It's time companies used the 'F' word

Employers need to realise that failure can be an important part of later success, says Claire Smith

"No one is going to get to a high managerial position without having made mistakes along the way," says Latham. "Exploring failure touches a nerve that can be very instructive. If someone can speak about failure or disappointment without being defensive or shifting blame on to others, it is an indication of a high level of managerial maturity."

With this in mind, Latham believes the reason many organisations struggle to find the right people for the job is because recruiters are avoiding the "F" word in interviews. "There is a conspiracy of silence between interviewers and interviewees about mentioning the failure word," says Latham. "They only focus on the positives."

Latham partly puts this down to the nature of the recruitment business. Many such firms only get paid when they locate the right person for the job - so it is in their interest as much as the potential employees' - to make the candidate sound as shiny and capable as possible.

Latham also believes it's not ideal to give responsibility for hiring to HR departments "who often haven't had the experience of business life. When the line managers in the hiring firm are involved, they are much more likely to address issues of failure," says Latham. "But HR departments may react to a candidate talking about their failures in a negative way."

And he might be on to something. In the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Developments' (CIPD) annual Recruitment, Retention and Turnover survey, released this week, 82 per cent of organisations admit to difficulties recruiting the right staff for the job.

Rebecca Clake, research manager for the CIPD, admits that the commonly used method of just talking through a candidate's CV - 85 per cent of job interviews are carried out in this way - has been found to be much less effective than competency-based interviewing, where the candidate is asked to demonstrate that they possess the skills and the behaviour necessary for a specific role.

"A CV is just an impressive list of achievements. It's more important for recruiters to probe and dig between the surface to make sure that there is some substance behind what the candidate is saying and to find out more about how it was achieved," says Clake. "People's natural instinct is to not want to talk about that, but recruiters can get around it by talking about challenges, rather than failures."

Latham prefers the term "sub-optimal decisions" and reckons that, not only can they help separate the wheat from the chaff, but being open about them can create a more even playing field between external and internal applicants - the latter of which are often at a disadvantage because their mistakes are already on the table for all to see.

But what kind of sub-optimal decisions should you be talking about? Would you mention the one that landed you with a criminal record, or the time you decided to send a dodgy email to a colleague?

Unless you are applying to work with children, a criminal record is not something you have to divulge. However, Latham argues that, even if the social shame may seem irrelevant, it is best to come clean to a prospective employer. "If there is something significant in your past, it is usually best to bring it to the fore. More often than candidates may think, their past will catch up with them."

But what if you aren't asked? Should you take the bull by the horns and admit to failures that you have learnt from?

Latham thinks that you have to be careful, especially if you are applying for a junior position. "At the younger end of the market, the recruitment process is often aimed at sifting out high volumes of people," says Latham, "and the sifters may have less experience of business life. Admit your failures to an inexperienced person, and you may find yourself unfairly blacklisted. You have to use your judgement."

Further up the career ladder, Latham thinks it can be "disarmingly powerful" on the part of candidates to volunteer their thoughts on the mistakes that they have made in the past, especially if they have gone on to turn things around. "It can give added credibility to the positives that you then go on to discuss."