What Are The 3 Ws?

25th March 2021

When it comes to good recruitment, at DMA we all think it’s about getting personal. We think getting to a know business and it needs, and also understanding each and every candidate and their skills, is crucial to making good matches – and therefore achieving sustainable, beneficial appointments.

Recruitment is at its most effective when it’s focused and strategic. But it’s also down to understanding each individual candidate. Putting together a shortlist based merely on a set of CVs won’t get you the best fit. For that, you have to dig deeper – and at DMA we do.

Charlie thinks that “the 3 Ws” are the key to unlocking an individual – or at least to understanding whether they’re right for a particular role. But what does this mean?

The 3 Ws are essentially three questions a recruiter should ask of any candidate in order to understand where they’re coming from – and where they’d be best to head:

1. What is the reason you’re moving?
2. Why is it not working where you currently are?
3. When have you previously achieved?

Answers to these questions will tell you a lot about a candidate – and help you put him or her forward for the right posts. From an employees perspective, they will help find the right hire.

The trick is the skill it takes to get on the level with a candidate – to develop the trust it takes for them to answer those questions truthfully. At DMA, we think trust is the absolute foundation stone of all good recruitment: without it, no one gets quite what they want.

Once you have trust, you can begin to recruit the best candidates for the right roles. And that all starts with the three Ws.