The Hiring Tree: Laws of Applicant Attraction

By Steven J Smith

The Hiring Tree: Laws of Applicant Attraction, is an analogy using the growth of an apple tree, to help the reader understand concepts and principles needed to hire job applicants successfully. It is designed to help human resource professionals, recruiters, talent acquisition specialists, hiring managers, business owners, and anyone th

• Language: English
• Publisher: The Hiring Tree, LLC
• Release date: Mar 1, 2023
• ISBN: 9798987437018

Steven J Smith

Steven J Smith, SHRM-CP, PHR will be the first to tell you that recruiting is marketing. He earned a BS in Finance at Brigham Young University and started his career in recruiting in Feb 2005. In 2008, he took a risk during a recession to help with starting a new company with Ryan Kohler, called ApplicantPro, designed to provide applicant tracking software for small to mid-sized businesses. 10,000 clients and 300 employees later, ApplicantPro has been on the Inc 5000 list 10 years in a row. Steve currently serves as the Utah SHRM State Director, and he loves to volunteer. His presentations based on his book, The Hiring Tree: Laws of Applicant Attraction, have helped thousands of organizations across the country rethink the way they approach hiring. He currently resides in Lehi, Utah, with his wife, three daughters, two labradoodles, and two cats.

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PROLOGUE

A dear friend of mine told me that every good analogy begins with a story, which is good news, because there is definitely a unique story that led to the idea behind the Hiring Tree model described in this book. The first epiphany happened in the fall of 2014 when my family moved from Alabama to Utah. While it was not one single moment that led to the analogy, a lot of moments came together to build the concept of the Hiring Tree from the roots up. These experiences occurred in a very special place called Santaquin, Utah.

When I arrived in Salt Lake City and then drove south on I-15 for about two hours, I was awestruck by some of the most magnificent mountains that exist in the United States. In fact, they were so close to my vehicle, that it almost felt like I could touch them if I were to stretch out my arms far enough.

During the fall, these mountains are often blanketed with snow. I watched the scene unfold upon passing the city of Spanish Fork, at which point I veered west and came upon an even more alluring landscape, dotted with trees in the most gracefully placed rows. I quickly began to understand why Katherine Lee Bates described a similar scene in a popular patriotic song when she penned Oh Beautiful! … For purple mountain majesties, Above the fruited plain!

Sure enough, the fruited plains I was observing were placed perfectly along the foothills of the mountains, along what locals call the Wasatch Front. Exiting the freeway at Main Street for Santaquin, there were several neighborhoods that I had to maneuver through in a mouse-like maze before the road finally led me to a set of railroad tracks. The train’s horn was blaring as it whizzed past me, heading to an unknown destination. Once safety resumed, I crossed the tracks and found what I was seeking, nestled near an array of grapevines along a hidden fence. Orchards of cherries, heavenly white nectarines, peaches, and a variety of apples also dotted the landscape. I had come to my journey’s end and found myself looking at a peaceful orchard known as Pyne Farms.

Farmer Pyne could be seen in a red-and-black-checkered flannel shirt, jeans, and some mountain-man boots designed to withstand the terrain he confronted each day. He waved his sun-darkened arm in an excited gesture to welcome me as he bumped up and down in an ancient-looking tractor that was chugging along the dirt road toward me.

I parked underneath an enormous tree that was much older than I was. To my right was a newly built and spacious building with a lift-gate garage door big enough to fit the very tractor Farmer Pyne was driving. I learned later that this building was a giant cooler, designed to hold the fruits of his labors, as picking season had already begun.

Once the humming of the engine died down upon his arrival, he hopped down and gave me a big hug. It had been several years since I had seen my friend Kent, though back then, he was not a farmer at all. In fact, his father had run the farm for years, inheriting it from his father, who had also inherited it from his father. As the new fourth-generation owner, it was now Kent’s turn to run the farm with all the fervor and strength of his ancestors before him.

With a hope and a vision of a future that had never before existed on the farm, he was looking forward to developing unique plans and implementing fresh ideas. This would be the beginning of a new dream to make things better than they had ever been before. He had sacrificed his steady job to take over the farm, which meant he was laying the foundation for a new chapter of his life. With a family of four boys and a wife to take care of, this was not going to be a small undertaking.

