Gordon, “between today and 2020, low-paying, low-skill jobs will shrink to just 26 percent of the total jobs in the U.S. Worst of all, just 44 million people will be needed for those jobs, but 150 million or more candidates will be seeking those jobs.”

It used to be that if you worked with your hands and had a good work ethic, you had a lifelong career. But now it’s not the worker’s hands and back that does the grunt work – it’s a robot. And workers that are needed by employers must understand how to program, operate, and repair a robot. That requires good math skills…and good critical thinking skills… computer skills. And it’s not just skills that are needed. It’s the ability to apply those skills on the job. And that requirement is a problem.

Read more about the Benefits of Math Aptitude Tests.

A headline earlier this month in the Philadelphia Inquirer read “job seekers can’t do math.” That shouldn’t come as any surprise. It’s been reported for years that the high school dropout rate in the U.S. approaches 30 percent year. Among the 33 other OECD countries, 17 countries had higher average scores than the United States. When it comes to preparing students for future jobs requiring basic math skills, schools deservedly earn a failing grade.

But to be fair, shouldn’t employees assume some responsibility to develop and maintain job relevance? The answer is an unequivocal Y-E-S. Every organization has a responsibility to its stakeholders and/or shareholders to be productive and profitable. They can’t do that with employees who don’t come to work with the most basic of skills – reading, writing, and arithmetic. It’s not in the best interest of business to set their job skill requirements to the lowest common denominator. That places responsibility for acquiring and continually upgrading minimum job skills on the shoulders of job seekers. Everyone is entitled to the opportunity to work. But entitlement doesn’t include the right to middle class wages and lifestyle when the skills they bring to work are for obsolete or lower-skill jobs.

The major workplace transformation however will be driven by technology and globalization – and working with those conditions requires new skill sets. The definition of work has changed … and will change again sooner than later. Employers, workers, and schools need to get a grip on reality and start working together to prepare for employment in the future workplace.

“Reprinted with permission from Ira S Wolfe and Success Performance Solutions. Copyright 2010 Ira S Wolfe.”

While the question sounds like the preamble to a funny punch line, the answer is no laughing matter.

According to an article last week in the Wall Street Journal, it takes many more than most employers think (or at least want to accept.) I repeat – a lot more. The actual numbers are numbing.

For example, an infographic presented in the article revealed that it takes approximately 1,000 online views by candidates to get 100 candidates to complete the application. Out of that, 25 applications are selected for review, then 4 to 6 candidates are recommended for an interview. When all is said and done, companies may find their one diamond in the rough only after 1,000 candidates view the job posting. If those numbers hold up, it is clear that the impending war for talent is no longer imminent or pending. It’s here today.

Not one to rely only exclusively on hearsay, I was prompted by the article to review 25 jobs posted on our applicant processing system by clients during the last 3 months. The results don’t only confirm the findings presented in the Wall Street Journal but throw up an even bigger gauntlet to challenge employers. The best views-to-applicant scenario was 10 percent. But a more common scenario was as low as 1 percent.

Unfortunately for many companies, as good or bad as those results are, the job search does not always end when the one lonely qualified candidate is identified and offered the job. According to research presented by Talent Function Group, LLC, “the chosen applicant accepts the offer only 80% of the time.” That situation leads to two options – offer the job to your second choice (if there is one) or go back to the drawing board. Neither choice is desirable when a company’s productivity and competitive advantage are on the line and dependent on a minimum time to hire and high quality of hire.

To win the war for talent moving forward, nearly every employer will need to cast the widest possible sourcing net to attract, identify, and hire qualified candidates. In addition, operations and sales managers don’t have the time to waste interviewing candidates who can’t do the job.

The competition for recruiting qualified skilled workers poses a formidable challenge for most organizations. Management has a choice: deal with a “resu-mess” which will inundate recruiting and human resource staffs, which are already running lean; or insist on applicant processing automation to build a talent pool of qualified candidates, reduce the time-to-hire, and ultimately improve the quality of employees.

“Reprinted with permission from Ira S Wolfe and Success Performance Solutions.
Copyright 2010 Ira S Wolfe.”

There are many elements to establishing a testing program. This section outlines some of the more important elements. While establishing a program according to legal and professional standards does not guarantee that there will not be a legal charge or that an employer will be able to successfully defend the testing program, following legal and professional guidelines increases the probability of a successful defense. Many of these steps may require the services of a professional with training in test development and evaluation in employment settings.

