Hire Strategically and Reap Big Benefits

I was driving in north Phoenix the other day during rush hour and saw a man dressed in a business suit sitting in an executive's chair on the side of the road. He held a sign that said, "Executive available, cheap."

It's no secret that unemployment is at a near record levels. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average length of the nine prior recessions was less than ten months. This recession is approaching twenty months and not predicted to end until 2011.   Many excellent employees are currently subsisting on unemployment and growing increasingly frustrated with their inability to find any work.

As most business owners know, money won't buy loyalty. Money is not the primary driver of employee flight. According to Michael Echols, the vice president of strategic initiatives at Bellevue University in a recent article in Chief Learning Officer, the main reason employees quit their jobs is "actions or inactions" on the part of their immediate supervisors. So an important question to consider is how to teach supervisors and managers to manage more effectively.

One of the frustrations I encounter with large corporation's hiring practices is their seeming inability to hire strategically. They focus on filling a narrowly defined job opening and eliminate any candidates who don't fit a constricted, cookie-cutter outline of that position. In other words, they fail to hire strategically.

As an example, let's return to our executive sitting in his chair on a busy Phoenix street. He, like many other executives, are available today at greatly reduced rates. Yet many companies hiring today ignore highly qualified candidates in favor of younger, inexperienced applicants. Perhaps these organizations believe highly qualified applicants will move on to higher paying positions or perhaps threaten the dominant paradigm. However, if this current and protracted recession doesn't end until 2011 as predicted, it may be several years before that "overqualified" employee has other viable employment options. So why not hire laid-off executives and utilize their management skills to improve your organization? Even though you know that he or she may move on when the recession ends, consider how much your organization could gain in one or two years using his or her expertise in the following ways:

• Grooming existing or underperforming employees so that they can manage or work more effectively.

• Utilizing their specific knowledge to mine your competitors' clients or customers. 

• As mentors to younger employees or better yet, to develop a mentor program in your organization.

• Using his or her contacts in the community to help increase your business.

• As an ambassador to showcase your company's name in the non-profit community through employee volunteer programs or other non-profit support such as serving on advisory panels to non-profits, desperately in need of talent and funding in today’s down economy.

• To “brain map” institutional knowledge in your corporation, knowledge that may well walk out the door when the recession is over or due to an aging population rapidly approaching retirement.

• As your representative at industry trade meetings you simply don't have time to attend. 

• To investigate the launch of a new product line or marketing avenue that you haven't had time to fully explore.

• To implement a risk management program that shows a solid return on investment.

This is by no means an inclusive list, but only a starting point. There is a great deal of talent going to waste in America right now. Even if you hire these retired executives as consultants or on a part-time basis while they continue to pursue other options, both your company and laid-off executives are winning.

One final note: Many laid-off workers are using this time to explore other career options: school, career changes or entrepreneurship. Your company could be part of that exploration. Why not take advantage of their extensive experience and hire someone really experienced, without any expectation of longevity? Your company and the laid-off worker will benefit. In fact, if you mine this talent correctly to grow your company, you may, in a few years, be able to pay that formerly highly paid executive just what he or she is worth.