Measuring quality of hire is a perennially important—and somewhat problematic—issue. We covered it in our Quality of Hire: The Next Edge in Corporate Performance paper and HCI webcast Measuring Quality of Hire: You Can't Improve What You Can't Measure.

Now, there’s some buzz about a BusinessWeek podcast and column by Jack Welch: The Hiring Batting Average: Improving your chances of hiring right. Read, for example, The HR Capitalist blog posting, Do You Measure Your Manager's Effectiveness at Hiring? and Dr. John Sullivan’s article What Is Your Hiring Batting Average?.

The Hiring Batting Average (HBA) concept extends a quality of hire measurement out to more stakeholders—especially to the actions and recommendations of hiring managers. Of course it’s hard to hit a home run if your hiring manager behaviors are turning off your top candidates.

Two-thirds of jobseekers reported that the interviewer influences their decision to accept a position, according to DDI/Monster’s Selection Forecast 2006-2007: Slugging Through the War for Talent.

The most annoying interviewer behaviors?

Learning to hit hiring home runs requires a process that is optimized — from spring training conditioning all the way through consistent contact at the point of impact.