Identify jobs where testing might be helpful.
The use of testing should be dependent on a careful analysis of the costs and benefits. Testing is often beneficial when there are high volumes of individuals to make decisions about, when there is high turnover, or when the consequences of making a poor decision are potentially very negative.

Managers should take time to carefully consider what the problem is before concluding testing is the solution. One of the biggest errors managers make is assuming their problem is a decision-making one, when, in fact, the problem is caused by poor training, poor supervision, or poor compensation. Once the manager defines the problem, he/she, with the help of a professional, can determine if a test will help or not.

Another consideration is assessing the size of the problem. If an organization makes decisions about only a few people a year, testing may not be cost effective, depending on the costs of poor performance, turnover and other negative decision outcomes for those few instances.

As noted earlier, testing can be helpful for improving employee performance, decreasing turnover, and decreasing costs associated with negative employee behaviors (e.g., theft, sabotage); a careful analysis will indicate whether testing is the right solution for a given situation.

Define job and organizational requirements clearly, completely, and accurately.
A common mistake employers make when hiring or promoting a job candidate is paying insufficient attention to what the requirements really are. Employers should gather systematic information on what are the knowledge, skills, abilities and other characteristics required for a given position (or entrance to a training program), and which are the most important to success. Not all key requirements will be easy to measure or should all be measured via testing; however, employers should ensure that any requirements that are assessed are important ones. In addition to job requirements, employers may go even further to define requirements as related to the organization’s values and purpose.

Determine whether testing is useful for evaluating requirements. Review the key job requirements and determine the best means of assessing these. This determination will be based on whether a requirement can easily be evaluated by a test, whether a test exists or must be developed for a requirement, whether a cost effective means of evaluation is available, whether available tests have demonstrated effectiveness, and other factors.

Select or develop a test. Before purchasing a test, ask for information regarding the reliability and validity of the test. Reliability refers to the consistency of test results. Validity refers to whether the inferences made on the basis of a test score are correct. Also, ask for information on the development of the test and for information about the comparability of test results for different demographic groups.

Implement the test.
Make sure that the people who administer, score, and evaluate test results are appropriately trained. Depending on the type of test, such training might include issues related to standardizing administration conditions, scoring protocols, detecting cheating, what a score means, how to use test scores in decision-making, how to avoid rater biases, and many other things. Accurate record keeping of test scores and decisions made about individuals is typically a legal requirement, and is a necessity if one wishes to evaluate the effectiveness of the testing program.

Testing procedures should be consistent for all individuals for which the test is being used. Policies should be developed and articulated regarding issues such as proper administration conditions, retesting intervals, eligibility for testing, access to test scores, and other implementation issues.

Evaluate the testing program.
When possible, employers should attempt to gather information to evaluate the effectiveness of the testing program. This may be difficult to do with any accuracy if the test is used with only small numbers of individuals, the test is used in a highly restrictive manner (i.e., few individuals obtain a positive decision outcome after testing), or the outcome desired from testing is not easy to assess in a short time period. Consult with a professional regarding what kinds of record keeping might enable conducting an effective evaluation of the test.

excerpted from www.SIOP.org
Dr. James M. Wendling The Wendling Group 3.31.11

Would you hire a candidate if he agreed with the following statements during the interview?

•I am usually satisfied with work that is “good enough.”
•It is not necessary to do more than enough work to get by.
•My anger frightens other people.
•Sometime you have to lie a little to protect yourself.

Would it surprise you to find out that many managers do say yes. If so, you wouldn’t be alone. Thousands of managers make that decision every day; ignoring the results of pre-employment tests and allowing their egos and gut instinct to rationalize very clear signs of employee behavior danger.

Pre employment tests enjoy a love-hate relationship with managers. Some managers live and die by the results of a pre employment assessment test in screening out candidates. Others despise the notion that a simple questionnaire might second guess a hiring manager’s gut feeling about how well a candidate might fit into a job. The fact is that both approaches are flawed.

First of all, both parties must consider moderation when using pre-employment tests. The die-hard advocates must put the results of these tests in context. No test should be used as the sole determinant in screening out or selecting a candidate. The best formula for hiring is one-third interview and experience, one -third reference and background checks, and one-third pre employment assessment tests.

