I recently had the chance to sit down with Dan Andrews, one of the brains behind Dynamite Jobs, an amazing remote job board. He's also the host of the Tropical MBA podcast (which, if you aren't already listening to, do it already!). Our conversation covered all sorts of things, but we dug into some elements of hiring well in a remote context and I wanted to share three takeaways that surfaced during our conversation.
Tell People Who You Are
It's very important, especially for a company making the first of their remote hires, to really be aware of their employer brand. This means taking the time to lean in and tell people about who you are and what you're about. Once you've done that you can get around to crafting the job listing.
As I talked about in my series on hiring, the text of your job ad is really important, as it has to stand out when people might be scrolling on the toilet. But the best applicants want a backstory on the company too, not just a great job listing, so make sure you've taken the time to do that — really talking about why your company exists, what your culture is, and what kind of people will thrive with you — and once you have, you'll have it for every future job listing.
Consider Outsourcing
One of the options that Dynamite Jobs offers is flat-rate placement, which I think is awesome. If you find the entire hiring process a hassle, that's understandable (it's still a part of entrepreneurship, so you can't ditch it entirely if you want to grow past solopreneurship). That's where outsourcing comes in.
Now, you're not totally off the hook. You're still going to need to do final interviews. But a company like Dynamite Jobs will sit down with you to figure out exactly what you want so that they'll take care of all the screening. Only the final batch of best candidates will be sent your way, with their thoughts and comments.
It's a Numbers Game
At one point in our conversation Dan asked a couple probing questions from my perspective as a Dynamite Jobs client. One of them focused on getting to the finish line and making a final offer. My experience was in alignment with what he has seen site-wide, which is that it takes quite a few applications in total to get us to the stages of:
- good (meets the minimum requirements of the application)
- interviewed (worthy of a deeper look)
- offered (we want this person with us)
Often I found that there was one person that was head and shoulders above the rest and others who would be solid, but were not our first choice.
That outcome isn't bad. In fact, it underlines the importance of the numbers game. Fill your funnel so you can have that one very clear best hire. Otherwise you may end up choosing between just the solid applicants instead of also having the amazing one you wanted.
These were just three things I wanted to share after my conversation with Dan. If you want to listen to the entire conversation Dan and I had, you can find it here.
Photo by LinkedIn Sales Solutions on Unsplash
This article was written by Neel from MaidThis Franchise, a remote-local franchise opportunity for people looking to escape the rate race and reach financial freedom. Learn more here.
