News Canada

Find a candidate who matches your company culture with these 4 easy steps

Company culture is the lifeblood of your organisation. It permeates everything you do, from what you believe in, to the way you run your workspace. It can be tricky to pin down, but when the wrong candidate comes into the mix, it can whack that delicate ecosystem out of balance.

But it’s not just employers who are preoccupied with company culture; younger jobseekers are also increasingly on the look out for organisations that reflect their own beliefs. As a consequence, we’re seeing more and more organisations up their sustainability credentials and create a friendlier, public-facing image (but that’s a blog for another time).

Company culture is as essential as it is challenging, here are four steps that we spotted on The Undercover Recruiter that can help you find a candidate who fits seamlessly into your company culture.  

Make your values clear from the get-go

Your company culture and values should be clear on every step of the recruitment process, from placing the job ad to the final interview. You should describe your work environment, the day-to-day duties and what the company’s overall mission statement is. You can even express this in the way that you write about the company.

Ask yourself, what does your company stand for? How would you describe an average day? If you’re unsure, start by defining what you’re not – is your office strict, corporate or progressive?

Let them do the talking

We need to know more about our applicants than just their work history. Ask questions like:

• What is your ideal working environment?
• What inspires and motivates you?
• What do you believe in?

You can also ask them to describe themselves in three words, or find out where they’d want to be in five years’ time. The important thing is that you get a sense of the person. Try to imagine them in your workspace – would they fit in?

Use multiple interviewers

Two heads are better than one, after all. Also, quiz your current employees on what they think. At Pret-a-Manger, the popular café chain, before they hire anyone, they consult their team first. That way you can be sure that everyone likes the newbie as much as you do. By bringing more people into the hiring process, you can also alleviate the chances of one individual’s subconscious biases getting in the way.

Show them around

New recruits won’t spend their whole work life in the meeting room. Take them for a tour of the office – you may not have slides and rooftop bars a la Google, but you can still show off the place. This will also give the candidate the chance to see whether your offices are somewhere they can imagine themselves, not just surviving but thriving.

Once you have these four tips under wraps, you’ll be ready for any candidate. Get immediate access to a sea of unbeatable international graduate CVs by registering your business for free with GradLink today.