Alternatively, ignoring employment tests as part of the employee selection process ignores a powerful ally in the search for the right fit candidate. A validated assessment offers an objective third party view of a candidate, often exposing character flaws as well as unidentified potential.

Then we have situations where the assessment results paint a clear picture of a risky hire and the manager’s opinion is called into question.

For instance, I received a phone call just the other day from a manager questioning the results of candidate’s honesty and integrity report. A candidate revealed during the interview that he had been picked up twice during the last year for driving without a valid license. The candidate explained this away by saying he had a mortgage to pay and a family to support. “I couldn’t afford to lose my job,” he said.

The employer interpreted that commitment to his family as a positive value. He questioned why the pre employment test would raise red flags about this individual’s character when he was such a good father and husband. He rationalized away that driving despite a suspended license was still illegal no matter what the reason. He ignored how this candidate might respond again if he lacked the money to pay his mortgage, to put food on his family’s table, or to purchase medications for his children. Would he resort to “borrowing” money from his employer without the employer knowing it? That’s exactly what many employees caught embezzling fund say when caught – “I wasn’t stealing because I meant to pay it back.” What lies would he be willing to tell to protect his family?

If you think I’m exaggerating, consider what lengths one employee working for a Wisconsin business went to “keep her husband happy.” (Hint: she had systematically stolen more than $600,000 from the business over five years.)

While not absolute, the pre-employment test prompts red flags in areas of conscientiousness, hostility, and honesty. The responses on a validated assessment clearly indicate how a potential candidate like the one described above might react if given a choice between family and the law. And yet employers choose to doubt what they read in the candidate’s report despite numerous confirming statements about questionable integrity.

Pre-employment tests can offer valuable insight into a candidate’s integrity, work attitude, and job fit. They are effective and reliable indicators of job fit and future performance. Ignorance is not bliss when hiring employees and pre employment assessment tests can help managers hire smarter.

“Reprinted with permission from Ira S Wolfe and Success Performance Solutions.
Copyright 2010 Ira S Wolfe.”

Why do so many employees hate their jobs, diss the boss and perform poorly? Because so many managers adhere strictly to these five rules designed to make hiring the wrong person super easy:

1. Assume everything the applicant says is true
Desperate to land any position, some candidates make wild claims about themselves or their accomplishments. They skew the facts, stretch the truth, or show interest in roles for which they’re unsuited or unqualified — but they seem credible. Once hired, SURPRISE! These workers revert to their true selves and start exhibiting traits incompatible with the job and work culture.

2. Be vague about the position or your needs
If you have no job criteria, then almost anyone is employable. You won’t waste time pouring over stacks of resumes – you just hire the first person who seems interested in your company. However, don’t be surprised to hear your new worker complain about not knowing what he/she was getting into. Or worse yet, you may be forced to terminate your new recruit and restart your search for another one all over again just because too many questions about the job went unanswered. Why? Because you didn’t take the time to sit down and outline your own needs for the job you are looking to fill.

3. Focus exclusively on the applicant’s job compatibility
When you find a person well suited to a position, you might think there’s no need to look any further. This is fine if you don’t care whether your new employee also fits into your corporate culture and mixes well with your existing team members. The risk is high you’ll end up with a new worker who’s great at the job… but impossible to get along with.

4. Ignore signs of stress in an applicant
If your potential new hire has issues causing anxiety or uneven focus, you may feel it has no bearing on you. The reality is it could mean you’ve taken on an employee who can’t get the job done because he or she is distracted, overwhelmed, intimidated or reckless. Responses to stress vary from person to person; that worker who seems so assertive and driven can become demanding. And the new, enthusiastic charmer? She transforms into an outspoken diva when upset.

5. Hire someone just like you
Send in the clones! If your applicant answers questions the same way you would, the two of you should share similar goals and objectives, and that sounds like a good thing. However, over time identical thinking and responses do little to drive creative solutions or fresh approaches to problem solving – attributes that come from someone who tackles things differently than you might.

By Kerry Benik October 12, 2011

Can you spot a diamond in the rough? They exist inside every organization, but most managers fail to identify them. Meanwhile, research indicates these diamonds will never reach their potential because they are in the wrong job. Or worse still, they’re in the right job, inside your very own company, but are being mismanaged.

