Hire people smarter than you
Hiring new employees purposefully is one of the most direct ways to
build a company's success amidst ever growing external challenges. You
need to have the best people working for you to beat the competition and
the most intelligent way to do it, is to enhance your team's abilities
at a level much higher than that of your competitors.
If you are a manager and you hope to recruit a team member, look for
the most able candidates - people whose brilliance exceeds your own.
Challenge
A hiring manager might compare a candidate's qualifications with the
job description but not sit back and think, what can I learn from him?
Some managers just don't want to be outshone by the creativity, skills
and experience of a new employee. Business leaders should strive to
create a team of excellence. Nobody sets out to hire B and C players but
sometimes this is the result when ego or job insecurity gets in the way.
And if you end up hiring B and C players, the company can end up being a
total failure and you will be rated a failed leader.
As any well-seasoned recruiter knows, the most fitting applicant for
a position often needs to be far better at many competencies than the
actual manager doing the hiring or the person that they'll be reporting
to, for that matter.
While this fact can be intimidating to the one doing the hiring, it's
absolutely necessary to build a competitive organization. Highly
competent employees improve the performance of their teams by imparting
different perspectives.
While it's instinctual to hire people whose personalities are most
like our own, a company of clones or 'yes people' seldom succeeds. You
need to hire people smarter than you so they continually challenge you
to improve the average performance of the team.
Some managers are intimidated by the prospect of a follower who's in
some way more able or knowledgeable than them. They perceive the
talented candidate as a threat. This type of thinking can have a
detrimental impact on a business and in the long-run make you an
obsolete leader. The remedy is to always encourage personal growth and
introspection for everyone on the team.
Managers can become more acquainted with themselves by engaging and
learning from new recruits and external knowledge. Inspiring leaders are
most often not discovered but are created and re-created through
continuous knowledge-building and skill-development for personal growth.
Some managers see themselves as victims in their personal and
professional lives.
They maintain an outlook that things are being done to them and
refuse to take responsibility for business outcomes.
Hiring
When managers take responsibility for their actions, opportunities
for improvement and growth present themselves. Instead of being insecure
about their own job when hiring someone more able or knowledgeable,
managers should embrace the chance to collaborate with an individual who
has a brilliant, yet different perspective.
If you're rushing to get someone hired, stop and check to see if it's
because you feel excited about them too early on. Are they someone you
really like (someone like you, naturally) versus someone who is actually
the best right fit for the job.
Yes, a likable personality is always important, but emotional hiring
should not be at the expense of overlooking someone who may be better
suited - in terms of attitude, ambition, demonstrated behaviour and
competency - to the actual job. Design a culture and institute hiring
practices to attract superstars - with no settling for less.
Create an organizational mandate to hire only A players and clearly
define what that means. Craft an interview process in layers, beginning
with discovering the way that a candidate thinks, enquiring about past
performance and then seeking the big picture of what he or she wants
from a career.
Success-focused employees will always choose candidates who
complement their skills and abilities. Hiring people who are smarter
than you means that the work can be confidently delegated over time.
Then focus on the important stuff -- growing your business and hiring
more A players.
They make our businesses more successful by bringing additional
skills and valuable 'differences' to the table. Hire carefully,
following the proven method of skills assessment, benchmarking, and
communicating to ensure your company continues on an upward trend for
years to come. |