 Hi, I'm Penny Glover and I'm going to give you three tips for successfully hiring staff. Hiring staff is one of the most important decisions you will make in your business. For many small business owners, this can be a daunting prospect. Poor hiring decisions can have a big impact on your business, such as financial loss and reputational damage if customers and suppliers aren't treated well by your staff. Your employees represent your business and are a critical part of its success, so it's important to get it right. There's an old adage that you hire for attitude and train for skills. Many employers focus heavily on the technical skills and overlook the so-called soft skills. Soft skills are character traits, such as how well someone communicates, works in a team or adapts to change. These skills are difficult to teach, so it's important not to overlook them in the hiring process. So how do you do this? One useful technique is to ask hypothetical questions in your interview that are not related to technical skills. Their responses could provide insights into how they behave under pressure, their initiative and ability to solve problems. When writing a position description, analyse the role and break it down into its components based on your needs for the business. Give each component a weighting of importance and list the technical skills and soft skills that are required. Apart from clarifying to yourself and to the candidate what the requirements of the job are, your position description will be helpful for performance appraisals later. We all have biases, whether we like to admit it or not, but there are a few simple things you can do to make your hiring process fair. Ask each candidate the same questions and use an interview scorecard that grades their responses on a defined scale. Evaluate the candidate's applications, focusing on their skills and experience. You could ask candidates to solve a work-related problem or take a skills test. This will allow you to assess the quality of their work rather than judging them on personal information. Remember, you want to get the right person to fit the role you've identified, so don't let personal biases get in the way. Otherwise, you may miss out on an excellent employee. Have another person at the interview to offer a second point of view. This can be tough if you're running a small business, but consider asking another business owner in your network to help. Hiring the right staff is critical to your business success. Invest the time into developing a hiring process that becomes part of your business practice. For more information on hiring staff, visit business.vic.gov.au.