Hire Brighter!

Are you hiring the brightest people you can find? Or are you worried that they will replace you and don't hire them? Successful leaders don't let their fears stop them! They are brave, optimistic and full of positive beliefs. They know what David Ogilvy knew and hired the best.

*Each of the 217 times David Ogilvy opened a new office for Ogilvy & Mather he’d leave a set of Russian nesting dolls on the desk of the incoming manager. When the manager removed the top half from the largest of these bowling pin-shaped dolls, he or she would find a slightly smaller doll inside. This would continue until the manager came to the tiniest doll and retrieved from its interior what looked to be the note from a fortune cookie: “If each of us hires people smaller than ourselves, we shall become a company of midgets. But if each of us hires people bigger than ourselves, we shall become a company of giants." — David Ogilvy.

Better advice could not be written. This shows vision and strength of character and will help you grow like no other thing you can do. Good luck this year.

*Found on The Monday Morning Memo for Nov. 5, 2007 - Ronald, Bill and You

Hiring is Marketing - Look for Those Who Can Make an Impact

Impact
The person with each of these skills will make an impact on your business. They will help you and your customers. They will find solutions to the problems you didn’t even know you had. They will be able to see things through and make things happen. And they will be able to lead others to do the same for you.

If this type of person become one of your managers they will be able to teach and inspire other to greatness and some of them will stay longer at their jobs than they normally would helping you lower costs.

If you are hiring young people, they may have some of these skills but they may not be fully development yet. You will need to mentor them to focus their passions and skills to work the way you need them to, for now and into their future. You can do it. They need you to be a mentor every bit as much as you need them as an employee and leader.

The person who possesses these seven skills knows how to make change happen. By the way we educate people in our public school system though, they most likely don’t know that they have these skills. You see our public school system is designed to produce workers that will follow the status quo and do what they are told to do. And our system of public school does this very well. This is their goal and its outcome is different from the model found here, which is fine, you need people who don’t fit the mold. Those who fit the mold will not have these skills. Compare the skills of those employees you’ve already have to those mentioned here. They will be different and you need to find different if you want to succeed.

I think that you should also be aware that you may see in people with these skills signs of rebellion form the pressure to fit into the social structure of our public system which teaches contrary to the skills revealed in this report. That’s OK. These peoples natural leadership ability has been squelched or even negated by the public school system. Be aware and don’t be afraid. Most people reject great ideas because they are not normal. Know this, these are the skills you need in employees if you want to grow your business. These and only these are the skills needed to make thing happen. Without these skills you may get someone who will come to work because they need the money but you won’t get someone who will go out of their way or as Tom Gagax said, “run through walls for you.”

I’m sure that you can imagine what you can accomplish if you have had employees that “run through walls for you,” especially if you have or have had warm bodies working for you in the past.

After you’ve gone through this process and hired a person, whether the person works for 6 months or 16 years, do whatever you can do to keep in touch with such an achiever. This person has the skills to lead and make thing happen. A person like this is worth rehiring at some future point, if you can!

Do what you can to encourage and support such an employee, in the end, you will agree that they were a God-send. And remember, “Your Employees Are Your #1 Asset!” Until you start finding employees of quality, and treat them as if they are, your business will never reach the potential it could.

Hiring is Marketing - Passion

Passion
If you ask the question, “What are some of your passions?,” you will begin to see how this person will perform while working for you. If their passions have taken them far and wide they will do the same for you. Even if they are young, as they share their passions you will begin to see how these questions reveal more than the questions you’ve here to for been asking.

You will begin to see what this person is capable of and what they have done and will do to achieve it. They will be able to move mountains for you. Satisfy your customers. Help new employees and even motivate others to excel.

Following questions will help you draw out more on how their passions govern their actions.

1. Show me examples where you have committed yourself to the pursuit of lifelong learning?
2. Describe the process you would go through to gain a through knowledge of a subject.
3. Explain in detail something that you are an expert at.
4. Tell me of a time where you have successfully persuaded others to adopt your point of view.
5. Tell me about two memorable projects, one success and one failure. To what do you attribute the success and failure? And what did you learn from each?