Skip to main content

Optimise your recruitment now! | Issue #178

10 ways to optimise your recruitment process to attract top talent

Want to grow your business this year? Then you’re going to need good people. Hiring top talent is the single most important difference you can make. Yes, strategy is essential. And your execution plan needs to be sector-beating. But without A-Players to carry this out, you may as well pack up now. Blackpool donkeys are never going to win the National. Loveable, they might be. Race winners, they’re not.

So why do so few companies give recruitment the focus it needs? Job ads are sloppy and unfocused; interviewers are untrained, recruitment procedures are excruciatingly long and drawn out. You might blame the ‘war on talent’ for your inability to recruit talented staff, but I don’t buy this. Does this even exist? The labour market’s always been tight for A-Players (the top 10% of available talent for a given job, salary and location). If you’ve committed to recruiting only the best and decided to screen out B and C-Players, there’s always going to be stiff competition. You’ve made your life hard, but you know the rewards are worth it.

So how do you make sure your recruitment process attracts top talent?


How to Plan for and Execute Blitzscaling with Chris Yeh

Why do some organisations grow really quickly? How do they reach the scale that they do? If you’re looking for the secret sauce to make your company grow exponentially, then don’t miss Chris Yeh on this week’s episode of The Melting Pot. 

Chris is a venture capitalist with Blitzscaling Ventures, educator at the Blitzscaling Academy, and co-author with LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman, of bestselling books Alliance and Blitzscaling (among others).

In this latest episode, Chris explains why companies and employees lie to each other, why we all need to be having more grown up conversations, and why he wrote Blitzscaling. 

He also discusses the algorithm his VC firm has built to score companies as they come to market looking for money, and shares his thoughts on the most interesting businesses to come to market in recent years (and the ones to avoid). 

Download and listen today.


Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders

Each week, experienced entrepreneurs and innovators come to Stanford University to candidly share lessons they’ve learned while developing, launching and scaling disruptive ideas. The Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders Series is produced by Stanford eCorner during fall, winter and spring quarters.


3 Strategic Options to Deal with Inflation

Companies tend to deal with inflation by raising prices, accepting smaller margins, or reducing product costs (and often quality). However, better analytics now allows companies to consider more sophisticated strategic responses to inflation. This article looks at three larger strategic responses: Making changes to the product portfolio, repositioning the brand, or revamping the pricing model.

Reid Hoffman and Chris Yeh share four ways to ‘blitzscale’ your business

Six of the world’s ten largest companies fall into the ‘serial business builder’ category. What does that mean, and what do these companies have in common? In a recent webinar hosted by McKinsey, Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn and partner at venture capital firm Greylock, and Chris Yeh, co-founder of the Global Scaling Academy, offered insights. They explained that ‘serial business builders’ are organizations that relentlessly come with new ideas and spin them into scalable businesses—businesses that can disrupt entire markets by creating value in radically new ways.

Why We Adopted a 4-day Work Week

When, at Friday Pulse, they realized that the pandemic wasn’t ending any time soon, they knew they needed to do something for their team. With people feeling overworked and on the brink of burnout, they switched to a 4-day workweek to astounding results. Here’s a look at what happened.


Beyond Digital by Paul Leinwand and Mahadeva Matt Mani

Digital transformation is critical. But winning in today’s world requires more than digitization. It requires understanding that the nature of competitive advantage has shifted—and that being digital is not enough. In Beyond Digital, Paul Leinwand and Matt Mani from Strategy&, PwC’s global strategy consulting business, take readers inside twelve companies and how they have navigated through this monumental shift: from Philips’s reinvention from a broad conglomerate to a focused health technology player, to Cleveland Clinic’s engagement with its broader ecosystem to improve and expand its leading patient care to more locations around the world, to Microsoft’s overhaul of its global commercial business to drive customer outcomes.


Anthro-Vision by Gillian Tett

Meet the business anthropologists seeking to explain how we buy, sell, work and think.
From supermarkets to factories, trading floors to tech firms, their methods are revealing the hidden codes that define our lives. The result is a wholly new way to see human behaviour: anthro-vision.


News from the farm

The Melting Pot LIVE episode with Ian Mann and Dominic Monkhouse

Is your business protected and prepared to deal with potential cyber-attacks?

Attacks such as ransomware are increasing at a 400% rate year on year. We see reports of significant incidents in the media regularly. Staying on top of your security is now more critical than ever.

That’s why cyber security expert and CEO of ECSC Group, Ian Mann is joining us for a LIVE session to share his expertise and insights.

Ian and Dominic will discuss the reasons behind the increase of cyber-attacks and the actions you can take today to protect you, your data and your business.

Join LIVE, 7th March at 12:30 GMT


Register Here


MEANINGFUL ACTION FOR MONDAY

Speed up recruitment of A-Players

A-Players aren’t out of work. If you get a sniff of an A-Player on the back of a job ad, they need to talk to the person that they’re going to work for, immediately. Once they’ve gone through a screening interview with HR – and if this candidate looks like an A-player – they need to talk to the hiring manager in the next 24 hours. You need to get them through your interview process in a week. That speed will help you land amazing people. You need your conversion rate of potential hires to hired to be 100%.


Upcoming events

Like Minds Nudge Ideas Festival, Exeter (UK) – 25th March

The Like Minds Nudge Ideas Festival is back in person. Join 200+ entrepreneurs and business leaders at the South West business event of the year. It takes place at the impressive Winslade Manor, just outside Exeter on March 25th. They’ve curated an amazing group of speakers and workshop leaders for you this year.

Early Bird tickets are on sale now and include all your tea/coffee during the breaks and lunch in the Georgian Manor House itself.

Very limited on numbers so don’t miss out.


Monkhouse & Company Scaling Up Workshop – New Forest – 23rd June

The workshop is your first step in the process of identifying and addressing the real challenges confronting your business. You will receive practical guidance in the essential skills that underpin manageable and sustained growth. Join five other business leaders on a half-day session with Dominic Monkhouse, away from the uproar of the everyday commercial world and look at your business afresh – to recognise your strengths, your weaknesses and your opportunities.


CEO Bootcamp with Verne Harnish and Dominic Monkhouse – 12-15th September

Author of Scaling Up, Verne Harnish is coming to the UK for the first Scaling Up CEO Bootcamp in Europe. A reinvigorating 4-day Bootcamp where you and nine other CEOs and their #2’s will spend small group and one-on-one time with Verne addressing your specific opportunities and challenges – in a setting that promotes deep thinking and relaxation.

Join Verne and Dominic from Monday 12th, September – Thursday 15th, September at Lucknam Park Hotel & Spa, near Bath (UK).


Quote of the week

“If 90 percent of life is just showing up, the other 10 must be just standing up.”

Tim Keown

Dominic Monkhouse

Dominic offers business coaching and management development, strategy planning and organisational change, using tried and tested methods to launch your organisation onto an unparalleled growth trajectory. His programme is a function of his broad experience, his deep expertise and a proven process used by over 2,700 firms worldwide.

Scale Your Business

Answer 10 challenging questions and discover if your business is going to crush it or get crushed.

Get your own growth report with customised insights that will help you to identify the main challenges that may prevent your business from scaling up.

Take the Scorecard

Receive Dominic Monkhouse’s expertise in your inbox every week

Sign up today and get your copy of F**K PLAN B: How to scale your technology business faster and achieve Plan A, the book that will change your business and your life.

      Discovery Call | Business Growth Strategy Session

        Enquiry | Scaling Up Master Business Course