Do you choose candidates with your head or your heart?

The heart or the mind?Well.

I love it!I'm still waiting for the love of my life.

Jen, if you're watching, call me."Do you choose your candidates with your head or your heart?" Good question.

It's a really good question.I choose candidates with both my head and my heart.

They'll say, "You can't choose." But I do know how to choose.

Okay.However, I've worked several years in the recruitment sector, a line of work where people say, "Yes,hiring is all about intuition." But it's not.

It's not about intuition.Hiring.You need a selection method.

And for a few years now, since 2017, I've been using a basic method,already structured, the STAR method.

You might know it.It's an evaluation method,situation, task, action and result, which you reach by asking the candidate a question."Tell me about a situation where you succeeded." "Tell me about a situation where you had to show resilience." And that's what we assess.

I call it a semi-structured interview. Why?Because I include the assessment linked to the scorecard,since those cards are evaluation grids that rate talent from 1 to 5.

This allows each member of the team, in my company,to have a harmonized evaluation.

There's just one evaluation.However, when you assess a candidate's hard and soft skills...

HR handles the soft skills, and for the hard skills,in the IT area, we use technical tests, at Artemys,we created them internally.

We're proud to have developed our own tests."But you use a bit of intuition," I wouldn't say it's intuition.

Above all, you ask yourself questions.The question I always ask myself is, "Do I want to work with this person?" "Does this person fit into Artemys' current ecosystem?" "Are they a consultant?" After all, I'll be there."Could they offer their services?" "Could this consultant work with one of our clients?" Each client's different, so we try to make sure they match.

So, I choose candidates with my heart, but also with my head.

There's also something I like to add, that's why I talk about semi-structured interviews, meaning, evaluating transferable skills using the STAR method.

The emotional side, although a friend of mine will say: "Fabian,you can't evaluate emotion, there's too much bias." Oh, come on.

No, it's important.I've also got a few anecdotes from my selection process.

I tell candidates, "Draw me your path." Rather than their experience, I ask them...

We've got a whiteboard, markers, and little stickers."Come on, draw me your path, where you come from." Feel free to tell me whatever you want to share.

That's why I say my process is unique and legendary.

I pay close attention to feedback at every stage.I give constructive criticism.

I've observed and felt things.I express my needs.It's super important so that the employee,the talent, feels confident enough and, ultimately,says, "I really want to work with you." Because we're in a competitive market, where we're actually in a position of having to sell the job to employees.

A quick anecdote?All right then, I'll share one, I know you didn't ask,but I like sharing this.

A few years ago, I was in...I was in a company and a client said to me, "Hey, it's not going to work!" It was in the pharmaceutical sector, "I've got no money to move forward with the candidate,so stop the process." So I called the candidate and stopped the process.

And the candidate said to me, "You know what, Mr Caldarella?

The fact that the client doesn't want to continue isn't the reason why we will stop."We've shared a sort of romance and now we are friends. That's it!" So we choose these candidates for their heads,not their looks... their heads,for their mindset and heart.