How to hire more productive employees

Hiring productive employees is really the ‘silver bullet’ of recruitment. If you can solve this issue and then replicate it, your business will be on track for success. So how exactly do you hire more productive employees for your business?

Hire for ownership

Barbara Fanfan, in her article: ‘Finding and Keeping Employees with Ownership’ states that recruiting employees that have the trait of ‘ownership’ is the first step in hiring productive employees. ‘Ownership’ is when employees have the quality of ‘mine-ness’, states Fanfan. This means they operate with a vested interest in the business and as such, are more proactive and productive. If something isn’t working, they want to fix it and take every aspect of their job personally. Fanfan recommends including criteria specifically linked to employee ownership during the advertising process, such as:

You must have a strong sense of ownership which drives you to find ways to do things more efficiently.
Someone who takes ownership with each transaction, and finds ways to delight and impress customers every day.
Success in this job requires that you take ownership in your assigned department and exceed the expectations of your supervisor with your efficiency and attention to detail.

Engage your employees

You can start engaging your new recruits before they even commence by giving them information about the company’s vision and values. Disengaged employees drag a company down – they have low levels of productivity and high levels of absenteeism. They also have a negative impact on the company culture. Engaged employees work autonomously, are emotionally invested in the business and encourage others. While the first step is hiring for engagement during the recruitment process (and ensuring that employees fit with the company culture), there are other ways to engage current employees, such as: