How do we get rid of the resume?

The resume and the cover letter have been connected to recruitment for decades. And that is weird, as the purpose of our profession is to select the candidate that is the best fit for the job. The cover letter and resume do a great job of telling what a person has done, they are not great at predicting future performance.

Why the resume is dead

Yes, I've said it. The resume is dead and we should actively take it off life support. Don't get me wrong, there is value in knowing someone's background, though the resume should not be a key driver in decision-making around how well we think someone will fit the role, the team, and the org.

And for everyone who feels resistance coming on and thinks I'm just saying it because of the hype. No, the resume is really dead. In many industries and types of recruitment, the resume has been dead for a couple of years. Think about blue-collar recruitment in operations, retail, logistics, and hospitality.

Does it really matter that someone worked in IT for 20 years and now decided to become a truck driver? Or is someone who worked in retail stores for the last 10 years really better than a mom who decided to go back to work again after being out for 5 years?

So why do we stick to the resume?

What do the 2 examples have in common? What is important is identifying 'what makes someone a good fit and successful in the role'. The answer to this question has to do with what 'skills and competencies' someone possesses or can develop on the job. (And combine this with what people want in their lives and to what degree this job is a good fit for that).

And if we have a clear understanding of what skills and competencies drive performance, success and satisfaction it will also prove to be a better way to hire for white-collar roles.

When it comes to being able to hire for skills and competencies, there is a hard truth. The vast majority of TA teams around the world don't know which skills and competencies make someone successful in the role. So what happens is 'we stick to what we know works', while it kinda doesn't...

This lack of knowledge or insight does not only sit within the TA team, Hiring Managers and business leaders often don't know the answer to what set of skills, competencies and behaviours make people thrive.

Where do the knowledge and ownership sit?

Your HR or People organisation. Yes being able to switch successfully to skills and competency-based hiring requires your HR team to step up their game implementing the right frameworks and infrastructure for skills and competencies to form the basis of people management. So, that's the end of the article; Just get them to do it, right?

Obviously, TA needs to be a big partner in translating a skills and competency approach into how we map them per role and team. Then how do we translate this into how we do recruitment. How do we advertise, how do we screen, how do we interview/assess, and how do we make hiring decisions based on the right data. This would mean each Hiring Manager in your organisation needs to be re-educated on how to hire people, which is a bit of a monumental project.

And this is exactly where we should take an active role as TA teams. To give an idea of what that could look like;

Example; When a role opens up, let's say in the performance marketing team as a random example, as a TA specialist I would love to have the following conversation. Ok Hiring Manager, we have a clear overview of the set of skills and competencies you need in your team to achieve your goals. Now that person X has left I have 2 questions;

1. What is the gap in skills and competencies we need to replace because person X has left?

2. Now that we have the opportunity to make a new hire, looking at your team vs the ideal skills and competency set, what would you like to add to your team?

This would form the basis of the job description and search & selection criteria. I would literally put the skills & competencies we are looking for in the 'requirements' field rather than 'x years of experience & master degree'.

The skills and competencies would form the basis of the screening, interviewing, and of course the hiring decision. (for which we ALWAYS have a dedicated meeting with the entire interview team present *couch* :)

What to do as a TA leader if you are stuck on resume-based hiring?

Talk to your CHRO or people leaders! Any business leader sometimes needs another team to change or implement something for them to be successful. This also goes for us in Talent Acquisition. Yes, you are a business leader, you are not an operational manager of a back-office function ;)

If your organisation has some project work going on around skills and competency mapping, maybe around internal mobility or performance management. Great! Make sure that if they believe those skills and competencies are drivers for success, you want to get involved to ensure you are capable of actually hiring people based on this.

If your organisation has no priority around any of these topics. You need to step up and become the advocate for this internally. And if you think it is not your place, I would challenge that. Anything that could drastically improve your ability to hire the exact right people into the business is definitely your place to make noise about. Sometimes we need to influence and stakeholder manage outside the boundaries of our profession or team, this is one of those examples.

Good luck!

ps. Yes, I do help TA leaders build their case and get HR and leadership on board. If you want to have a chat, drop me a line.