So many articles, books and conference panels shout the same message over and over to you.
"People are your most valuable asset."
Though I find this statement to be generally true, I also find it vague, trite and frankly uninspiring especially when it comes to hiring.
Regardless of whether you are a newly minted manager hiring for the first time, or that startup CEO who is putting your initial team together, you will be judged and your business will depend on the people that you hire. The clich "you are only as strong as your weakest player" is never more apparent in a small startup team.
During my career of managing small (2-4 person teams) to large (> 300 employees) organizations, this cliche would ring through my head every day. Jack Welch would have you force rank your team and remove the bottom 10% or 20% with the goal of consistently upgrading your team. Some call this rank-and-yank.
This thinking may work when you have the ability to turn over staff without paralyzing your team, but the focus is still on the management of your team. What about the hiring of your team? I find it surprising that most hiring managers run the same playbook that everybody else is running when they begin the recruiting process.
If you are simply relying on interviewing a bunch of candidates and choosing the one candidate that makes you feel good/right/inspired/comfortable/fill-in-with-a-word, you have already lost the opportunity for something great.
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