elevating soft skills in engineering talent acquisition · this e-book explores the ways leading...

Systematic Engineering Talent AcquisitionAssessmentInsights from Forward-Thinking Companies & Executives

• Systematically Assessing Soft Skills

• Determining Cultural Fit

• Quantitative Interviewing Systems

• Quality of Hire Metrics

ENGINEERINGt a l e n t s o l u t i o n s180

https://180engineering.com

As we consider the talent acquisition and retention challenges facing virtually all of us within theengineering and IT fields, three issues spring to mind:

• Within our knowledge-based economy, few demands are higher priority than acquiring and retaining the talent needed to grow our businesses.

• The search and acquisition process for top engineering talent is extremely competitive.

• Without effective talent acquisition processes, there’s no method to ensure we have the key skills needed to grow our businesses.

These three statements are not profound individually, yet collectively they

are quite challenging and foundational to the future success of our indus-

try. Nearly all of us readily accept that acquiring and retaining the right

talent is critical. Additionally, most of us would agree that the engineering

and IT labor markets are tight to the point of significant long-term concern.

The United States is not graduating enough engineers and IT profession-

als, and the current immigration policies may put additional pressure on

our ability to source talent from other parts of the world. For a deeper dive

into the state of the engineering labor market in the United States, we

encourage you to explore another recent e-book, Engineering Talent in the

U.S.A. Demand > Supply, A Special Report on the Tightening Engineering

Labor Market.

Systematic Engineering Talent Acquisition AssessmentInsights from Forward-ThinkingCompanies & Executives • Systematically Assessing Soft Skills

• Determining Cultural Fit

• Quantitative Interviewing Systems

• Quality of Hire Metrics

S Y S T E M A T I C E N G I N E E R I N G T A L E N T A C Q U I S I T I O N A S S E S S M E N T 2

TheGuide forTackling theTight Engineering and IT LaborMarket



https://180engineering.com/tackling-tight-engineering-market-guide/





Many would agree that our talent acquisition processes need to be

as robust as possible, but are our hiring processes evolving with the

changing demands of businesses and the market as a whole?

Nearly all of us value data-driven, systematic decision-making for

aspects of our business, such as operations, finance, manufacturing,

research and development productivity, and marketing. However, are we

bringing this same discipline and analysis to talent acquisition? How do

we know whether our talent acquisition processes are effective?

This e-book explores the ways leading organizations and industry

executives are improving talent acquisition by focusing on the areas

that are most difficult to measure objectively --interviewing, soft skills

assessments, cultural fit and quality of hire evaluations.

Systematically Assessing Intangibles Is Critical to Improving Talent AcquisitionTechnical skills are a basic requirement for consideration.Soft skills and cultural fit determine which doors will open fora candidate.

We meticulously collect data, monitor trendlines, and hold ourselves and our teams accountable for a wide assortment of performance metrics.

However, few of us apply the same rigor to talent acquisition and retention—one of the most critical aspects to the future success of our businesses.

Why is this? Arguably, because we have convinced ourselves that hiring is more of an art than a science. That it’s too difficult to measure. Cultural fit

and soft skills are right up there in importance next to technical skills when hiring engineering and IT professionals. However, few organizations have

a system to truly measure these areas during interviews or to monitor the results over time. Even fewer organizations track hiring decision-making

after the fact so that continuous improvement opportunities might be identified.

Additionally, within many organizations, systematic interviewing constructs are often missing. The good news is that it is possible to apply methodical

approaches to these areas and hire candidates who are better fits for your needs and your organization. Even better, improved talent recruitment processes

will ultimately make your company more attractive to potential employees within this highly competitive talent market.

3

How concerned are you about your company’s ability to recruit theengineering andtechnology talent needed for your company’s long-term growth?

Very concerned

Moderately concerned

Not at all concerned

62%

32%

3%

S Y S T E M A T I C E N G I N E E R I N G T A L E N T A C Q U I S I T I O N A S S E S S M E N TENGINEERINGt a l e n t s o l u t i o n s180


7 Tips for Creating a Structured Interview Process As much as possible, interviews should be standard, equitable, and efficient. In addition to making better hiring decisions, approaching interviewing

in this fashion improves the candidate experience by making the process discernibly fairer and more transparent.

