Why Experience Isn't Always the Best Hiring Signal — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:00So, you recently had a podcast where you
2. 0:01outlined a Oh, there you go. You
3. 0:04recently had a podcast where you
4. 0:05outlined
5. 0:06>> [laughter]
6. 0:07>> You had a podcast where you outlined a
7. 0:09change in hiring strategy where you
8. 0:11focus less on experience and even skills
9. 0:15and focus more on like raw processing
10. 0:18power, how fast can someone learn
11. 0:20something new.
12. 0:20>> Mhm.
13. 0:21>> I've really been struggling with hiring.
14. 0:24>> Yeah.
15. 0:24>> And um
16. 0:26during the interview process it's very
17. 0:27difficult to identify if someone can
18. 0:30learn quickly, if they can solve
19. 0:31problems independently. And I hire them
20. 0:34and then
21. 0:35after the first two weeks, I basically
22. 0:38there are these small things that I
23. 0:39notice and then I have to let them go.
24. 0:41And this has happened many times.
25. 0:43>> Yeah. It's all your fault.
26. 0:44>> What what are tactical things that you
27. 0:45can How how how can I better identify
28. 0:49if someone is smart as defined as like
29. 0:52how how quick they can learn.
30. 0:53>> Mhm.
31. 1:00I'm super stimulated.
32. 1:02>> [laughter]
33. 1:03>> Just so you know.
34. 1:04So, if I talk fast,
35. 1:07uh listen fast. So,
36. 1:09so there's there's the need of the
37. 1:11business, which is what you have. You
38. 1:12have some need that you're trying to
39. 1:14fill, right? Some clear function that
40. 1:15you need to to fill the gap for. And so,
41. 1:18there's a person who's going to come in
42. 1:20and they're going to come in with a
43. 1:22learning potential and skills that are
44. 1:23actual,
45. 1:24right? Now, within skills, you have the
46. 1:27hard skills and soft skills.
47. 1:29I I spent a weird amount of time trying
48. 1:31to trying to reconcile this idea of
49. 1:32like, do you hire for attitude not
50. 1:34aptitude? You guys have heard I'm sure
51. 1:36you've heard some of these things,
52. 1:37right?
53. 1:37And it really bugged me because I was
54. 1:39like, sometimes it's better to do this,
55. 1:40sometimes it's better to do that. And I
56. 1:42was just trying to figure it out. And
57. 1:43so, I did come to a conclusion, which is
58. 1:45that
59. 1:47you always hire for the smallest skill
60. 1:49deficiency.
61. 1:51It's just that
62. 1:53being kind is also a skill.
63. 1:56It's just that it's probably a harder
64. 1:57skill to teach than
65. 2:00setting calls for a sales team.
66. 2:03I can teach someone to set calls in
67. 2:04about 48 hours.
68. 2:06Teaching someone to be kind takes a lot
69. 2:08longer, mostly because kind is a single
70. 2:10word, but it has 30 sub skills
71. 2:12underneath of it, which is how What are
72. 2:14all the different conditions that I need
73. 2:15to train someone to behave, right? Does
74. 2:17that make sense in terms of the bucket
75. 2:18of like the word kind, lots of skills,
76. 2:21setting, fewer skills. And so the actual
77. 2:23skill deficiency, it makes sense to hire
78. 2:25someone if setting is the skill
79. 2:26deficiency to hire someone who has all
80. 2:28these soft traits, and then you just
81. 2:30train up the hard traits. Now, to give
82. 2:33you an opposite example, if I want to
83. 2:35have a transactional CFO who's done
84. 2:38multiple M&A deals above 100 million and
85. 2:41specializes in health care,
86. 2:43I'm not going to have that many guys
87. 2:45that I can pick from, number one. And so
88. 2:47if I go find some nice guy on the
89. 2:48street, for me to go teach the skill
90. 2:50deficiency of all of that would be too
91. 2:52big. It's not that it's impossible, it's
92. 2:54just that my return on resources is not
93. 2:56ideal. And so we're still always making
94. 2:59the investment of what is the highest
95. 3:00return I can make per hire. So we always
96. 3:04solve for the first small skill
97. 3:06deficiency. And depending on the role,
98. 3:08sometimes it'll be soft skills,
99. 3:09sometimes it'll be hard skills. So it'd
100. 3:11be easier for me to take the guy who's
101. 3:12got that all that experience, who's just
102. 3:14the least big dick, and then say, "Hey,
103. 3:17here's how to not be a douche with my
104. 3:19team. And if you just do these six
105. 3:20things, I can at least attenuate some of
106. 3:22the downside."
107. 3:25Now, the second piece is if I we we're
108. 3:28There's always going to be some
109. 3:29deficiency in terms of skills, right?
110. 3:31Like no one comes in 100%, and I think
111. 3:33Frank talked about that today or
112. 3:35yesterday. Um you always have to be
113. 3:37willing to have a little bit of a
114. 3:38bridge, right? It's very rare to have
115. 3:40perfect fits. And so then if we have
116. 3:42this gap from the skills that are
117. 3:44current, what is my rate of learning?