“If hiring managers are allowed to interview candidates who have an 80% to 90% job match, most performance and retention issues go away.”

Why are so many people in the wrong job?

- Experience and education do not a superior performer make. Yet, management bases their hiring decisions on education and experience. There is no research to support that hiring based on education or experience leads to successful job performance. If there was, then all educated and experienced people would be top performers.

- They were a perfect fit – for the job description, not the work. Hiring managers fail to understand the job. A job description does not provide a basis from which to interview and hire. Instead, the job must be defined by key accountabilities; usually not more than three to five for most jobs. Once these are identified, they provide a basis for specifying the knowledge, certifications, behavior, motivators, experience, personal skills and education required to fit the job.

- The hiring manager loved them. Hiring managers tend to hire with their heart, not their head. But they need to look for the chemistry between the person and the job, not the chemistry they feel toward the applicant.

Finding Diamonds

Finding those diamonds in the rough starts with clearly defining the job with key accountabilities. Once the job has been defined, a system to qualify and screen candidates can be established.

For more information on finding diamonds, contact your Value Added Associate and go to www.ttiresearch.com, click on Articles, and then “Selecting Superior Performers Safely Under the Law.”

Reprinted with permission from TTI Performance Systems

Many companies and organizations are experiencing the pains and problems of working to attract and retain the right people for the job. If you are like them you may well be disappointed with your results. These same companies and organizations are having problems identifying those candidates who have the best opportunity to succeed in a specific job. Do you seem to find yourself identifying with them?

In today’s business climate it doesn’t make any difference what business you are in. You, like other business owners, CEO’s and managers are under the gun to hire and retain top performing people.

Your challenge is to find these top performing people in an environment that has the lowest unemployment in modern times. You probably need people with various levels of technical skills, people skills and intellectual abilities to compete in your marketplace.

It may be time for you to consider evaluating the process your company or organization presently uses to hire and retain top performing people. To compete for today’s top performers you will need to acquire and use the latest in processes, ideas, tools and technology to help you find, and select those top performers who can help your company or organization flourish.

You may not have thought about the cost of employee turnover recently, but it lurks inside every company and organization. In fact, turnover costs combined with poor quality and low productivity cost companies and organizations far more than investing in a result oriented hiring system.

 A Fortune 500 company said it costs $255,000.00 to find, interview, hire, train and have little or no results from a sales representative. These costs include lost business or production, figures most companies and organizations fail to include in any of their job turnover cost estimates.

Another major financial institution, when asked, stated the last cost of job turnover they had done was in 1929. They are in the business of managing money and helping other businesses manage their money and they haven’t realized the financial impact employee turnover has on their bottom line.

When all the important factors included in the selection process; advertising, interviewing, training, little or no productivity and all the HR administrative items related to getting the candidate employed the costs of turning over even an hourly position becomes costly.

The purpose and goal of the articles you will see here is to help you become better informed and effective in your most important task- hiring the right person or persons for the job. When you achieve the goal of making more right hires everything else in your company or organization gets better. Better productivity, better communication, better customer relations, better sales results and of course, better company or organizational profits.

 By Bill Schult

Finding motivated self-starters can seem like looking for a needle in a haystack. But top performers do exist. Here are seven tips for how to identify and hire the kind of self-motivated achievers who can become an asset to any sales team.

1) Conduct ongoing interviews. Scan LinkedIn routinely (even once a month can help) to find viable candidates, even when you’re not actively looking to hire. That way, you’ll always have a handful of good applicants to contact when a position opens up. Also, consider advertising for new salespeople at least once every quarter (whether you have an opening or not).

2) Don’t hire on the spot. Even if a candidate makes a great first impression, it’s risky to hire too quickly. At the April 2011 Sales & Marketing Leadership Conference in Scottsdale, John Grosshans, Vice President of Line Business Solutions at SAP America, told the audience that face-to-face interviews aren’t enough to evaluate sales ability. He asks candidates to send him a thank-you letter after the interview and explain why they think they’re the best person for the job. This tests how well the applicants can express themselves in written form. “It’s incredible what you get back,” Grosshans said. “[I'm convinced] some of them don’t know how to use spellcheck. And think about that going out to your customers.”