Avoid comparing candidates to each other or to current employees. Instead, strive to compare candidates to the established ideal as reflected in your rubric.

1. Establish position requirements. Prior to posting the job, determine

what is required for this position, such as technical skills, role-related

knowledge, soft skills, and a level of general cognitive ability. Your

company and team culture and how these characteristics relate to this

position must also be determined.

2. Bank of Interview Questions. Develop a list of questions relevant to

the role, work to validate your questions against the role requirements,

and ask the questions consistently across all interviews. Ask both behav-

ioral and hypothetical questions. Behavioral questions will focus on how

the candidate responded to a given situation in the past. Hypothetical

questions ask how they would approach challenges in your workplace.

The goal is not to trick the candidate with brain teasers or crazy scenari-

os, but to truly assess how the candidate might handle a challenge while

working for your company in this position.

3. Create a Rubric. Once you have a bank of solid interview questions,

figure out what the good, mediocre, and poor answers look like, and

record them in a rubric. Then, ask each candidate the same questions in

the same way and grade their answers against your rubric.

4. Standard Rubric Scoring. Develop standard rubric scoring for a given

position or type of position. Consistently assessing candidates against

the same expectations reduces unintentional bias and allows you to

better predict on-the-job performance. Avoid comparing candidates to

each other or to current employees. Instead, strive to compare candidates

to the established ideal as reflected in your rubric.

6. Interviewer Recommendations. After each interview, the interviewer

completes the rubric, makes notes about the candidate’s specific an-

swers within the interview, and makes a hire or no-hire recommendation.

7. Train Interviewers. Interviewing is a skill that must be practiced and

perfected. Interviewers should undergo training and, if possible and

appropriate, shadow experienced interviewers.

4

Does your company have a well-defined, systematic interviewing process that allows you to track and measure the effectiveness of your company’sinterviewing process?

Yes

No

64%

36%



Systematically Assessing Soft SkillsSoft skills have always been important, but they’re increasingly vital. The rise of automation and artificial intelligence means that hard skills alone are no longer enough to be successful. Additionally, the valuable life span of many hard skills is shrinking, but soft skills will stay relevant for the long haul.

In LinkedIn’s 2019 Global Talent Trends report, 80 percent of hiring professionals indicated that they feel soft skills have increased in significance.

Additionally, 92 percent say that soft skills matter as much or more than technical skills.

While 92 percent of hiring professionals recognize how critical soft skills are to the success of their organizations, only 41 percent have a formal process

to access soft skills and 57 percent struggle to accurately assess soft skills.

Concerningly, 68 percent of hiring professionals in the LinkedIn study indicated that they primarily assess for soft skills by picking up social cues during

an interview. Unfortunately, these perceptions aren’t predictive, and worse, they’re often unconsciously biased.

How to Systematically Assess Soft Skills

1. Make a list. List the soft skills that are most important to the specific

role for which you are hiring. If you haven’t yet determined which soft skills

are most important, take inventory of the soft skills possessed by success-

ful members of the team in similar roles. Having a team-wide discussion

is often a great way to identify the most important soft skills, and doing so

can be a beneficial team-building exercise.

2. Online tools. Consider some of the emerging online tools to prescreen

candidates. While these tools are still in their infancy, an ongoing explora-

tion of tools to help you to remove bias is highly recommended.

3. Structure interviews carefully. Unstructured interviews often allow

unconscious biases to creep into the interviewer’s judgement. Remember,

you are working to assess the candidate against the ideal traits you

have established—you are not comparing candidates to each other.

Furthermore, interviewers must not unconsciously compare interviewees

to themselves.

4. Soft skills in action. Ask problem-solving questions to observe soft

skills in action. It is best to present candidates with scenarios that are re-

lated to your organization and the position in question. For example, what

would the candidate’s approach be if they were asked to make a product

feature adjustment within a compressed time frame?

5

When recruitingcandidates, does your company have asystematic method forobjectively assessingcandidates’ soft skills?

Yes

No

60%

40%



Systematically Assessing Culture FitWhen assessing for culture, it’s critical to avoid applying unconscious bias. The question is not whether you want to have a drink with the candidate, but if the candidate possesses the qualities prioritized by your company.