The reason I had come was not only to see the farm and all the work generations had put together for his inheritance, but also to offer the help of my three daughters, who would soon begin selling apples and other fruit at the local farmers’ market in the region. While he had pickers and others to tend to the orchards, one of his ideas was to expand the financial aspects of the farm by selling his fruit at various markets throughout the state, instead of just the little market stand where his father and grandfather had been selling for years. Ultimately, he wanted to establish a standard of quality by having the best fruit to offer neighbors, friends, and the community at large.

Not only did I love the idea he had presented to me weeks before, but I was also excited for my daughters to have an opportunity to learn how to run a market booth. Communicating with customers, handling money, and being accountable to inventory were just a few of the lessons they would learn. What I really wanted for my girls was the ability to learn what it means to work for a living and gain skills that would accompany them for the rest of their lives. They were young, ages 7, 8, and 11, but I have always felt that one can never be too young to learn these irreplaceable skills and life lessons.

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As Farmer Pyne excitedly guided me toward the large building, I began to understand the enormity of what he was trying to accomplish. Once inside, he was eager to show me all that he had built, which included a gigantic cooler on the right-hand side within the structure that was to replace a much smaller version in a neighboring city. If he was going to expand his offerings as planned, he needed to increase his space and provide a better environment to house his fruit, especially the apples. The stacks of empty bins and crates that lined the inner walls would soon be filled with a variety of fruit, and from what I could see, there was plenty of room to drive his forklift throughout the building, to manage the movement of crates and bins as needed.

Farmer Pyne also showed me an idea that would offer year-round production, using crops from the previous season that had been carefully preserved in his redesigned facility. After crushing these preserved apples into a sweet, all-natural nectar, a drink machine would churn his cider into a delectable slushy drink for the summer months before the real market season would begin. It was refreshing, being made with apple juice and nothing else. This would allow him to offer a much more natural option to quenching one’s thirst on a hot summer day than the sugary drinks that were then being offered. Ultimately there would be no wasted time throughout the year as he had proved that he could be selling something all year long.

Soon after, we ventured outside, where he showed me the heavenly white nectarine trees, which were the most amazing nectarines I had ever tasted! As we wandered through the groves of trees, I could see every variety, from tiny saplings to more than 50-year-old trees that had borne the weight of thousands of apples, peaches, nectarines and cherries over the years.

Of all the fruit that was present, his most prized trees were those that bore his apples. The coveted apple was truly the symbol of strength to the entire orchard, as well as the very logo that represented Pyne Farms’ label and brand.

I admired the rows of apple trees that ranged from colors of solid red to yellows, greens, and every mix in between. Farmer Pyne was also very excited to show me an apple called the Elliott, which was a mix between a Golden Delicious and a Starking Delicious apple and was discovered locally in Provo, Utah, by Farmer Grant Elliott.¹

The story goes that Farmer Elliott found a sapling that began to grow in a remote part of his orchard around 1980. To see how it would do, he placed some rocks around it and let it continue to grow for several years. Within five years it began to produce blossoms, so he allowed a neighbor to graft it into other trees, and the branches began to produce a new variety of apple that was like the Golden Delicious in color, with a slight blush of pink. The Elliott is a tart variety of apple that was recently used in 2021 by Mountain West Hard Cider Company to create a new hard cider called Elliott Gold.²

What fascinated me the most about hearing this story of the Elliott apple from Kent was not the fact that it was a new variety, but I had no idea that the odds of creating a new variety of apple were one in 100,000. In other words, a person cannot take the seed from his or her favorite apple and plant it, expecting it to someday grow into a beautiful tree, bearing the much-loved fruit. There is a lot of work that goes into growing an apple tree, and Farmer Pyne was ever so willing to educate me on the dedication necessary to bear such fruit.

In my mind, I began to see a unique correlation to my own career and the role I have had in educating companies all over the country on how to improve their hiring process. The Hiring Tree concept began to take root, and I realized that this same commitment and enthusiasm portrayed by Farmer Pyne is the effort required by an organization to find and hire the right people.

