Gun to your head, would you hire them?

The other day a friend of mine was asking me for advice on hiring people for his business. Now, I don’t claim to be an HR professional or a recruiting machine, but I have hired a number of people in my day.

What have I learned?

1. astute (but ultimately poor) candidates can put on a good show
2. professional/educational experience tells no more than 50% of the story
3. even poor candidates come with good recommendations

What’s my solution for sifting through the fog? A little bit of Priemerization! Here are three techniques I’ve had a good amount of success with, that will no doubt reinforce or debunk the feelings you have towards a candidate.

1. Request an audition

Hiring a sales rep? Get them to sell something to you. Hiring a software developer? Have them solve a logic problem. Hiring a creative designer? Get them to go through a consultation with you. The key is, go beyond their resume and have them put their experience into practice for you to see first hand.

One technique that worked really well when I was hiring presales reps was having them deliver a 15 min presentation to me and my team. I gave them the topic in advance. Set the context. Made sure that the topic was relevant to our business and their potential role. Made sure all the content they needed could be readily found online. Seeing how the candidates prepared for the task, how poised and confident they were during the exercise, and how they handled themselves after being asked tough questions from the audience, spoke volumes of potential.

I saw some candidates who had otherwise been stellar up until that point, completely blow this step! Saved me much grief down the road.

2. Get stuck at the airport

One of the most important aspects to consider when hiring a candidate is cultural fit. At the outset of my masters, my supervisor said to me; “David, what we’re about to embark on here is a bit of a short term marriage.” She was right.

Let’s face it,  most of us spend more time with the people we work with than our actual families. That means that in addition to a candidate being able to deliver the professional goods, you need to generally “like” being around them. Can you see yourself working with this person? Do the people that will work with this person daily like him/her?

In addition to having multiple people from your team or company meet with the candidate, one true litmus test is asking yourself this question:

How would you feel if you were stuck for 10 hours with this person, in a departure lounge at O’Hare, in the middle of a snow storm?

If most of the interviewers are cool with this prospect, you may have a good cultural fit. (as a side note, Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh, who built his whole company around culture, has a similar approach most likely stolen from me!)

3. “Put a gun to your head”

After spending time with a candidate and having your colleagues do the same, you will inevitably circle back to discuss your thoughts. This is where the typical interview process can sometimes break down and make it difficult for the hiring manager to make a decision.

“Well, I don’t know…they have a lot of experience in [A,B, &C ] and I like the fact that they did [X, Y, & Z] really well, but one thing that still bothers me is….yada yada yada…”

Fail! Want to know how to decide? Get everyone who interviewed the candidate together and first ask them this:

“Gun to your head…no explanations! I only want to hear ‘yes’ or ‘no’. Would you hire this person?”

If they’re a sales person, would you trust your top prospect to them? Yes or no.

If they’re a developer, would you trust your biggest project to them? Yes or no.

You’d be amazed at the ease with which you can reconcile complex thoughts when you have a virtual gun pointed at your head and you are forced to give a binary answer! Explanations can then follow but by then everyone’s gut (and most likely correct) reaction has been surfaced.

Professional and educational experience is important when considering a candidate, but they don’t always give you the complete picture. Follow these three techniques and I guarantee by the end of the interview process you’ll be much more confident in the decision you make!

What is Priemerization?

Back in 2002 my good friend Martin Hartshorne was at a crossroads; buy a condo or continue renting. Indeed, there were many elements to consider. Current interest rates, prevailing market conditions, time horizon, location, etc. Having been through a similar process not long before, he came to me for advice.

“Hey Priemer,” he said. (I should add here that people have always called me by my last name or some permutation thereof). “Remember the spreadsheet analysis you put together when you were deciding whether to rent or buy?”

“Sure,” I replied.

“Well,” he continued with a grin, “would you mind sending it to me? I’m wresting with a similar problem myself and I was hoping to take advantage of the ‘Priemerization’ you’ve already done on the topic!”

And so the term was born.

Many years (and many spreadsheets later), I like to think of Priemerization as:

…the unique combination of social, scientific, and analytical techniques I use to make sense of the world.

Deciding which career path to take, getting the best deal on a car, commanding the very best customer service, and figuring out what recipe to make when company comes over, are all areas that can (and have) been addressed through Priemerization.

As a scientist by training and a tech entrepreneur by profession, it shouldn’t come as any surprise that I enjoy the hunt as much as, if not more than, the kill. As an amateur chef, I also appreciate that, much like making baklava, the rigor I go through is not for everyone.

Can my approach be time-consuming, laborious, and annoy my wife to no end? Oh goodness yes!!!

Tools such as spreadsheets, computer models, social media, empirical data, and incessant nagging, are quite common in the Priemerization universe.

On the up side, it means that I’m:

1. confident in the decisions I make
2. a huge advocate for products and services I patronize
3. left with a storehouse of reusable decision support tools to share.

So why blog?

Well, over the years, people have often come to me as a resource (as in “You should go ask Priemer about [INSERT THING HERE]. I’m sure he’s analyzed the crap out of that!“) and if there’s any way my experience and approach can help others make sense of their own world, I’d love nothing more.

So what now? Subscribe to Priemerization and stay tuned as I do my best to share, learn, and entertain! This is who I am 🙂