Author Post: What Makes a Good Hire?

If you are in the earliest stages of your business, this is the moment you will define your company’s culture. This is the time you will hire the people building the very foundation of your company. Every hire and business decision from here on out will rest on this foundation.

The job market is competitive – people are more educated and have more options for places of employment than ever before. But for businesses, that also means there is a lot of talent out there to choose from. To leverage some thoughts from one of my favorite authors, Patrick Lencioni, you want people who are super competent but also hungry to grow, reasonably humble, intelligent, both intellectually and emotionally, and, perhaps most importantly, just plain old “nice.” So how do you identify those people?

Do they share your same vision?

People who, for lack of a better word, “fit” your vision and your culture will be self-motivated to find more people who fit because they’ll want to work with like-minded people. While their means to getting to the business goals and meeting that vision can and should vary – we do want innovation after all – take time to dig into where they see themselves fitting into your broader business picture. Getting people who can simply do a job is often relatively easy, but taking the time to find someone who can do that job and see themselves as part of your company’s success is imperative.

EQ vs IQ

It’s a long-standing philosophy of mine that it is typically pretty easy to find people who are good at what they do but, unfortunately, not so humble about it. My view on this is that you simply must weed out the “smart jerks” when hiring. We have all been subjected to working with those people, and probably always will be in the broader business community, but you have the power to hire people who are not smart jerks. Think of the difference it will make in your day-to-day environment – the one where your people are spending the majority of their time during the week – when you find people who can serve up their intelligence with patience and a smile.

Go Back to Your Values

What are your core values and is this a person who embodies them? If you don’t quite have a grasp on your values, stop reading and go figure that out first. Then use that as a basis to guide what you are doing before, during and after hiring people. This is not just to serve yourself, but to set expectations for the people you are bringing in. Many people come into jobs and companies excited about the culture, only to realize that the values are simply a “plaque on the wall,” but not actually taken to heart. This is the two-way street your business must run on, and hiring people who fit your values will ensure that your cultural foundation is being nurtured and even extended throughout your organization. Life is too short to work with “smart jerks.”