If you’re a business owner or a manager then you will understand how difficult and challenging building and motivating a perfect team can be. At Digital Team on Demand we have 13 years of experience doing just that; motivating teams of digital specialists to deliver exceptional work, maintaining excellent service, achieving results and keeping a big smile on your face!
We would like to share 3 top tips on what to think about when looking for, hiring and integrating digital professionals into your in house team and business.
What are you actually looking for and what does the business need?
It is very easy to just think ‘oh we need someone to do digital and set up Facebook advertising’ without really understanding the specifics of the job role and identifying the skills gaps in the current team that need filling and also tying it back to the objective of hiring someone in the first place. Analyse the strengths and weaknesses of the current team in relation to your digital strategy to help you identify the specific competencies and skills needed to bolster your in house team and to hit those all-important targets. Look at your current performance against your strategy to also identify where the gaps are in delivering the results. Why not try and include the existing team in the decision making of what support/skills they need, this will ensure buy in and also help you to understand what characteristics will fit well within the team.
You will then be in a position to draw up a comprehensive job description that you can use as a qualifying list when searching for the perfect candidate.
PLEASE NOTE: There is a complex set of skills required for a successful strategy with both analytical and creative skills required. This is very rare for one individual to have in abundance. Be prepared to have a collection of different people working within different disciplines but as a combined effort. This isn't easy but our next post will cover the best way to do that. One general digital marketing person doesn't often achieve the results you need!
How to find the perfect fit?
Now you have your ideal job description with all the skills you require to do the job and the characteristics you require to fit within the in house team, you’re ready to begin the hunt. When sourcing candidates make sure you use advertising platforms that suit your requirements, there is no use in using social media if the candidate you are looking for is unlikely to be looking for jobs or opportunities on there. Think about where your ideal audience is looking or lurking and advertise the job there. Make sure that all your requirements are clearly communicated and adapt the language depending on where you are advertising.
When conducting interviews make sure you plan ahead, decide on questions that correlate directly to the skills and characteristics you are looking for, using role play questions are a great way to really test what they would do in a particular situation or problem they might likely face within the role.
Allow enough time to go through everything you need to so you don’t need to rush. Ask each candidate the exact same questions so you can easily compare the answers and results. Using marking grids is a useful way to analyse the data and help you to inform your decision making.
You've found them so now the hard work begins!
The offer has been accepted or you've found the right consultant for the project, now comes the hard part, getting them started and integrated into the team. Ensure that you spend time explaining the expectations you have to build a framework for performance management and so they fully understand their responsibilities and lines of communication. Organise time for them to meet the rest for the team in a non-work environment to start building rapport, if this isn't possible then arrange a phone call or Skype chat so they can virtually meet the team they will be working with on a daily/weekly basis.
Arrange for an induction into the business as a whole, so that they have a clear picture of where they fit in, who they will be working with and the history and culture of the business.
Ensure that you have regular catch ups in the first month (and beyond), don’t just leave them to get on, it’s vitally important that you as the business owner or manager fully understand the work they are doing and also whether there are any problems that need airing as this could lead to performance issues in the short and long term and ultimately affect your business goals. Having one on one meeting’s also gives you an informal platform to check in on progress against performance targets.
These are just a few basic tips to think about when sourcing and embedding your in house digital team, you need to plan as much as possible to ensure they are firstly the right person for the job and secondly that they fully understand their responsibilities and performance targets.
Alternatively if you do not have the time to do any of the above or you don’t have the digital knowledge to know what you need in your business you can enlist the help of us and we will do all of that for you, phew!
If you are interested in learning more and discussing how Digital Team on Demand can help and support your business and digital growth then please get in contact - rosie@digitalteamondemand.co.uk.