Here’s the freaky part, that reaction is normal for my generation! So, how can Gen Y’s addiction to instant information benefit you?

1. Constant Learners
   We have spent our entire lives learning how to use new technologies and systems without consciously thinking about it. For example, I am confortable knowing that I can get music to my ears from a Walkman, Disman, MiniDisk, MP3 player, iPod classic, iPod Nano, iPod Shuffle, and iPhone, while on the go.This means, we will fly through your training program, pick up your computer system in no time, point out processes that could be updated to increase efficiency, and consequently, save your time and money.
2. Self Taught
   Ask us to do something and we’ll say, ‘Sure, no problem.’ Of course, we might not know how to do it just yet, but lucky for us, we know where we can find all the information we need to get it done. We have constant access to a wealth of information on the web, there is always a YouTube video, blog article, or forum post that will tell us how to get on top of what we have said wouldn’t be a problem. We save your valuable time by teaching ourselves. Take away our Google… we might be a bit stuck.
3. Increased Efficiency
   We aren’t lazy, we just know there is a better way, and we like to work smarter, not harder. We are naturally inclined to use technology to make things easier and more efficient. Our innovative streak makes us creative, keeping you on top of online trends and best practice. And, our passion for new technologies will save our time, and your money by increasing overall efficiency.

• Where are you going?
  How can you expect employees to focus their energy in the same direction, if they don’t know what that direction is? If you’ve got a vision or mission statement, awesome! Take some time to remind your employees what that vision is, and ensure that everyone is on board and aligned to make it happen. If not, consider including your team and build one collaboratively. Working together to create the vision is a great way to ensure everyone is bought in to make it happen.

• How are you going to get there?
  Do your employees know what is expected of them day to day outside of completing their work? What behaviours or individual actions will contribute, or detract, from your company culture? Are there guiding behaviours that will help your team achieve their overall purpose and contribute to the company culture you are trying to build?

• Who is going to make that happen?
  Don’t hire jerks; hire people that you naturally want to be around. Try mixing thinkers with doers, and ensure all new hires are aligned with the company’s vision or mission and guiding behaviours. You can train the skills, but you can’t train the attitude or fit.

Here are some answers to watch for when asking a candidate about their break from employment:

1. “It’s a bad economy right now, no one was hiring.”
   Really? No one seems like a bit of a stretch. Look for an answer that shows the individual is able to take some accountability for their unemployment, not someone who feels helpless. For example, the combination of a slow economy and mistakes made while job searching, demonstrate ownership and ability to learn from mistakes.
2. “I used to be pretty good with an abacus.”
   If someone has been out of the industry for a while, how do you know they aren’t going to be out of touch? If they have taken the time to do the research to get up to speed with the changes, and challenges, and current trends in the industry, you’re seeing initiative. Freelance or volunteer work to stay involved is an even better demonstration of their effort to keep their skills up to date and in practice.
3. “I was backpacking around…”
   This is increasingly common with Gen Y’s perception of the world as borderless. With everything just a plane ticket away, taking a gap year is the thing to do. This is great because it demonstrates their ability to adapt to new cultures, and a desire to build global context and networks. An open mind and ability to function out of their comfort zone are good qualities for a new hire.

You want to attract a high calibre candidate who can withstand the rigors of your long-standing recruitment process. Survival of the fittest is how you have always siphoned out the average applicants and found someone who is able to handle pressure situations and say all the right things in an interview.

This year has proven to be the beginning of a Candidate market. Skill shortages have become increasingly apparent in a range of industries. This means you are now in competition to recruit quality candidates, who often have multiple employment options. So if previously your recruitment process has been a lengthy survival of the fittest type, the fittest might be now be taking other offers before you even get the chance to measure their survival skills.

There is significant time and resource invested into the recruitment process and to lose the candidate in the end because the process has taken too long and they have taken another offer can be frustrating, and unnecessary. If you have a 4-step interview process with your toughest hiring manager, multiple tests, and a physical, ensure you aren’t scaring off good talent unnecessarily. If the structure is rigid and you can’t get around it, make sure you are selling your company to the candidate so they know it will be worthwhile to stick around for the long haul. They must believe the role and company are worth all the hoops they are jumping through, knowing there are easier options.

Instead of showing them the door and telling them they need a serious reality check, stay ahead of your competitors and make the most of the kid’s personal ambition! Don’t say, “Not a chance champ, you need to give the company your first born to get this corner office.” Instead ask them, “What do you believe it takes to get here?”

