looking for talent

Lately, I've been on the hunt for more talent again to add to my production team. I still need some reporters (and hosts). As it's an english business program, finding someone who speaks english and have the right skills is not easy.

First of all, the resumes I've been getting from my HR department aren't very promising. I first filter the stack for those who can speak English and that really narrows it down. I can sort of tell right away from their cover letter. Most are cut and paste type. If you can't even write an original cover letter, you're not going to cut it as a journalist.

Then the next filter is academic background. Since it's a business program, I'm looking for someone with an accounting, finance, or business degree... and mind you, I say degree, not a diploma.

After all this is shortlisted, then it goes to the interview stage. At this stage, I can pretty much tell from the first minute of the interview if I want the person or not already. The interviews I do are designed to see how the candidates do well under stress and also how they handle real life situations they will be facing on the job.

The last interview I did, we asked the candidates "If you could interview the finance minister, what would you ask him?". I think most of them mumbled a feeble question but those who were confident knew what they wanted to ask... though some questions were a little too daring for Malaysian standards. I like someone with guts, who are not afraid to speak their mind.

I think the talent pool for english speaking Broadcast Journalist in Malaysia is very small. I wonder what happened to all the kids who graduate every year with a mass communication degree. Maybe they all go into advertising, PR or print journalism. Those who do go overseas to do broadcast journalism either don't come back or do something totally different from their first degree.

My degree isn't broadcast journalism either, it's TV Production but at least I'm doing what I studied.

Suddenly I feel like Optimus Prime at the end of the Transformer 1 movie where he's sending a message out to the stars asking for other autobots to join him. Any broadcast journalism graduates interested to join my team?

You can be a Decepticon too.