3) Hire based on attitude, not experience. Perhaps the most important quality to look for in an applicant isn’t industry or even sales experience. It’s attitude. You can train and educate people with little sales or industry knowledge, but people with innate drive and determination aren’t easy to find. Whatever your applicant’s background, look for positive energy and an ability to bounce back from rejection.

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4) Use language that’s likely to attract the applicants you seek. For example, try using words and phrases like self-starter, hard working, motivated, experienced, and energetic. Make sure that anyone who reads the job posting or description will get a sense of your unique corporate culture. Be clear about parameters (for example, if the position pays commission only, state that up front).

5) Pay attention to body language. During each interview, imagine that you’re a prospect. Would you welcome the chance to talk or do business with this applicant? Is the person engaging and pleasant? Candidates should maintain consistent eye contact, smile frequently, listen well, and project confidence.

6) Look for people who want to do more than meet quotas. Look for people who broke sales records in previous positions or who excelled in other ways. What they did isn’t as important as their desire to be the best. Design interview questions that gauge your applicants’ desire to achieve. Their answers will help you decide who will excel and who won’t.

7) Note whether the applicant asks for the job. You might be able to tell how applicants will pursue a prospect from the way they pursue a sales position.

To build a sales team of achievers, you have to know how to identify great performers as well as diamonds in the rough. With a little practice, you can learn to spot and hire the winners.

 – Selling Power Editors   May 17, 2011

Key #1 – Interview only those people who will perform the job well.

 Key #2 – Ask the right questions during the interview to identify the candidate’s true skills.

 Key #3 -  Hire people with the skills and talents that best match job needs.

 Key #4 – Orient or train the new hire on the best way to do the real tasks the job requires.

 Key #5 – Managers, waste less time correcting mistakes and spend more time rewarding the right performance.

 Key #6 – Managers, know how to most effectively communicate and motivate staff.

 Key #7 – Performance appraisals get done, take less time to complete, and are more constructive.

 Key #8 – When internal reassignment or staff leaving the organization occurs, the employee leaves with less conflict and fewer negative organizational outcomes.

 By: Dr. Michael Abelson  CEO/President of The Abelson Group

Hiring A Players for your organization can result in a financial gain of 10 to 100 times their annual compensation.

To determine the tremendous financial impact of moving employees from your bottom half into your top half, consider creating three categories – Your Best, Your Second Best and finally the Not So Good. By conducting this exercise you will have created three categories of the same size.

Your Best, which comprise the top third, are those employees who are the bedrock of your organization. These people are the hard workers, who go beyond what is expected, who produce high quality results every time. These are the employees who need little direction, are team players, getting along well with everyone. It is these same employees who are often on a fast track for promotions. It is difficult to hire these high quality, top performing employees if your hiring process is flawed.

Your Second Best, are those employees who can get the work done with some direction, work well, for the most part, with others, are technically strong, work to get the job done in a crisis and often get promoted if there is no one else who is better qualified. Most times they will not be the first person considered for the promotion.

The Not So Good are those employees who just never seem to be a fit with the organization. It could be that they are in the wrong job, or they need additional coaching and mentoring to produce average results. These employees seem to be a magnet for conflict with other team members. These Not So Good employees are most times hired because they have interviewed well, come across as friendly and enthusiastic and look to have the necessary experience. For many organizations this group represents, at a minimum, one third of their entire employee count and this becomes a huge problem.

Hiring managers and HR personnel said that when the Second Best and Not So Good employees were hired, they appeared to have all the requisite qualifications. Yes, they had the right degree, the right skills and experience. However, something seemed to go wrong after the hire that led to their underperformance on the job and ultimate termination. Most times the inability to perform the job at a high level was the result of the employee not having the right behaviors and/or competencies necessary for successful long term job success. This translates into under performance on the job, little or no interest in the job, strained relationships with their manager, few team skills, poor work habits and a cultural misfit for the organization.

The expense of hiring Not So Good employees is huge. A method to calculate this expense is to look at what is termed the Average Profit Per Employee. For demonstration purposes, let’s assume that the average profit per employee is $100,000. Remember that this example does not take into account the differences in jobs and salaries, but we can still make a good point.

Now consider that your Best performing employees produce at an average of 20% more than your Second Best or middle category, resulting in average profit per employee of $120,000.

By Bill Schult  Copywrite@2011 Maximum Potential Inc.