118. 3:47And so that's where the raw intelligence
119. 3:48comes in. And so I have looked more for
120. 3:53raw intelligence. And what's been
121. 3:55interesting for me is that if I look at
122. 3:56the
123. 3:57some of the most successful businesses
124. 3:58in the world, right? You look at the
125. 3:59Googles, the Facebooks, the the the
126. 4:02Bains, the Goldman Sachs, like the the
127. 4:04the most successful businesses out
128. 4:06there,
129. 4:07what do they have? They have a machine
130. 4:09for raw talent. They just pick the
131. 4:11smartest people out of Harvard
132. 4:13and they're just like, "Okay, we will
133. 4:14make you into something. You just have
134. 4:16raw raw talent you have raw learning
135. 4:18potential." And so they put them through
136. 4:19an 8-week boot camp and then they're an
137. 4:20analyst.
138. 4:22And so
139. 4:23I bring this up because I have more Over
140. 4:25time, I've been putting more and more
141. 4:28uh weight on someone's learning
142. 4:29potential because we've also gotten
143. 4:31better and better at training.
144. 4:32And so with that, I can actually take
145. 4:35people and so if I have somebody Let's
146. 4:36say if I have two candidates that have
147. 4:37to make this decision between, I've got
148. 4:39somebody who's a 10-year HR vet and
149. 4:41somebody who's 3-year uh a 3-year
150. 4:44person. This person has more hard skills
151. 4:46for HR cuz they're 10 years experience.
152. 4:48Um maybe let's say they both have the
153. 4:50same soft skills. So, I would rather get
154. 4:53the really intelligent, hard-working HR
155. 4:56person rather than just the hard-working
156. 4:58HR person who has more experience
157. 5:01because I know that it'll take me 4
158. 5:02months to get this person to be the same
159. 5:04as this, but every month after that,
160. 5:06this one's going to keep growing.
161. 5:08And so I still get a better return
162. 5:09overall.
163. 5:10Does that make sense? Now, how do I
164. 5:11identify this? Right. So, part of it I
165. 5:14think is um
166. 5:17This is going to sound douchey, but
167. 5:19we'll do I'll see what I see what comes
168. 5:20out.
169. 5:22I think I think to a large degree
170. 5:28you can tell if someone's smarter than
171. 5:29you.
172. 5:31And
173. 5:32the goal is to find people who are
174. 5:33smarter.
175. 5:35And the hard part is getting someone
176. 5:37smarter to work for you if they're
177. 5:38smarter than you.
178. 5:40And so I actually think this is one of
179. 5:41the biggest limiters of businesses, just
180. 5:43being real. Like the more I've thought
181. 5:44about this is that I I
182. 5:45um and that's where I think having all
183. 5:47of these other skills where like if you
184. 5:49look at Jeff Bezos who I do think is
185. 5:51brilliant. I think part of the reason
186. 5:52that Jeff Bezos was able to bring people
187. 5:54even smarter than him in is because he
188. 5:56is such an admirable leader. If you've
189. 5:58ever watched like the few interviews of
190. 5:59Bezos, he just seems like
191. 6:01such a solid guy like unshakable. And um
192. 6:06that's where I think having character
193. 6:08traits that people find admirable and a
194. 6:09mission that they believe in they're
195. 6:11like you're like listen you're way
196. 6:12smarter than I am but we're trying to do
197. 6:14this thing and will you come with me and
198. 6:15I think that's how you can attract some
199. 6:17of that top talent. Um
200. 6:19but a big part of it comes down to the
201. 6:20opportunity that you're bringing them in
202. 6:22on.
203. 6:22And so I can tell you you know very
204. 6:24transparently that the talent that I
205. 6:26could bring in for Gym Launch
206. 6:27is significantly different than the
207. 6:29talent I can bring in for
208. 6:29acquisition.com.
209. 6:31And part of that's also building the
210. 6:32external brand. Is this something that's
211. 6:34going to add to their career?
212. 6:36Because the kid who's graduated from
213. 6:37Harvard has unlimited options.
214. 6:39He doesn't need to go to you. And so the
215. 6:42best candidates you have to sell.
216. 6:44And so I think um in the early days I
217. 6:45used to think that I'm giving this
218. 6:47person the opportunity of working at my
219. 6:49working at my business. And nowadays we
220. 6:52have to spend these very long processes
221. 6:54of courting very intelligent people to
222. 6:56convince them to work for us rather than
223. 6:58the 10 other very good options they
224. 6:59have.
225. 7:01And I think that's what
226. 7:02Now again this depends on levels I'm
227. 7:04trying to give a contextual answer
228. 7:06which is people right?
229. 7:07Um
230. 7:08but like a low level role might not you
231. 7:10know like you might not have to court as
232. 7:12hard. But if you're bringing in the
233. 7:13higher basically the level is the more
234. 7:15it goes from them coming to you and it
235. 7:17goes to more you going to them.
236. 7:19That's kind of the shift that happens
237. 7:20over time.
238. 7:23>> Thank you.
239. 7:24>> Yeah.
240. 7:24If you like this video and you're
241. 7:25business owner who wants to break
242. 7:26through your current revenue ceiling, I
243. 7:28distilled every lesson from scaling 10
244. 7:29businesses past 10 million and three
245. 7:31businesses past 100 million into a
246. 7:33completely free scaling roadmap that
247. 7:35I've used to go from zero to one, zero
248. 7:36to 10 and zero to 100 plus. And so you
249. 7:39can click here and you can check it out.
250. 7:40Again absolutely free and since you're
251. 7:42business owner I appreciate you and
252. 7:43enjoy.