How to get the BEST employee

It's the age old question all potential employers dread - how do you know you are hiring the best person for the job?

Well there are several ways you can ensure you choose the right employee!! Some of them are obvious:

do their qualifications meet your needs?
does their previous job experience suit your requirements?
did their referees speak well of their strengths and abilities?

There are also the standard internal processes you need to ensure the candidate is well suited to the specific job role:

a detailed job description,
KPI's (Key Performance Indicators),
business hierarchy and reporting structure.

You can hedge your bets by using external sources, eg: recruitment specialists, who can perform specialist activities, such as:

interview techniques,
psychometrics, and
performance tests.

But there is one method that most employers overlook and it is the one area that can make all the difference to ensuring you have the BEST employee for the job! You need to find a way to measure a potential staff members resilience!

At the interview phase I have found that asking questions about how someone will handle a specific situation is a great way to measure if they will be a success in your organisation. To help you out, here are some of the questions I like to ask (in no particular order):

how would you respond if you hear staff member bad mouthing another staff member;
what would you do if your immediate supervisor asked you to drop everything to do something for them, but you are on a deadline for something else;
what is the best way to placate an angry customer;
how would you handle a situation if you realise you make a mistake before someone else picks it up;
how would you handle someone pointing a mistake out to you;
how do you unwind after a particularly stressful day at work.

These are some great questions to help you determine someone's resilience! You see, you may have a number of candidates with the experience and qualifications you need; they may all have glowing references (because let's face it - we don't give poor references to potential employers, do we??). They may score well on typing tests, or personality tests - but in the end, if they fall apart when something goes wrong, if they are unable to take responsibility for their actions, if they undermine their colleagues - is this the type of person you really want, despite what else they bring to the table??

I have a saying - you can teach anyone about a product or service, you can't teach them how to care!

Have you got any examples of great questions to ask? We'd love to hear them!