We all have ways of doing things that feel tried, tested and reassuringly familiar. But what if some of our most established hiring habits are holding us back?
As we look towards 2027, here are ten worth questioning and ten more intelligent approaches worth experimenting with.
| The hiring habit | Expand your mind |
|---|---|
| 1. Hiring for the skills you need right now. | Get ahead of the curve. The skills that matter today won't necessarily be the ones that matter in a few years' time. Look for curiosity, an appetite for learning and people who are comfortable finding their feet in unfamiliar territory. |
| 2. Relying too heavily on a CV. | Don't believe everything you read. AI can make almost anyone look brilliant on paper. The interesting stuff comes when you look a little deeper: how someone thinks, what drives them, how they respond to challenges and what they're capable of becoming. That's where a good hiring decision really begins. |
| 3. Only hiring people who know your industry. | Fresh eyes can see things the old hands have stopped noticing. Someone from outside your industry might bring the very thinking your business has been missing. |
| 4. Letting technology pick the winners. | Keep your wits about you. AI can do some remarkable things, but good judgement is still worth its weight in gold. |
| 5. Hiring someone who's done the job before. | Look beyond the obvious credentials. Experience matters, of course. But so does the ability to apply it in a new context. Someone who's spent ten years doing a particular job isn't automatically better equipped for what comes next than someone with the adaptability and potential to grow into it. |
| 6. Replacing like with like. | Rip up the job description. A departure is the perfect excuse to shake things up. Imagine the role you would create today, with everything you now know about where the business is heading. |
| 7. Looking everywhere except your own backyard. | Look a little closer to home. Your next brilliant leader could be hiding in plain sight, doing a job that barely scratches the surface of what they're capable of. |
| 8. Thinking great leadership only comes in one shape or size. | There's more than one way to bring brilliance into a business. Fractional leadership gives you access to heavyweight experience for the time you need it. All that wisdom, without the full-time commitment. |
| 9. Making candidates jump through endless hoops. | Enough with the circus. Every stage should tell you something meaningful. Make the experience sharper, more revealing and rewarding for everyone involved. |
| 10. Going for the safe bet. | Challenge everything. The person who challenges your thinking, asks the awkward questions and sees things from a completely different angle might just be the one who takes your business somewhere extraordinary. |
So, what will you experiment with in 2027?
There's a reason hiring habits are hard to kick. They give us a sense of certainty in a process where the stakes are high and the outcome is never entirely predictable.
At Denholm, we've spent more than two decades getting to know businesses, people and the markets they operate in. That experience gives us the insight to challenge a brief, spot potential in unexpected places and help our clients make hiring decisions with greater confidence.
Explore our Talent Strategy & Delivery Models, Executive Search and Contract, Interim & Fractional solutions, or get in touch at connect@denholmassociates.com.
