Hiring Tip: Search for Candidates Who Have Failed

During your hiring process, consider looking for job candidates who have failed. This advice may sound counterintuitive. After all, your company wants to succeed and you don’t want to bring in staff members who cannot help your business achieve its goals. The key thing to remember is past failures and mistakes are how people learn and grow as professionals.

Your company can benefit by hiring job candidates who have failed in the past because:

• Candidates with past failures have shown perseverance. A person who has always had it easy and never made mistakes may be unable to respond effectively if something goes wrong. On the job, things do happen and setbacks occur. You want someone with coping skills who has shown that he gets right back up again after getting knocked down. When someone fails and comes back again to try to do better, that person is going to be an asset to your company due to their persistence.

• Candidates who have failed have learned from their errors. Very few great accomplishments have come from a first attempt. Many of the brightest minds have suffered setbacks and failures along their path to success. With each failure, a person learns more about what works and what doesn’t. Failure also forces creative thinking so you can do better next time. If a job seeker can explain how they’ve turned past failures into successes, your company can benefit from their ability to think outside the box and find solutions. 

• Candidates with past failures have developed problem-solving skills. People who challenge themselves to solve complex problems often fail in early attempts, but are ultimately able to prevail by using their brains to find solutions. Those who have never failed, on the other hand, may not have pushed themselves … and they won’t have the experience necessary to respond to setbacks through innovation that could help your business to reach new heights of success.

SmartTalent connects companies in Kirkland, Fife, Renton, Lacey, Lynnwood, Everett and surrounding areas with job candidates who are ready to help businesses to succeed. Many of these job candidates have failed in the past, learned from their mistakes and picked themselves back up again.

We help you find workers who can bring this perseverance and on-the-job learning abilities to your business. Give us a call today to find out more about the ways in which our staffing service helps with your hiring process by facilitating your search for the right candidates.