A Simple Approach to Better Hiring (Part 2)

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Tom Murphy is likely one of the greatest CEOs in American Business history. Famously profiled in William Thorndike’s excellent book, The Outsiders, Murphy was CEO of Capital Cities Broadcasting. While Capital Cities is an obscure name to those but the biggest of business nerds (raises hand) the media properties they owned, such as ABC, are household names.

Murphy and Capital Cities did not start as a media powerhouse, far from it. In fact, when Murphy became CEO of Capital Cities in 1966 CBS, the largest player of the day, was sixteen times the size of Capital Cities. After thirty years under Murphy’s tenure he would sell Capital Cities to Disney. When he did, it was three times as valuable as CBS.

Why start a post about hiring with an obscure piece of American business history? Well, other than the fact that I’m a nerd, it’s because one of the things that made Murphy’s leadership unique was a radical commitment to decentralization predicated on hiring great talent.

Dan Burke, Murphy’s operational right hand, once famously said about his boss, “Murphy delegates to the point of anarchy.”

Murphy was so devoted to this form of decentralized command that every annual report from Capital Cities contained the following paragraph:

Put more succinctly by Murphy himself when asked about his leadership philosophy, “hire the best people you can and leave them alone.”

Traits to look for when hiring

Hiring the best people and leaving them alone is a simple, not easy mandate that any leader can, and should, get behind. But how? Last week we reviewed the nuts and bolts of a well run hiring process with the following five steps:

1. Initial screen

2. Mindset interview

3. Written assessment

4. Role related application

5. An outside opinion

But as we step away from the process side of things what type of individual are we looking to hire? Who is likely to be more successful in the role you’re hiring for? How do you get more specific in defining, “the best” as mandated by our hiring hero Tom Murphy?

With respect to traits to look for I find the best team members I’ve worked with and hired have a combination of 7 traits (in order of importance):

1. Optimism

2. Energy

3. Competence

4. Endurance

5. Curiosity

6. Low ego

7. Role Related Knowledge

Optimism

I’ve talked about Optimism in multiple contexts in this newsletter before. Beyond being a leadership imperative it is the most important hiring trait to screen for assuming the individual you’re hiring for will be interacting consistently with others.

In truly individual pursuits perhaps optimism is less important, but if you’re going to be working with others it is a necessity. Nothing pollutes a team faster than someone with a consistently dour countenance who brings down those around them.

To quote Napoleon, “Your troops, who are either strong and victorious or weak and beaten depending on what they think they will be.”

Napoleon reminds us that to be successful you must believe you will be. Your team’s ability to succeed is predicated on their own belief that they will. Don’t erode that belief by bringing a pessimist into your midst.

Energy

Ben Wilson has an excellent podcast where he profiles famous leaders from history. After nearly six years profiling history’s greatest leaders he said the single defining theme among them all is near superhuman energy.

With respect to hiring the best, the same is true. So much of success, aside from luck, comes down to an individual’s ability to be more committed (perhaps obsessed) than their competition. To create something where there was nothing, close a challenging deal, or succeed in a difficult endeavor requires a great deal of energy.

In the same way that pessimism erodes the capabilities of a team, energy bolsters them. When hiring, find energizers and let them do their work.

Competence

There is no substitute for competence. When you work with someone who is truly committed to mastering their craft it is both humbling and inspiring. I’ve talked about my own love of proficiency in the past and the two can be used interchangeably here.

There was no higher compliment in the Marine Corps than to tell someone that they, “set the standard.” This is an acknowledgement that they took the previous bar for acceptable performance and raised it. When you hire highly competent people they set a new standard across your organization redefining what is possible from within.

Back to Murphy’s mandate from above, you can leave the best alone if they are highly competent.

Endurance

“By endurance we conquer”, the Shackleton family motto which we’ve reviewed before is as good a barometer for hiring as it is a reminder for any leader. Endurance is the unique combination of grit (a toughness belied by your belief that you can get better) and consistency which leads to success.

If energy is paramount in hiring, it is sustained energy over a long time horizon (aka endurance) which will produce repeatedly successful outcomes. As the tortoise taught us when he faced off against the hare, intensity can be useful in the short run but consistency generally bests it. Look for sustained patterns of success in those you bring to your team.

Curiosity

My favorite way to test this in interviews is to ask what someone is currently excited about or learning outside of their professional context. In working with curious people I’ve come to realize that curiosity can be a great source of energy. A constant fussing, fiddling, and experimenting which underpins a dissatisfaction with the status quo.

Curious people are always dissatisfied with the status quo. This dissatisfaction will make your team better.

Curious people also tend to form deeper relationships with their customers and team members because they’re more interested in talking about others than themselves. This fascination with others will endear them across your team, and if the role is a customer facing one, help them close more business.

Low ego

If pessimism is the little death of all successful teams ego is its close relative. Nothing stifles innovation and execution on a team more than a single individual with a high ego introducing friction into its midst.

Life, work, success are all difficult enough as it is. The trade off for working with talented, high ego individuals is never worth it. Avoid ego like the plague it is and ensure you screen for it in your hiring process.

Role Related Knowledge

Closely tied to competence can be an individuals role / industry specific knowledge. While important, and in certain contexts incredibly valuable, it is the lowest with respect to priority in the traits you should hire for.

A competent, optimistic, high energy individual will always beat a pessimistic, low energy, industry expert if you have the correct training and coaching in place to make them better (which is your job as a leader).

Conclusion

Take Tom Murphy’s advice to heart, “hire the best people you can and leave them alone.” To ensure you’re hiring the best look for:

1. Optimism

2. Energy

3. Competence

4. Endurance

5. Curiosity

6. Low ego

7. Role Related Knowledge

See y’all next week.