In my world as a hiring expert, I specialize in helping organizations with their hiring processes and practices. For many years, I have helped thousands of organizations look differently at their strategic operations as they relate to hiring and onboarding the right talent. While I have recommended principles found within this book for many years, the hardest part has always been to watch individuals squander the knowledge given. Without proper application, organizations will continue to do what they have always done, with little to no success. The biggest challenge has always been how to motivate and inspire, but more importantly, how to persuade others to be bold and daring enough to put these principles into practice.

As I continued to watch Farmer Pyne peel back the leaves to reveal the different types of apples on his trees, I suddenly realized that the best way to teach others was to do it the way Farmer Pyne was teaching me about apples. When he was peeling those leaves back to reveal the fruit, the analogy became clear. For all of us in the hiring world, the leaves and fruit represent applicants who apply for our open positions. The leaves on the tree are applicants who are unqualified or unfit for the position, while the fruit represents the actual applicants we wish to pick and move to the bin to be managed in the facility.

After sifting through the myriad of leaves to find the actual fruit, the apples are then gathered and made available for sorting, which involves separating the good fruit from the bad fruit. This process takes additional time, because while the fruit has been picked, not all apples are fit to be placed in front of customers for sale. The customers in this scenario are just the hiring managers or executive team members who are there to select which candidates they wish to hire.

I jokingly shared this idea with Farmer Pyne. In that moment, he taught me something that I will never forget. He said, We all seek the fruit, but we cannot forget that it all starts with the roots of the tree and the very ground in which the tree is planted. In other words, while organizations are constantly seeking the right applicant to fill their open roles, all too often they forget the beginning of the process, which starts at the very roots of what I call the Hiring Tree. Before we can start with the branches of the tree, where the fruit is picked, we must remember where the tree actually begins.

The roots hold the tree in the ground to provide a steady and strengthened system designed to withstand the weather and other dangers that lurk above the ground. If the roots are not properly cared for, the nutrition that provides strength and girth to the main trunk is not given. This will have an immediate impact on the vitamins and minerals sent to the branches. Without these roots securely planted in the ground, the trunk will never grow strong enough to sustain the tree when storms or other elements threaten its livelihood. For an organization, the storms that come may come in the form of new laws, political changes, inflation, economic factors, natural disasters, or even pandemics.

COVID-19 and all the ensuing challenges that have accompanied it, represents the third hiring recession that I have experienced in my professional career. Much like the storms an apple tree can face, this pandemic was a danger lurking above the ground, which a lot of employers were not prepared to face. Like with any recession, the ways in which things were done before the storm arrived are forever changed. Typical of any recession, there is no question that there were some distinct differences, but the principles introduced in this book will continue to hold true in any recessive period.

This is important to understand because as a company begins to develop its own Hiring Tree to help with managing the talent sourcing process, the organization will also find that taking care of the whole tree is crucial to its success. Otherwise, the fruit it desires will never properly develop. When a tree does not bear fruit, it is eventually chopped down and made into firewood.

With that in mind, let’s move on to the first principle of the Hiring Tree.

Chapter 1

Establishing the Foundational Roots

Farmer Pyne would be the first to point out that, while he personally works his farm to ensure the best quality possible, he cannot do it alone. The success of his farm is based heavily on contributions from family, friends, and coworkers, who take on a variety of tasks to fulfill their own roles by following his leadership. This team effort makes all the difference before the blossoms of the spring season even begin to explode from the branches of the trees. With this in mind, in order for these blossoms to burst forth, special care must be taken during the winter months to provide health and longevity to the root systems of the trees.

The initial growth of a young sapling is based on one of three unique root structures that will follow a season-specific growth pattern to support the developing tree. An apple tree specifically uses a complex system called a taproot, which is vital to its firmness, its absorption of sustenance, and its continued growth as it begins its journey to becoming a fruitful contributor to the orchard. The taproot is the first root type and is deep enough to reach into the moisture reserves of the soil to sustain the tree when there is a scarcity of vitamins and minerals, or even during times of drought (which, in Utah, is a common occurrence, due to the desert-like nature of the region). Over time, the depth of the taproots can