They aren’t stupid; they know how their parent’s generation advanced in their career, hard work, persistence, and company loyalty. Although, they might surprise you by listing none of these as traits they will use to get them to the next step on their way to CEO. With no intention of paying dues, or getting your coffee simply because you have seniority, they are competitive and see themselves as equals from the word go.

This type of Gen Y, seemingly over-ambitious, can inject enthusiasm and fresh ideas into your organisation. Technologically savvy, with an inclination to find an easier and more efficient way to do things, encouraging this newbie to continue asking, “Why?” forces you to re-examine the way you operate and improve systems, increasing efficiency and productivity.

The ability to give feedback effectively is one of the most challenging things for a good leader to master, and arguably one of the most important. Once you get it, you will be able to increase performance of those around you without inciting an emotional reaction, and convey a strong message.

1. Timing is everything
   “I have some feedback for you, is now a good time?” That’s a good way to ensure the time is ok so you will both be able to focus on the feedback, rather than having attention pulled away by other tasks. Give feedback in private and ensure you are not setting the individual up to be embarrassed, which will take their attention away from the feedback and focus it on their feelings of embarrassment.
2. Don’t sugar coat it
   Compliments and positive reinforcement are great! Unfortunately, sandwiching your feedback with compliments detracts from the feedback you have deemed important enough to address. If they react defensively, don’t rescue them and start rattling off the list of all the things they are doing right, let them own their mistake.
3. Individualise
   Make sure you know whom you are dealing with. If they tend to be overly sensitive and take everything to heart, be sensitive and ensure you don’t make them feel guilty which can demotivate.  Focus on the action and your observations, not the person’s character.
4. Don’t use verbal erasers or generalities
   “I think you really need to work on your time management, but your doing a great job.” The word ‘but’ is a verbal eraser and negates anything said before it. Try to avoid using  ‘but’ (nonetheless, however, although…) when giving feedback, and just focus on the message you want to convey. Avoid saying things like “You’re always late” as it lacks clarity and is assumptive, try something like, “I have noticed that you have been late three times this week, is everything okay?”

Good leaders know how important it is to focus on growing and developing their employees. Ensuring employees are supported and invested in, demonstrates that a leader is focused on what is best for the business by developing the strengths of the people around them. This is even more important when your employee is just getting started!

If training and development just aren’t a priority, you could be missing out! By developing your employees you will be able to delegate more work, increase your talent pool, be recognised as a leader and get promoted, and enjoy the personal satisfaction of getting the most out of your team.

Win-win. Now here are a few tips to get you started:

1. Set Goals
   Work with your employees to set realistic and attainable goals. Setting goals is a great way to help your employees focus on what they would like to achieve. By beginning with an end in mind, you will both have a better understanding of what are the necessary steps to get there. The most important thing to remember is that goals can’t be arbitrary; they must be Specific, Measureable, Attainable, Realistic, and Timely. Keep your superstar accountable!
2. Coach
   Coaching is becoming more recognised as a necessary and important part of employee growth and development. Coaches give employees a safe place to vent, learn new skills and develop skills they already posses, gain insight into themselves and their work, feel supported, encourage fresh thinking, gather advice and suggestions. These tools enable employees to make more educated decisions, while growing and developing in their role and adding more value back to the organisations. Coaching your superstar in a weekly one-on-one is essential to tapping into their real potential.
3. Professional Development and Training
   Professional development and investment in training are especially important with Gen Y, who are massively ambitious. They appreciate an employer who will invest in up-skilling them and feel rewarded when presented with a new challenge. Ambitious employees will not be satisfied with minimal training. These are the future leaders of your organisation and you need to ensure their development and training are supported, or be prepared to lose them.
4. Network
   In today’s world, who you know is more important than ever. Supporting and encouraging your employees to expand their professional networks ensures you employ people who are comfortable gaining information, advice, support and inspiration, helping develop best practice for your organisation. Additionally, they will develop important business acumen and possible business development contacts.
5. Challenge
   If you want to develop high performers, you need to encourage your employees to step out of their comfort zones. By assigning new tasks or increasing allowance for innovation and new ideas, your employees will become more comfortable with challenge. This will ensure they grow both new skills and confidence and you’re building future leaders for your organisation.
6. Feedback
   The annual review is not something valued by a culture that has grown up with everything being instantaneous. Your employees expect no different from their managers. They expect to be told how they are doing, when they are doing it. If your employees accomplish something, recognition for the achievement is appreciated. If they have made a mistake, let them know in a constructive way and give them the opportunity to learn from the experience and correct it. Don’t wait 6 months and tell them where they went wrong at an annual review.  A good place to start is a weekly one-on-one meeting.

