The Art of Hiring

Now, as we sit with the highest unemployment rates in recent history, is the time you should be considering your current workforce and the opportunity to upgrade. One of the best things and worst things I did personally during my time at Pioneer was hiring and firing. I believe I am like most managers today running small businesses. Hiring and firing are simply not skills we have nor do we spend a lot of time working to acquire.

Is it controversial to imply that now is a good time to rid your company of dead weight and replace them with those more capable, eager and proven? You bet it is. Is it controversial to ask you to consider what is best right now for saving your company? Absolutely. But it is also a time to address the big elephant in the room that both you and your quality employees are not addressing. You know who these people are, your employees know who these people are and, quite frankly, even these people know who they are! Now is time to upgrade!

In an interesting discussion I had with then-Vice Chairman of Walmart Stores Eduardo Castro-Wright, he said that while attending seminars of the various business schools around the country, he noticed that they are all good at teaching the product and principle side of business, but no one teaches the people side as well as they should.