Four (4) notes on “How not to recruit”

Everybody knows, recruitment is an important activity during bootstrapping or expanding a company. Bad recruits lead to bad result. At a worst point it can make a company collapse. I am not a HR expert here, but I do have some point to notice on recruitment process.

  1. Not knowing what you want. “Needed a network administrator capable of managing Windows based Server and Linux based server. Must be able to program in shell, PHP, and HTML/CSS. Can manage MySQL, Postgre and SQL Server. Web 2.0 savvy”. I’m sure you have seen better example of “not knowing what you want” vacancy. Those kind of vacancy implicitely tell us that the company has minmal direction of where to go. Not knowing where to go means you don’t know who you want to go with, no? If you want to put off a fire, why brought a pyromaniacs?
  2. Not knowing where to find. Fish lives in the water. Birds fly in the sky. Every kind of people, in common, live (near) where they want to live. if you want a FOSS evangelist, jump into FOSS community. If you don’t have it in your town, look for it somewhere else.
  3. Not knowing what to offer. Everybody has their own wishlist. However, the path will likely follow “want adequity”, and then “want satisfaction”. Salary will lilkely the first priority to check.
  4. Not knowing when to reject applicant. Bad recruits lead to bad result. Don’t force yourself to accept bad seed. And note to differ potential seed with actual bad seed. Potetial seed grows, bad seed don’t.

Now, all HR, on your combat station. Good recruit will remove above paintings from your company/office!

Photo: Cappellmeister

  • http://kriwil.com/ Aldiantoro Nugroho

    nice article. while for #1, I think it’s typical in (indonesian) company, looking for one man to do everything.

  • http://neofreko.com Akhmad Fathonih

    Then it must be typical also for Indonesian company to have no direction of where to go or what to achieve and how to achieve their goal ;)

  • http://kramero.com Kramero

    kebanyakan memang minta personil palu gada (apa lu minta, gue ada) dengan gaji seminim mungkin..
    anehnya, ada aja yang mau apply dan nerima offer yang minim tersebut..
    Makanya standar gaji untuk bidang IT tergolong kecil.. Mikirnya khan, ngapain ngasih standar gede, padahal standar kecil aja orang2 udah pada mau…

    *sedih*

  • http://neofreko.com Akhmad Fathonih

    Percayalah saudaraku, perusahaan yang seperti itu berarti tidak mengerti bahwa karyawana dalah aset berharga. Percayalah turn over rate karyawan-nya akan melebihi batas normal karena karyawan tahu mereka tidak akan bisa achieve lebih jauh dengan stay lebih lama.

    Calon karyawan bialng iya karena kepepet saja. After a while, they’ll do something else, saner :)

  • http://www.stucel.com Felix

    Haha #1 sih Indonesia banget.
    Bagus ni post nya Ton!

    Felixs last blog post..Sad Day for moki Monsters

  • http://neofreko.com Akhmad Fathonih

    Hehe, iya, mmg sering banget dijumpai. Menginspirasi post ini sebenarnya :)

  • http://uculan.blogspot.com/ uculan

    asyem, aku masuk yang no 1 :) )

    -uculan-

  • http://www.mangoaddict.com Ivan

    Gue juga kerja jadi yg #1, di Chicago, IL nih. Gelasr sih Master in Structural Engineering, mulai Data back-up, AutoCAD rusak, Scroll Lock kepencet, semua panggil gue.

    Perasaan itu bukan typical company Indonesia koq, itu lebih typical Company kecil. Karena modal pas2an, dan pendapatan belom pasti. Akhirnya harus cari “Superman” yg serba bisa. Untung2 saja kalo di kemudian hari tugas2nya jadi semakin terarah. Kebanyakan sih pasti dah keluar sebelum company nya jadi terbenahi.

    Ivans last blog post..6 Hal Yang Patut Diketahui Sebelum Memulai Blog

  • http://neofreko.com Akhmad Fathonih

    Iya, bener @Ivan. Biasanya karena perusahaanya masih kurang modal jadinya belum bisa memberi insentif besar pada karyawannya. Perusahaan startup juga masuk kategori ini ya biasanya?

    Eh, sekarang masih di Chicago? That’s cool! Ada startup bergaji lumayan gk di sekitar situ? :D

  • http://www.mangoaddict.com Ivan

    Iyah, sementara masih disini, urusan imigrasi. Tahun depan pulang koq. Biasa bikin startup kali. huahaha. Mau kerja rodi?

    Ivans last blog post..Gambaran Internet Indonesia Menurut Alexa

  • http://neofreko.com Akhmad Fathonih

    @Ivan
    Roti? mau dong. Huahahahha. Kerja rodi boleh saja, saya berani. Tapi harus dijamin ya masa depan saya. Opsi saham, profit sharing, dsb. Kerja rodi kan tidak berarti kerja tak dibayar. Ya tho? ;)

  • http://mangoaddict.com Ivan Sielegar

    Haha… Ga lah, saya sudah cukup merasakan kerja sebagai bawahan dan atasan. Lebih setuju kalo “Happy employees are more motivated and perform better” Makanya ga setuju kalo kerja rodi deh, yang penting work smart and efficient, no slacking :)

    Tuh Moodmill success ga? ada MSN? ivanmp3@hotmail.com

    Ivan Sielegars last blog post..Inilah.com, Okezone.com, Detik.com ….

  • http://neofreko.com Akhmad Fathonih

    Hehhe, saya belum pernah jadi atasan :D . Tapi saya cukup setuju dengan “Happy employees are more motivated and perform better”.

    Kerja rodi tak selalu buruk, siapa tahu ada karyawan yang suka kerja rodi (masosis)? LOL. Klo kerja rodi artinya no happiness ya tentu saja saya juga tidak setuju :)

    Moodmill? tanya ke stucel.com aja :p. I would love to scale Moodmill. I’m still looking for the feasible way to do it.