Hire Positive People

Hire positive people.

Their go-to attitude, hard working ethos, and optimism will become contagious to other employees and you’ll have the best workforce on the block, wowing customers and boosting the bottom line.

So says Patrick Yearout, director of training for Ivar’s Restaurants, Seattle, who presented at the National Restaurant Association Show, which is being held now, May 5 through 8, in Chicago.

Some more perks of hiring a positive individual:

• When confronted with an obstacle, positive people find a way past it.
• Positive people lead to more satisfied customers.
• They look for solutions to problems instead of complaining about obstacles.
• Positive staff members are more accepting of constructive criticism (a negative person will think you’re picking on them).
• Positive people are healthier, meaning fewer sick days that you may have to pay for.
• They work harder.

“The last thing you want is a negative person, whose emotions spread like a poison,” Yearout said.

He pointed to a December 2011 survey by Career Builder that showed that:

• 41 percent lost worker productivity
• 40 percent lost time to recruit/train another worker
• 37 percent incurred costs to recruit/train
• 36 percent said the poor hire had a negative impact on employee morale

Yearout used these numbers to illustrate how important it is to hire the right person, and to do that hiring well in the first place.

To be successful at finding the right person, Yearout suggested being meticulous in the interview process. “Always remember what you are looking for [in an employee] and write it down,” he says. “Even keep a job description written down with you during the interview, so you don’t get swayed by other things on the resume or things they say.”

Be sure to look thoroughly into the person’s background and check that everything seems credible. And did the applicant arrive promptly, answer questions clearly, and provide a clean and neat application form and resume as well as present him or herself neatly?

Pay attention to red flags, Yearout cautions. “When you’re interviewing someone, this is their opportunity to shine. If they can’t impress you once they’re putting their best foot forward, do you think it’s going to get any better on the job?”

During the interview, an employer should ask an applicant three types of questions:

Open-ended questions, which are designed to get the applicant talking. Ninety percent of the talking in an interview should be by the applicant. “So ask open-ended questions. They’re your secret weapon to get them talking,” Yearout says.

Examples: “Tell me about your previous position.” “Tell me about the atmosphere at your last position.”

Behavioral questions. An employee’s past behavior is the best predictor of his or her future behavior. “Don’t ask hypothetical questions because they can give the perfect answer,” he advises.

Examples: “How did you improve employee moral at your last job?” “What are some programs you instituted to improve guest counts?”

Self-appraisal questions, which help you learn what they learned.

Examples: “How did that incident change you as a team leader?” “What did you learn about yourself when confronting this problem?”

Once you have interviewed all candidates, don’t hire someone merely because there was not a suitable applicant “and do not be influenced to overlook an applicant’s shortcomings” Yearout cautions. “It’ s much more costly to hire the wrong person."

By Amanda Baltazar