We always mention that the candidates you should be interviewing are the best candidates that are available to interview. These are candidates who need to be phoned up and told about your position, they are not actively looking around for a new job, they are too busy hard at work at their career to spend time looking out for a new opportunity. Herein lies the rub, great candidates have careers, great candidates are making a huge difference at their current employer and that employer will be loath to lose them.
After the courtship of the interview process and offer of employment there is a dangerous quiet time till the day your new hire arrives at your office. During this time your new hire goes back to his soon to be ex employer and spends the next few weeks months there. As a smart hiring manager you know you can always tell when one of employees looks like they are looking around for a new opportunity and if you want to keep those employees you will start with the charm offensive. The counter-offer process can begin prior to the employee even resigning, without the employee even been aware that the game is up.
To deal with this issue, you as the hiring manager must start to build a relationship with your new employee immediately, you must never leave them alone, living with the ex. Some ideas to building a relationship with your new hire are;
1. Give them small, but fun tasks to do for you, nothing too hectic. Phone them once a week to discuss the task or tasks if you giving out a task a week.
2. Have them come into the office and set-up their new work area, get some stationary and order their new computer.
3. Invite them over for a function to meet the staff, organize a lunch with some critical staff members.
The benefit of the above is that if you do have a situation where the candidate accepts a counter-offer you will more than likely realize it during these interactions giving you a chance to deal with it.