We recently presented on the HCI Quality of Hire webcast with Taleo customer Dell. The tremendous interest in the subject was not surprising. Really, quality of hire represents the most upstream driver of corporate performance. McKinsey research shows that quality of hire is becoming even more important.

Here it is—in characteristic McKinsey-speak:

Three categories of American jobs:

1. Transformational: extracting raw materials or converting them into finished goods.

2. Transactional: interactions that can easily be scripted or automated.

3. Tacit: complex interactions requiring a high level of judgment.

The analysis shows that quality is becoming even more important because the jobs people perform are getting more and more complicated.

• In the past six years, jobs that emphasize “tacit interactions” have grown two and a half times as fast as the number of transactional jobs and three times as fast as employment in general.

• These jobs now make up some 40% of the US labor market and account for 70% of the jobs created since 1998.