The hiring process has gotten so complex that it has begun to overwhelm what should be a basic, straightforward activity – hiring a new employee. Couple that complexity with the desire to hire the “right” candidate, the absolutely “perfect” candidate (or in other words, what is known as a “Unicorn”), and what should be a relatively simple process has now become unwieldy.

1. Hunting Unicorns
Overview
The hiring process has gotten so complex that it has begun to overwhelm what should
be a basic, straightforward activity – hiring a new employee. Couple that complexity with
the desire to hire the “right” candidate, the absolutely “perfect” candidate (or in other
words, what is known as a “Unicorn”), and what should be a relatively simple process
has now become unwieldy.
Is it any wonder that the hiring process is now getting longer and longer and…
What Once Was
It used to be that hiring a new employee was a fairly simple process. You’d write a brief
job description, post it somewhere, collect the applications and resumes you received,
go through them, pull out the ones of interest, bring them in, interview them, eliminate
the obvious ones who wouldn’t fit, bring the others back in for a second round, gather
feedback, rate and rank the remaining candidates, maybe do a quick final round of
interviews, then make a decision and make an offer. Sure, it used to take a few weeks,
but it was still fairly straightforward.
No longer though.
Today, the hiring process at best can take several weeks, while at worst it can take
several months! The hiring process now includes not only online applications, but also
screening calls, phone interviews, panel interviews, in-person interviews, aptitude
testing, skills testing, quantitative and qualitative testing, personality testing,

2. psychological profiling, and more. Each day it seems as if a new test has been
developed that must be administered to a candidate. Just in case…
It’s gotten so ridiculous that the average college student preparing for an SAT or GMAT
has less to study for than the average candidate applying for a job.
And why is that?
It’s because HR departments, recruiters, personnel managers and hiring managers are
scared.
Scared?
Yes, scared. They’re scared of making a mistake – the mistake being that, Gasp!,
they’re going to miss hiring the perfect employee if they don’t review or interview every
living, breathing human being who even looks at or considers applying for their open
position. Scared that they won’t hire the absolutely perfect candidate! Scared that they
won’t find the Unicorn!
Really?
Sadly, it’s true.
Dum, dum, dum, Daaah!!!!! (think dark, heavy music, Beethoven’s Fifth, here)
Now It’s Process Before People
Because those people involved in the hiring process are so scared, they’ve lost sight of
the goal of the hiring process, which is simply to hire the best person who can do the job
to help the business.
In other words, they’ve let process take priority over people.
Unfortunately, that process takes the form of CYA in many instances. So rather than
making a decision with a candidate and moving forward, they continue hunting
Unicorns.
Again, just in case…
Note that nowhere in a typical job description does it say that the person hired has to be
perfect. The person doesn’t have to be able to perform each and every aspect of the job
function on the first day of hire. They simply need to be able to learn and grow and do
the job once they’re hired.

3. But process has apparently now taken over and common sense no longer applies.
Because of this, the hunt for Unicorns continues to get more and more complex, which
in turn causes the hiring process to spiral more and more out of control.
The reality is that every employer, regardless of industry, regardless of sector,
regardless of size, location or technology, has their own way of doing things. Even if a
business hires a person away from a direct competitor, the new employee still has to be
on-boarded and then learn their new employer’s way of working and doing things. This
means that the employee is not going to be perfect on Day One.
Gasp! What!?!
You mean the newly hired person won’t be the Second Coming of Jack Welch? The
new employee doesn’t walk on water? He may actually have to learn something? He’s
not a Unicorn?
Oh woe is me! What shall we do???
To quote an old TV commercial from the Sixties, “Sorry, Charlie.” That’s just how it is
when you hire a new employee. It takes time to come up to speed, regardless of who
you are or how qualified you are.
Delays in Hiring Costs Money
The hiring process is complicated enough as it is. With all of the steps that are involved,
why should it take even longer? The longer it takes, the worse it becomes for the
business.
Why?
First, because the longer it takes to go through the interview process, the more it costs.
The hiring process requires lots of coordination, logistics and scheduling of people, both
internal and external. All of that takes time, which in turn costs money.
Second, the longer it takes to hire a new employee, the longer it takes for the business
to accomplish what needs to be done by the person they need to hire. The business
therefore pays the price and suffers from delays in the hiring process. These delays
may even cause the business to lose a competitive edge or fall behind in the
marketplace. In other words, it costs the business money!
Finally, as it becomes known that your business is not looking for qualified candidates,
but instead is just hunting Unicorns, the pool of qualified potential candidates may
actually shrink. Candidates quickly get tired of the interviewing game and the associated
delays and take themselves out of consideration. Or they may be hired by another
company that moves faster and realizes that there is no such thing as a Unicorn. By

4. moving too slowly, not only is a Unicorn never found, the best candidate may be lost as
well. This causes the hiring process to drag on even longer.
When that happens, it means the hunt for a new employee has to start all over again!
Guess what? That costs money!
Let me say it again.
For each day lost in the search for a Unicorn, the business loses money!
Hunting Unicorns Costs Money
When we were all in about the 5th
or 6th
grade, we began learning a bit more advanced
math. One of the mathematical properties that we learned was known as the Transitive
Property. The transitive property proved that:
If A=B, and B=C, then A=C
The same thing holds true today for hunting for Unicorns:
A) If hunting Unicorns is extremely time consuming compared to hiring a qualified
candidate
B) And the more time the hiring process takes, the more money it costs
C) Then hunting Unicorns costs more money than finding and hiring a qualified
candidate
Summary
Let me put it in simple terms:
1) In the search for a new employee there is no such thing as a Unicorn
2) Hunting for Unicorns causes delays that impact the business
3) Those delays cost the business money
4) There are lots of qualified candidates that can do the job
5) Hire one of those candidates!
Now let’s just hope that all of those HR departments, recruiters, personnel managers
and hiring managers will begin to understand that by hunting Unicorns, they’re actually
hurting the business.
It’s simple.
© Richard Hatheway, Catalyst Strategic Marketing
All rights reserved