by Ben Hess, Managing Director, ThirdPool Recruiting
In the late ‘90s, Sheena Iyengar conducted her now famous “jam study” at the Draeger’s Supermarket in San Francisco.
In the first part of the study, customers were given an opportunity to taste a sample from an array of 30 different jams.
In the second part to the study (different day), customers were given the same opportunity but only had 6 jams from which to choose.
The display with 30 options drew many more tasters than the display with 6 options. Customers seem to enjoy the idea of sampling so many different flavors.
Surprisingly, more jam tasting didn’t convert into more jam buying–the opposite happened.
The 6 jam tasters bought jam at 10 times the rate of 30 jam tasters.
Why? Because too many choices overwhelmed and paralyzed the customers.
There are lots of applications for this principle in the recruiting process.
Are there places where you’re offering too many choices to recruiting prospects (ex. commission plans)?
During an interview, do you present too many options for features such as a marketing strategy or business plan (“…there are lots of ways we can do this”)?
When discussing options for moving forward in the hiring process, do you boil things down to just a few reasonable choices.
Recruiting prospects want to maintain the capacity to make choices, but need a good recruiter to keep those choices from causing paralysis.