Have you noticed lately that everyone you have been interviewing is below average? They have bad attitudes, no personality, and really don’t seem to care about impressing you. So what do you do if you have a position that needs filling and a limited amount of time or resources to actually find someone to fill it? Hire the best of a bad bunch I guess? Not ideal but you need bums on seats.

Maybe they are ok in the interview and you are desperate to get someone in the role so you give them a shot. Not only have they not impressed you since signing the contract, but also they really don’t seem to bother putting in any effort to learn their new role, let alone do well in it.

This can be a major issue in a candidate driven market like the one we are in now. Unemployment has never been lower (currently 5.3 percent according the Australian Bureau of Statistics) and HR professionals are finding it increasingly difficult to attract good talent. So you settle, but what does this mean for your business? Are you or another employee being forced to pick up the slack? Is it creating issues with overall performance or company culture?

The situation isn’t ideal if you are forced to settle for a candidate that you don’t love. Or maybe just isn’t the right fit. We are strong advocates for hiring for attitude and then training the skill. You can do a lot more with a new employee who is excited and wants to learn than you can with someone who has the experience but doesn’t give a hoot about the role.

Since I founded Rookie Recruits, over the years I have spoken with thousands of candidates… some who are average, some who are great, and a few who are AWESOME. I was asked a few months back to describe the signs or triggers of an awesome candidate. After much thought and research, I settled on the following 7 signs:

1. Attitude
   The single most important factor. Most people are hired for SKE (skills, knowledge and experience) only to be fired for their poor attitude. If someone has an awesome attitude and is placed in the right environment, I have found this to unlock discretionary effort which is going above and beyond what they are expected to do in the role. We define someone with an awesome attitude as someone who is Enthusiastic, Ambitious, Hardworking, and Determined to Develop and Grow.
2. Social Intelligence
   The ability to immediately understand the environment and how to ‘be’ in that environment is an extremely valuable quality for a business. Not just for a starter when settling into a new role, but also the ability to identify things like future opportunities that exist within the business.
3. Value-Centric
   WIIFM is NOT their favourite radio station. The best candidates seek to always want to GIVE first and RECEIVE second. It’s as simple as that. (WIIFM for the uninitiated is What’s In It For Me)
   
4. Communication
   Everyone needs to be able to communicate effectively. It does not matter whether it is written or verbal, a person needs to be able to express themselves and what they are trying to achieve. A lack of communication from just one person can cause great dysfunction in a high performing team.
5. Natural Talent Alignment
   A person’s natural talents must align to the role they are going to be in. A lot of people apply for roles they think they can do, not what they are going to be the best at doing. I have seen a lot of accountants who are better suited to be in sales, and sales people who would be great in accounting (I use this example as it is the most drastic). People whose natural talents do not align to their role will work REALLY HARD to be mediocre.  Awesome candidates usually have a good awareness about their natural talent alignment.
6. Information and Preparation
   Information is everywhere and it takes so little effort to find loads of information about anything today. No matter what role a candidate is applying for, if they have not done research about the role, the company, and the industry, they are not the person you are looking for. The best candidates do the most research. The best researched are the best prepared and preparation is confidence’s twin.
7. Managed Ambition and Expectations
   We only do career start roles at Rookie Recruits. And yes, it is a myth that all Gen Y want to be the CEO within a week of starting. They want to be the CEO within the first 3 months. Kidding… sort of. However, an awesome candidate will typically do their research when they are looking at a role and asses the realistic growth and promotion opportunities. If they cannot find them, they will ask throughout the recruitment process. I have seen some candidates even call the HR department of a company they were applying to and ask for stats on promotions within the company. A bit over the top for me, but you see where I am going with it. They are ambitious and would like to see that there is opportunity for career progression within the company.

So that’s it, years of observation in recruiting and these are the 7 essential signs to look out for. Next time, we will look at how to uncover these things and how to select an awesome candidate based on their resume and your conversation with them