Values-Aligned Hiring

By Zane Slacum

At Point b(e) Strategies, our values are central to all that we do. They are fundamental to how we work, whom we work with, and how we engage with one another. Our hiring process is no different. It centers around our core company values of authenticity, integrity, equity, process, change, and partnership. Our most recent hiring process landed us two amazing new team members. At their urging, we thought it might be helpful to share a little bit more about how we designed a values-aligned hiring process.

We began with a job description that, while long, demonstrated who we are and who we were looking for. We asked interested candidates not to submit a cover letter but to answer three questions that would help us gauge their experience leading complex projects, how they make and communicate hard decisions, and why they wanted to join our team. From there, candidates completed a 90-minute interview, an in person-facilitation, a quick writing prompt, and a final interview with our CEO. A lot of stages—we know! We wanted to really get to know our candidates and ensure that our newest team members were able to truly see what they were signing up for and who they would be working with.

Throughout the process, each candidate met more than half of our team—either in person or via Zoom—and was given the chance to ask questions, be curious, and share. We asked candidates to tell us what being equity-centered means to them, what they love about the social change sector and what they would change about it, what they love about co-facilitation, how they keep projects on track and guide groups that have gotten off track, and how they engage with historically and currently marginalized communities. Each question was designed for us to learn from them, but also for them to understand what is important to us. We fielded questions around ensuring that a facilitation is a safe space for all people, and about our North Star, the change we seek to create, our approach to conflict, our values, our expectations, and our clients.

After each step in the process, we informed all candidates of our decision to either continue or end their candidacy and fielded requests for feedback. At a time when AI seems to be ever present in hiring, we wanted them to know that a real person was thoughtfully  considering their qualifications and responses—and their suitability for the role. From the beginning, we shared what our entire hiring process would look like, giving candidates the full overview of all stages of the process, including a timeline.

We asked a select few final candidates to join us in the office and facilitate a 30-minute session with members of our team. This stage required significant prep work and fortitude by each of them:  designing—then presenting—a strategic facilitation to a room full of strangers. Because of the time commitment and labor required for this stage, we compensated candidates for their time.

Every step in our process felt logical: Tell people where they stand, compensate them for their time, ask meaningful questions, respond authentically, be clear about expectations, and ensure everyone is set up for success. This led us to a values-aligned hiring process that centered around showing up authentically, transparently, and equitably, and resulted in two amazing new team members joining our team. Hiring is hard and takes far longer than it should, but if you can remain true to who you are, you will end up with the right people!