Hiring candidates who are a poor culture fit for your organization can cost

you dearly—according to the Society for Human Resource Management

(SHRM), it can cost that employer between 50–60 percent of the candi-

date’s annual salary. However, before the hiring team can start assessing

a candidate’s cultural fit, they need to define and articulate the organiza-

tion’s culture and then weave this understanding into the hiring process.

Edgar Henry Schein, a former professor at the MIT Sloan School of

Management, published groundbreaking work related to organizational

culture. He submitted that culture is “a pattern of shared basic assump-

tions that the group learned as it solved its problems that has worked well

enough to be considered valid and is passed on to new members as the

correct way to perceive, think, and feel in relation to those problems.”

So, how can you assess whether a candidate will operate well within the

pattern of basic assumptions that the collective has used to effectively

solve problems within your company?

Some Suggested Interview Questions for Determining Cultural Fit

• What type of environment do you thrive in?

• Describe a time when you worked for or with a company where you felt you were not a good fit. Why was it a bad fit?

• What values are you drawn to within the workplace?

• Why do you want to work at our company?

• How would you describe the culture of our company based on what you have experienced so far? Does it feel like a fit for you?

Expose Candidates to as Much as Possible

Expose the candidate to what it would be like to work for your company, and observe the candidate interacting within these settings. Allow them to meet

and interact with their future peers in addition to their future boss. Making time for candidates to interact with members of the executive team provides

candidates with valuable insights into the company’s broader visions and to gain a better understanding of the leadership team’s priorities.

6

When recruitingcandidates, does your company have a systematic method for objectivelyassessing the likelihood of the candidate’s cultural fit within your organization?

Yes

No

56%44%



Quality of Hire AssessmentAn ideal quality of hire measurement includes metrics for performance, productivity, cultural fit, and a 360-degree comparison.

Traditional recruiting practices reinforce efficiency and talent acquisition cost

reduction. However, these considerations do not take into account the contri-

butions the hire will make towards advancing the company’s success. Filling

positions quickly and cost effectively is an accomplishment, but does not reflect

whether your organization is making effective hiring decisions.

In a recent survey conducted by 180 Engineering, only 28 percent of engineering

executives indicated that their company is objectively tracking the performance

of their talent acquisition process. Turnover, performance reviews, and hiring

manager satisfaction are good proxy measurements, but these measurements

have their limitations.

Working to determine how long it took for a new employee to become fully

productive, how he or she ranks among his or her peers, and whether he or she is

a cultural fit are better determinants of whether the hire was a successful one.

Establishing a process to collect quality-of-hire understandings for the express

purpose of improving your hiring process can be quite valuable—the challeng-

ing part is the statistical analyses that determine whether your quality-of-hire

metrics are aligned with critical outcomes.

7

Is your company able to objectively track theperformance of your talent acquisition process through analytics andinsights?

Yes

No

72%

28%



Four Engineering Executives Share Their Talent Acquisition InsightsWhat are engineering executives’ thoughts as they consider the engineering labor market today and in the near future? How are their organizations

managing interviewing processes to secure the best candidates? What are the best ways to assess soft skills and cultural fit? How do they know if

their hiring processes are effective?

180 Engineering spoke with four engineering executives to learn more. The executives we spoke with included:

• VPLC - the vice president of connected products at a nearly 100-year-old legacy company in the midst of digital transformation

• EDMD - the engineering director at a medical device company

• VPAS - the vice president of engineering at an aviation services company

• DQWS - the director of quality & product engineering at a wireless services company

What does the availability of engineering talent look like today and in the near future?

VPLC: Four or five years ago, recruiting was easier in that there were a lot of contractors and consultants coming through temp agencies. For

the past year and a half or so, we have had to look hard to find the right candidates because the market is quite tight. The market is especially

challenging for software and firmware engineers. You have to rely on relationships to find candidates interested in having a conversation about

potentially coming to work for us even though they are happy in their current positions.

Even here, a 98-year-old mechanical-products company in the midst of a transformation, we see engineering talent become more software-based,

just because it has to be. As we continue to build out the IoT, I believe there will be a decided shortage of software and firmware engineers.

EDMD: The near term is very rough. Just looking at some of the data, the engineering unemployment rate is at a five-year low. It’s especially

difficult to hire more specialized engineers.

It is not as challenging to fill entry-level positions. But, we do struggle to hire more specialized engineers. For instance, injection molding and

plastics engineering is a core competency required in our line of business. These people are difficult to find. Even though some of the schools offer

specialties in plastic engineering, these schools tend to be in specific regions, and it is not a nationally developed field.

