Past Performance Does Not Guarantee Future Performance!

Our culture’s current selection process sure is sloppy. We have all seen this statement when investing in a mutual fund – “past performance is no guarantee of future performance.” Why don’t we apply this concept when selecting a candidate? Isn’t it true that when someone is hired at an ice cream store, they are encouraged to eat as much ice cream as they want when they start – because the owner knows they will get sick of it and never want it again?

We live in the information age, and candidate selection is all about information. People (hopefully) are learning and changing faster than ever before. In fact the rate of this change is accelerating. But our recruiting and selection process remains archaic. "Find me a square peg for a square hole."

If rectangular candidate is selected, the recruiting manager may look incompetent. But what happens when our employees are changing their shape every 6 months? The square peg you selected 6 months ago just became a star shaped employee, and your competitor is desperately looking for a star. So, s/he leaves your company, and you are back to square one. But you still look good - because the right shape was selected. Surely no one could have predicted the candidate would change that fast! That's OK, because your boss just found a better job and you have been left on your own anyway.

Would it not be better to hire a plastic, round peg, and then routinely ask them to work at new stations until they are fashioned into a square? We are surrounded by employees and candidates who know 85% of a particular job. But instead of helping them learn the remaining 15%, we let them go and pay a recruiter to find someone who knows 100%. We usually end up with someone who knows 92% of the job, but is skilled at interviewing and "fakes it till they make it." Our competitor hires our former employee who they think knows 100%, but then learns on the job and soon knows 95%. What a stupid system!

This kind of thinking has made people today loyal to their discipline, but not to their employer. It takes courage to hire the round peg for the square hole, and with rare exceptions, our corporate structures just do not allow this kind of courage to be expressed.

In today's environment, we must view all of our employees as if they were volunteers. We all have so many other options that now, from the employers perspective, $1.00 of humane consideration is worth $20.00 in compensation.