Kimberly
Rath, President and Managing Partner, Talent Plus, has nearly 25 years
of experience in the human resources field, and she is a recognized
leader in the field of executive development. Rath provides executive
management consulting consulting and training to organizations
worldwide, including the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company, The Estee Lauder
Companies, and Mercedes-Benz USA.
Rath asserts that:
(Talent + Fit) x Investment = Growth
- Talent means "Talent/Potential"
- Fit means "Culture, Schedule, Compensation, Skills, Education"
- Investment means "Relationship, Training, Mentoring"
"Recruiting is like shaving…if you don't do it every day, it gets a little rough, and a little shaggy."
"We are a company of 120 people. We had 1,500 applicants last year."
Rath
also led the group in a very eloquent conversation of the judgements
and labels we put on candidates based on our initial impressions. Bill
Eckstrom was a great sport, and allowed himself to be "labeled" by the
group. Literally.
Rath counseled that an organization needs to hire "as-is" – as fundamental change of an individual is unlikely.
Over
thousands of interviews, the attributes that Talent Plus has seen that
drive success are the following nine (values, competition, focus,
discipline, customer relationship, empathy, positivity, persuasion,
enterpriser), in the following five categories:
Drives and Values
Values
CompetitionWork Style
Focus
DisciplinePeople Acumen
Customer Relationship
Empathy
PositivityInfluence
PersuasionThought Process
Enterpriser
Successful
sales people need to have 2 of the following 3, according to Rath:
Enterpriser, Persuasion, Competition. ("After Sept. 11," Rath noted,
"the two key attributes were Positivity and Persuasion.")
"We can predict failure — e.g. 'this person won't make it' — better than we can predict success."
"The behaviors you hire in, they define your culture."