I love to cook. I have my favorite dishes for every season based on what's fresh and available. This approach, combined with my husband Don's love of wine, usually means that most weekends you can find a fairly decent meal at our house.

Cooking Basics

This slight gastronomic success has only come after years of trial and error, I must admit. (My five brothers and sisters were victims of some pretty ghastly early years in the kitchen for me.)

Now after 30 years in the kitchen, I tend to be very experimental in my approach to cuisine. If I read a recipe that looks like something I'll like but I don't like one of the spices used, I'll substitute with a spice I do like.

What I learned early on is that you should only be gastronomically experimental after you have mastered the basics of cooking.

Take the basic quiche, which I love (eaten too frequently in the early 80s and not enough now). It's a supremely versatile dish because you can eat it at any time and you can put anything you want in it. But the filling proportions never change.

When I started concocting quiches long ago, I just couldn't get it right. They were either too soft and runny or too hard and dry. Believe me, I tried everything. Then I turned to Julia Child (my patron saint) who had worked it all out for me in "Mastering the Art of French Cooking." The basic ingredients are:

• 4 large eggs
• 2 cups of light cream
• 1 cup grated cheese (preferably gruyere or a Swiss-type cheese)

That's it. Just remember this: 4 – 2 – 1. Now you can add anything you want to the filling.

Hiring Basics

It's the same when you are hiring. There is a basic formula that you can follow that will just about guarantee that you'll have a successful hire. This "recipe" I discovered after years of interviewing and working with my clients to recruit top talent. (Unfortunately, the hiring and recruiting industry does not have a Julia Child to spell out the basics. All of the gurus seem to be out there doing their own thing.)

So, here's the basic recipe:

• 5 First Interview Candidates
• 3 Second Interview Candidates
• 1 Hire

That's right. 5 – 3 – 1. Remember that.

It goes like this. If you interview 5 QUALIFIED candidates you should have three (or at least two) candidates who you will advance to the second round. From those two or three, you should have one hire.

As in Cooking — Use Good Ingredients and a Good Process

You'll notice I emphasize the word "qualified." (In cooking, you would substitute the word "fresh.") This is very, very important. If you are interviewing substantially more than five candidates to make one hire, then your have a problem. It could be:

• Your candidate "pool" is not right — the candidates may be too senior, too junior, or just not qualified to do your job. (If this is so, further refine exactly what you are searching for and only interview qualified candidates.)
• You or your hiring manager actually don't know how to interview and hire. (If this is so, go get some cooking — read hiring — lessons real fast!)
• Your expectations for a candidate to fill the position are too high.

Determine where the problem lies. Your HR professional, your manager or your recruiter should be able to help correct the situation.

As in cooking, trial and error is a very big part of the process. But when you have a basic recipe to follow, it goes a long way towards a great meal!