We’ve all been there. It took months to get approval to hire someone and you need to make the right decision, but you are so afraid you are going to mess it up. You have multiple candidates to choose from, so how do you know who to pick? Believe it or not, it’s not all about likeability and who you connect with most, even though I find many people hire that way.
Some of your best hires might be nothing like you and yet, complement you so well. So make sure you take these three steps for a successful hire:
- Get really clear on the most important skills required and screen for them. No one is going to have everything you want, so decide upfront what the non-negotiables will be and then screen each candidate for these skills during the interview process. When I say screen for it, don’t simply ask the question “Have you ever done XYZ?”. Have them describe specific examples where they used the skill or even ask for completed products.
- Know what behavioral qualities are most critical to your culture and screen for them. Every culture is different. Some companies move quickly while others are slow and steady. Some have very open dialogue where people openly provide real time feedback publicly while others only provide it behind closed doors. A leader needs to understand the culture and pace of their business, in order to place the right individuals in the right seats. You can learn a lot about someone’s natural behavior by having them tell you about a time they navigated something similar to what they might experience in your business or even give them a hypothetical scenario and find out how they would proceed. Don’t simply assume that because they have only worked for large companies, they would struggle in a small startup or vice versa. By asking about their ability to perform at pace and under pressure, you might find that your best candidate has been hiding in an environment where their superpowers weren’t even unleashed.
- Once they are onboard, put your entire belief in their ability to perform. Give them the resources to excel, including time with you and team members that can mentor them. Allow early mistakes or missteps to happen without it meaning something about them, as long as they continue to develop and remain hungry to learn. If there is something they aren’t grasping, go back to the first step and confirm it is actually critical to their role. Don’t hold the “nice to have” skills you didn’t screen for, against them.
And if you do have a mis-hire, don’t hold it against yourself. You aren’t a fortune teller and therefore can’t predict the future. Simply take the time to figure out what you learned. What information were you missing? What skills or expectations need to be added to the screening? How can you modify your questions to ensure you get the information you need?
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