Hiring Successfully in the era of the agile workforce

We’re living in the age of the agile workforce, with hybrid teams of full-time, onsite, remote, and freelance workers collaborating to create great results. In order to achieve the most success possible, companies need to innovate in their hiring practices and shift their thinking in some cases.

This means that a reliance on traditional methods of comparing talent, and even assumptions about the type of talent (full-time, part-time, or contractor) should be revisited. Here is what to avoid when hiring freelancers and contractors in the era of the agile workforce.

1: Don’t get distracted by the shiny objects

In the world of products, those with the best specifications haven’t always won out. Betamax was a superior format to VHS, but due to cost issues, as well as marketing, those of us that still remember those days know who won that war. The same can be said for many other things: sometimes the “shiny object” wins over one that is technically superior.

The same goes with the hiring process. Don’t get distracted by shiny objects like company names, titles, or other things that look or sound good, but require more details to determine their value. 

For instance, someone could be CEO of a 1-person company, but that doesn’t make them ready to be an executive at a Fortune 50 organization. Or, a graphic designer can have experience with household name brands, but only doing very tactical work that doesn’t translate into understanding how to design for larger projects.

Instead, you should focus on the results of those efforts. What did that CEO accomplish with their 1-person company, and what were the results of the designer’s efforts for those brands? While it can be harder to quantitatively measure results in some fields than others, adapt and adjust your thinking to focus on substance whenever you can.

2: Don’t mistake job titles for skill sets

Relying primarily on resumes when narrowing candidate sets has taught all of us some bad habits. One of these is to prioritize looking at job titles over getting a better understanding of the skill sets of the individuals. For instance, if you are hiring a graphic designer, how can you get a good understanding when comparing three different people with three different titles: Senior Designer, Art Director, and Creative Director? 

The answer to that question is, that it depends on a lot of factors. Each company might have a different definition of what each of those roles does. Also, sometimes people are promoted to job titles that outmatch their actual skillset. 

Instead of looking at job titles, then, you need to find ways to understand the skills used by an individual, and their level of expertise in those skills. This unfortunately can’t be done simply by reading a resume, but there are a number of relatively easy ways to assess a candidate’s skills.

Hiring freelancers or independent contractors? The same goes here as well. You can’t simply look at a portfolio or resume to hire short term workers successfully either. The world of the agile workforce means skills-based hiring is in, and reading resumes is out.

3: Don’t assume full-time hires are not the only viable option

The future of the workforce is going to rely on a hybrid model of employment. “Hybrid” can mean many things, but there are three primary components:

• A full-time in-office workforce

• A full-time remote, or partially remote workforce

• An independent contractor workforce

If we have learned anything over the last year, it is that flexibility is key to being successful in building teams and getting great work done. At the same time, not only does the same approach not work for every company, even within departments different team makeups might work better than others. 

Thus, in your hiring, you don’t need to only think in terms of full-time, in-office employees anymore. Sometimes highly-skilled contractors can fill a short-term need where a full-time position isn’t needed. Remote workers can also fill talent gaps in local markets where skillsets are difficult to source.

In my experience, this can be measured and evaluated by using both quantitative measures such as employee engagement surveys and productivity metrics, as well as more qualitative methods that help build empathy with employees and contractors.

Recruiting has been, and always will be about finding the best fits for the role. What continues to change are the internal and external factors that determine and influence what that best fit should be. In the era of the agile workforce, an adaptable approach will lead to the most success.