Hire Better, Suck Less. Mitigating Virtual Hiring Loopholes.

Some companies have many years of experience with managing a remote team. Due to COVID (heard of it?), managing a remote team is new to many.

Me? I've had an entirely remote team since day one of owning my 14 year long SEO agency, SEO National. We’ve optimized websites for NBA teams, billion-dollar international real estate agencies, businesses featured on Shark Tank, INC 5000 companies, and so many other cool companies and people. All with a team of two dozen that I've never met in real life.

How crazy is that?

Well, there is one exception to meeting a quarter of my team in March 2020. But that's a story for another day (I was half way across the globe when COVID exploded, cutting the trip short).

Managing a team remotely can be very different than managing a team that is in front of you. Let's start with five real-life challenges/tips to managing a remote team.

1. Frontload your hiring efforts to find the right candidate

Better to take more time finding the right person than to “save time” finding the wrong person and have to clean up the mess later and start the search all over again.

“Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.” — Abraham Lincoln

2. Experience over resume — ask to see their work

Anyone can say anything on a resume. Understandably, people need a job. Unfortunately, that means skills are exaggerated.

When available, depending on the industry, ask to see some real-life examples of their work. Seeing tangible results is infinitely more insightful than a resume.

3. Pay for a test

I pay candidates to do a test all of the time. Offer a paid test and set realistic expectations that you want to make sure their skills are a match. That way, you establish trust (if you do continue engaging) by valuing their time. They’ll also appreciate time not lost as unpaid if the opportunity didn’t work out.

4. Trust your heart

Maintaining positivity within the organization is a must. If you have a candidate with an amazing resume and skillset, but they come across as an emotional vampire… NOPE!

5. Trust your gut

If something feels wrong, something is wrong.

Don’t make exceptions to your hiring loopholes.

A hack I use all of the time is throwing curve balls. By creating silly requests, you can proactively eliminate half of the job candidates immediately.

Example? I like to ask candidates to contact me through a specific channel with a specific message. For example, if I post a job on a website, I’ll ask the candidates not to message me in that portal’s messaging system. I’ll send them elsewhere, like Skype. I’ll also ask them to copy and paste a bizarre intro message, like “When you message on Skype, please say, 'T-rex is bodacious!'”

Why? You’re passively finding candidates that:

1. read thoroughly
2. can follow directions

In the past, I made the mistake of making exceptions. I’d see a shiny resume in my inbox on the hiring website. The candidate looked perfect, so I replied. I’ve also responded to candidates that Skyped me but didn’t tell me how bodacious T-rex was. Save yourself. It. Never. Works. Out. Don’t make exceptions to your hiring loopholes.

If someone is in front of you, body language helps a lot with communication. But when someone is remote, how can you give honest feedback without it being misinterpreted as being negative?

Proactively communicate that you’d rather someone be honest with their question, fear, or mistake so you can help them proactively, versus you finding out on your own and have to correct course reactively after the damage is already done.

Beyond just mitigating awkward feedback sessions, I don’t want to micromanage. For that reason, I’d way rather spend weeks finding the right candidate than hiring quickly. Sure, not filling a role can be painful as the workload builds up, but having a poor performer or someone that brings a gray cloud to company culture is a lot more painful to try and cleanse later.

Tips to give constructive feedback virtually to prevent from sounding too critical or harsh:

Compliment sandwich:

• top bread = compliment

Be sincere. Compliment them with something that is truly one of their good characteristics. Otherwise, you’ll make the whole situation worse with fake schmoozing.

• “meat” of the compliment sandwich = the feedback

Be direct. Don’t give a huge backstory, don’t justify what you’re about to say. Say what needs to be said and how it impacts you all. Don’t make it come across that only one side or the other suffers. Communicate that you’re a team, and by correcting course, it’s not only a win for you but also for them and their colleagues.

• bottom bread = compliment

Thank them for their time and willingness to be open-minded to creating a winning solution for the whole team.

What about teams who are used to working together on location but are forced to work remotely due to the pandemic?

Different reality = different people.

Stay humble and be graceful as you’re given a unique opportunity to virtually join people in their homes that are otherwise private.

We’re all human and bring that awareness of humanity to the discussion. Everyone’s homes will be different; some bigger, some smaller, some perfectly polished, some homes a FEMA kid tornado zone.

Can you create a healthy and empowering work culture with a team that is remote and not physically together? YES!

If you care, they care. And if you want extreme examples, here you go. The team I've never met have:

• asked me to be a godfather of their child
• asked me to be a mentor over their marriage
• when I couldn't personally attend one of their weddings because my wife was about to deliver our daughter, they ordered a life-size cutout of me and had the cardboard cutout IN THEIR WEDDING (legit in their wedding)

Just because you’re not physically close, doesn’t mean you can’t be emotionally close.

Do virtual team bonding activities or offer one-on-one growth opportunities. Find out what activities are near the team members’ locations, figure out their interests or if they’re a parent, and offer unique activities that they can do within groups that they can socialize with. BE HUMAN!

It has been really interesting being more introspective the last year or two and seeing how most people have insecurities. Often, they’re so simple to the outsiders but so huge to the person. Sometimes all it takes is a little nudging at the right time from the right source of caring, and amazing things happen.

Originally published by Damon Burton on Thrive Global.