Why Job Search is Full of Myths

Why job search so bizarre.

Why this is good news for you.

The bad news is simply this: everyday hiring processes don't work. Standard interviews are almost useless at predicting who is going to be a good employee. Hardly anything works at any stage of employee selection. To be more exact: Hiring managers don't know what they actually need. Thus, they don't know what to look for. They can't detect whether a person is a bad or good fit, even when sitting before them. I'll prove this in a minute. Now, the stakes are very high for the employer and the job seeker. The uncertainty gap drives everyone nuts. The void is filled with myths, unfounded beliefs, and superstition. The lack of predictability may be covered over with procedures and justifications. Or gut reactions may take over. Or both. This is why job search is so unlike regular sales and marketing.

The good news is that I know the valid "fit factors". Offering truly useful information about the "job-person match" works like magic. There is lot to say when selling a high-priced intangible product (such as yourself and your future contributions). Candidates must prove 1) that they are not losers and 2) that they would be a good fit for this particular job. Writing or saying the most objectively relevant things works like a charm. It is like saying: "Here are the answers to the questions that you would ask: 1) if you knew what you what you needed, 2) if you knew what you were looking for, 3) if you wanted the best match. These answers prove that I do not resemble your other hiring mistakes. I do resemble your hiring successes."

Let me back up and make the first point again.
The most fundamental finding in selection science literature: all job selection criteria are near invalid. This applies to more than just resume screening and interviewing. Every step that filters and sorts is a "test" that predicts who will be a good employee.

Except for some basic qualification criteria, all normal employee selection steps are marginally effective. The research is clear, long-standing, and consistent: you just can't pick 'em. Not from an online form, resume, referral, regular interview, or group interview.

The staffing process has plenty of procedures and justifications. But they don't have predictive validity. You may wonder if high-paid headhunters are any better. Nope. Clueless, just like everyone else, but very good at covering it up.

I've pressed a lot of hiring managers about how they really choose employees. The factors they actually use to select one candidate over another - are just made up.

Numbers you can understand.
All the studies written by academics boil down to this. Correlations of r = .30 are typical in real studies of hiring effectiveness. For any employment selection process, the signal to noise ratio averages in the 10-90% range, that's 90% noise and 10% accurate message (this person would be good or bad). Whether the next employee to be hired is above average or below average is slightly better than 50-50. It is a 55-45 coin toss.

Cover a piece of paper with just 4 fingers, not your hand. That represents the largest amount of useful information people have before they hire or reject you. All the white space stands for pure guessing. No wonder they get it wrong 90% of the time.

So, in a vacuum of true information, people decide with intuition, superstition, and mumbo-jumbo. After all, when you are only looking for one person, and there are lots of candidates to weed out, any reason at all will reduce the pile.

How could everyone be this wrong?
For thousands of years, most people in the world believed that draining blood out of sick people helped them get well. It never did any good, of course, only real harm. Any evidence was ignored and the mass belief lived on, even if the patients didn't. Barbers still have red stripped polls to denote bleeding as healthy.

Hiring decisions are 90% inaccurate. It is fully documented fact.

But, I know who I like.
Yes, everybody has consistent preferences on who they like. It's just that people disagree on those preferences. When everyone has a different list of candidate rankings, most will be wrong. This is a larger effect than is normally visible.

To be more precise: intra-rater reliability is high; inter-rater reliability is low. Validity cannot be higher than reliability.

Proof you can see anywhere.
You may know the old 80-20 rule. Such as:
80% of the sales come from 20% of the customers and
80% of the profits come from 20% of the sales.

For mid-and upper level salary workers, it's the 2 to 1 rule. This rule applies across the broad range of industries and job functions. Roughly 67% of the work is done by 33% of the workers. Just look around. Two-thirds of the value is generally accomplished by one-third of the employees. The top half is twice as productive as the other half.

If hiring procedures actually selected only good employees, this would not be true. Enough said on that.

All this uncertainty works to your advantage.
How would you sell paintings to the blind?

Imagine a town of blind people with a big art museum. These blind people are rich. And they desperately need paintings. What would you do? How would you sell to them?

All the other salespeople have strange ideas which they picked up from the blind themselves and their art brokers (also blind). A painting's frame is very important it seems…

You can be the "two-eyed man in the land of the blind."
Advanced selection science has posted very strong benchmarks of hiring effectiveness. My favorite source here is Dr. Wendell Williams of ScientificSelection. But few know of these results and fewer know the methods.

Now, most job seekers are snake bit with the superstitions that surround the hiring rituals. Well, Hello? This is business. By the way, sales techniques work. But even sales and marketing pros have a hard time converting their expertise to their own job searches.

Sales and marketing principles method work especially well on the blind, desperate, and demoralized. Hiring Managers may try everything, but nothing works. One must accept the reality that "sometimes I choose someone good and sometimes, I can never tell." Hiring Managers, put on a good front, but there is nothing there except the power to choose. Remember, no predictive validity.

Staffing people are always talking about the "match" between person and job. But what traits to use? Technical competence? Yes, but that not usually why people are poor performers.

I have what you need, whether you know it or not.

There are actually valid factors, that vary up and down with people and that vary up and down with jobs. To identify those factors and your place on them, is a message worth conveying.

For candidates to detect and assert these valid fit factors gives a calming reassurance to demoralized hiring managers. They won't know why, but you can convincingly prove that you really aren't a turkey, and probably won't be another hiring mistake. You can describe yourself as a match in ways that HR and job descriptions don't attempt.

The research has spoken; we have the answers, the factors. You can honestly make the compelling case that you are the ideal candidate. And prove it to the skeptical so that they believe in you too.