One of our most significant issues is hiring control engineers. As manufacturing operations move increasingly toward automation, there

aren’t enough engineers with PLC, coding, or motion control experience. It’s only been within the past five years or so that I’ve seen some

universities creating automation engineering and control engineering tracks in addition to the skills they are learning in more traditional

engineering tracks.

VPAS: I don’t think there’s necessarily a shortage of engineering talent in general. However, I do believe that different metro areas face different

challenges. For instance, we are an aviation company in Chicagoland, and there isn’t a lot of aviation engineering talent in this area.

8S Y S T E M A T I C E N G I N E E R I N G T A L E N T A C Q U I S I T I O N A S S E S S M E N TENGINEERINGt a l e n t s o l u t i o n s180


I also think hiring managers, senior leadership, and human resources need to be more aware of when industry-specific expertise is critical, and

when it’s not. The aviation industry is heavily regulated, and I would never hire someone without aviation regulatory experience to do a compli-

ance job because you have to know very specific FAA regulations inside and out. However, a hardware engineer does not need industry-specific

knowledge to design a piece of equipment according to defined specifications and requirements. It is frustrating that we sometimes lose the best

candidates because we don’t understand when industry-specific knowledge is critical, and when it’s not.

I will say that I believe the future is bright because there are a lot of smart, hard-working millennial engineers coming up the ranks.

DQWS: We employ a good balance between people who are U.S. citizens and those here on visas. However, there has been a significant

tightening within the H-1B visa program, and we have had some situations where people have had to leave the country. This puts us in a squeeze.

The engineering labor market is already really tight, and the diminishing lack of access to international talent puts further pressure on us. Our

company is growing rapidly, and we will need more engineering staff to continue to grow.

Also, like so many companies, we increasingly need more specialized skills, and the people with these skills can be tough to find.

Given the highly specific skills that are now needed in many cases, are you findingthat it takes longer to bring new hires up to speed?

VPLC: I don’t think we are alone in this. Depending on how qualified a new hire is, it now takes three to six months to get them up to speed.

This is considerably longer than it used to be because there are so many technologies in the cloud now, and people don’t know them all. There is

so much to absorb, understand, and put together. Because the technology in the cloud is changing so rapidly, I’m convinced that you will have to

revisit any decision you make today in six to nine months. We are now in a constant state of learning.

How does the interviewing process at your company work?

VPLC: Today, it’s more of an art than a science. That said, we work to inject discipline into the process, and we plan our interviewing process

with the specific position we are hiring for in mind. As the hiring manager, I consult with my peers to determine the best people for the candidate to

talk with to get a well-rounded experience for the candidate and for us to acquire the best insights to make a decision.

Each interviewer has a perspective from which we are evaluating the candidate, and we’ll look for specific responses that align with our values. My

group is built on people who possess a particular DNA, such as problem-solving ability, collaboration, commitment to being responsive when we have

an urgent situation, eagerness to win, and commitment to ongoing learning. We’re all looking for people we believe will fit well within this culture.

I always honestly lay out the challenges of the position and our work, then ask the candidates to assess whether they are up to it. I think you have

to be very straightforward about your expectations within the hiring process so that you don’t waste each other’s time.

VPAS I think a lot of professionals still rely on gut instinct, which is another way of saying that we are making decisions without data. This type

of decision-making might serve us well for a while, but you can’t predictably repeat success, which is a problem.

Also, there’s a limited amount of information you can get from an interview, even if it’s a long-form interview. There isn’t much difference between

knowing someone for an hour and a half and knowing someone for six hours. Therefore, I tend to broaden my interviews as opposed to making

them deeper. For instance, I’d rather have six people interview someone for thirty minutes than have two people interview them for two hours. This

committee approach allows us to get several perspectives and has proven to be quite effective.



EDMD: We’ve specifically structured our interviewing process to assess soft skills and cultural fit better. The way that I set up our inter-

views—from entry-level engineers up to senior principal-level engineers and managers— is that candidates will meet with a diverse cross-sec-

tion of our engineering team. Everyone on my team understands that they need to be transparent throughout the interviewing process. The intent is

to give the candidate an idea of what life here is like.

