Talent-Based Hiring

According to Matt Mosser, chief of global talent resources at management consulting firm the Gallup Organization, the key to hiring quality talent in today’s tight job market is research.

"Understanding the talents that contribute to outstanding performance is the key to developing an effective talent-based hiring strategy," says Mosser. "Our consultants identify the talents that contribute to success and then work with organizational leaders to develop and refine a strategy and the supporting processes and systems that help organizations find more employees who are like their very best."

Gallup Consulting has refined its strategies over 30 years to help organizations define and implement talent acquisition strategies, identify and assess talent selection practices and processes, define and describe talent value propositions– the improved performance that results when companies select employees with the right talents and to design and administer talent-based selection systems. The result: a talent-based hiring strategy that leads to improved business performance. "We go through a series of research methodologies to determine profiles based on measurements of top performers," says Mosser. "We conduct research on what we call selling themes, which are patterns of behaviors and thoughts that exist in the most successful salespeople."

Gallup conducts its assessments to determine whether the person has the right talent for an organization in several ways. They conduct interviews to help them define what it takes to be successful in a company’s sales culture. They base the assessments on key metrics that are important with each company whether it’s margin, productivity, or culture. "We study the individual businesses and we also conduct focus groups of top performers as well as bottom performers," says Mosser. "What comes out of all this is a structured interview setup where Gallup scores each of the candidate’s answers.

"We look for common themes in high achieving people," says Mosser. "We have different ways that we can measure each candidate’s intensity on these common ‘success’ themes. Top performers in all jobs think, talk, and act differently than average and poor performers."

Gallup spends a lot of time upfront with candidates because spending time and money on the front end reduces turnover, costs, and lack of success on the back end. It’s an investment in the future that saves tons in terms of increased productivity as well as low turnover, says Mosser.

Some of the advantages to talent-based hiring include providing each organization with a very scalable process to develop a culture across the company and a systematic approach to hiring that is objective and can be applied the same every single time.

"Everything we do when selecting talent is always tied back to business outcomes – revenue, profit, and engagement of employees," says Mosser. "The process and system are constantly being updated by Gallup scientists and researchers to stay on the cutting edge. It shortens the learning curve and the time it takes for the new hire to become successful in his or her new environment."