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Depomed Focuses on Hiring Right the First Time: Silver Business Solutions Guides Managerial Team

Challenge: To bring order and effectiveness to the hiring workflow process.

Solution: Managers attend offsite Hiring Right workshop to develop skills.

Result: Interview process represents a team effort that elicits the true value of applicant.

A group of managers at Depomed, Inc. strongly believed that they would benefit greatly from a workshop that molded their considerable interviewing skills into a cohesive process. Their intuition proved correct.

After taking part in Silver Business Solutions’ full-day Hiring Right workshop, the group was able to reach deeper into their interviewing tool box, and now possess a complete arsenal of hiring skills.

“After taking the class, I was given a strong system to make the interviewing process more efficient,” said Mike Okagaki, Manager, Quality Control.

Hiring Right Brings Managers Together

With head count that was showing a steady stream of new hires as the company grew, it was obvious that Depomed could further its expectations of hiring the best and brightest workers if they internally all sang from the same sheet of music.

Menlo Park-based Depomed is a specialty pharmaceutical company that utilizes its AcuForm™ drug delivery technology to improve existing oral medications, allowing for extended, controlled release of medications to the upper gastrointestinal tract. Depomed has two approved products on the market and multiple product candidates in its pipeline.

When Christine Silver, owner of Silver Business Solutions (associate of The Practical Solutions Group), met with Depomed’s hiring managers, she knew she could put her more than 15 years of human resources coaching experience to good use.

“Companies do the best they can with limited resources, but sometimes they need a little nudge to bring everyone together,” said Silver, who brings a practical, no-nonsense approach to her workshops. “Managers don’t innately possess interviewing and candidate selection skills. This is a talent that needs to be learned.”

Silver’s offsite workshop topics included:

• The three key elements of an interview.
• The costs of making hiring mistakes.
• How to prepare for an interview.
• How to conduct an effective interview.
• How to evaluate candidates.

“The workshop is fast-paced and collaborative,” Silver said. “It’s an interactive, experiential, hands-on learning experience that builds vital hiring and management skills.”

The Benefits for Depomed

For Okagaki, who has been employed at Depomed for 12 years, the world took on a new sense of order after taking Hiring Right.

“After taking Christine’s workshop we found ourselves spending a lot more time on a prospective applicant’s resume prior to the actual interview,” he said. “This sort of planning makes the interview experience positive for all parties concerned.”

After taking the Hiring Right workshop, Okagaki found that he required two things to secure the correct applicant:

• He had to determine the exact skill set required for the position.
• He needed to put together a team of subject experts to probe all aspects
  of the interview.

“I’m not always the best person to talk to about certain areas,” he said. “I needed to put together a team of specialized interviewers to get feedback in a systematic way.”

How the System Works

The name of the game is preparation.

Spending time analyzing a resume makes all the difference in the world. Not only is Okagaki familiar with the territory, but he also has time to hear the applicant’s point of view, along with thoughts and concerns.

“I get to see how their mind ticks,” he said. “The most important thing is how a person thinks.”

After he and his team have all interviewed the applicant they meet either face to face or by e-mail to debrief. All parties also give the person a numeric score — based on a set of predefined, job-related skills. “Because I set up this process in a scientific way, I get meaningful scores that gauge the ability of an applicant to work in this job,” he said.

Okagaki does not deviate from his new-found system. He recently left a requisition open for four months so he could identify just the right person for the job. “I really stuck to Christine’s formula and it worked,” he said. “In this particular job I was looking for a person that could get along with people and wanted to learn. The technical stuff I can teach.”

Kudos for Hiring Right Workshop

Getting off campus and into the hands of an expert trainer is priceless.

“The best thing about this class is being able to meet with my peers in a career environment,” he said. “This workshop has helped us work together as a team.”

Okagaki said the Hiring Right process is effortless and serves as a catalyst for identifying candidates that are a good fit for the company.

“If a person needs to hire or manage somebody they should absolutely take this class,” Okagaki said. “I guarantee that you and your company will be rewarded.”

Call today for more information: 831-588-6191

E-mail: info@silverbusinesssolutions.com