Being transparent instead of merely giving a sales pitch to try to get that talent onboard has been helpful for us because we can identify some of

the things that people want and need from an employer, from a boss, and their peers. We have multiple people ask those same questions through-

out the day, document the responses, and see if the answers are similar.

If a candidate has a need that is important to them, and we can’t meet that need, we will recognize it as a potential weakness in our current

system while also acknowledging that we might not be the best fit for this candidate.

DQWS: Even when we are hiring engineers, we ask candidates to talk to employees outside the engineering team. We are a small company,

so candidates can talk to our CEO and our VP of Engineering, possibly our VP of Operations, and maybe members of the sales team. We want the

candidate to meet with anyone that person would have interactions with.

We have a set of criteria on which all interviewers grade the candidate so that we can come to a consensus. We also feel it is important to allow

candidates to interact with others, such as some of the younger engineers who are not on the interview team. Gathering some of these people for

lunch with the candidate is a great way to give the candidate a feel for the company.

Which candidate qualities are most important to you?

VPLC: I look for candidates who enjoy learning and evolving. People who are interested in continually honing and updating their skills are the

folks who are going to do well and won’t become obsolete.

EDMD: A lot of my time is spent on the manufacturing engineering side of our business. We support production operations, and every day

there’s an issue—a fire that pops up.

What matters most is how well candidates handle challenges. That’s what’s going to separate successful people from those who struggle. So,

during the interview process, we ask difficult questions to try to understand how the candidate would respond to challenges. I don’t expect them to

know the answers; instead, I’m looking for how they handle adversity and stress. The defining characteristic that I look for in candidates is grit.

Communication and collaboration skills are also critical. To evaluate these skills, I ask candidates to teach me something. It doesn’t matter what

it is, and it doesn’t even have to be related to engineering or medical devices. Just teach me anything. I’ve had people teach me how to tie my shoe,

shoot a basketball, and even how to do a dance.

How do you determine how effective your hiring process was?

VPLC: We look at a couple of metrics, including turnover. Are we retaining the people we want to keep? How well and quickly do we move

people on when it is not the right fit?

Whenever someone leaves on their own, we take time to reflect on what we could have done differently—why didn’t they fit?



EDMD: The easy answer is by looking at turnover. Given the shortage of engineers, we work to reduce our turnover—we’ve been under the

national average, which is good. It tells us we’re doing something right and creating a good culture.

However, turnover is only one metric. You can have low turnover because you have a bunch of mediocre players who don’t have the desire to go any-

where. So we also look at the results. It’s challenging to put metrics on engineers because projects vary. But, we try to have some guiding metrics

such as completion rates, budget adherence, sticking to timelines, documentation issues, quality of the product, and so forth.

Turnover and performance of the organization—these two metrics combined give us a good picture of how we are doing.

What value do you find in using outside talent acquisition resources?

VPAS: I’ve always thought that for knowledge work, like engineering, you tend to get fresh ideas from outside your industry. Our company’s

relationships are mostly within the aviation sector; however, an outside firm specializing in engineering talent acquisition can tap into a network

across different sectors.

Engineering jobs are also incredibly specialized today, so it’s tough for internal talent recruiters to understand the nuances of all of the positions

needing to be filled. Outside recruiters specialized in engineering understand many of these specialized positions and can bring a lot of value to the

process.

ConclusionCompetitive advantage among engineering- and technology-based organizations is increasingly based on companies’ ability to acquire and retain

the talent needed to support their strategic plans. The engineering and technology labor markets are incredibly tight and all indications are that

this pressure will continue to mount.

Given these challenges, the most successful companies will be those that continue to improve their ability to acquire and retain needed talent.

Soft skills and cultural fit are two factors that play an enormous role in the ability for candidates to meet the needs of the organization and the

organization’s ability to support employee satisfaction and professional development. Creating systematic processes and objective measurements

to support success in these areas, just as we do in nearly every other area of our businesses, will separate leading organizations from those at risk

of falling behind.




37.5%24%

Our percentage placement perjob order vs. national average

180 Engineering

4300 Commerce Court, Ste 315, Lisle, IL 60532

[email protected]

Phone: 877-977-0377

Seeking new engineering opportunities or seeking anengineering talent recruitment partner?

Contact 180 Engineering. We’re lookingforward to working with you for mutual success.

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